While I find the other points you made reasonable, I think this was a great way to lower the tone of the thread immediately and from a respectable SPL player I find that surprising (plus with likes from moderators no less). Seeing as you don't qualify who you're talking about (could be me, could be anyone) with the "lack a grasp of the meta" stuff you're using it as a blanket nay-say to any anti-ban arguments that have come before, while also implying that your knowledge is vastly superior and people who don't agree with you are idiots. Regardless of how you feel about the anti-ban arguments, how you've articulated yourself here is derogatory and extremely poor.
In spite of what could be seen as a rather poor tone, he's not necessarily wrong either. This happens many times in previous suspect threads where players who, honestly, are bad and will attempt to make flaky comments such as "Mega Gengar has counters", or "Mega Metagross back in Gen 6 is literally killing the meta." Or other rather poor statements.
I've been glancing at the thread, and there are still some anti-ban arguments that aren't necessarily bad arguments. papai noel's argument is not necessarily bad, and neither is mulgokizary's. I seriously question Tele's as an example, but I can at least respect he goes into a little detail on why he thinks the Dugtrio suspect is wrong.
I can even look at this thread's arguments for Dugtrio and call them poor. Below is a perfect example:
If that was the case shadow tag would have never gotten banned. Doesnt change the fact playing vs dugtrio is still completely boring to play against, with its only way of winning is arena trap. Dugtrio still can counter char-x and heatran. Its just nothing but a gimmick pokemon that shouldnt be in OU.
Even if playing against stall can be seen as "boring", that does not reserve the tier a right to simply ban things because it is stagnant nor un-entertaining. Smogon may not always seem like it, but tiering is a very serious and practiced thing since its inception in Generation 4. Sometimes you disagree with something, but the matter is that Smogon strives for competitive - not for pleasure. Pleasure is subjective in this case to the player. After all, some players like Eo Ut Mortus do enjoy playing stall.
Alas, let's look at such gems that have come about from the thread:
Dugtrio can't effortlessly trap and kill walls as easily as magnet pull Magnezone either.
That's blatantly false.
Dugtrio actually can trap two walls without too many issues that are common in a stall core - Toxapex and Chansey (Blissey). Clefable could even be argued as a third. Magnezone has only one Pokemon usually that it can trap and attempt to KO, and it has even heftier requirements than Dugtrio does against certain walls:
- Shed Shell needs removal from Skamrory.
- Magnezone needs to be brought in when Skarmory is not using Whirlwind.
Choice Band Dugtrio reliably 2HKOes Toxapex in spite of the burn while Sash Dugtrio takes on Chansey as if it were a joke most of the time. Some Dugtrio have even opted for Tectonic Rage just to hit the sweet spot of KO ranges. As a fun fact - Magnezone
can actually lose to a lot of Pokemon it attempts to trap. Ferrothorn and Mega Scizor are two of the rarest guarantees.
If you do take Dugtrio out of OU there are a large number of pokemon that are already really big threats that will become too hard to handle such as specs Lele (or even scarf Lele who doesn't have to deal with losing ~70% of it's health to earthquake), Z-Fire blast Volcarona and the previously mentioned Magnezone. It is for these reasons that I will be voting No Ban if I gain reqs this suspect.
What exactly makes Magnezone overbearing in the meta? As a protip - In spite of Magnezone's rather modest usage it has been hit or miss throughout spl. Magnezone is a good Pokemon, but it is nothing that is close to broken in terms of being too overwhelming for teams to handle.
Dugtrio kills _______ lando comes in and gives a free dance or garchomp, gyrados, buzzwole, beast boost(or quiver dance) and etc. Dugtrio getting its kill can be costly if the other team can build around turning that into momentum.
Here's another argument where, ironically, I needed p2 to re-explain to me in normal terms just because how bad this post is in my opinion. Going back to the argument made earlier by one of the anti-ban Dugtrio movement Stall sometimes has to make a critical choice to safely get Dugtrio in. The thing stall will always evaluate prior to is its chances of winning in spite of losing a critical Pokemon. Sometimes this scenario doesn't even happen with Pyukumuku and Shedinja because you have Baton Pass to get Dugtrio in a lot safer! Many of those Pokemon you mentioned fail to break a combination of some of the regular stall components in the OU tier. Example of Buzzwole - Toxapex and Clefable as a combo can handle just about any Buzzwole set. Mega Sableye and Skarmory still can back up the team as well. Even though some of these momentum Pokemon, like Gyarados, can be frightening they also have to take rather large gambles at times to overcome some of the walls. Example - Supersonic Skystrike would be needed to bypass Toxapex effectively. A stall player could predict ahead of their opponent and re-direct it to Skarmory. There's also risks when something like Toxapex switches into Gyarados because of the risk of burn through Scald or Haze removing stat bonuses.
This is why I said in my post from before - it is true that some Pokemon with Z Moves, in theory, can overcome stall. In practice a stall player can adapt to these strategies and redirect the Z Moves elsewhere. Unlike very bulky teams stall can survive with a fallen member in their team if they need too, and in some cases usually do without many issues. It's true the metagame has developed and theorized better Pokemon that can overmuscle stall, but in the same ironic vein Dugtrio can be used on offensive teams to make the dents necessary for offensive teams to have an easier time to pressure and crush.
Let's go to your post for a minute to demonstrate examples of what could be seen as poor arguments with little-to-no justification:
- Set up Rocks or other hazards to break the sash. Not entirely easy against stall and Mega Sableye, but you can always use a Fairy setter, a Skill Swap setter or a Mold Breaker setter.
The only Stealth Rock Fairy-type that even comes close to my head is Clefable. The latter two have issues - mainly being the first one is strictly a suicide lead. The latter eats a lot of risk such as a Will-O-Wisp, etc.
- Use a slower bulkier threat that has priority, e.g. SubCoil Zygarde, again not a bad mon vs stall.
Zygarde without Toxic means it loses to stall the majority of the time. It needs Toxic to pressure Clefable and other threats.
I could go on since you mentioned incredibly niche and situational setups (Aurora Veil or Hail?), but the point is simple - even if you completely disagree with the tone that p2 made with his post, it does not dismiss that there is a lot of solid evidence supporting such a bold claim. Sorry to not delve further, but 10 hours of work with minimal sleep exhausts me. :[