Discussion on any aspect of competitive Pixelmon.

What Tier should Blaze Blaziken be in?

2
20%
3
30%
5
50%
User avatar
By Geodude671
#187955 Moody was banned because the ability itself was broken. Even Bidoof became broken when it had Moody. BIDOOF. Speed Boost is only broken on Blaziken.

User avatar
By Geodude671
#187958 Also, let me ask you this: Would Speed Boost Blaziken be broken without Swords Dance? It is pretty obvious that Blaziken pretty much has to be physical as mixed and special sets generally suck on it as they are rather ineffective at helping it beat its checks. If it didn't have that move which it could use to bust through practically anything that could check it such as Slowbro, Gyarados, Dragonite, Tentacruel, and Salamence, would it be nearly as threatening as Speed Boost Blaziken without that amount of wallbreaking power? Or would it be just like Sharpedo and Yanmega - fast cleaners with great coverage that are still solidly walled by plenty of things due to lack of a boosting move and checked by most priority. Would Blaziken with Swords Dance be, on the whole, a better Pokemon + Move combo than that of Blaziken without Swords Dance? The answer is yes. Are they different? Yes, they are. Do you see the similarities here?

Blaziken wasn't banned just because of Speed Boost. While it was a large factor in its banning, you must also consider the fact that it gets Swords Dance and insanely strong physical moves backed by said boosting move as well. The Pokemon itself was considered as a unit - Smogon wasn't trying to ban certain aspects of it or nerf it to force it into OU. Otherwise, we'd have situations like I described earlier for all the lower tiers as well. If we try to "nerf" Pokemon into lower tiers, we create effectively multiple versions of a single Pokemon - what is supposed to be a single unit - spread across two or more tiers, which ultimately ruins the concept of the tiering system itself. Considering the Pokemon as a whole unit when it is brought up for possible banning is really the only real way to have an effective tiering system.

Unbanning Blaze-iken is an arbitrary cutoff that completely disregards lower tiers and the future implications. What sane reason is there to stop at just Blaziken other than "just because?" What's going to happen when we get another "Blaziken," like Thundurus, Landorus, or Greninja? The argument against banning Blaziken entirely seems like little more than just "I like Blaziken so let's put it in OU/UU/somewhere that's not Ubers so I can use it." The way Smogon does things ensures simplicity and removes arbitrary factors, lowering the entry barrier to competitive play.

You can't unban a specific Pokemon with a specific ability, or else we dive into another discussion later - "What about Darkrai without Dark Void?" "What about Shaymin-S without Seed Flare or Air Slash?" "What about Aegislash without King's Shield?" "What about level 70 Lugia?" "What about Greninja without Low Kick and Gunk Shot?" etc. etc. Yes 4 out of 5 of those Pokemon aren't in the mod yet but you get the point. You have to be able to ban something completely to make a ban - ban an item (Soul Dew), ban an ability (Moody), ban a move (Swagger), or ban a Pokemon.

TLDR: Speed Boost is an inherent part of Blaziken. Speed Boost Blaziken and Blaze Blaziken are not distinct Pokemon; they are both Blaziken.

We tier Blaziken.
User avatar
By SimonFlash
#187978 Quick FYI for everyone: I have been sick with who the heck knows once since Saturday, but I'm back on my feet and super excited to get things moving again! And now, back to your irregularly scheduled update.


After a week long suspect test, the vote stands to unban Blaze Blaziken at 8-2. Furthermore, Blaze Blaziken has been placed in PmUU for the meantime.

I would also like to say that the vote to place Blaze Blaziken in PmUU was not part of the suspect test (hence the 8-2 vote). Simply enough, I was just trying to kill two pidgey's with one geodude by figuring out what tier we should place it in to start if Blaze Blaziken was pulled out of OU.

In addition, I'd like to clarify a couple of points about designing the Pm Tiers and the overall idea behind this projects.

First, I am no stranger to competitive play with over 10 years of competitive experience (DPP), and specialize in GenV / GenVI Monotype. I am in no means an OU player, nor would I consider myself to a expert in anything competitive related. I do however have a strong passion for competitive play and consider myself knowledgable in both teambuilding and battling alike as well as an advocate of unorthodox strategies. With that being said, I am well aware that pokemon are placed into tiers through usage statistics and that BorderLine tiers are used as a banlist for pokemon too power in their own category. If you can find a way to properly track usage stats of a current pixelmon metagame that adjusts for missing pokemon, missing or bugged features, and the relative skill level of the player, please let me know.

Until then, I will be doing the best I can with my available resources to construct a relatively accurate tier list that can be used to relative success on most servers.. The goal of this project is primarily to help revive the competitive section of the forums after being virtually empty for 10 months while working towards establishing a competitive pixelmon metagame with a dedicated community. I am in no means, shape, or form attempting to construct a tier list and state, "Here you go, it's official now. Deal with it or get out."

The reason why I'm creating a tier list in particular is so we have a semi-standardized competitive format that works relatively well. If that means we copy Smogon tier for tier, then so be it. I however, like many, see ways to improve on what Smogon has already established (not to mention the metagames don't line up). Like this suspect test, there are ways we can make the established system better for our community, and that's really the ultimate goal here.

I will be creating a new thread sometime tomorrow elaborating a bit on this project, particularly the overall goal, the method used to construct the tiers, and suspect testing, as I feel it is well overdue.

Lastly, please keep discussion on-topic, especially in official threads. This discussion turned into too much of an argument over banning policy rather than the suspect test at hand. Please save that for the thread tomorrow ;)
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