shoz999
Back when Tigers used to smoke.
Gen 8 Balance Thread
So some of you may have noticed Gens 1 to Gens 4 focused more on balancing mechanics, Gen 4 perfecting not just the mechanics of competitive but also battling in general with the physical and special split. Afterwards there really wasn't anything else to revolutionize as the mechanics were basically perfected to the point that it has become the norm. Later, Gens 5 and up focused more on balancing the Pokemon itself through new Pokemon counters, abilities, new types or buffs or debuffs to types, that sort of thing ever since the Gen 4 power creep started, increasing the number of competitively-viable Pokemon either through simply new Pokemon or balancing old Pokemon.
If you learned anything about how the meta or balance of a game evolves over time in Pokemon, you gotta look back to past metas, see what you think is broken or what others think is broken and how it can be fixed later. For example, the Garchomp issue in Gen 4. Garchomp was OP in Gen 4 and while there were a lot of strong Pokemon in Gen 5, Garchomp was still OP. It didn't took till Gen 6 with the introduction of Fairy-Types, that Garchomp was properly balanced. Let's look at another one. Trick Room. The move was introduced in Generation 4 back when single player competitive was still the dominant form in the meta. Trick Room users were actually pretty rare back than, as most Trick Room users were very fast and fragile Pokemon and there weren't really a lot of noteworthy heavyweights to take advantage of it in singles. It took till Generation 7 that Trick Room became a dominant move that players should be more cautious of thanks to Pokemon like Oranguru or Mimikyu. The next generation will be Generation 8 and if it's following the trend, I expect them to balance a lot of the Pokemon with new Pokemon countering other Pokemon, reworkings to the types, moves, or abilities, or even introduce a new feature in attempt to make more classic Pokemon viable like Mega stones or Z-moves.
So now I'm asking what you guys feel like needs to be balanced? Do you feel like certain types need a buff or debuff, like for example Ice-Types. That's a common talked about type that needs a buff. Maybe you want to see a particular move to be more commonly used in the meta like Trickroom? More Pokemon counters against Pokemon you feel don't have a proper counter such as Landorus or the Ultra Beasts for example? Do you feel that GameFreak still needs to look back on some of the game mechanics over balancing Pokemon instead? Heck. Do you want weather wars to make a return? New Mega Evolutions perhaps? These are the questions I'm expecting. The ones that look in past meta's, take a look at the powercreeping and wonder how do you counter that? I say power creeping as this is the number 1 issue in competitive, really any turn-based game. Looking back at previous meta's, what do you feel is a problem and how would it be fixed in the 8th generation of Pokemon games? Not just Pokemon 2019. The entire 8th generation of Pokemon games.
Also it just occurred to me the people who would likely come here already understand the competitive meta or just competitive fans... so no need to explain the huge powercreeping and balance of Gen 4, the anti-powercreeping and weather wars of Gen 5, the simple but massive changes of Gen 6, and TRICKROOM WARS of Gen 7.
So some of you may have noticed Gens 1 to Gens 4 focused more on balancing mechanics, Gen 4 perfecting not just the mechanics of competitive but also battling in general with the physical and special split. Afterwards there really wasn't anything else to revolutionize as the mechanics were basically perfected to the point that it has become the norm. Later, Gens 5 and up focused more on balancing the Pokemon itself through new Pokemon counters, abilities, new types or buffs or debuffs to types, that sort of thing ever since the Gen 4 power creep started, increasing the number of competitively-viable Pokemon either through simply new Pokemon or balancing old Pokemon.
If you learned anything about how the meta or balance of a game evolves over time in Pokemon, you gotta look back to past metas, see what you think is broken or what others think is broken and how it can be fixed later. For example, the Garchomp issue in Gen 4. Garchomp was OP in Gen 4 and while there were a lot of strong Pokemon in Gen 5, Garchomp was still OP. It didn't took till Gen 6 with the introduction of Fairy-Types, that Garchomp was properly balanced. Let's look at another one. Trick Room. The move was introduced in Generation 4 back when single player competitive was still the dominant form in the meta. Trick Room users were actually pretty rare back than, as most Trick Room users were very fast and fragile Pokemon and there weren't really a lot of noteworthy heavyweights to take advantage of it in singles. It took till Generation 7 that Trick Room became a dominant move that players should be more cautious of thanks to Pokemon like Oranguru or Mimikyu. The next generation will be Generation 8 and if it's following the trend, I expect them to balance a lot of the Pokemon with new Pokemon countering other Pokemon, reworkings to the types, moves, or abilities, or even introduce a new feature in attempt to make more classic Pokemon viable like Mega stones or Z-moves.
So now I'm asking what you guys feel like needs to be balanced? Do you feel like certain types need a buff or debuff, like for example Ice-Types. That's a common talked about type that needs a buff. Maybe you want to see a particular move to be more commonly used in the meta like Trickroom? More Pokemon counters against Pokemon you feel don't have a proper counter such as Landorus or the Ultra Beasts for example? Do you feel that GameFreak still needs to look back on some of the game mechanics over balancing Pokemon instead? Heck. Do you want weather wars to make a return? New Mega Evolutions perhaps? These are the questions I'm expecting. The ones that look in past meta's, take a look at the powercreeping and wonder how do you counter that? I say power creeping as this is the number 1 issue in competitive, really any turn-based game. Looking back at previous meta's, what do you feel is a problem and how would it be fixed in the 8th generation of Pokemon games? Not just Pokemon 2019. The entire 8th generation of Pokemon games.
Also it just occurred to me the people who would likely come here already understand the competitive meta or just competitive fans... so no need to explain the huge powercreeping and balance of Gen 4, the anti-powercreeping and weather wars of Gen 5, the simple but massive changes of Gen 6, and TRICKROOM WARS of Gen 7.
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