[RBY] RBY wrap/bind

Discussion in 'Past Gens Discussion' started by zeroality, Feb 14, 2011.

  1. GGFan

    GGFan Banned

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    That's alright Bobby, it's not a surprise that you wouldn't be able to understand how a community can't be credible because they haven't written a tour book of the same quality of yours. Keep writing those RSE tour books and prove the naysayers wrong. I'm sure that, sooner or later, you'll convince the isolated community that welcomes people from different forums to participate that they all think as a singular entity.
     
    Last edited: Jul 7, 2011
  2. borat

    borat Member

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  3. GGFan

    GGFan Banned

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    Bobby, please. You might not be as good as Gloxie, but you try and I respect that! And that's a funny topic, but not as funny as this:

    http://lionheartggfan.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=general&action=display&thread=1078

    You're dedicated! But you need help, and I'll be more happy to remind you that this is the part where you accuse moderators from Smogon of being my alts:

    ianfloridian [2:20 A.M.]: no he's spamming me with ****. don't really care
    PMPFTourney [2:26 A.M.]: its kind of creepy that he pmd you like that
    PMPFTourney [2:26 A.M.]: he probably does it to other people
    ianfloridian [2:26 A.M.]: lol
    ianfloridian [2:28 A.M.]: i told him i don't really care about the pokemon community / history / etc, but he's a good battler. he's like "nope he's not. all his tourney's were rigged, usually against his own alts, etc"

    Really, I'm flattered that you try so hard just for me, Bob. And for five whole years, too!
     
  4. borat

    borat Member

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    sorry didnt mean to. you are much too strong. so strong. like a dragon master. i will leave. you are victorious.
     
    Last edited: Jul 8, 2011
  5. naFGG

    naFGG Banned

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    How cute.
     
  6. Pocket

    Pocket ashirogi muto

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    Hey, just wanted to post my impression of Wrap after playing RBY for quite some time. Copy-and-pasted from my post on rby2k10 months ago:

    "It arguably has some amazing perks to it, such as the switching control, which may provide the team with Wrap some advantage over a bog-standard Tauros-Chansey-Eggy-Snorlax-Alakazam team. Not really.

    However, we can always switch out of Wrap, and the opponent can only use Wrap or switch out - We know that if a Victreebel is wrapping our Chansey, it won't throw a Stun Spore at our Alakazam / Gengar when we switch out. I think the fact that we still have control even while being wrapped makes it not broken / overpowered. If our Pokemon was not only immobolized by Wrap, but was also unable to switch, now that's undisputedly broken, too luck-oriented, and should be banned immediately.

    The truth is, a standard-rby team has all the utility to deal with Wrappers (even Agility Nite). The biggest weakness of Wrappers are that they are rendered virtually useless when they are paralyzed. And most rby teams have at least 2 T-Wave / Stun Spore and even more paralysis through Body Slams. Plus, another weakness is that they are not terribly fast, and they need to be faster than our Pokemon in order to be effective. OU mons, such as Starmie, Alakazam, Tauros, and Gengar terrorize these monsters all day. I agree with Borat's sentiment on bans: for anything to be even considered semi-bannable, it needs to force players to use more gimmicky, less OU monsters just to counter the new threat. That is why he believes HP Zapdos / Raikou should be unbanned, because their counters (Snorlax, Blissey, and Raikou) are all OU anyways. Celebi in the other hand, should stay banned, because it provides unprecedented defensive and supportive coverage that would force teams to use shit like HP Bug Rhydon.

    Wrap is certainly annoying, but it is by no means luck-oriented (bring in a faster Pokemon). Wrappers also have many weaknesses that can be exploited (boltbeam weak, no recovery, not particularly fast) and the move itself have some intrinsic characteristic that can be exploited (INACCURATE / wrap forces that Pokemon to use Wrap until the duration ends; cannot switch moves). Again, Agility Nite is really the only controversial candidate for being banned, because Agility resolves many of the problems with Wrappers (now Dragonite is faster than anyone) - Agility Nite IS heavily luck-oriented (we can only hit it when Wrap misses). Otherwise, Wrap has not really made a revolutionary shift in RBY metagame that has forced people to use gimmicky and more situational monsters, and imo only helped to diversify the relatively static OU metagame."

    Also, I had an excuse to use Wrap while I participated in Smogon RBY Tournament, and really, Wrap is unreliable. My Starmie Team > My AgilityNite Team. When you need to rely on a move with 85% accuracy, shit doesn't go your way half the time. It's a gamble. The chance of AgilityNite 6-0ing a team is extremely slim.

    Also if the accurate 3:3:1:1 mechanic of Wrap is implemented, then that means the Pokemon must use Wrap more often, increasing the risk of a miss. Seeing how Wrap has proven to be unreliable already in Netbattle with 1:1:1:1 2-5 turn ratio, I feel Wrap would be under-powered.
     
    Last edited: Jul 16, 2011
  7. Blitzamirin

    Blitzamirin Waluigi! Number one!

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    I'm going to be real here.

    In RBY (cartridge, my only place), Wrap was abused. Yes, you have AgiliWrap from the likes of Dragonite or Moltres. Usually, Wrap was just spammed until the opponent was at KO range and Hyper Beam was used. However, I strongly disagree in banning the move, as Wrap/Bind/Fire Spin all share one thing that prevents them from being too broken: flawed accuracy. When it misses, it's not so great.

    I will note that Gengar (and its line) are immune to Wrap and Bind, but still are immobilized.
     
  8. Pokefan Bob

    Pokefan Bob Member

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    Wrap, OHKOs and Evasion should all be allowed. RBY is a game of luck no matter what strategies are allowed/banned, so why clausewhore those strategies to death?

    It figures that Smogon-related communities like RBY2K10 would over clause things because that's all that Smogon ever does. If something is powerful or luck related, they just ban it. If taking luck elements out is such a big objective to everyone, why the hell are you playing this game in the first place? Play a different strategy game that is not determined by chance.

    PS: @borat, why does GGFan call you Bobby?
     
    Last edited: Dec 26, 2011
  9. Crystal_

    Crystal_ Active Member

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    So, because rby is already luck based, it would be better if there was a lot more luck involved?

    Honestly, we are in 2011, it would be really retarded to go back to the way you guys played ten years ago, no matter how stupid these bans looked back then.
     
  10. Pokefan Bob

    Pokefan Bob Member

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    Then play "Standard OU RBY", in which people like you have banned everything that you don't want to face. That doesn't mean there isn't a need for a metagame where all strategies are allowed.

    A "purist" metagame can co-exist alongside a "standard" metagame easily. Whichever one people want to play more, they play. But to not have the option of playing a purist metagame is just silly.

    If Smogon deserves their own tiers, then surely Gamefreak deserves their own too. If you're battling on Pokemon Stadium or Colosseum, these are the rules that you will have to follow, so why not have tiers devoted to seeing what strategies win out in that environment?
     
    Last edited: Dec 26, 2011
  11. Isa

    Isa Well-Known Tauros

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    "It figures that Smogon-related communities like RBY2K10"

    Go back to your cave.
     
  12. Hobbes2

    Hobbes2 Aren't I dead or something

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    a good RBY Meta, Music, and Candy

    Get rid of the WRAPPERS (or the wrap)

    seriously though, i dont think wrap should be banned or anything until we can do a test on it when RBY comes out.
     
  13. Pokefan Bob

    Pokefan Bob Member

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    Is that the best you can do? Smogon is responsible for turning Pokemon into a game where the users arbitrarily vote on what they don't like, and then ban it.

    Isn't the point of a competitive metagame to use the most powerful strategies to win? Smogon, as a whole, is opposed to that competitive mindset.
     
  14. Crystal_

    Crystal_ Active Member

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    Going back to the topic itself, Wrap is not exactly broken (not more than Tauros after all, and not more than Chansey/Snorlax/Eggy either imo), but it's still on par with other rby standard teams. That's when the word "cheap" comes in as an argument for people that want to ban it (banning Alakazam, Lapras, Golem etc is beside the point). You can easily make a team like cloy, dnite, egg, chansey, snorlax, tauros and you'll be at least 50/50 initially against almost every standard team (bar really unfavorable matchups against stuff like gar, starm, zapdos and/or bro etc). Get some para and residual damage beforehand, and then clamp or agi-wrap stuff, while capitalizing on immovilized Gar/Zam/Chansey with Snorlax if you need to. So that's mostly about wrap missing or not tbh.

    But Clamp Cloyster is great btw. Use your standard lax/chansey/tauros and 3 of egg/lapras/zam/golem/rhydon and cloyster can actualy RAPE it tbh, and not with necessarily a lot of luck. And even if Cloy's being hard walled by Starmie you can always use it for neutralizing Snorlaxes or explodion into that Starmie, which is not actually that bad.

    But with so many players blaming at his opponent when he uses wrap moves, even the players that don't care about them being unbanned don't feel exactly well when using them, so stuff like Cloy/Dnite aren't probably getting the usage they should imo, especially cloy. That's gonna be a shame for usage stats btw, wrap and non-wrap are different metas, so dnite/cloy etc will have very little usage when considering wrap meta, and will be to high when considering wrapless meta, and other pokes are slightly affected as well.

    As for me, I don't like these moves (especially agiwrap), but i've realised how stupid it was what I said, so sorry about that guys.
     
  15. alan

    alan Guest

    The basic idea behind banning moves / pokemon that "we don't like" as you eloquently put it, is that they are unhealthy for the metagame which they are tied to and create an overcentralisation and make the metagame stagnant. I'm not going to go on, because it's off topic, but if there weren't pokemon banned from certain tiers all you would see is Mewtwo and Ho-Oh and stuff like that. Play Ubers if you want to play with every pokemon, simple enough.

    As far as the topic at hand, Wrap/Fire Spin/Bind should not be banned. It is a legitimate strategy with it's own risk and rewards. On one hand if you happen to get lucky enough to have all your Wraps hit in a row and wrap your opponent down to no HP because a) your opponent is dumb enough to not switch out or b) you were dumb enough to get all your pokemon paralysed or c) it's your opponents last pokemon, then you took the risk and it paid off. If you do Wrap your opponent, you have a good chance of it missing and then your opponent get's a free attack on you. It's no different than spamming Body Slam and praying for a paralysis, using Jolteon with Pin Missile and hoping that all 5 connect with a crit or two to take out Exeggutor. It's all about risk v. reward. It's the same reason people use Thunder instead of Thunderbolt, they view that the extra power gained is worth the chance of missing.

    I'm not saying that because RBY is already luck based "wrap won't hurt" but really, wrap doesn't hurt. There are plenty of counters and if you play smart, you can easily beat a team with wrap. There are plenty of pokemon that outspeed common wrappers and plenty of pokemon who beat them.

    tl;dr wrap is a legitimate strategy and if you don't play bad you can beat it. deserves to be in the game.
     
  16. Crystal_

    Crystal_ Active Member

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    If your opponent is against agility dragonite, he will be dumb if he DOES switch out everytime.

    And this is RBY, you can't "easily" beat any team (unless it's a joke team or something), you know. And teams with Dnite are more 50/50 than other teams in general. Dnite comes into Golem/Rhydon/Snorlax, how do you play "smart" here?

    But yeah, Wrap isn't broken if you are into that. Not more than... Alakazam.
     
  17. alan

    alan Guest

    I think my wording was just awkward. I didn't mean that it was easy to beat, I meant more along the lines of "you should be prepared for various major threats, wrap being one of them".
     
  18. Xinc

    Xinc Time for Oras?

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    Personally I see a lot of potential wrap counters ex. Exeggutor and gengar (sleep powder and hypnosis), so I don't see a reason to ban wrap.
     
  19. Mr. GGFan

    Mr. GGFan Banned

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    Because that's his name.

    After having a look at my posts, I feel like I was on the mark so I won't add much more to this discussion. However, I would like to address the common pro-Wrap argument that it should be allowed because "if you don't play bad you can beat it." Wrap isn't banned because people "can't beat it;" rather, it's banned because it essentially forces people to use unreliable Pokemon such as Gengar--who, mind you, still falls victim to the free switch-out--and because many games will come down to whether or not Dragonite or Cloyster will miss. Dragonite and Cloyster are already faster than a considerable portion of the metagame; it's not difficult to give them support. Also, Dragonite and Cloyster don't need to sweep on their own, thanks to the free switch-out mechanic that I have already explained. They can be substantial contributors by merely damaging something a little and then switching out to something that can finish off the opponent. For example, you can switch to Snorlax on that 65% Chansey and kill it, or get a free Body Slam on the switch-in. It adds unnecessary luck to what's already a "luck-based" metagame.

    Honestly, I don't see the point in ever allowing it. As I said a while back, it was almost never used competitively until six or seven years ago. It received a lot of attention and was immediately scrutinized--not much of a surprise. If you want to play in a metagame that will often come down to a move missing, then you should give OHKOs and evasion a try. Actually, one could probably devise an effective pro-OHKO rhetoric against a pro-Wrap advocate. OHKOs have about 30% accuracy to begin with, making them risky. Someone like Dugtrio is an ideal user of Fissure because of his speed, but he can't take more than two hits from anything. What does the pro-Wrap advocate say? "OHKOs require no skill?" I don't condone the use of OHKOs either, but an effective user of Wrap will probably find himself losing only if he misses. I find it far too easy to take advantage of Wrap; it would just be a matter of missing at the worst time.

    I guess it'll be one of those arguments that will never quite see a conclusion, mostly because of RBYs antiquated status in competitive Pokemon today.
     
    Last edited: Jun 2, 2012
  20. undone

    undone New Member

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    If I remember correctly, the only reason wrap/bind/clamp weren't part of the RBY metagame before Netbattle is because they didn't work on the PBS, hence why it was never used even without a clause to prevent its use (may be wrong, but I'm pretty sure it didn't stop the opponent from attacking). Of course, this was all a long, long time ago in a community far, far away, so this should have little or bearing w/e on how the game is played now. Personally, I find it annoying, but nowhere near as annoying as a fucking Tobybro.
     
  21. Dre.

    Dre. Member

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    Tobybro is much easier to counter than agiliwrap. You don't even need critluck to beat tobybro if you know what you're doing and you have the right pokemon (which are basically standards anyway).

    Saying that something shouldn't be banned because it is not unbeatable is stupid. Evasion, ohko moves, and even mewtwo are technically beatable. Heck, starting a battle with only 5 mons instead of 6 is still technically winnable, but it doesn't mean that the opponent has been given an unfair advantage.

    The problem with agiliwrap is that the luck-skill ratio is too heavily in favour of luck. It's the exact same problem as with evasion or ohkos. Ohkos aren't guaranteed to hit, and evasion isn't guaranteed to avoid hits, yet they're banned because of the luck-skill ratio.

    A nite simply has to get one move off safely (two if you count the switch-in) then potentially the rest of the battle is determined purely by luck.


    I'd like to hear pro-agiliwrap's reasoning for keeping ohkos and evasion illegal. I struggle to see the consistency there.

    However, I think wrap's mechanics seem interesting and could potentially add more depth to the meta. I think wrap should be kept legal, but agiliwrapping should be banned.
     
  22. Jørgen

    Jørgen Sniper

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    To play devil's advocate, all you need is that one eventual Fissure hit to break the game wide open, whereas with Agiliwrap, all you need is that one eventual miss to lose your advantage. Double-team requires several hits past it in order to beat, and literally everything gets it instead of just a few Pokemon that are otherwise pretty mediocre. A single Thunder Wave isn't crippling something like Double Team Alakazam the same way it will cripple Agiliwrap Nite.

    Personally, I think there's enough play against Wrap on its lonesome to make it permissible, but Agiliwrap ruins games. Only plays to use against AgiliWrap are "Stall" and "Pray for Miss", the latter of which comes down to a coin flip in the endgame, and which both take an uneventful forever to deal with AgiliWrap.
     
    Last edited: Jul 7, 2012
  23. Dre.

    Dre. Member

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    Twave doesn't cripple nite (at least it's not guaranteed anyway). If you don't KO him with your next move, he simply has to agility again and he regains his speed boost and is now immune to being statused. If you're trying to twave him before he sets up, outspeeding him and twaving him in the same turn he agilities means he only needs to do one agility and is now protected from potent status. He does still have the fp chance and the miss chance, but it still degenerates into almost pure luck.

    The point is, it being totally unbeatable was never the problem. It's how much it degenerates the game into luck. Ohkos and evasion aren't totally unbeatable either.
     
  24. shrapn3l

    shrapn3l Member

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    he has 25% chance to be fp every turn in addition to the ~15% chance of miss... i don't see how that makes the game any more luck based. you are carving a statistical advantage for yourself. he has to wrap a lot of times to win, and it's pretty likely that he will fp or miss each turn. also "being immune to other status" doesn't really matter because trying to hypnosis/sleep powder something like dragonite would be a waste of a valuable turn of wrap miss when they have bad accuracy and you could just explode or attack it, and dragonite isn't going to be frozen by ice attacks, it is going to die from them.

    i also really don't get how the luck required to win with wrap is comparable to the luck ohkos and evasion introduce into the game. with wrap moves, you have to land the move DOZENS of times to have a CHANCE at winning, and it has either 75% or 85% accuracy depending on which move we're discussing. with ohkos, you have a 30% chance to kill something every time you use it. so if you use something like dugtrio, there's a 30% chance you'll get a free kill, which is WORSE than a "coin flip" fyi, an even lower chance you'll get multiple kills, and a 70%+ chance you wasted a valuable slot on your team. other pokemon you can use are... rapidash? with evasion, you have pokemon like chansey and starmie which are already two of the best pokemon in the game and have 1 turn recovery moves becoming exponentially more difficult (almost impossible in fact) to kill because of minimize. with wrap, you have things like victreebel and dragonite ALMOST becoming top tier threats, and you don't have to use stupid shit like swords dance+swift scyther to combat them. you just have to have standard pokemon like starmie or gengar or alakazam tauros or something with explosion/selfdestruct/paralysis move and you have to bank on a very LIKELY eventual miss. if you want to legitimately win with wrap you have to have a well built team with proper support and you have to put your opponent in a position where you can finish them off. you have to set up agility dragonite up on the right pokemon at the right time. you can MINIMIZE the risk you take when relying on wrap to sweep by setting up para and building a solid team, but it is also LIKELY that you are going to miss and lose the game if you don't accomplish those things, because it has ~85% accuracy. on the other hand, no, ohkos don't take skill, because it doesn't take any set up or team building prowess to sack something, bring in dugtrio and kill something 30% of the time. please stop bringing up ohko moves and evasion as they have no bearing here and clearly deserve to be banned.

    if agiliwrap weren't pretty much only available for dragonite i'd agree that it could be problematic, but dragonite is slow as shit before the agility, and x4 weak to ice attacks which are everywhere. also, its best bet for hitting gengar is blizzard which does jack shit to it, so gengar, which is on a large number of teams (no, you aren't forced to use gengar because dragonite exists. however, you may be forced to reconsider choosing dragonite as your team's main sweeper, because gengar is very common), essentially FORCES IT to switch, or, i guess, waste all of its pp??? which means it has to come in and set up agility again later. additionally, agility dragonite is the ONLY thing that makes wrap teams viable, and it works just as well on standard teams as it does on wrap teams. bind/clamp/fire spin are garbage moves and you have to use shitty pokemon like onix or moltres if you want a full wrap team. the only reasonably viable pokemon with either of the lesser wrap-moves is cloyster, and clamp makes it "good." even with clamp, lapras and starmie are better... i really don't see how anyone sees full wrap teams as anything more than a decent gimmick. you're much better off using something like cloyster/dragonite/victreebel/zam/golem/tauros. if you want to ban agiliwrap, go for it. it only affects dragonite, but i guarantee you will never see a wrap team again because they are bad without it. the next most reliable "sweeper" they have is... victreebel??? and speaking of reliable sweepers, tauros is better and more consistent than dragonite, and isn't completely halted by ANYTHING, never mind something as common as gengar.
     
    Last edited: Jul 7, 2012
  25. Dre.

    Dre. Member

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    You're missing the point.

    You're basically saying that it's beatable. It's beatable, but only by luck. The point is all nite has to do is agility and not get KOd in the same turn, and from that point the outcome of the battle can potentially be determined purely by luck. Yes you have to land the move dozens of time, but after nite has agilities landing it takes no skill whatsoever.

    I don't see how ohkos are much different. You have to get dugtrio in without being KO'd or statused, then luck determines whether or not you KO the pokemon. If fissure connects, assuming the opponent doesn't have a non-parad jolteon/aerodactyl/electrode (which are pretty unlikely, even jolteon) or a flying type, pure luck then determines whether you KO the next pokemon or not.

    It's the same concept. In either case, once you set up, it's simply a percent chance that decides whether the pokemon is KO'd or not. The percents are different, but the fact that the opponent can bank on nothing other than those percents to have any chance of winning is the problem.

    It could even be argued ohkos are more fair than agiliwrap. FissureTrio doesn't work on the three legal pokemon who are faster than it, and any flying type (which include nite ironically, in fact trio is set up fodder for nite). Agiliwrap is really only countered by gar.

    And saying that nite is slow as shit is flawed logic. I could easily say that hdrill rhydon should be legal seeing as he is outsped by the entire OU meta barring lax and bro. Besides, nite outspeeds lax, golem/don, chansey, lapras, eggy, bro, bell/saur, cloyster and anything parad or asleep. That's a good portion of the meta. He doesn't even need to come in on something that he outspeeds, just anything that can't 2hko (and he may have switched in on a suboptimal attack) or status him.

    If ohkos were allowed, do you think people would just lead with trio and just fissure everything slower than it? Probably not, because the chance of taking out more than one pokemon before trio is taken out is incredibly low. The reason why it's banned is not because it's an auto-win, but because it can potentially win matches with virtually no skill whatsoever.

    You mention that to win with wrap you need to have a well balanced team with para support. Agility removes the need of a lot of that. Even if it doesn't 6-0 a team, it can still do too much damage considering how little is required to set it up and how healthy nite is likely to be after it. However, as I said before, wrap without agility will always require skillful team building and para support. I have no problem with this sort of gameplay. You'd still need a good degree of skill to win with wrap without agility, and the luck involved in winning with it is similar to that involved in winning with other strategies.
     
    Last edited: Jul 8, 2012
  26. shrapn3l

    shrapn3l Member

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    I am not missing the point at all, you are just not understanding what i am saying properly. you don't win with or lose against wrap BECAUSE OF LUCK. you cannot lead dragonite and wrap because you are never going to kill 6 pokemon with it in a row. you are probably not ever going to kill 5 or even 4 pokemon in a row with it. honestly, it's very unlikely that you'll kill 3 pokemon in a row with it without missing, unless they are pokemon that you have a good matchup against/can't really kill you/hyper beam or blizzard can get them out of the way quickly. that is because your opponent can PLAY AROUND wrap by making you use it a lot. if you make your opponent use wrap a lot, and they eventually miss, it's not because you got lucky or because they got unlucky, it's because you played smart and made them do something risky. that is not something you can really do against something like fissure dugtrio, who your only option against is to switch something in that's faster or switch something immune to ground (please keep in mind that switching jolteon into dugtrio is rather unrealistic because it beats you easily. it is much more likely that someone will be switching something like lapras or exeggutor into dugtrio so that point is kind of moot all around). you don't PLAY AROUND fissure, you just 30% of the time lose a pokemon to it, 70% kill dugtrio.

    if you don't see how ohkos are much different then you didn't even read my post. by saying facing agility dragonite is completely luck based and it's comparable to ohkos, you're making it seem like there's even a MINOR chance you can lead off with dragonite, agility and then win. obviously, that's not the case. you need to weaken your opponent's team, you need to remove or otherwise incapacitate a few specific pokemon, you need to agility at the appropriate time, and you have to not die in the process. IT'S NOT ALWAYS THAT EASY. it takes skill to put yourself IN A POSITION where you can win with agility+wrap, or in a position where you can kill even one pokemon with it, and even at that point, it's STILL risky because it's only 85% accuracate. hyper beam and blizzard aren't 100% accurate either! plus there's always the chance that you will run into gengar, and then you HAVE TO SWITCH OUT because you are never going to kill it, and you have to set up agility AGAIN, which is not really that easy to do even once!

    it is VERY different from ohkos because you can lead with dugtrio and fissure right off the bat and there's a 30% chance something's dead, or you can sack something and fissure and there's a 30% chance something's dead. you can even switch dugtrio in predicting your opponent will switch. using fissure doesn't take skill to kill something; it doesn't even take a second thought. if dugtrio is in, you fissure, and maybe something's dead, or maybe you'll realize you should've just put a better pokemon on your team. you don't have to tell me why it's banned, I KNOW why it's banned, but you're saying the same logic applies to using agility + wrap when it does not.

    i am not really arguing against agility + wrap being banned because it really doesn't matter too much to me and it is "annoying" to play against i guess but i do not personally think it is broken. i am just really refuting this terrible argument that it's "just as fair" as evasion and ohkos. i'm glad that at least you aren't trying to argue that evasion is on par with agility+wrap because that is even more of a losing battle...

    the difference between saying "only horn drill rhydon should be legal" and saying "only agility wrap dragonite should be legal" is that horn drill is still more luck based than agility + wrap and dragonite is the only thing that can use agility + wrap anyway. also the dragonite being slow thing is significant because it that means it HAS to use agility, meaning it NEEDS a free turn (or more) in order to work to its fullest, but since it is slow and has that 4x ice weakness (these are BOTH important, so i'm not sure why you only pointed out the speed part. if anyone's argument is fallacious it is yours... but i'll humor you) it can't expect to force as many switches. look at it this way: if you have dragonite out against a lapras, you aren't going to agility. you might not even wrap because there's a decent chance you'll miss and die, but if you do wrap it can still switch to something faster than you like alakazam or tauros, and there's ANOTHER chance you'll miss, but if you don't, the best thing to do against either of those is switch out. if you're in a position against either of them where you have to sweep or you'll lose, you obviously won't be able to win without using agility, so you HAVE to take paralysis or a blizzard or what have you. whereas, rhydon's slowness on the other hand just makes horn drill ineffective against most things but you'll still pop off a haxy 30% of the time kill against snorlax for free. it's still skillless, it's still uncompetitive, it's just effective against less things. rhydon can still fulfill its role as a zapdos counter/explosion resistance/strong earthquake spammer regardless though, so even if you don't get to use horn drill it's not that big of a deal, whereas dragonite's lack of speed actually can prevent it from doing its job. agility+wrap dragonite's speed and x4 weakness are much more significant drawbacks than horn drill rhydon's are to it, and agility+wrap is less stupidly skillless and haxy regardless, and since, again, dragonite is the ONLY THING capable of using agility+wrap, i do not see how that logic is flawed.

    if ohkos were allowed i do think people would do that with dugtrio because that is the best way to use it and people always lead with dugtrio if they use it anyway, and that's the way to make the most of your fissure dugtrio: to lead with it (that's the safest way to get it into the game, after all) and fissure asap to get free kills as fast as possible. it is not going to "win you the game on its own" OBVIOUSLY (and i do not think i implied that at all anyway...) but it is 30% possible that it is going to turn the match in your favor at the push of a button. THAT is what you call "uncompetitive." honestly, i do not care if you think agility+wrap dragonite is broken (i disagree, and i do not think it is going to get banned anyway so it doesn't matter that much). all i really care about is that people stop using that TERRIBLE, HAREBRAINED ohko and evasion argument against wrap.
     
    Last edited: Jul 9, 2012
  27. Jørgen

    Jørgen Sniper

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    Para spread can make Rhydon work against a broader range of targets. Eggy isn't too hard to para with Zam or even your own Eggy unless they're playing really cautiously with it and are okay with delaying their sleep. Then you're just a 30% switch-in away from a really early BS kill on Rhydon's chief counter.

    Dnite certainly isn't on the same level of "brokenness" as OHKO or Evasion, which can insta-win whenever you feel like it, so yeah that comparison is pretty bogus. Dnite is really awful to face up against, though, and I think shrap is overstating the amount of play one has against it. While if everything is alive it's really easy to check, in the late midgame it's fairly trivial to have hidden it until Gengar blows up or Lapras dies (not many carry Rest), then all you do is get it in on a Snorlax EQ or something and Agi up. If you avoid the 30% paraslam (Lax fails to OHKO full-health Dnite with SD, meaning it just sac'd a whole Lax just to make Dnite a bit easier to deal with, i.e. Dnite wins if Lax booms), you're whittling away the opponent's mons to make a cleanup inevitable. Agi is even easier to set up against Rhydon, who straight-up runs away from Blizz/Surf. Sure, you can outright beat the strat with some luck, and you can play around it to an extent to mitigate the damage. Outright sweeps are indeed rare, but if STAB Blizzards and Gengar are not around (really not that uncommon), Dnite is guaranteed to wear down opposing teams while having enough leeway to deal with at least one miss, all while the opponent doesn't have any real counterplay, just damage control options. This is mostly true for partial trapping moves in general, but generally requires heavier para support and often the use of even less accurate moves (e.g., Clamp) or very defensively weak Pokemon (e.g., Victreebel) to pull off, allowing for a much broader and effective spectrum of counterplay available to combat it than is available against AgiWrap Nite. Thus, I'm fine with Ptrapping moves in general, but AgiWrap is a bummer, man.
     
  28. Dre.

    Dre. Member

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    I'm failing to see how there's more skill involved in agiliwrap than ohko.

    You get dugtrio in safely on something slower than it, then luck determines whether there is a KO or not.

    Once nite gets agility up, what skill is required after that? This is a genuine question I'm not being sarcastic. I fail to see where skill is involved after using agility.
     
  29. Jørgen

    Jørgen Sniper

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    Knowing when to hold and when to fold. Knowing to get rid of scary things (Gengar and bulky STAB Blizzarders) before you try for the sweep, and enacting a plan to eliminate them. The skill is in creating and waiting for a defensive landscape that Dnite can thrive against, which actually isn't that hard, but it's still more involved than just stupid "Get Duggy in and roll for 30% chance of instant advantage with no positioning whatsoever."
     
  30. shrapn3l

    shrapn3l Member

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    snorlax is sort of dead weight if you are legitimately facing an agiliwrap dragonite sweep, so you might as well blow up on dragonite and try to take it out. aside from that, i agree with what you're saying. however, from a hax perspective, i do not think that the strategy is luck-reliant enough to warrant its banning (which is something incredibly arbitrary and debatable, but as long as i've put that ohko/evasion argument to rest i am satisfied), and from a skill-based standpoint, i do not think agili-wrap dragonite is RELIABLE enough to warrant consistent, centralizing usage over other standard pokemon, especially when it is hardwalled by something as common as gengar already is. i do not mean to imply that gengar alone makes it not-broken, it's just a major facet in the overall shape of the metagame that make dragonite a less dominating choice. maybe it is easier than i am suggesting to pave the way for an agili-wrap sweep, but then again, you have to consider that people don't really prepare for agiliwrap dragonite at ALL and they STILL tend to have some decent answers to it. overall it just doesn't seem reliable or dominant enough to warrant banning. but i certainly agree that when it comes up and it seems like you're going to be on the losing end of an agiliwrap sweep, it's a bit of a bummer.

    while i don't think agility+wrap (and certainly not wrap on its own) is comparable in mindlessness to ohkos or evasion, i think it is most comparable to ADV OU Baton Pass teams. I personally do not think they take much competence to use, but something like that is endlessly debatable and arbitrary. it often comes down to 50/50 guesses against ingrain/spore smeargle and shit like that, unless you have something like haze vaporeon. if you don't have any phazer at all and you don't get a ch while your opponent doesn't have a sub up you're completely dead. but that's all beside the point, what it really came down to was how much standard teams had to alter themselves just to prepare for what is otherwise a rather under-the-radar, rogue sort of strategy like BP. whereas most standard teams were incapable of handling, or at least ill prepared to handle bp teams in adv ou, i think in rby ou dragonite sees enough trouble to keep it from being too unfair or uncompetitive or what have you. bp teams pretty much always had a distinct advantage over standard teams, which is not always true when you are using agili-wrap dragonite or a wrap team. anyway, what they did to handle bp teams in advance was not to ban bp chains, but simply to disallow ingrain+baton pass smeargle, so if it came down to it, i do think it would be most reasonable to simply ban agility+wrap on dragonite, but i still believe such measures to be unnecessary in the scope of the metagame.
     
    Last edited: Jul 9, 2012
  31. Dre.

    Dre. Member

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    Does wrap use pp every time you switch to another pokemon? If it does then you could stall it out I guess.
     
  32. Isa

    Isa Well-Known Tauros

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    No, because the PP rolls over to 63 if you do it like that.
     
  33. Jørgen

    Jørgen Sniper

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    Then you just make sure to count the Wraps.
     
  34. Dre.

    Dre. Member

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    So you just count the wraps then on the last wrap you just stay in until the move finishes, and it'll have zero PP?
     
  35. Jørgen

    Jørgen Sniper

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    Yup. Wrap's PP only rolls over when it has 0 PP but is forced to use Wrap PP as the opponent switches out.
     
  36. undone

    undone New Member

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    Having revised my opinion, wrap needs to go.
     
  37. Dre.

    Dre. Member

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    What changed your mind?
     
  38. undone

    undone New Member

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    A team with agility-wrap Dragonite, wrap Victreebel and clamp Cloyster. Shit is whack, yo.
     
  39. pokemonnerd

    pokemonnerd Only uso listens to pnerd. Devo too. Article Contributor Article Contributor

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    Victreebel and Cloyster. Two very significant threats that turn the metagame on its head and proceed to spin it around.

    I don't really care what we do with wrap to be honest. It's not broken like OHKO moves or Evasion are, but it can be really annoying at times. Although I've not had a problem with anything besides Dragonite, and even then it's perfectly manageable.
     
  40. Isa

    Isa Well-Known Tauros

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    No it is not. Force a Gengar kill, Agility, your opponent can only win if he is lucky.

    But really, it's just so annoying that I cannot stand to play RBY with it allowed.