[BW2] Proposed Removal of a Bunch of Tiers

Discussion in 'Gen 5 Side Metagames' started by sulcata, Jun 7, 2013.

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  1. HBC

    HBC Health, Beauty and Cosmetics!

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    Monocolor - It is quite unbalanced and it's very supported, therefore it should be removed.

    Monogen - It's balanced and an interesting tier, and when Gen 6 arrives it will be better, so this one should remain.

    BW Cup - This one is included in Monogen, almost no one plays it and when gen 6 arrives, as someone already mencioned here, it will be dead, so removal is better for this.

    Shanai Cup - Never played this tier and it doesn't look interesting and appealing, so I don't mind this one gets removed.

    Middle Cup - Interesting tier but no one plays it, maybe it should remain and wait until gen 6 comes out to decide. Maybe then this one will be more played.

    Wifi NEU - This one is as good as any other Wifi tier, so it should definitively stay, I even think it's better to play than LU or NU.
     
  2. PichiTheShinyPichu

    PichiTheShinyPichu I'm not amused

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    Here are my thoughts.

    Middle Cup: I enjoyed the idea at first, but these days it's dead now. I do find potential that it can stay as a tier, but only if we could promote it better. Even then, I feel like once Gen 6 comes out, we could work it out to make it more balanced, if possible.

    BW Cup: I feel like this tier was made to promote the fact only Gen 5 Pokemon could be found pre-Elite Four in Black and White, but now with Black 2/White 2 I don't feel that it should exist anymore; probably due to the fact that Monogen exists now. Which brings me to...

    Monogen: I find this tier rather unbalanced; this is due to how each Pokemon in each generation were; and with generation 5 getting a power creep, it is easily dominant. I also find more variety to use in generation 5 (and possibly 4), where as the previous generations it's almost the same thing each team I see. Fun concept, but not very enjoyable.

    Monocolour: Personally I enjoy this tier, but red and blue are indeed the most populated and therefore the most used. Other colors can be rather underrated or are just plain bad unless someone makes a relatively good team around each color. Indeed, the lack of variety of use in some colors doesn't make it as enjoyable, but I still find it to be a tier worth keeping. The lack of support of the Deoxys-S vote makes it saddening, but again, it just might need to be promoted some more.

    Shanai Cup: As a former Shanai admin, I admit that I play this tier more for the nostalgia these days. The tier itself is limited because Shanai could only handle so much at the time, and that was acceptable. The only reason I'd let it stay is because it relates to the history behind PO's current Tournament system and the Trivia game. Otherwise, it might have to go. :c

    Wifi NEU: It is stable since it does count as a part of usage statistics, and it's a nice tier if you want to use Pokemon with niches that otherwise would not be usable in NU. However, with generation 6 coming out, this tier could stay for the possibly 750+ (random estimate) Pokemon that will be coming out. Personally I do enjoy this tier, and although it doesn't get a lot of laddering like the other main tiers, this is because it's not a main metagame, it still has potential to thrive.

    Overall, besides Shanai Cup and BW Cup, all of these tiers have potential to live again when generation 6 comes to full release. But I realize this is about the here and now, and thus I have my input on each tier.
     
  3. palkia62

    palkia62 Member

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    Monocolour - As mentioned, it's pretty much unbalanced with red and blue dominating. The other colours such as purple and Brown could shine if only the players knew how to make a good team with them. I would have no arguments against this tier being removed.

    Monogen - This is much more balanced than monocolour and at least players know how to make a team for this tier. Unlike monocolour, there's no specific gen which actually dominates this tier. I would like this tier to actually remain because of this.

    BW cup - Pretty much I'm guessing this was done so people would use the new generation of pokemon. This pretty much should just stop considering Gen 6 is on its way and I'm guessing a gen 6 version, XY cup or whatever it'll be called will probably made so you might as just remove this tier.

    Middle Cup - I've not played this tier at all to analyse the metagame but it seems that it could well be an interesting tier that just lacks a playerbase to understand how to build teams. This is more of a 'I don't know' to be honest.

    Shanai Cup - Never played this tier, the Shanai bot was gone ages ago so might as well just remove it in my opinion.

    Wifi NEU - I've played this quite a bit and looking at the ladder, barely anyone actually plays this and it's understandable why people would want this gone. But before this tier was made I've never thought of using pokes like Persian and Ampharos who are just outshined by better pokemon in NU. These were not getting much usage if not no usage at all in NU and NEU had given a chance for these pokes to be used. I'm guessing it would be best to keep this for now and promote these tiers to a wider audience especially since 6th gen coming out meaning more pokes may eventually end up in NEU.
     
  4. Arceus_17

    Arceus_17 Avoid eye contact

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    My thoughts on this are:

    Keep - Wifi NEU, Monogen
    Remove - Shanai Cup, Monocolor, Middle Cup, BW Cup


    Shanai Cup - This is by far the most straightforward, gimmicky and boring tier I have ever played and I seriously doubt I will ever find worse... Well, the 43 batttles last month pretty much says everything about its popularity.

    Monocolor - The concept was good. Unfortunately, the results were not. Simply put: the colors are sickening unbalanced. There are only 3 or 4 colors from which you can build a decent team around.

    BW Cup - Never really understood the point of this tier...Isn't this exactly like Monogen except you are forced to use 5ºGen Pokémon?! And why isn't there a "DPP Cup" or a "RSE Cup"?

    Middle Cup - Very similar to what happens (happened?) in LC, where it is dominated by 2/3 Pokémon. Pretty low diversity, and overall it is seen as NEU's poor cousin.


    Wifi NEU - I really like the concept of this tier. Like Key to progression said "Wifi NEU should stay as a place for truly unviable pokemon to be useful outside of their small niche that they may (or may not) have in Wifi NU" That said I find it really depressing to see a powerhouse like Crawdaunt, destroying the whole tier in 2 hits, while much weaker shit like Dewgong is locked up in NU. This tier should be kept but absolutely needs a huge reformulation to make it more playable. We need more Dewgong and Raticate, and less Crawdaunt and Slaking.


    Monogen - Relatively balanced, good concept. Should stay.
     
    Last edited: Jun 9, 2013
  5. User Name

    User Name Life is a maze

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    The main argument for keeping and removing most of these tiers is, TBH, the fact that they're almost literally impossible to balance with even a pretense of democracy when they have such a minimal playerbase. Some of you might remember our several Suspect Discussions; very few of them had any sort of feedback. Monotype obviously had the most, but even Clear Skies had very little participation and I have no idea how much that tier was played but it's not on the chopping block, obviously.

    So, rather than "Why keep this tier if no-one plays it", IMO it's more a question of "Why keep this tier if it's essentially impossible to balance it without the tier leaders just doing whatever they want to the tier".
     
  6. Starstorms

    Starstorms The stormiest of stars

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    Honestly we should give these tiers another chance. It is simply not that no one likes it, it's just that no one knows about them. I think we're not doing a good job of spreading these tiers. I think we could change the opening message so that it says something like, try out more unique tiers and how you could get into those tiers. The monos should definitely stay. Easy to play except for monocolour in a way, but it's easy to get battles and at least some people like them. I think that middle cup and bw cup are simple enough to understand, it's just no one knows about them. NEU would also be great with an actual tier list with pokemon. Shanai cup could go, I personally find it too difficult to understand but overall, whats' the harm of losing them? It's just going to upset people and in the Tournaments channel these are played with a good number of people at times. So, there is no point in removing them, but we should definitely spread the word about these tiers.
     
  7. eishiba

    eishiba New Member

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    Monocolor was always hard for me to understand because you think a pokemon is a certain color and turns out to be something else. Why not remove the ones that aren't used as much and create brand new tiers? Like, maybe a tier where you use 6 of the same species which can vary having different moves items and abilities and such from one another. Or maybe a tier where you must have a Pokemon from each tier like one Uber, 1 OU, 1UU, and so on down the line. Maybe you could have two of the lower tiers to make it 6 pokemon. Or maybe a tier that would be a 1v1 and the computer selects a pokemon and everyone has a couple of minutes to create that pokemon in the team build section and battle it in the tourny.
     
  8. sulcata

    sulcata stéphane curry best waifu Forum Moderator Server Administrator Forum Moderator Server Administrator

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    This thread is about the potential removal of the previously mentioned side tiers in the original post. Please refrain from discussing off topic subjects such as adding tiers. I will be trying to gather logs to submit to the Youtube channel. If anybody wants to help with that, submit logs/replays to the Youtube battles thread or whatever it's called. If the player base doesn't have a drastic improvement this month, I see no reason to keep them.
     
  9. Dasdardly

    Dasdardly Uknown Bird

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    Fuck it, death of Shanai. Nobody will ever care to try it.
     
  10. Whatzin

    Whatzin New Member

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    I'm going to refrain from commenting on Shanai Cup as I don't have much knowledge in that tier.

    Anyway, onto the others:

    Monotype : Perfectly healthy tier, has a fairly-balanced metagame, gets good usage, and the rules of it are simple. Not much to say, except that I think it'd be very silly to remove such a tier, as its fulfilling its role as a tier.

    BW Cup : Kthnxbai. Don't see why this tier even exists anymore.

    Monogen : 6th gen is nearly out, and you want to remove it now? Sure, gen 5 got a bit of a power creep, but other generations are still usable. Also, I think we should wait for gen 6 if a decision for it's removal is going to be made. Why remove a "generation" tier with a new generation right round the corner? >_>

    Monocolour : Despite what people are saying about this unbalanced business, I find the tier is workable. Sure, Red & Blue may dominate, but there are still other colours that are good, like Grey and maybe Brown, and others that are useable. And like monotype, there are categories that work and others that don't. I mean, look at monotype, despite people's best efforts, Mono poison is never going to be amazing, nor is something like mono-electric. Monotype's dominating types are : steel,flying,fighting,psychic,bug. Ice is good, but it doesn't really dominate, and even bug isn't used as much anymore. Other types don't get nearly as much usage because they're outclassed, but it's a perfectly healthy tier all the same. I think that maybe, since these tiers are 1 tier in themself, rather than split into usage like OU/UU/LU/NU, people are using neglected categories as reasons for their arguments. But really, gamefreak are a bunch of trolls, and there are always going to be areas where pokemon are neglected (Poor Spinda!), but somewhere along the line we're just going to have to accept that. I'm not saying this tier should stay, because it still gets nada usage, but that's probably because gamefreak is colourblind too (or whoever set the colours, come to think of it), and some pokemon fit into ludicrous colour categories. Or it's just because people don't want to play it much; I really can't say. All I have to say about this tier is, I don't see the dominance of some colours as an excuse in itself to remove the tier.

    NEU : Keep it! Might not get amazing usage, but it gives a chance for the pokemon that are victims of gamefreak's epic trolling to get some usage. Also, unlike the other side tiers, it is based on usage statistics, so it gets a fairly changing metagame (Munchlax and Crawdaunt went from LU to NEU iirc, lol). And gen 6 is on the way, so more troll victims are coming too, and they need some love.
     
  11. Aurist

    Aurist I do not jump for joy. I frolic in doubt.

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    I haven't read fully through this thread yet, and I'm sure I will at some point, but, I am opposed to the removal of any tiers. It's pointless. Removing tiers achieves literally nothing regardless of how much they're played. There is no reason to remove the tiers but for the vanity of the people who "didn't like the tiers to begin with". They require no extra effort on the part of anyone for them to exist, and are just there, occasionally playable.

    Should we be removing tiers like Adv Ubers, Clear Skies, RBY UU, RBY NU, RBY Ubers, Stadium/Stadium 2, JAA, GSC LC, GSC Ubers, GSC UU, Adv LC, Adv NU, Adv UU, HGSS LC, HGSS NU, HGSS UU, HGSS Ubers, Smogon RU, Wifi LC Ubers, Wifi LC UU, Wifi OU Doubles, Wifi Triples, Wifi Uber Doubles, Wifi Uber Triples, and all VGC Tiers too? All of these have less than or roughly equal to the same level of usage as most of the tiers being proposed for deletion here.

    This entire thread is ridiculous. Just leave things as they are.
     
    Last edited: Jun 10, 2013
  12. Luck>Skill

    Luck>Skill Well-Known Member

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    By that logic we could add about other 600 tiers because "what harm would that cause?", quality > quantity, if we were to add tiers, they should _at least_ having a active and caring playerbase, something Middle Cup and BW Cup doesn't have

    Tiers like ADV UU and VGC are official metagames, supported by Nintendo or by the overall online Pokemon community, they have been existing and played (or, are still played in VGC '13 case) a lot in their times of existance. Of course they lost their playerbase (despite the fact that lots of tournaments include ADV and DPP subtiers, at least on Smogon, and it is still relatively easy to find a battle there)
     
  13. Aurist

    Aurist I do not jump for joy. I frolic in doubt.

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    My logic isn't add more tiers, my logic is don't remove the tiers that are there. I don't think anyone wants to see any more tiers added. Hence why I said leave things as they are, rather than make things open to further change. I don't see why tiers that have more actual playerbase than ones that are supported "by the overall online Pokemon community" should be removed. This discussion is literally being had because a handful of people don't like certain tiers and it's stupid. Leave tiers as they are, keep balancing the ones that can be balanced and let's get ready for gen 6.
     
  14. sulcata

    sulcata stéphane curry best waifu Forum Moderator Server Administrator Forum Moderator Server Administrator

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    Monotype was never up for removal. It has a MASSIVE player base compared to all the tiers listed. Once again, not all side tiers are up for removal, only a select few.
     
  15. .Rawr!

    .Rawr! c(°3°)כ

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    Removing of tiers isn't pointless. If a tier don't work anymore (BW Cup, Shanai Cup) or didn't work at all from the start (Monocolour, for explanation see earlier post) what is the point on having it? Plus, the lack of players in those tiers make impossible to balance them, because suspect discussions are void.

    That's only my opinion, but like i said first, while i love Side Metagames i think too some tiers need to leave.
     
  16. Kyrk

    Kyrk KACAW

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    I don't find it too great to remove some of these tiers this late in BW2 when XY will be coming out in a few months to possibly change how these tiers work.
    Here are my opinions anyways:

    Middle Cup - Should NEU stay, this tier is redundant minus some other usable pokemon, even in the next gen. Remove

    BW Cup - Like others, I never found the point of this tier. Remove

    Shanai Cup - A tier created by something now dead. Remove

    Monocolour - I would wait until XY to decide when to remove this, even at its current state. Keep

    Monogen - See Monocolour - Keep

    Wifi NEU - Despite the ladder playerbase, it's a great tier for tournaments. It will also more than likely be implemented in XY. Keep

    I also agree with Luck on the stuff he mentioned:

    No Preview Wifi Triples - Almost all of the abilities in 5th gen are released anyways, so with a less popular, but actually usable, tier, it's kind of pointless. Remove

    Lower, LC, and Ubers tiers of gens 1-3 - These tiers have just as low usage, if not less than most of the tiers you just mentioned. Did RBY NU even exist back then? ADV UU is an exception as Luck has mentioned. - Remove Can't remove past tiers, no matter which ones, so retracting statement.
     
    Last edited: Jun 10, 2013
  17. The Tempest

    The Tempest Banned

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  18. Yui.

    Yui. Member

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    I feel like NEU really needs a chance. It's something that very few people really know about. When it was first created, a lot of people thought that it wouldn't even last. We need to get this tier some publicity folks. I feel like it could really blossom if it got some attention.
     
  19. Firer

    Firer Owner

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    The only argument I saw so far against "Why should we remove them?" is that they are unbalanced and as such might affect the leaderboard in a negative way. But even if we assume that this is true and that they can not be balanced, then that is still no reason to delete them. If it is really that bad then remove them for the tour queue, but there are players which have fun in these tiers, including me, so it would only do harm...

    If I oversee any argument there, then tell me pls...
     
  20. Dasdardly

    Dasdardly Uknown Bird

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    Sulcata's main argument (I believe) is that the tiers are unplayed and thus will never be balanced- if they are indeed unbalanced. So any argument solely based on how (un)balanced the tiers are is moot. As for the people that enjoy the tiers that are subject to deletion: suck it up, sure the server won't recognize what tier you're in, but you can. THE TIERS CAN NEVER BE DELETED FROM YOUR HEART.
     
  21. JinLong88

    JinLong88 Golden Dragon

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    my personal vote is that we keep monogen.

    to improve side tier population, have we ever tried an incentive system here?
    for example, a separate point system: rising on a main tier ladder = 50 points, rising on a side tier ladder = 150 points
    then there could be prizes for the top 100 players at the end of each month.

    the question would then be, what prize would be attractive enough (that PO could also afford)?
    perhaps some mentions / methods of fame.

    just a suggestion on how to improve the system, instead of only posting complaints.

    edit:
    also, the side tiers could be broken down into higher and lower usage side tiers (e.g. monotype vs. clear skies),
    so the lower ones would produce more points when going up their ladders.
     
  22. .Rawr!

    .Rawr! c(°3°)כ

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    I think prizes for play in a tier isn't a good idea. Tiers are done to have fun on them, not to make people become Ranking bitches (lol XD). We have the standard ranking anyway for that too.
    The idea of spread the word about these tiers is good, but not in that way.

    Anyway, is almost a month of the Tiers testing, some news Sulcata?
     
  23. Xdevo

    Xdevo Phrasing Super Moderator Tour Director Super Moderator Tour Director

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    Right now, Shanai Cup and BW Cup are almost 100% going to go.

    When the end of the generation comes around we'll probably clear the list and then add the biggest side tier for the new gen (so Monotype), we will probably put a better system for determining how we add metagames in the future.

    This isn't confirmed at all, so don't get up in arms. The staff are still working on the problem.
     
  24. gnaaye

    gnaaye New Member

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    I totally agree with this. I'd like to suggest 360 battles per month as a potential cutoff, or a battle per 2 hours on average. Any tier that doesn't make the cutoff can go, with the exception of regular tiers (Uber/OU/UU/NU/LC/Doubles/Triples and Adv 200) of any generation. According to current stats, this would be:

    Clear Skies (100 battles)
    Emerald (46 battles)
    GBU Singles (1 battle)
    HGSS LC Ubers (6 battles)
    JAA (9 battles)
    Metronome (133 battles)
    Middle Cup (9 battles)
    Mixed Tiers Gen 1 (15 battles)
    Mixed Tiers Gen 3 (20 battles)
    Mixed Tiers Gen 4 (23 battles)
    Monocolor (122 battles)
    Monogen (152 battles)
    No Preview OU Doubles (32 battles)
    No Preview OU Triples (10 battles)
    No Preview Uber Triples (107 battles)
    Platinum (2 battles)
    Shanai Cup (1 battle)
    Stadium (1 battle)
    Stadium 2 (10 battles)
    VGC 2012 (5 battles)
    VGC 2013 (195 battles)
    Wifi LC Ubers (13 battles)
    Wifi LC UU (7 battles)
    Wifi Uber Doubles (29 battles)
    Yellow (4 battles)

    Pokemon Showdown has only 22 tiers. I see no reason why PO should have an absurd number like 57 when 25 of those don't even get a battle every 2 hours and 17 have less than 1 battle per day on average. It's just useless clutter.
     
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