hu, i mean, it feels the exact same ?
greying out the button would just be a quality of life thing, doing the same role as replacing the text on the sleep move by "forfeit" ?
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Metagame Views From The Council
- Thread starter njnp
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greying out the button would just be a quality of life thing, doing the same role as replacing the text on the sleep move by "forfeit" ?
The big problem with this is that it becomes abusable as an instant win utilizing Encore shenanigans against someone that used a sleep move. This is why just making them unable to use a sleep move while an opponent has an asleep mon is the better solution.
that's for those four cart players to figure out then i think, a misclick can cost you the game in any format. graying out the button wouldn't be a mod, it's just a way to ensure both players are respecting the rules. similarly if you brought flutter mane to a Smogon™ approved metagame cart match forgetting it was banned you wouldn't be told to change your team you'd be DQed on the spot. players attending an event are responsible for their own mistakes
i'm just not a big fan of introducing new win conditions to the game so i'm not a huge fan of this proposal, to me "don't use a sleep move if an opposing pokemon is already asleep" is just more comprehensible to the average player than "you can use a sleep move if an opposing pokemon is already asleep BUT if it lands without the opposing pokemon having woken up you lose the game". making it a loss condition too means that exceptions that you could grant to the grayed out moves clause such as "if they encore you tough shit it's their fault and the clause doesn't activate" are harder to justify
reading the sentiments of people in this thread is telling me that quite a few people are at the very least unsatisfied with the current implementation of sleep clause mod so i think if there's enough outcry in a PR thread something definitely could happen in regards to it !
I just feel like that's a very limiting viewpoint. We are playing Pokemon, and we don't make the rules. But we do manage the most popular way of playing pokemon. We are a fan community at the end of the day, and if we all collectively decided on something, even something as drastic as fire is now good v water, we could have this implemented. We would never do that though as we all have a desire to stay *close* to the cart. We would never decide on a change that throws so many natural rules of pokemon out the window. But we do have the opportunity to make smaller adjustments. Nobody likes seeing things get banned to the point we never see them again, hence the idea of tweaking sleep clause mod instead of outright banning Sleep moves. There are strategies that are close to being balanced that are unfortunately too powerful that need to be banned. I see no issue as a fan community allowing for little edits of what currently exists. If you hate that GF controls how the game operates, which you do, there is an out to this! I know it leads to the question of a grayzone, but that is something we can decide together as a community, rather than throw in the towel.
Sleep clause mod gives us the benefit of giving us interactions such as this:
This is an interaction that *can* exist on a cart, just not in the exact same way. If sleep was not restricted in anyway, it would be entirely doable for a pokemon to fall asleep on the same turn it wakes up. You can do it in game in every pokemon game after gen 1. Keeping Sleep Clause mod as it is, allows us to have a form of sleep that is as close to in-game as possible, without the one thing that makes things like Sleep broken (which is sleeping many mons). In that way it is very close to cartridge. But it is also unenforceable on cartridge, since if a pokemon was slept you wouldn't be able to click sleep into it in the possibility that the opponent switched into another pokemon (which would make two pokemon slept on the same side of the field). This slight bend in what is enforcable allows us to get closer to what is on cart than what would actually be enforcable on cart. This also allows us to keep sleep around as a mechanic rather than sacking it and everything associated with it to a ban purgatory.
This is another thing I don't agree with. Don't tell me "tiering policy states" X. Use more justification than that. Why is it tiering policy says this? Why should it not be the case that we have other policies that try to patch up other banned mechanics. I understand the reasoning for a lot of the bans that currently exist, destiny bond, baton pass, ohko moves so i do get it. But the general hatred towards clauses in modern smogon is just so restrictive in my mindset. Why say a blanket "we will never come up with another compromise between OU and in-game again we will just ban everything"? Its so defeatist. Its so depressing and unexciting. Like we already think everything should be banned from the get-go and you shouldnt try to make anything work and we don't critically think about how we can adapt a core part of the game (which seems at points to not be designed competitively) in a way that works competitively
Wait, is bond banned?
I don't think so? Idk why he said that, maybe he was thinking of something else but I don't know what else that is similar to destiny bond that is banned.
before i opened this thread i, as nothing but a lurker of the ladder and the compeyitive board, had no horse on this race, maybe even thinking the status quo was fine, but i need to register that some of the arguments in favour of it are so bad (special shout-outs to "paralysis is as uncompetitive as sleep" and "the very concept of banning things is inconsistent with the cartridge") that i find myself actively hoping for action against sleep. some of you are really good at convincing people of the exact opposite of what you want
i do think the suggestion of reworking the sleep clause to outright forbid clicking sleeping moves after one opponent mon is asleep, unless forced by the opponent, is fine (and if you encore a sleep move and switch, you deserve a second asleep mon for not considering the foe might stay), but honestly just banning sleep makes more sense than the things people are saying to keep it as is lol
i do think the suggestion of reworking the sleep clause to outright forbid clicking sleeping moves after one opponent mon is asleep, unless forced by the opponent, is fine (and if you encore a sleep move and switch, you deserve a second asleep mon for not considering the foe might stay), but honestly just banning sleep makes more sense than the things people are saying to keep it as is lol
I don't know how many of y'all are familiar with or interested in philosophy, but I sometimes feel like Hegel was right. I feel like we are at the end of history and that there are going to be no more major shifts in policy, ideology and culture. Today I've been proven wrong. Today, right in this thread, we have among us the solution to all of our questions. MeepBard has found the definitive solution to shut all concerns of cartridge accuracy for the rest of time. Smogon is alive, Smogon is evolving, this is not the end.
In a less melodramatic way, I feel that this thread is showing that the question is two-fold:
1. How faithful do we want to remain to cartridge play?
2. Do we actually consider sleep to be universally broken?
In regards to the first question, I seriously believe that the proposed solution is the closest thing we have to keep the philosophy of Sleep Mod Clause without altering the in-game mechanics. I think it finds the balance between something enforced from outside and something replicable beyond any ignorance and bad faith.
I'd like to briefly point out that this cannot/should not be replicated with Freeze Clause, so that leaves the question of cart accuracy up in the air again, however that's a fairly small one.
In regards to the second question, I don't think that it should be applied universally. I'm sure Sleep is manageable and not a factor in many tiers. In SV OU tho, I personally don't see that big of an issue, and maybe it's just tradition, but I don't mind playing around sleep. Please remember this is Pokémon and not chess, RNG is inherent to our game.
So in conclusion, I wanna take this opportunity to label/baptize this alteration of Sleep Mod Clause as MEEPSLEEP in honor of the first poster. We can disagree on the specifics of sleep, but this small mechanical change is gonna be one to unite us all, regardless of which side of the spectrum we stand on. Vote YES for MeepSleep!!
In a less melodramatic way, I feel that this thread is showing that the question is two-fold:
1. How faithful do we want to remain to cartridge play?
2. Do we actually consider sleep to be universally broken?
In regards to the first question, I seriously believe that the proposed solution is the closest thing we have to keep the philosophy of Sleep Mod Clause without altering the in-game mechanics. I think it finds the balance between something enforced from outside and something replicable beyond any ignorance and bad faith.
I'd like to briefly point out that this cannot/should not be replicated with Freeze Clause, so that leaves the question of cart accuracy up in the air again, however that's a fairly small one.
In regards to the second question, I don't think that it should be applied universally. I'm sure Sleep is manageable and not a factor in many tiers. In SV OU tho, I personally don't see that big of an issue, and maybe it's just tradition, but I don't mind playing around sleep. Please remember this is Pokémon and not chess, RNG is inherent to our game.
So in conclusion, I wanna take this opportunity to label/baptize this alteration of Sleep Mod Clause as MEEPSLEEP in honor of the first poster. We can disagree on the specifics of sleep, but this small mechanical change is gonna be one to unite us all, regardless of which side of the spectrum we stand on. Vote YES for MeepSleep!!
Bro how the fuck did i say destiny bond i meant shadow tag
Mix of "Isn't really working when fast, strong attackers have sleep now," the eternal minor chorus of "Sleep Clause mod should be reworked or revoked because it's not replicable on cart," generalized dislike of sleep as a mechanic, generalized dislike of 'pure' RNG, and oh look a shiny new topic to poke at.
Also, it's not even at the proposal step yet, so there is no plan in place.
Here's my suggestion, and I will do my best to explain why I am confident in this idea, given the current circumstances. I have noticed a plethora of issues arising surrounding the sleep clause mod itself, as well as its placement and morality. This idea should hopefully solve at least a couple of those issues, or at least I hope so:
Match Integrity: By far the biggest issue that has been brought up is how the sleep clause mod creates "illegal" interactions in Pokémon Showdown. To help illustrate what exactly this entails, imagine this example: You've put your opponent's active pokémon to sleep, and want to make sure it stays asleep. You've agreed to a gentleman's rule on only having one sleeping pokémon at a time, but you don't think this could violate that rule in any way. So, you click your sleep move again, but your opponent instead switches out. The second pokémon is now asleep, and you've broken the gentleman's rule by pure accident. See what's wrong? So, sleep clause mod was added to reinforce this. However, now the game goes awry in a completely different way. When your opponent switches out, you've now wasted a turn (and a mostly-unimportant power point) because something out of your control happened. Either way, having the effectiveness of this rule be completely dependent on your opponent's actions takes away most of your sense of control of the gameplay, and that's besides the fact that sleep already makes uneasy matches on both sides due to its shaky mechanics.
In the instance of my rule implementation, neither side has to worry as much about (non-) volatile RNG anymore. If a sleep move is unavailable while a sleeping pokémon is out, then the sleep move user can simply wait for the opponent's active pokémon to wake up or switch. Additionally, the owner of the sleeping pokémon doesn't have to worry about being put to sleep on the same turn the pokémon wakes up, as it is no longer possible. The owner can also safely switch pokémon and not have to worry about losing another pokémon to sleep.
Sleep users vs. abusers: A big question that many people might have is, "what about fast sleepers?" Fast sleep move users are, sadly, not something that sleep policy changes can save, outside of a full sleep ban. The issue of fast sleep users vs. slow sleep users is much harder to solve than probably every other issue with sleep combined. The change which I have suggested, unfortunately, will buff fast users and nerf slower ones. Fast sleep users can and probably will out-speed pokémon that switch in and, due to moving first, can re-sleep an awoken opposing pokémon before said pokémon can make more than one move. Slow users, on the other hand, will be decently nerfed by this. Being out-sped by an opposing pokémon means that pokémon will get at least two moves out before you can re-sleep that pokémon, and pokémon switching in that out-speed you will be able to punish you heavily with ease. Overall, this actually sounds like a properly-balanced version of the sleep mechanic, save for a little RNG. However, it's a version which pokémon like Darkrai and Iron Valiant (the two main sleep concerns of the OU council) will be able to very easily exploit.
Match Integrity (Cont.): In comparison to the sleep clause mod, this idea is not only independent of game changes, but can even be used in a real pokémon game as well. Rather than enforcing itself only when the move connects, not letting the player choose the move in the first place would save any chance of game interruption or faulty interaction. Additionally, it relies on a condition which a player can observe and respond to accordingly, rather than one which neither player has full or even partial control over. While this would require a new "mod" in order to function on Showdown/Smogon, it would not require a mod on actual hardware.
In summary: Honestly, I thought I had more stuff to go over. Turns out there weren't as many specific issues, but rather prevalent, divisive ones. I truly hope this elaboration helped thoroughly explain the idea I had, and I hope that it at least inspires some implementations made in whatever decision may or may not be upcoming. I actually enjoyed typing this long essay, as it gave me some time for reflection on what is and isn't important in this debate, and how I really feel about it. I don't want to offend anyone in favor of sleep clause mod or any other clauses that may exist now or be added later, but I also hope that you all are open to this idea. Feel super free to respond however you want, as the support, or at least acknowledgement, would be super appreciated! I worked really hard on this and I hope to use that hard work to positively contribute to the debate and the website(s) in any way I can! Best of luck to the OU Council of all of the valuable gamers here!
- Remove sleep clause mod
- Make players unable to choose to target sleep moves against a pokémon which is already asleep
Match Integrity: By far the biggest issue that has been brought up is how the sleep clause mod creates "illegal" interactions in Pokémon Showdown. To help illustrate what exactly this entails, imagine this example: You've put your opponent's active pokémon to sleep, and want to make sure it stays asleep. You've agreed to a gentleman's rule on only having one sleeping pokémon at a time, but you don't think this could violate that rule in any way. So, you click your sleep move again, but your opponent instead switches out. The second pokémon is now asleep, and you've broken the gentleman's rule by pure accident. See what's wrong? So, sleep clause mod was added to reinforce this. However, now the game goes awry in a completely different way. When your opponent switches out, you've now wasted a turn (and a mostly-unimportant power point) because something out of your control happened. Either way, having the effectiveness of this rule be completely dependent on your opponent's actions takes away most of your sense of control of the gameplay, and that's besides the fact that sleep already makes uneasy matches on both sides due to its shaky mechanics.
In the instance of my rule implementation, neither side has to worry as much about (non-) volatile RNG anymore. If a sleep move is unavailable while a sleeping pokémon is out, then the sleep move user can simply wait for the opponent's active pokémon to wake up or switch. Additionally, the owner of the sleeping pokémon doesn't have to worry about being put to sleep on the same turn the pokémon wakes up, as it is no longer possible. The owner can also safely switch pokémon and not have to worry about losing another pokémon to sleep.
Sleep users vs. abusers: A big question that many people might have is, "what about fast sleepers?" Fast sleep move users are, sadly, not something that sleep policy changes can save, outside of a full sleep ban. The issue of fast sleep users vs. slow sleep users is much harder to solve than probably every other issue with sleep combined. The change which I have suggested, unfortunately, will buff fast users and nerf slower ones. Fast sleep users can and probably will out-speed pokémon that switch in and, due to moving first, can re-sleep an awoken opposing pokémon before said pokémon can make more than one move. Slow users, on the other hand, will be decently nerfed by this. Being out-sped by an opposing pokémon means that pokémon will get at least two moves out before you can re-sleep that pokémon, and pokémon switching in that out-speed you will be able to punish you heavily with ease. Overall, this actually sounds like a properly-balanced version of the sleep mechanic, save for a little RNG. However, it's a version which pokémon like Darkrai and Iron Valiant (the two main sleep concerns of the OU council) will be able to very easily exploit.
Match Integrity (Cont.): In comparison to the sleep clause mod, this idea is not only independent of game changes, but can even be used in a real pokémon game as well. Rather than enforcing itself only when the move connects, not letting the player choose the move in the first place would save any chance of game interruption or faulty interaction. Additionally, it relies on a condition which a player can observe and respond to accordingly, rather than one which neither player has full or even partial control over. While this would require a new "mod" in order to function on Showdown/Smogon, it would not require a mod on actual hardware.
In summary: Honestly, I thought I had more stuff to go over. Turns out there weren't as many specific issues, but rather prevalent, divisive ones. I truly hope this elaboration helped thoroughly explain the idea I had, and I hope that it at least inspires some implementations made in whatever decision may or may not be upcoming. I actually enjoyed typing this long essay, as it gave me some time for reflection on what is and isn't important in this debate, and how I really feel about it. I don't want to offend anyone in favor of sleep clause mod or any other clauses that may exist now or be added later, but I also hope that you all are open to this idea. Feel super free to respond however you want, as the support, or at least acknowledgement, would be super appreciated! I worked really hard on this and I hope to use that hard work to positively contribute to the debate and the website(s) in any way I can! Best of luck to the OU Council of all of the valuable gamers here!
It's baffling because smogon always had a sleep clause, unrestricted sleep is clearly uncompetitive, but in almost twenty years of site history there never was a paralysis clause, this is proof enough that both are not in the same league of uncompetitiveness. Bringing up paralysis weaken their argument.
i'm having trouble understanding what you're trying to say here, but i'm going to assume you missed a "not" somewhere in the second half of the sentence and go with that.
so, we're not "throwing out" anything, even if sleep clause gets replaced with sleep moves clause. first of all, this hasn't even reached policy-review stage yet, so it's entirely possible that nothing will come of this discussion, or that someone higher up on the food chain than the council will step in and say no, or that there won't be enough community support to do anything. second, if this happens, it'll only affect this gen at first, and other gens and metas are free to follow suit or not, so you might be able to play sleep-clause games in gen 8 or 7, or even natdex. third, even if every single meta chooses to implement sleep moves clause (except 1 and 2 because there's no way in hell they'd vote for that), it's not going to somehow invalidate the battles that have already happened. brightpowder was legal in every format since the founding of smogon in 2004 until the addition of the evasion items clause in 2022. did we throw out those 18 years' worth of battles then? no. did we throw out all the past battles when baton pass was banned? no. so why would this somehow be different?
Please do yourself a favor in the future and actually read the fucking discussions before trying to boil them down into a single sentence and making yourself look ignorant.
Unrelated to the discussion at hand but I have seen this brought up a few times, but what exactly is the Aldaron's proposal? Would greatly appreciate the explanation because I did a quick search of the forum and what I got seems vague
I have always been a lower tiers player, not usually fancying OU or Ubers. This generation I only have experience playing NU and PU. In this tier the main way sleep occurs is from a pokemon using rest, with the only competetive spore user being amoongus. There is little to no hypnosis to speak of due to the low accuracy. In NU spore amoonguss is a very valuable but not overpowered too, good to deal with many mons. I understand the argument against sleep moves, as it's true sleep is usually a death sentence, but I also agree it just feels wrong removing such a big feature of pokemon, except by absolute random occurences such as relic song (lol) or effect spore. If sleep is removed what's to stop additional modding of the game? To make the game as competetive as possible why not just remove all random occurrences? Why not just remove freeze? I personally love the fact that RNG can take effect in pokemon and results in wins or losses no matter what you do. Pokemon is not chess. It can feel that way, and get close, but as long as random elements exist, nothing can be a 100% certain victory or loss. And that spice is part of why i love pokemon.
Please don't remove sleep.
Please don't remove sleep.
I think the slippery slope argument is a bad faith argument. We operate under the idea that if something is broken or uncompetitive, it is banned, but the line for broken or uncompetitiveness isn't cut and dry, it's a spectrum. Banning one thing is just choosing where on the spectrum we want to place the needle, and while other random elements exist, it doesn't exist in the same general area as sleep exist as of now.
Now, I am FOR not performing any action against sleep, but I feel like a lot of arguments like "para and freeze is the same as sleep" is hella wack.
Banning all sleep inducing moves is not a mod but sleep clause is, you are defending the literal mod to the game and fear mongering about mods.
did… did you think we were going to remove sleep clause and not replace it with anything?
It was, and part of the discussion was which action to take IF we got rid of Sleep Clause, because Sleep moves shouldn't be unrestricted. Sleep Move Clause was one of the suggestion, alongside some others like harsher Sleep clause (additional rule on not being able to click sleep move).
I wanna preface this post by saying: yes, is inherently broken. For it to exist in a competitive setting requires something like the Sleep Cause to heavily limit its effect on the game. That being said, not only do I believe that the Sleep mechanic should be preserved as much as possible. I also believe that Sleep in its current form is not only competitive, but in some cases healthy for the game.
While some would argue that Sleep is inherently “uncompetitive,” and provides nothing for the game we play I couldn’t disagree more. Like all Status conditions Sleep is just a way of trying to force progress by debilitating one of your opponents Pokemon in some fashion. There is in fact play to it despite the allegations of basically being an OHKO move. Like all Status Conditions, Items like Lum Berry can be used to negate it, based on the move being used Types and even Abilities can negate the Sleep Move, and there is even an entire Move dedicated to combating Sleep in Sleep Talk. Even outside of these niche aspects of the game there is still a game to be played once a Mon is Asleep. It takes legitimate skill to not only understand which Pokemon on your team would be best to put to Sleep, but also finding opportunities to burn Sleep Turns. Remember it is not Gen 1 Freeze, or even Gen 5 Sleep. Your Pokémon still has a typing, an Ability, and most importantly HP to leverage. The fact that you can use all that to pivot your Pokémon around, and find opportunities to burn Sleep turns makes me see it as rather “competitive.”
In general I would also argue that your one time Sleep can be used in a healthy manner. Of course the stand out move is Yawn. Used often on passive Pokemon as a way to dissuade Set Up Sweepers and Wallbreakers. Everyone agrees it’s healthy for the game, and would be a negative loss if all Sleep Moves were banned. Ok Yawn was a give me, but what about the others? What about direct Sleep Moves? Much like Yawn I would say Sleep is often used as a way to check potential problem Pokemon for a team. Think of the plethora of set up sweepers in OU and Booster mons in OU. Yes while Sleep could be used to help give these Mons opportunity to set up it can also be used to scare away the mon if not outright stop the sweep in such a way that other Status Conditions don’t/can’t. It is potentially an invaluable tool for non HO teams to one time check these threats.
Of course, there are some problematic elements to Sleep that we’re currently seeing in the SV OU metagame. Arguments for its healthy aspects are usually in the context of slower more passive Pokemon. Generally Pokemon that have a hard time actually taking advantage of the free turns that Sleep provides by itself. Even Pokemon like Breloom or Venusaur which can in fact hit back are largely fine thanks to their relatively low Speed. So what happens when the Sleep user is fast and not passive? You get Darkrai, Iron Valiant, and H-Lilligant. All three of these Pokemon can actively make use of their Sleep that they induce by either hitting hard or setting up. The only saving grace about this situation is the low accuracy of the Sleep Moves, and the general frailty of these Pokemon. 75% and especially 60% are not very accurate, and turns these moves into High Risk, High Reward moves that begin to resemble the OHKO moves they’re often compared to. While considering just how frail these Pokemon are usually there is very little opportunity to use their Sleep Moves, and even then if they don’t put their counters/check to Sleep they can still struggle to actually make progress, kind of.
Darkrai is the hay bale that broke the camels back. Darkrai’s natural stats allow it run Focus Sash with very little drawback. Something that Iron Valiant cannot afford to do thanks to Booster Energy. This in general gives Darkrai more opportunities to actually hit its Sleep Move, but is also far less committal. Where Iron Valiant can’t really afford to switch; nothing is really stopping Darkrai from switching and potentially preserving its Focus Sash. Unlike H-Liligant which is stuck on Sun structures Darkrai can hit on any offensive team in need of an anti lead. Top it all off Bad Dreams is an insane ability that actually allows Darkrai to snag KOs on would be checks/counters. Darkrai is just built different compared to all other Sleep Abusers.
TlDr: Sleep is competitive, Sleep can be healthy, and Darkrai should be looked at before the whole of Sleep.
While some would argue that Sleep is inherently “uncompetitive,” and provides nothing for the game we play I couldn’t disagree more. Like all Status conditions Sleep is just a way of trying to force progress by debilitating one of your opponents Pokemon in some fashion. There is in fact play to it despite the allegations of basically being an OHKO move. Like all Status Conditions, Items like Lum Berry can be used to negate it, based on the move being used Types and even Abilities can negate the Sleep Move, and there is even an entire Move dedicated to combating Sleep in Sleep Talk. Even outside of these niche aspects of the game there is still a game to be played once a Mon is Asleep. It takes legitimate skill to not only understand which Pokemon on your team would be best to put to Sleep, but also finding opportunities to burn Sleep Turns. Remember it is not Gen 1 Freeze, or even Gen 5 Sleep. Your Pokémon still has a typing, an Ability, and most importantly HP to leverage. The fact that you can use all that to pivot your Pokémon around, and find opportunities to burn Sleep turns makes me see it as rather “competitive.”
In general I would also argue that your one time Sleep can be used in a healthy manner. Of course the stand out move is Yawn. Used often on passive Pokemon as a way to dissuade Set Up Sweepers and Wallbreakers. Everyone agrees it’s healthy for the game, and would be a negative loss if all Sleep Moves were banned. Ok Yawn was a give me, but what about the others? What about direct Sleep Moves? Much like Yawn I would say Sleep is often used as a way to check potential problem Pokemon for a team. Think of the plethora of set up sweepers in OU and Booster mons in OU. Yes while Sleep could be used to help give these Mons opportunity to set up it can also be used to scare away the mon if not outright stop the sweep in such a way that other Status Conditions don’t/can’t. It is potentially an invaluable tool for non HO teams to one time check these threats.
Of course, there are some problematic elements to Sleep that we’re currently seeing in the SV OU metagame. Arguments for its healthy aspects are usually in the context of slower more passive Pokemon. Generally Pokemon that have a hard time actually taking advantage of the free turns that Sleep provides by itself. Even Pokemon like Breloom or Venusaur which can in fact hit back are largely fine thanks to their relatively low Speed. So what happens when the Sleep user is fast and not passive? You get Darkrai, Iron Valiant, and H-Lilligant. All three of these Pokemon can actively make use of their Sleep that they induce by either hitting hard or setting up. The only saving grace about this situation is the low accuracy of the Sleep Moves, and the general frailty of these Pokemon. 75% and especially 60% are not very accurate, and turns these moves into High Risk, High Reward moves that begin to resemble the OHKO moves they’re often compared to. While considering just how frail these Pokemon are usually there is very little opportunity to use their Sleep Moves, and even then if they don’t put their counters/check to Sleep they can still struggle to actually make progress, kind of.
Darkrai is the hay bale that broke the camels back. Darkrai’s natural stats allow it run Focus Sash with very little drawback. Something that Iron Valiant cannot afford to do thanks to Booster Energy. This in general gives Darkrai more opportunities to actually hit its Sleep Move, but is also far less committal. Where Iron Valiant can’t really afford to switch; nothing is really stopping Darkrai from switching and potentially preserving its Focus Sash. Unlike H-Liligant which is stuck on Sun structures Darkrai can hit on any offensive team in need of an anti lead. Top it all off Bad Dreams is an insane ability that actually allows Darkrai to snag KOs on would be checks/counters. Darkrai is just built different compared to all other Sleep Abusers.
TlDr: Sleep is competitive, Sleep can be healthy, and Darkrai should be looked at before the whole of Sleep.
I think saying that Sash Darkrai makes Sleep a problem is quite troublesome. I find more reasoning behind Wide Lens than say, another chance to miss a 60% Accuracy move. At least with Lens you have a boosted accuracy Focus Blast as well, in case you are up against something you don't have to sleep. Though, the held item argument here is fringe, because no matter what it is holding, I don't think a Hypnosis set is as good as a NP3A or 4A set, or even a Sub3A set. Darkrai isn't the giant troublemaker for sleep people make it out to be, and yes, I do understand the positve you have listed over Valiant and Liligant, but to actually believe Valiant or Liligant have nothing over it as well is intellectually dishonest.
Valiant might want to preserve booster energy, but the idea of running Hypnosis is to not have to switch out of its checks in the first place, and it can comfortably win against its counter if Sleep did land. Meanwhile, the sash on Darkrai can easily be broken by hazards because you're not running boots. Liligant needs Sun, which is THE best weather right now and you can get it to activate more often than not. It's not a "when all the star aligns" condition you make it out to be.
The Sleep Clause Mod is a straight up mechanic change from cart, and causes players to make different decisions than they would on cart. I've seen a few instances (and personally done it myself) of people switching in a Mon to take a Spore, so it can be kept in the back all game and nothing else can be slept. Regardless of how viable that actually is, people wouldn't do that on cart. Showdown is not an accurate battle simulator with Sleep Clause Mod, straight up. People might feel differently on how important it is that Showdown be as accurate as possible. But let's be real, if Sleep Clause hadn't existed before this and the council just proposed it now, people wouldn't like it.
I think enough has been said on banning all sleep moves. It would be too much, and it'd impact more than just the few problematics mons we've mentioned. Like, Yawn is a good tool for phazing and doesn't deserve to get caught up in all this. And banning only some sleep moves but not others would be too complicated.
Darkrai is the sleep Pokémon, that's his whole deal. It would be weird if him being unbanned caused sleep as a whole to be banned, instead of just him. I think it would be best if we put Darkrai back in Ubers and then lifted Sleep Clause. It might be kind of crazy for a couple months, but the meta will adapt.
tl;dr Ban Darkrai (or don't) and get rid of Sleep Clause, let people adapt
I think enough has been said on banning all sleep moves. It would be too much, and it'd impact more than just the few problematics mons we've mentioned. Like, Yawn is a good tool for phazing and doesn't deserve to get caught up in all this. And banning only some sleep moves but not others would be too complicated.
Darkrai is the sleep Pokémon, that's his whole deal. It would be weird if him being unbanned caused sleep as a whole to be banned, instead of just him. I think it would be best if we put Darkrai back in Ubers and then lifted Sleep Clause. It might be kind of crazy for a couple months, but the meta will adapt.
tl;dr Ban Darkrai (or don't) and get rid of Sleep Clause, let people adapt
- Status