Thread: Our own tiering system: Empirical Tiers

I think the point of this tier system is to be unlike that one other tier system, which might have made some people, well, get mad. This tier system promotes variety. I don't really want to see that exact same Pokémon in lots of teams.

Originally Posted by coolking503

I remember the weight factor being talked about on Smogon too, and while I think its a good idea, I'm not sure of how plausible it is. that being said, it would make the banning thing more of a formula where if a pokemon ends up with too high of a rating it is banned. This is a bit too complex ad I honestly think it should be simpler than this. Another problem is, say I get a 1500 rating and the next highest rating is 1300. Needless to say I must have battled alot. Also, because I battled over 500 times AND my team stayed the same AND my rating is so high, whatever pokemon I use will be nearly automatically deemed Uber. Even if I use a Delibird and win with the other 5 pokemon I still would be getting into OU at least.

Not if there are a lot of other players, even with a lower rating. Just one player with a rating of 1500 is not going to do much.

Originally Posted by coolking503

What is the definition of an ideal metagame?

Before we lay a foundation like we are doing now, we have to ask and answer this question and move towards this.

I would say an ideal metagame is one in which it is completely skill based, and where the person who plays better and has the better team will always win. A metagame where there is no one pokemon which has no counters or ways of prevention, or requires more than one pokemon to stop consistently. There should also be multiple pokemon capable of stopping this one pokemon, if there is one. Where luck does not play a part, or a large part, and skill is much more important. Also, I would want a metagame which has as many pokemon viable as possible.

I'm aiming for this as well. But the way in which I'm doing it is quantitative. The way that Pokémon itself is designed, it may not be possible for us to position the Pokémon in this way without relegating ourselves to UU/NU.

Just like the Elo rating system depends on trying to calculate the expected wins per game based on rating differences, so my tiering system depends on trying to calculate the expected tier based on differences in representation.

Originally Posted by Ax-ax-axew!

I think the point of this tier system is to be unlike that one other tier system, which might have made some people, well, get mad. This tier system promotes variety. I don't really want to see that exact same Pokémon in lots of teams.

I'm with Axew. If we want to segregrate things into teirs, let's just copy Smogon completely and not bother with empiricism. If the issue is ladder tiered-divisions, using a band-aid to make a different ladder of tiers will not change anything.

Just thinking out loud: The main complaint over evkl's proposed system was that it would become a race to the bottom. What if Pokemon in the banned list could move down faster? I.e., divide everything into 'Uber' and 'Regular' categories (lambaste me for proposing a 2-tier system over hypocricy if you must; I'm thinking out loud). Then, just as the most-commonly used Pokemon in the Regular tier get banned and moved to Ubers, the Pokemon used least in Ubers move down to the general tier.

Originally Posted by Phoenicks

Just thinking out loud: The main complaint over evkl's proposed system was that it would become a race to the bottom. What if Pokemon in the banned list could move down faster? I.e., divide everything into 'Uber' and 'Regular' categories (lambaste me for proposing a 2-tier system over hypocricy if you must; I'm thinking out loud). Then, just as the most-commonly used Pokemon in the Regular tier get banned and moved to Ubers, the Pokemon used least in Ubers move down to the general tier.

Ubers is a banlist. It is not and never was suposed to be a playable tier. Exkl's system realizes this, and my system realizes this. The banlist allows for pokemon which are deemed to good for the OU metagame, in whatever way, to be gotten rid of. Ubers, on the other hand, is just a list of pokemon banned. Some people wanted to play with these Ubers, and it became popular. But technically it isn't a tier, it is a banlist. there is no point in taking unused pokemon that were banned from standard and reinserting them AFTER other strong pokemon are banned. This in fact is exactly what Evkl's system entails, as after some pokemon leave, and then others leave, the first ones will return.

Originally Posted by coolking503

Ubers is a banlist. It is not and never was suposed to be a playable tier. Exkl's system realizes this, and my system realizes this. The banlist allows for pokemon which are deemed to good for the OU metagame, in whatever way, to be gotten rid of. Ubers, on the other hand, is just a list of pokemon banned. Some people wanted to play with these Ubers, and it became popular. But technically it isn't a tier, it is a banlist. there is no point in taking unused pokemon that were banned from standard and reinserting them AFTER other strong pokemon are banned. This in fact is exactly what Evkl's system entails, as after some pokemon leave, and then others leave, the first ones will return.

Ubers bans the most powerful from regular play -- to be put in their own category. There's no functional difference between a Ubers tier and a banlist for a Regular tier. It still seperates the most powerful. Pokes that aren't banned can easily be used in Uber.

I wish that the metagame could eliminate tiers and never be bothered by anything but making good teams (regardless of distorting lists). That's not an option with Ubers. Thus, they're being banned from Regular Play. We can let users play with Ubers in a seperate tier; is there a reason not to?

Originally Posted by Phoenicks

I wish that the metagame could eliminate tiers and never be bothered by anything but making good teams (regardless of distorting lists). That's not an option with Ubers.

It's not an option with the OU group as a whole either. That's probably one of the reasons the tiers were created. The OU game is balanced by itself, but it completely overshadows the UU and NU groups. It's the group as a whole, not an individual Pokémon, that is the "problem" here.

Thus, they're being banned from Regular Play. We can let users play with Ubers in a seperate tier; is there a reason not to?

Nope, which is why we have a tier system in the first place.

In the interests of moving this project forward, I'm willing to drop my proposal if it looks like Gi-gi has enough support.

To answer questions posed:


1. Would you say that the current gen4 OU metagame is balanced?
Depends on how you define this. One Poke doesn't break it. A combination of 8 or so do.

2. Would you say that the current gen4 OU metagame is fun?
No.

3. Do you think Scizor and heatran are broken in gen4 OU and should be Uber?
I don't think we should do uber based on brokenness, but with that said, I still don't think either is so broken as to be pushed into uber.

4. (slightly unrelated) Do you think Wobbufett and Wynaut are broken and should be made Uber regardless of BST.
Wynaut, probably not. Wobby, I'm not sure. I think some diverse strategies could be put together to counter it; the metagame's at a pretty advanced point.

But more to the point, who cares what I think? The whole purpose of me arguing for a new system is because what I think is a bad way to determine anything in this. The experts simply aren't all that good at determining what makes a good game. I have a stated objective: creating a metagame that involves lots more Pokemon than the current one does. My plan aims to realize that objective by any means necessary. You can disagree with my methods and my aims, but I do believe my plan is at least internally consistent.

Originally Posted by evkl

But more to the point, who cares what I think? The whole purpose of me arguing for a new system is because what I think is a bad way to determine anything in this. The experts simply aren't all that good at determining what makes a good game. I have a stated objective: creating a metagame that involves lots more Pokemon than the current one does. My plan aims to realize that objective by any means necessary. You can disagree with my methods and my aims, but I do believe my plan is at least internally consistent.

The UU and NU metagames as they currently exist certainly involve a lot more Pokémon than the OU one does, I can say that for a fact.

Even if we do use my 9-tier system, it still won't prevent people from concentrating on playing in Tier 7 or Tier 8 (equivalent to smogon!OU) where most of the good sweepers and things like that are, which I presume is the main goal here. If you really want to promote a more varied metagame, you have to make sure that Tier 6 (equiv. to smogon!BL) is the maximum for most battles, to block out the OU - because no matter which way you slice it, the OU is going to dominate the rest of the metagame by a long shot, even if it's internally balanced.

But I'd personally like to see my tier system in action, and help adjust it and things like that. Because it's a very new idea, and very prone to glitches and the like.

Perhaps starting with all the Pokémon in Tier 5 is not the best idea after all - maybe we should try giving very basic a priori orderings based on base stats.

I think we should test the Shadow Tag Pokemon BEFORE banning them. They are not that hard to beat down and are usually very frail so they can be revenge killed with ease.

I worry about using 9 tiers; could we run the first test with 7?

Edit: We could base initial tiers on Smogon's usage statistics, since that's as good a starting point as any.

Originally Posted by evkl

I worry about using 9 tiers; could we run the first test with 7?

Sure, that would be fine.

I agree with Evkl in that 7 is a good starting point and we can expand to 9 if needed.

As for gi-gi's proposal, the same problem I brought up still persists. Given the Latias example, where Latias had only the 4th most usage in the OU metagame, but was still deemed broken. Now, regardless of if you agree that Latias was broken, it wouldn't have enough usage to be banned. As such, usage =/= broken, albeit it being close.

As such, I think that there should be an edit to the proposal, a manual, human edit to the usage stats. If a pokemon is deemed broken for a tier (in a manner I mentioned in an earlier post, or in any other way), by a human vote, it should be banned. Also, I think that if we want to make tier 9 playable, it has to have a banlist. As such, i think this system should be instituted so that tier 9 can ban the broken pokemon, and keep it balanced and playable.

Lastly, i think the way tiers should be made in the system is that Everything starts in tier 9, and things that don't have enough usage drop down by one, and again, and again, etc. That way we wont have to worry about going up and down, which would make it too easy to ban pokemon initially, since you are diving usage by 600+whatever.


edit: smogon doesn't have usage stats for gen 5, and the previous gens shouldn't get enough matches to make them applicable for this. Just stick with the accepted tiers, imo. I dont trust PO's stats because, as I said earlier, Latia and Mew were UU for the longest time, which shows some sort of incapability. I think we should start on our own.

Also, the part about previous gens reminded me... What if we get to the point where there are maybe 5 matches held in tier 1. we have to institute a base number of matches for the tiers to change, or maybe, like Evkl suggested in his system, a multitude of months.

Originally Posted by coolking503

As such, I think that there should be an edit to the proposal, a manual, human edit to the usage stats. If a pokemon is deemed broken for a tier (in a manner I mentioned in an earlier post, or in any other way), by a human vote, it should be banned.

I'm pretty sure the idea is for it to all be automated, and to take the 'expert' and human element out of it. If something's broken, it'll sort itself out, and if it hasn't sorted itself out, it must not be broken enough to ruin anyone's games.

Also, I think that if we want to make tier 9 playable, it has to have a banlist. As such, i think this system should be instituted so that tier 9 can ban the broken pokemon, and keep it balanced and playable.

Tier 9 is the Übers tier. It exists for every single Pokémon to be usable. It was a 9 tier proposal, not 10.

Lastly, i think the way tiers should be made in the system is that Everything starts in tier 9, and things that don't have enough usage drop down by one, and again, and again, etc. That way we wont have to worry about going up and down, which would make it too easy to ban pokemon initially, since you are diving usage by 600+whatever.

I'm pretty sure the fair share negates that problem, but I'm not too sure of the maths, and if it doesn't, then that's a fair point.

Also, the part about previous gens reminded me... What if we get to the point where there are maybe 5 matches held in tier 1. we have to institute a base number of matches for the tiers to change, or maybe, like Evkl suggested in his system, a multitude of months.

Considering Pokémon can be used in the tiers above them, that's more of a Tier 8 and 9 problem, but having a minimum number of battles involving Pokémon of that tier for a Pokémon to move from that tier makes sense. I doubt, however that the months would help the problem.

Originally Posted by evkl

2. Would you say that the current gen4 OU metagame is fun?
No.

I agree on this point. It's why I usually play UU instead. So yes, you could ban all things that keep domining the standard tier, but eventually you will just end up with a UU, in which we finally have a lot of balance (at least 4th gen UU was very balances with nothing really overpowered). Then people who play the uber tier will claim it's unplayable, and demand another banlist for Uber, causing everything to return to its roots, only now being a tier higher. That's why we shouldn't auto-ban everything on usage.

As such, I think that there should be an edit to the proposal, a manual, human edit to the usage stats. If a pokemon is deemed broken for a tier (in a manner I mentioned in an earlier post, or in any other way), by a human vote, it should be banned. Also, I think that if we want to make tier 9 playable, it has to have a banlist. As such, i think this system should be instituted so that tier 9 can ban the broken pokemon, and keep it balanced and playable.

But can you imagine a situation in which something that's broken does not get used everywhere? I can't. If it's broken, why wouldn't everyone be using it? You can't have something that's only on 10% of teams in a tier be simultaneously too overpowered and...only used by 1 person in ten.

Lastly, i think the way tiers should be made in the system is that Everything starts in tier 9, and things that don't have enough usage drop down by one, and again, and again, etc. That way we wont have to worry about going up and down, which would make it too easy to ban pokemon initially, since you are diving usage by 600+whatever.

This would take quite some time to filter; starting everything in the middle would take half as long.

Also, the part about previous gens reminded me... What if we get to the point where there are maybe 5 matches held in tier 1. we have to institute a base number of matches for the tiers to change, or maybe, like Evkl suggested in his system, a multitude of months.

If a tier gets no activity, then we should probably merge it into another tier.