Denied Pure Pivot

[Birkal]

This concept by Phione was approved for discussion. Is this concept worth pursuing? If so, what questions could we ask? How could we improve this? Everyone is free to discuss the following submission as if this was a concept discussion.

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Name: Pure Pivot
General Description: A Pokemon that is purely and singly intended to switch into attacks and force opposing Pokemon out. It has the tools to dismantle its targets it switches into, but if played right, should never have to actually use them except perhaps during the endgame. It should not provide major support to the team, instead focusing purely on pivoting.
Justification: A pivot is an interesting role in battling. They are used to absorb attacks that could severely damage teammates and force threats that could sweep your team - or wall it - to switch out involuntarily. This means that they must have the typing, stats, moves, or ability to beat top tier threats, even if they cannot do too much by themselves. This makes a pivot one of the more matchup-reliant roles. There is still a lot to explore about pivots, as though we know what makes a matchup favorable, there is still a lot to see about how pivots pull their weight outside of switching and assist the rest of the team. This concept aims to explore
Questions To Be Answered:

• What defines a pivot and separates it from a simple counter or check?
• What qualities (moves, abilities, typing, stats) make a pivot better or worse at doing their job?
• What support does a pivot provide to their team by pivoting into threats?
• What support does a pivot provide to their team outside of pivoting into threats, and is this support significant?
• If a pivot has no utility outside of their ability to force out opponents, are they worth using at all? What makes pivots worth teamslots in the first place?

Explanation: Pivots. You all know them, it's likely you've all used them. VoltTurn is a form of pivoting in that you Volt Switch or U-turn into a Pokemon that can handle the opponent, force them out (or KO them), and VoltTurn back when they send in their check. There's also more commonplace switch pivoting, which is basically just switching to a check that can handle the opponent. There's a thin line between just a check or counter that you switch in to beat the opponent and a dedicated pivot that's placed on the team first and foremost as a switch-in to various threats, and sometimes little else. This concept aims to explore that line as well as exactly what pivots do, what they offer to their team besides checking things. I think I've covered most of my concept, so here it goes!

 

[Qwilphish]

I feel like pivoting is an extremely covered topic in OU atm [insert obligatory Lando-T mention here]. There are other aspects to this concept such as using counters as pivots however I fail to see how we can learn something new with an elementary concept that is fundamental to the game. The concept states that there is a lot to learn about Pivots such as how they can support their team outside of their pivoting role, however that is the whole point of a Pivot: To take a hit, force the opponent out, and gain momentum based on that. Also, the "pivoters of OU" already prove the different roles that pivots play outside of switching: Rotom spreads burn, Lando sets up Rocks, Zapdos defogs, etc.

Also, the questions for this concept are weak as they can be answered already through simple observation. Pivots are great because they allow for your team to deal with many threats with a single team slot so that the player can play more defensively while still being in a favorable position. The last question in particular is incorrect, or at least is not worth asking. Of course Pivoters are worth using otherwise why would we make this concept / why would Lando-T and Rotom-W be used at all.

Overall I don't see the difference between a concept like Pure Pivot and "Make a Sweeper" (thanks imanalt) in that we already see these Pokemon in the metagame and just because these Pokemon are fewer in number, that does not mean that these Pokemon are low in usage.

 

[trc]

this is literally landorus-t. i don't like the questions either. they aren't good for the project because they're obvious. i don't see much interesting coming out of this project unfortunately ~n_n~

 

[Birkal]

I don't think this concept was created with the idea that OU is lacking pivots. Lando-T, Rotom-W, and Talonflame all succeed thanks to their ability to pivot and their usage indicates it. What is intriguing about this concept is how the process would look, in my opinion. There are no "gimmies" here in terms of what we'd decide at any given stage. As demonstrated throughout pretty much every tier, pivots can range in speed / stats / typing / ability, with the only common denominator being a pivot move. What is left to decide is whether or not this concept is intriguing enough to pursue. On the positive side, if we selected this concept, I think it would be pretty difficult to fail at it. On the negative side, there isn't a whole lot of challenge to be had here, since pretty much any type / ability / stats can lend themselves to a pivot. What would be of interest here is which one of those are beneficial or not, I s'pose.

 

[Empress]

Yeah, this is similar to the issues that Scarf Is Not Dead has. We all know what pivots do at this point, and there are plenty in the OU environment. Therefore, we have little to learn in that sense. Also, unlike Scarf Is Not Dead, where it would be viable to create a mon that functions with Choice Scarf and only Choice Scarf, I find it a stretch to be able to create a viable mon that is a pivot and nothing more. The pivots of OU, as Qwilphish mentioned, have roles outside of simply forcing switches and maintaining momentum. If a pivot offers no utility outside of that, it would be very difficult to justify its use over Lando-T, Zapdos, or any of the other countless OU pivots.

Thus, if we simply choose this concept to make a good pivot, we won't learn anything that we didn't before. Yes, the past few CAPs have not necessarily succeeded their concepts, but this would be taking the easy way out… and then some. And if we make our Pokemon a "Pure Pivot" as the name says, then we'd simply be making an inferior Lando-T.

 

[Agile Turtle]

i'm in agreement with most people here. We already have amazing pivots like lando-t and rotom-w. I'm actually pretty sure Lando-t and Rotom-w is a common core right now. It is literally the epitome of pivoting. They have volt-turn to bolster their abilities as pivots. The thing is though, Lando-t has intimidate, a very useful ability for pivoting because of its ability to force switches, and he also has stealth rock so he has use on a team outside of pivoting. He also has great stats. Rotom-w has pretty decent bulk and access to a great support move in WoW. Rotom-w can be scarfed too and trick its scarf to cripple defensive mons (that was a gen 5 ou thing though, most rotom-w aren't scarfed anymore). Rotom-w and Lando-t have nice resistances, too. They are very good pivots, and they aren't even the only pivots in ou.

I just don't see what we have to learn from this concept. What could we give the pokemon that would give them a niche over Landorus-therian or Rotom-Wash? And to be honest, if you can answer that question, then you already know everything we have to learn from this concept.

 

[nyttyn]

this is literally landorus-t. i don't like the questions either. they aren't good for the project because they're obvious. i don't see much interesting coming out of this project unfortunately ~n_n~

Denied 1/2

 

[Billy the Uncle]

I have the feeling that, if we make a Pokemon that is purely a pivot (and nothing else), the things it would be supposed to force out will eventually "learn" to stay in regardless instead of switching, since "it's a pivot, it's going to switch out anyway". This in turn will take away from the pivotal role of CAP20, because once the things it forces out start to stay in, CAP20 will start to attack instead of pivoting out.

That said, the 50/50 it forces (pivoting or attack vs. switching or staying in) might become an interesting topic itself.

 

[Qwilphish]

Hello, sorry for leaving this concept on edge for this long, but as you can tell from my first post in this thread, this concept is well established this gen and is unnecceasary to explore further.

Denied 2/2