What changes could be implemented to make 6v6 Singles a better competitive format?Regardless of how you feel about VGC it's been a reality for like over a decade now, and it's both successful and popular. It's not perfect, but no competitive format in any game is, and at least it functions. Yet it's weird that the official competitive format of Pokemon gameplay isn't the one that the most people directly associate with Pokemon due to the games and the anime, i.e. 6v6 singles.Showdown proves that there is a significant demand for 6v6 singles, but Showdown is inextricably linked to Smogon which has a checkered relationship with the Pokemon fanbase, to put it mildly. Smogon's tiers, rules, and clauses clashes with the streamlined nature of VGC, but at the same time those are all self-selected by 6v6 Singles Playerbase, which sort of implies that unrestricted 6v6 Singles is its own kind of mess. Say what you want about Smogon but having no other choice but to whiff against a max evasion foe as they power up to super saiyan levels to sweep your team isn't a particularly fun gameplay experience. Their solution is a litany of bans and clauses aimed at making the format more stable at the cost of accessibility. Meanwhile TPC just says "singles isn't competitively viable, let's stick with doubles" which relegates Singles to a secondary position of lesser stature, clashing with how 6v6 Singles is presented in single player mode as the path of champions.So, the point of this thread: how can 6v6 Singles be fixed? I'm not talking about rules and clauses, but actual mechanics that could be implemented in a game to make the format more enjoyable and approachable.
>>57205420It’s fine as is for me.
>What if Stat ups were limited?What you see a lot of times in Singles is one Pokemon maneuvering into a position where they can repeatedly raise their Stats into the stratosphere, setting themselves up to sweep the oponent's whole team. This is boring to watch and takes a million years to play through.Solutions to this exist in moves that reset Stat changes or force our Stat boosted Pokemon, but a better strategy could be to prevent the degenerate game state in the first placeWhat would happen, for instance, if Stat Changes had a time limit? If a Nasty Plot only lasts for 3 turns then you can't spend a million turns just cranking up your Special Attack because by the time you actually use it'll expire. This would also work the other way too: if stat reductions were limited then overpowered Abilities like Intimidate get nerfed because they don't permanently slash offensive options just by hitting the field.Alternately:>What if Stat Moves didn't stack?What if you can't repeatedly Quiver Dance to get godlike stats? You do it once and get its affect, and doing it again doesn't keep boosting your Stats. This also addresses issues like Evasion being so widely disliked in Showdown: if a Pokemon can only Double Team *once* it's impossible to drop your foe's chances to hit to single digits.
>>57205420Implement a cooldown on switching for like 2 turns and a lot of the slow-paced, hour-long games (on wifi) go away. This would encourage staying in and setting up more, which imo is fine because it doesn’t need to take 50 turns to ko 6 guys. If you’re encouraged to set up and sweep then moves like amnesia and iron defense become more desired as relevant counterplay. Entry hazards become way less popular (good thing)inb4 smogtards screech at this thread but I feel like it’s bait anyway
>>57205444It's not bait, I'm legit interested in this as a field of discussion. The thing about Smogon is that their rules and clauses are in place as a reaction to game mechanics not really incentivizing 6v6 Singles in PvP. If those mechanics were fixed they wouldn't have a leg to stand on (they'd probably still complain since Smogon has morphed into its own thing altogether, but that's their problem).Constant switching is the other thing that needs to be fixed, agreed. Is denying a player actions a good fix though? What if instead of punishing a player who wants to switch out the game rewards a player for staying in?The thing is, switching out means one player feels like their opponent's Pokemon is too strong a match-up against what they have, and so they retreat. This is a small victory for that Pokemon, and maybe that's something we can work with. When one player switches out their Pokemon, the other Pokemon gains temporary effect until the end of that turn; lets called it [Ready for Action]. This effect increases the power of their next attack by 20%, and at the end of that turn they regain 1/8th HP.Alternately, what if there was a passive accuracy improvement on all moves the longer a Pokemon is on the field?
>>57205420>fanfic format a tiny fraction of a tiny fraction of the fanbase plays>”i-it’s successful and popular!!”
>>57205420>Meanwhile TPC just says "singles isn't competitively viable, let's stick with doubles"Why do you retards make these threads about PvP game balancing when it's obvious you haven't even bothered to touch PvP a single time? It's genuinely fucking embarrassing.
>>57205444This is retarded. Your plan wouldn't stop people from switching, it would just put even more emphasis on every mon having uturn/volt swifch/flip turn. The mons that can't run those moves, in addition to being less viable, would have to run Protect as a 4th move to wait out the no-switching turn.>>57205469>reward a pokemon for staying on the field with health regenGreat idea, now you have Garganacl clicking Tera Fairy/Water turn 1, shuffling the whole team with Salt Cure damage and getting bonus recovery. That's before we get to Gliscor, which is now recovering 25% per turn before protecting.
>>57205540>he doesn’t realize you could just turn off the switch effect of volt switch and u-turnI do agree with >>57205469 though, rewarding staying in is better than punishing switching
>>57205534>>57205534So then do you feel that 6v6 Singles is fine and balanced and is not in need of improvement?Everyone knows that Single Battle is a thing, but the point is TPC has intentionally chosen to not give it any kind of serious competitive standing outside of in game rankings, whereas VGC has multiple huge events.>>57205540Fair points, though in Garganacl's case I think that speaks more to the incredible brokenness of Salt Cure specifically. So what's a better gameplay solution to deal with the constant switching?
>>57205469Agreed, it's nice to talk about these things.
>>57205596>but the point is TPC has intentionally chosen to not give it any kind of serious competitive standing outside of in game rankingsOfficial 3v3 tournaments exist. And even if they didn’t, how would it matter when you don’t play PvP regardless? You campaignshitters are fucking pathetic.
>>57205639The question was about 6v6 singles. Please read the question before making posts next time.
>>57206547The post pretends singles doesn’t already exist as a balanced format in the game. Please play the game before making shitposts next time.
>>57206556You didn’t read the post either. It posited that it’s only “balanced” because of the insane levels of restrictions players have arbitrarily placed on themselves from status conditions to which species are legal. Play the game before concern trolling next time
>>57205432Maybe stat stages should decay naturally back to 0 over time, and make them more gradual (-10 to +10) with each stage being +15 (if positive) or -8 (if negative); with stat-changing effects changed to account for this; generally at a ratio of 1 old stat stage to 4 new stat stages, with some moves deviating from thatThis both prevents setting up to ridiculous levels and sweeping with your stats being several times higher than they normally would, and it makes the high PP of most setup moves actually relevant
>>57205505>>57205534>>57205639>>57206556Mad cause bad and stupid
>>57207060The post pretends singles doesn’t already exist as a balanced format in the game. Please play the game before making shitposts next time.
>>57207384forgot to include percentage signs next to the per-stage stat changes (so positive stages would be +15% per stage and negative stages would be -8% per stage)which would result in stats being up to 250% at +10 or 20% at -10
>>57205420Delete Smogon.
>>57208127OP explicitly said actual mechanics inherent in the game itself, not any meta/community stuffBesides even if you somehow manage to delete Smogon (good fucking luck hahaha), a replacement will pop up in a matter of days because, as OP said, there's enough things wrong with completely unrestricted singles for a community to form and take matters into their own hands by creating their own rulesets to try and mitigate the problems with unrestricted anything goes formats
