It’s been over a week since we’ve heard news of a possible massacre which supposedly would have taken place at the Pokemon World Championships which were held in Boston this year. Since then, we’ve had time to consider the information presented to us. While I reacted strongly to the news (as did a lot of people), I’ve had some time to consider the information presented, and I actually have doubts that there was any real danger to any attendees of the PWC.

Was there any danger to PWC attendees? At this point, that’s something for investigators to figure out. However, a number of members of the Pokemon community already seem convinced of their guilt. This might actually be mistaken, and I admit that my quick reaction to the news may have been likewise mistaken. This is something that can happen when we are presented with news that sounds shocking and hits close to home. We are prone to overreacting.

In the case of the supposedly-thwarted massacre at the PWC that theoretically could have taken place, there are several mitigating factors that one can find if one were to carefully read the news stories (keeping in mind, of course, that many news outlets omit such important information altogether to present a story more fitting with the personal bias of it’s journalists).

For one thing, consider what these two men are charged with: according to BostonGlobe.com, the two men are charged with “unlawful possession of a firearm, unlawful possession of ammunition, and other firearm charges.” Why? Because the two men couldn’t produce a license to carry the weapons.

That’s it. No conspiracy to commit terrorism or similar charges.

If the two were really conspiring to commit a terrorist act, the lack of an appropriate charge for having done so would have been a serious omission. But there was no such charge. What this suggests is that the authorities have considered the information presented to them, and decided that there was no intent to commit a terrorist act.

Another point to consider is that the two men did not carry the guns into the convention center with them. Here is a question: If two people had the intention of carrying out a mass shooting, wouldn’t they want to take their guns with them? Of course they would. But they didn’t. And what this suggests is that the story of the two being gun aficionados who wanted to visit a shooting range after the tournament is actually plausible. It’s supported by the fact that, when attempting to gain entry to the event, they left their guns in the car.

Next point is the nature of the firearms and how the ammunition was packaged. Of the two guns pictured in BostonGlobe.com’s story, one is a shotgun, the other is a rifle, and the ammunition was not stored in bags. The weapons in question would have been more fitting for a hunting trip than for an urban assault. Such guns would quickly run out of ammunition, presenting an opportunity for people to stop them as the weapons were reloaded. And because the ammunition wasn’t stored in bags, there was no indication of any intent to carry the ammunition on their persons in a theoretical shooting. This evidence suggests that the two really did have the intention of visiting a shooting range after the tournament.

Considering this, fellow Pokemon fans, we shouldn’t be so quick to string these two men up by their toes. Careful consideration of the evidence suggests that they may not have had any malicious intent, after all.

Another point to think about is the fact that these two men really seemed to be Pokemon fans. Think about it: These two weren’t just passive Pokemon players, they received invitations to Worlds. That’s something that not every Pokemon fan can claim to have done. So it’s not like these were two guys that were some Pokemon-haters who were out to discourage Pokemon fans from enjoying their favorite game (with a mass-shooting, of all things). Furthermore, the two belonged to a Pokemon fan group on Facebook. Considering these things, do these two seem like the kind of people who would want to have a shootout at an organized Pokemon event? I don’t think so.

“But what of the evidence to the contrary?” What evidence would that be? Some might point out that the name of their Facebook group was “Mayhem Pokemon Crew”. And? It’s yet another Facebook fan group with an edgy-sounding name. There are a lot of gaming groups with edgy names like that. They are usually so named, not because there is a desire among it’s members for wrong-doing, but just to give their group a sort of appeal.

“But what about the joke about ‘killing the competition’?” It would seem that the two made a really bad joke, and they underestimated people’s capacities to take it seriously. And that they took it seriously wasn’t necessarily a bad thing; making such jokes with weapons makes people seriously consider the safety of people near them. But by the looks of it, it really was just a joke, even if a bad one.

It seems like the Pokemon community generally wants to see these two men locked away, and the liberal media doesn’t seem to care much to discourage them considering that, in turn, this story is being reworked by people with an agenda that involves rewriting the constitution of our republic to take away the right to possess weapons.

The court of people’s minds have already assigned guilt where there might not actually be any.

Considering the information that’s been presented to me so far concerning the two men accused by so many of plotting a massacre at the Pokemon World Championships, I am not convinced that the two actually had any intention of carrying out a shooting at the event.

It would appear as though the only charges that the two men face concern their possession of firearms without a permit, and other firearms charges. This is a matter that is in the hands of the justice system. As for us Pokemon fans, it might actually be mistaken to assign guilt, considering that the evidence points to the two men not being a danger to the Worlds event.

We might find out more about the supposed would-be shooting soon. Until then, it would seem that the two men might be innocent of what so many are accusing them of. I know that people are jittery concerning the recent increase in mass shootings, but it might be that, in this case, there’s no guilt.

As the old saying goes, “It’s better for twelve guilty men to go free than one innocent man be condemned.” That’s something to think about.

UPDATE (9/2/2015): The two would-be shooters have been denied bail. Because of this, the two will be held for about 4 months, the time it would take before their trial would take place.

It would seem that the Facebook conversation between the two wasn’t the only time that the two had joked about guns. There is an ongoing investigation into whether there was a potential mass-casualty situation. That’s something that still seems unsure, but that doesn’t mean that those viewing the case from the outside looking in aren’t already convinced of their guilt. It really doesn’t look good for the two right now, however. That these two have engaged in threatening gun jokes before means that there is at least something wrong with their sense of humor. What’s more, there is also an ongoing investigation into whether one of the two engaged in cyberbullying. If that turns out to be the case, that would make the two look even worse. That’s one of those things that the public hears about and gets sick of pretty quick. That would contribute much more to the desire to make an example out of the two.

The way things are looking, the two have an established history of making threatening gun jokes on the internet, and the matter culminated in the two being found to have brought near an event the same guns that they posted a picture of while making a joke threatening the safety of the event attendees. It really doesn’t look good for these two. Based on the information provided, it’s not surprising that the two were denied bail.

At this point, however, the most serious charges against them concern their possession of firearms and ammunition without permits. They still don’t officially face charges for conspiring to commit a mass murder. At this point, however, it’s hard to tell just what their motives were. That “they seem crazy” is not sufficient to convict someone for conspiring to commit a mass murder, there needs to be substantial evidence for that. However, the history of the two’s online interactions seem sufficient to deny them bail.

The two had a lawyer, who insisted that the two didn’t have any intent to cause harm. However, intent is a hard thing for people to measure. What the two joked about (if they were joking) was a pretty serious matter concerning the safety of a number of people. So it’s not a surprise that the two failed a dangerousness hearing.

What becomes of the two is up for the justice system to decide. For those wondering why I made a post that appeared to defend these two: It wasn’t my intention to defend what either of these two did that may have been wrong. Personally, I find the mentality of those who are out for blood a little distasteful, and I pointed out that there are mitigating factors to this case. Whether the two were guilty of plotting to carry out a mass-murder is something that I still don’t know, considering the information currently available to me (and to just about everyone else). A lot of people seem to have their minds made up, and much of that seems to come from emotional reaction, facilitated in part due to how the information was presented to them, rather than by carefully considering the information available. I’m sure that most people, if they were to appear on the news one day with a serious charge made against them that they were innocent of, would strongly desire that people would carefully consider the case rather than assume the worst about them. But it seems that the court of public opinion isn’t that kind. There are people who have been accused of sexually abusing children that have been cleared of the charges, but their reputations are still ruined. This is because of that “assume the worst” mentality. It might seem like “playing it safe” to some people, but assuming the worst of everyone you meet it taking it too far.

America has a problem, not with guns (which have been around for centuries), but with rotten attitudes, some of which can lead to mass shootings (which have only recently become a trend). America is going to continue having that problem as long as they obsess over padding all the walls and taking away the sharp objects, but not treating the mental disease that makes people want to go on killing sprees.

A plot to have a massacre at the 12th Pokemon World Championships has just been foiled. A link to the news story is here.

I’m happy that the Boston Police stopped these guys. While it’s easy to get cynical and think that police like to let power go to their heads, they do make communities much safer. I hate to think what might have happened if the would-be gunmen weren’t stopped.

As for the two would-be gunmen, they were competitors who had received invitations to worlds. One of them posted a picture of a hunting rifle on Facebook and said that they were “ready for Worlds”. The other joked about “killing the competition”.

One might think that it was just a joke between the two. If that were the case, it’s a vintage bad joke.

The two would-be gunmen might not have been bad at playing Pokemon (they did receive Worlds invitations), but they evidently didn’t understand the public nature of social media. The two attempted to gain entry into Worlds, but for a possibly unrelated reason, they were turned away and were slapped with “No Trespass” orders. The convention center security contacted the Boston Police Department, who were aware of their Facebook exchange, and they detained the two.

Bravo, Boston Police Department!

As it turns out, the two weren’t joking in their Facebook exchange. Boston Police found firearms in the two’s vehicle, and the two were arrested.

When you think about Pokemon, what do you think about? Maybe you think about cute, colorful hug-em-squeeze-ems that can breath fire and expel electricity. Maybe you think about dragons and whales wrestling for sport. You probably wouldn’t associate Pokemon with some guys who flip out and decide to kill a bunch of kids. As it turns out, there are some pretty messed-up people out there.

Pokemon is a game about friendship and adventure. In the Pokemon fanbase, there is a sense of energy and enthusiasm that makes it different from other game communities that I’ve seen. Pokemon players are less likely to become intellectual tyrants and instead encourage players that seem to be struggling. Because of this, it’s surprising that someone who plays Pokemon would seriously consider carrying out a mass murder. But, again, there are some messed-up people out there.

While it’s surprising enough that such a person existed in the Pokemon community, it’s more jarring still that two such people met one another and encouraged one another to carry out their sick murder fantasy. In the years that I’ve played Pokemon, I have never seen anything close to the kind of attitude that the two would-be gunmen exhibited.

However, there is a bright side to this. The Pokemon community, as well as the community at large, is much safer thanks to the efforts of the Boston Police.

As for the two failed terrorists, they’re probably finding out that Pokemon isn’t very popular in prison. One of the big games in prison is Poker. Not that they’ll be the ones playing; guys like them are typically used as bets.

I know that there are people out there who would use this incident to attempt to further their political agenda, saying things like “this is why guns should be banned”. No, it isn’t. This is why spanking a misbehaving child is a good idea. Doing stupid things like counting to five or ten only encourages your children to act up, because you’re establishing a limit that is very easy to push, and demonstrates to them that you’re too lazy to administer an actual punishment. Children have a hard time understanding an explanation as to why acting out is wrong, but they do understand when something hurts. Use that to discourage negative behavior, and in time, they’ll figure out the relationship between bad behavior and bad results. Besides, if you spank your child, you won’t kill them.

And if you spank your child, you’ll be far less likely to suffer the shame and disgrace of being the parent of some deviant that fired a gun at some kids playing games. Preventative measures are better than long-term regrets.

As for those who are worried about the safety of the Pokemon community, it’s much safer now that two would-be killers are locked up. The news may be jarring, but you can continue enjoying Pokemon.

UPDATE: I have made a separate entry with additional thoughts on this matter. It might be that the two men weren’t conspiring to carry out a mass shooting, after all.

Have you had a pokemon where what you’ve heard about it is much different from your own personal experience? I have. Dusclops is a pokemon that I’ve played competitively and had so much fun as other players struggled against it.

If you were to go to a community like Smogon, you’d probably hear something like “Don’t use Dusclops. It’s terrible.” But here’s the thing: not only is Dusclops not terrible, it rocks pretty hard. Here is a set that I’ve used:

Snickers
Dusclops
Sassy nature
Ability: Pressure
Item: Eviolite
– Will-O-Wisp
– Night Shade
– Pain Split
– Protect
252 HP / 4 Def / 252 SpDef

Not going anywhere for a while? It might because Dusclops is walling you so well. Dusclops’ already high defensive stats are brought even higher by the presence of Eviolite, which makes it soak up moves it’s not weak to as though they weren’t a big deal. Most walls are either physically or specially oriented, but Dusclops’ physical and special defense are both really high. A Sassy nature is chosen because once burned by Will-O-Wisp, physical attackers wouldn’t be doing much damage. Night shade is there so Dusclops has something to do when Taunted, and in between racking up passive burn damage with Protect. It’s a little disappointing that Pain Split is it’s only form of recovery, but it still works pretty well against opponents that think they’re nearing a KO.

Now, there are a few concerns that players express when it comes to Dusclops:

“But Dusclops is Knock Off bait.”
Yes, Dusclops is Knock Off bait. That doesn’t mean that Dusclops is unusable. In fact, that could work well in luring in threats with Knock Off. Dusclops even has Protect to scout.

Oh, I just brought Dusclops in, and the other player is bringing in something like Weavile. I’ll just bring in a Pokemon holding a Mega Stone.
Oh, the opponent used Knock Off. How predictable. Now I know which of their pokemon has Knock Off.
So, the opponent’s surprise is lost, and they’re probably going to want to get their Knock Off pokemon out of there, unless they want it clobbered by my mega.

Strategy.

“But Dusclops doesn’t have reliable recovery.”
Dusclops’ Pain Split isn’t very good, but Dusclops benefits very well from a Wish used by Sylveon. Dusclops can even switch in easily to benefit from Wish, as long as the player doesn’t allow it’s HP to get so low, that it’s hard to switch it in. It takes foresight on the part of the player to get that to work out. Again, strategy.

“But Dusclops doesn’t work well when statused, especially with Toxic.”
Something like Toxic can make stalling backfire, but the same goes for just about any pokemon that walls. Remember how I mentioned Sylveon? It also has access to Heal Bell. Or you can have Chansey use Aromatherapy. This is the kind of team support that’s often used in competitive play, so status conditions aren’t usually much of a problem as long as the team’s healer can get out there and do it’s job, which is pretty easy to do.

“But Dusclops is slow.”
And? There isn’t much expectation that pokemon that wall go first in a turn. Unless Trick Room is up, the opponent is likely going to attack first. I know that a lot of players out there like their walls to be something that they just send out and then they shut their brains off as they watch their pokemon soak up attacks, but sometimes a person might want to use a little strategic thinking to determine that it might be a good time to get Dusclops out of there so it can later safely come in on Wish support. It might seem like Dusclops needs a lot of help from Sylveon, but Dusclops worked great for me before adding Sylveon to my team.

“But Dusclops is shut down when Taunted.”
That’s true, but here’s the thing: Dusclops can be switched out to get around it. Dusclops doesn’t need to set up to do what it does, so it’s not hurt much by the minor inconvenience of switching out of an unfavorable situation to let a teammate take over. Much of competitive pokemon does involve prediction and strategic switching. I know it sounds like I’m using the word “strategy” a lot, but that’s something that makes certain pokemon very effective.

Dusclops is the kind of pokemon that Mega Mewtwo Y wants to get a critical hit on. If Dusclops doesn’t seem to be working on your team, that might not be Dusclops’ fault. Dusclops might not be invincible, but a pokemon doesn’t need to be high on Smogon’s viability charts to be usable. Perhaps the reason so many players are having a problem with this thing is that they aren’t very well prepared for it. Or maybe they’re seriously underestimating it.

Smogon banned Landorus. As of Friday, their members that achieved voting requirements have already reached a supermajority (of 75.5%) that was so overwhelming, that any further votes would not have changed the outcome. Therefore, the Incarnate form of Landorus is banned from OU, and is restricted to the Uber tier (or Anything Goes).

Wait, what?

I’m a little surprised that Landorus Therian form wasn’t the form being suspect tested. Landorus-T is the form that’s been consistently appearing in the top five for OU usage statistics.

Having said that, both forms of Landorus can cause serious problems. Both have excellent typing, both offensively and defensively. The combination of Ground and Flying types gives Landorus immunity to two popular attacking types. Landorus-I possesses an excellent speed tier, and both have access to Rock Polish for increased speed. Better yet, it doesn’t get paralyzed with Thunder Wave. Both have excellent abilities, with the nod going to Landorus-I, whose Sheer Force ability brings it’s already-high attack stat to stratospheric levels. Better yet, it can hold Life Orb for higher damage yield.

While it might be surprising which form was chosen for suspect testing, the outcome isn’t very surprising. Landorus was a very overcentralizing force. It was heavily used for a reason: it was very strong. Now Smogon’s popular OU environment will find itself adjusting to an absence of Landorus-I.

There are those who are on the outside looking in, who typically come about in times like this with something like the following:

Smogon bans every pokemon I like. They think they can change the rules for everyone. I don’t understand what Smogon is doing.

If Smogon only bans the pokemon you like, you probably like pokemon that are seriously unbalanced. Contrary to popular belief, Smogon isn’t out to change the rules for everyone. Smogon makes their rules for use in their own competitive environments. Those rules are not intended for use by any other community. This means that, unless you’re battling in Smogon’s competitive community, Smogon’s rules don’t apply to you.

So one might ask, “Why are there so many competitive battling communities that go by Smogon’s rules?” Even Serebii.net, with it’s Pokemon of the Week feature goes by Smogon’s rules. Why do they do this? Because Smogon is so popular, that they’ve become heavily trusted by fans. Some even trust their decisions above official Pokemon competitive rulings. Considering that the official VGC competitive environment is Garchomp and Mega Kangaskhan spam, it’s easy to see how someone would desire something more balanced. Smogon certainly has a far stronger mechanism for player input, which is natural, considering that Smogon.com is run by Pokemon players.

It’s not Smogon’s intention to try to change the game for everyone. Instead, many webmasters choose to adopt Smogon’s rules for their own competitive environments. Even among casual players, it’s easy for a person to say “let’s play this match by Smogon’s rules” and it’s not unusual for the other player to understand what this means.

What Smogon is doing seems pretty obvious. They are attempting to create a competitive Pokemon environment that is balanced. Smogon’s rules are as popular as they are because they have a very effective system for balancing competitive play, which is something that Nintendo and GameFreak don’t seem to spend much time bothering with.

So, Smogon banned Landorus’ Incarnate form. Perhaps its Therian form is next.

I’ve heard it said over and over again that Pokemon stole from Digimon with it’s new Mega Evolution game mechanic introduced in Pokemon X and Y. And while this is not true, it’s repeated again and again by uninformed people who didn’t bother looking into it.

Their statements basically come down to this:

Pokemon, after coming up with original content and implementing new and novel gameplay mechanics for well over a decade, decided to steal the concept of Mega Evolution from Digimon, and thought it would go unnoticed in spite of the fact that millions of people have played Digimon, and that there would be plenty of geniuses out there who notice the vague similarities.

The main reason anyone makes this mistake seems to be because of the use of the word, “mega”. But here’s the thing:

There are no mega digimon.

This might sound surprising, but it’s actually true. I know that if you’re playing the English version of Digimon, the Digimon growth stages are listed as follows:

• DigiEgg
• Baby
• In-Training
• Rookie
• Champion
• Ultimate
• Mega

And I know what some of you are thinking: “Look Raizen! It’s right there! Mega! Its the last one on the list! Did you miss it?”

However, what most English players of Digimon don’t realize is that, in the English versions, the assignment of the words Ultimate and Mega for the last two stages is the result of a mistake.

Here is what the stages were called in the original Japanese version:

• DigiTama (DigiEgg)
• Baby I
• Baby II
• Child
• Adult
• Perfect
• Ultimate

Source: http://wikimon.net/Evolution_Stage

This is what the stages are actually called. Notice how there is no Mega stage? It is actually called “Ultimate”.

When Digimon was being translated to English, a mistake was made: The “Perfect” stage was instead called the “Ultimate” stage. The translators were probably informed that the final Digimon stage was called “Ultimate”, and thinking that the Perfect stage was the last one (as the word “Perfect” implies completion), they assigned the name to that stage, instead. When the real Ultimate stage was revealed to them, they had already given the name to something else. Oops. So the last stage was called “Mega” instead.

So there you go, the only reason anyone thinks that there is a mega digimon stage is due to a mistake made by translators. There are no mega digimon.

Some, being informed of this irrefutable statement of fact, might still take issue with the temporary nature of Mega Evolution as being too similar to the temporary nature of Ultimate-level digimon. Does it really need to be pointed out that both Pokemon and Digimon came from Japan, which are very familiar with the concept of transforming characters?

The following is an incomplete list of Japanese IPs with characters that can transform:

• Dragonball Z
• Kamen Rider
• Sailor Moon
• GaoGaiGar
• InuYasha
• Ranma 1/2
• Magical Doremi
• Moetan
• Cardcaptor Sakura
• Mermaid Melody
• Sonic the Hedgehog
• Naruto
• Rosario Vampire
• Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha
• Yu-Gi-Oh!
• Shugo Chara!
• Voltron
• Demashitta! Powerpuff Girls Z
• Bleach
• Q-Ko-Chan the Earth Invader Girl
• Tokyo Mew Mew
• Pretty Cure
• D.N.Angel
• Most or nearly all super sentai genre anime and manga not already on this list
• Most or nearly all mahou shoujo genre anime and manga not already on this list

And there’s more. Lots more.

There is a reason that the concept of transformation and reversion occurs so frequently in manga and anime: it’s a sweet concept. So don’t be surprised if, after nearly twenty years, GameFreak finally decides to implement it as a gameplay mechanic in Pokemon (counting characters like Rotom, Castform, Shaymin, Meloetta, Kyurem, Giratina, and Deoxys, they’ve been doing it for a while).

At this point, someone might grasp for straws, saying, “What about Digimon crests? They’re like mega stones! Pwned!!” What about them? Crests were pretty much discarded as a concept after the end of Digimon Adventure 1 and 2, when Digimon was still young. They were a plot device that emphasized character development rather than a necessity for digivolution. Digimon could reach the Ultimate stage without their help. Now if only the Digimon anime emphasized that point… Oh yeah, it did, and legions of Digimon fans missed it. Some fans they are.

A thing about fans: it seems like a lot of people take the word “fan” lightly, and apply it to themselves not knowing what it means. People seem to like calling themselves “fans” of something if they like a concept or sometimes watch an episode of a TV show. What most people don’t seem to realize is that “fan” is short for “fanatic”, and that it implies a consummate level of involvement that perhaps goes well beyond nerdhood. A person isn’t a “fan” of House M.D. if they watch an episode now and then. A person is a fan of House M.D. if they’ve watched just about every episode, maybe some of them several times.

A person isn’t a Digimon fan just because they watched the Digimon anime on TV once. Also, a person doesn’t get to call themselves a Digimon fan if they didn’t know that there wasn’t really a mega digivolution stage, because they didn’t know one of the most basic things about Digimon. However, if you have a poster of Kari Kamiya bathing on your bedroom wall, you probably are a Digimon fan.

Or if you’re a 23-year-old overweight woman that draws things like this.

A lot of people miss this, but mega evolution isn’t in every case from a third stage to a fourth one. In some cases, it’s from a first stage to a second one (such as for Mawile and Absol). In this sense, mega evolution could perhaps be more closely compared to “burst digivolution”, but most people who are familiar with Digimon aren’t even aware of what burst digivolution is because most people who are aware of Digimon don’t know much about it outside of the anime up to Digimon Tamers. After that, Digimon fell from cultural relevance, and the show and games could have been about just about anything, and people would largely not even notice what they were doing.

So some might point to burst digivolution and say that Pokemon stole that idea. Nope. Yeah, there are digimon that require an item to digivolve, but Pokemon has been doing that for a long time. It’s been a thing since the year 2000, when Slowpoke and Onix needed hold items to evolve to Slowking and Steelix, and there were others like them. Remember that?

However, it’s a moot point. Pointing out coincidental similarities between two very similar intellectual properties pretty much gets nowhere, especially considering that one of them (namely, Pokemon) still sells Nintendo handhelds and has had characters that appeared on commercial airliners, among other things, while the other (namely, Digimon) hasn’t been culturally significant in well over a decade. Really, why would a highly successful intellectual property that’s going on to two decades old want to emulate a different one that hasn’t been popular in a long time, and wasn’t really a big deal to begin with?

I think any reasonable person would be persuaded by now. Pokemon did not steal the Mega Evolution mechanic from Digimon. If you know someone who disagrees, there is something that you can do for the winning side: provide them a link to this article.

Digimon fans, don’t get upset. You can still enjoy your favorite game while knowing that Pokemon didn’t steal from it. It’s been the case for over a decade, anyway. This isn’t an article about how Pokemon came first (you can read more about that here). In fact, you probably just learned something about your favorite game (that there is no Mega digivolution stage). Everybody wins.

Serebii featured Lopunny as it’s Pokemon of the Week, and personally, I think they could have done more with it.

Lopunny is very viable in competitive battles, thanks to the recent addition of Lopunnite in Pokemon Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire. Here are a few movesets that I think Lopunny can use well.

First, I’ll start with one that I use. It’s similar to one that Serebii featured, and I think it can be considered a pretty standard Lopunny set:

Chilled Mocha
Lopunny
Jolly nature
Ability: Limber
Item: Lopunnite
– Fake Out
– Return
– High Jump Kick
– Ice Punch
252 Atk / 6 Def / 252 Spe

Not a hard set to understand. Get Lopunny out there and mega evolve it, get some chip damage in with Fake Out, and then treat it as a fast Normal/Fighting sweeper, with one cool twist: thanks to the Scrappy ability that Lopunny acquires, it can hit the Ghost types that might otherwise switch into it with little problem with it’s Normal and Fighting moves. In fact, Mega Lopunny’s High Jump Kick is super-effective against Sableye. Ice Punch is for coverage.

Usagi Yojimbo
Lopunny
Jolly Nature
Ability: Limber
Item: Lopunnite
– Cosmic Power
– Drain Punch
– Return / Ice Punch / High Jump Kick / Baton Pass
– Return / Ice Punch / High Jump Kick / Baton Pass
252 HP / 128 Def / 128 SpD

Looking at Lopunny, one might not figure it to be a tank. But it does have decent defenses and access to Cosmic Power, so Lopunny can function as a tank with very high speed, and can use Drain Punch for recovery. The last two moves would depend on what supports Lopunny’s team well, with Return, Ice Punch, and High Jump Kick being attack moves that work well on Lopunny, and Baton Pass for passing on Lopunny’s defensive boosts. As for the EV spread, it can be adjusted depending on what seems like a bigger concern. One could go with more Defense or Special Defense, or max both with just a little in HP to focus on getting more out of a Cosmic Power boost. Impish or Careful nature boosts Defense or Special Defense, respectively, and may be preferable if you don’t care too much about the Speed for this set.

Last Resort Rabbit
Lopunny
Jolly Nature
Ability: Limber
Item: Lopunnite
– Fake Out
– Last Resort
– (blank)
– (blank)
252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spd

A very straightforward set. Lopunny comes in and uses Fake Out, and having done that, it can use Last Resort, its only other move. Fake Out helps with chip damage, and gives Lopunny a move to go with Last Resort so it will work. Scrappy really benefits Lopunny with this set, otherwise Ghost types would wall it. One might ask what this set would do about Rock and Steel types that would resist this set’s two moves. When up against these, it might be a better idea to switch Lopunny out and let one of it’s teammates deal with them. If hard-hitting, fast, and simple are how you like your pokemon, I think this set is something you’d probably enjoy.

I like Serebii’s Magma Head set, however. Lopunny can use Substitute pretty well. It can be tempting to put Drain Punch with the Magma Head set, but I think Power Up punch’s attack boost can serve Lopunny well. I don’t know why they called their set “Magma Head”, though.

Since it’s ban from OU before the release of ORAS, Smogonites have contested the controversial decision by Smogon to ban Aegislash from the OU tier. The vote passed narrowly, and with changes that came about with the release or ORAS, fans have called on Smogon to do another suspect test for Aegislash.

The fans have gotten what they wanted; Smogon did another suspect test for Aegislash. And Aegislash is still banned. In fact, the community so overwhelmingly favored keeping the ban in place, that just days into the vote, 72.8% of qualified voters had voted in favor of keeping the ban in place, and a release of the results was made well before the Friday deadline. For Aegislash to have been unbanned, there would have to have been a 60% majority favoring unbanning. However, the vote didn’t come close to that.

When you consider what Aegislash can do, it’s hard to disagree with the results.

Steel and Ghost are both excellent defensive typings, together granting nine resistances and three immunities. Aegislash has both those types. Not only that, Aegislash has some excellent versatility.

For one thing, it can change between two forms during battle. It starts out in a defensive form, with very excellent defenses that allow it to make more of it’s typing. During that time, it can set up with Swords Dance. Right before using an attack move, it changes to an attack form, with very high offensive stats. It hits hard with Iron Head, and has a priority move with Shadow Sneak. To turn back into it’s defense form, it uses it’s attack, King’s Shield, which in addition to changing Aegislash’s form, also protects Aegislash from attack moves for the turn, and sharply lowers the Attack stat of whatever tries to use contact attacks on it during that time. Also, it works well with Weakness policy so those super-effective moves that don’t do much to it in it’s defense form result in Aegislash increasing it’s Attack and Special Attack by two stages each.

It’s easy to see why Aegislash has a lot of fans. It’s a sword pokemon, which is a pretty cool concept. Not only that, it’s very strong. It’s hard to fault someone for liking something that can win. Aegislash is a practical choice in many competitive environments, because it’s good at winning. If you hear someone say that they have a high winning streak in the Battle Maison, he probably had Aegislash on his team. Or Greninja. Or both.

So, to those who wanted to see Aegislash suspected tested again so badly, you got what you wanted. However, it wasn’t unbanned from OU. Those who recognize Aegislash as a pokemon that would severely unbalance OU see this as a good thing. If Aegislash were unbanned, we might have seen teams include Aegislash and one or two pokemon that can take it on just to be competitively viable.

There are likely complainers out there who are saying things like, “Smogon always bans pokemon I like” or “Smogon bans everything” or “I just don’t understand what Smogon is doing.” Sound familiar?

If you like having an environment unbalanced by Aegislash and don’t like what Smogon does, you can just play in a different competitive community than Smogon. Smogon’s decisions only apply to the Smogon community. Smogon doesn’t make it’s rules to impose on other communities.

You might be asking, “So then, what about Serebii, who does it’s Pokemon of the Week feature based on Smogon’s rules? What about Pokebeach and numerous other communities out there that play by Smogon’s rules?” They do this because they choose to. It should be widely known that Smogon isn’t official, and it’s rules only apply to it’s own community. However, there is still a widespread notion that Smogon can be trusted to decide what pokemon are too strong for a balanced competitive game. Much of this comes from the fact that Smogon has perhaps the most sophisticated system in place to help them make such determinations. That Smogon is also very popular is another reason it’s trusted.

If you want to use Aegislash in link battles with your friends, you can still do that. There are probably plenty of communities out there that still permit it’s use. As for Smogon, they made the decision that they deemed necessary to keep their OU environment balanced, and this time around, I think it’s easy to see that their decision is pretty sound.

I’ve obtained my own Aegislash and used it in battle, and it’s easy to see why it would have to share an environment with the likes of Primal Groudon, Xerneas, and Mega Mewtwo Y to not seem unbalanced. Even in relatively inexperienced hands, Aegislash can be a terror.

So, what gets suspect tested next? Currently ranked S on Smogon’s OU Viability Ranking Thread are Mega Altaria, Clefable, Keldeo, Landorus (I), and Mega Metagross. Of those, Mega Metagross has recently been suspect tested. That it wasn’t banned, I found to be a little surprising. Whatever they decide on, there’s likely to be someone out there that’s upset by it.