CAP 23 CAP 23 - Part 1 - Concept Assessment

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Considering that TrappingMon are yet to be viable in OU, no matter how we build CAP23, it will eventually fall into the Targeting group of future Meta. It may be best for both this concept, and the exploratory topic of TrappingMon as a whole; to explore every viable Trap build and allow CAP23 to run them all.
As said before, CAP23 will rely entirely on surprise, being able to predict whether CAP23 is running Binding, Trapping, or any specific move in general is a weakness that will hurt CAP23's long term effectiveness in the Meta.

Something that I feel like should be made clear now is that CAP23 shouldn't have to run a trapping move
This is very important, though we can't allow these options be more viable than trapping. Several suggestions have been made to choose an Ability the maximizes Trapping moves through shoring up their current weaknesses, Perhaps a secondary Ability could chosen to give CAP23 a different spin, so long as the Secondary Ability combo isn't overshadowing CAP23's Trapping sets.

In response to 9): Perhaps there is a synergy here where the Player would choose whether to run trapping moves as their main strategy with the prime Ability and Trapping as supportive backing with a secondary Ability.
For example: abilities like Compound Eyes that boost Acc help Binding moves to hit and a secondary ability like Stakeout would synergies Offensive CAP23 to punish Trap avoidance. Making Trapping a secondary strategy that supports other attacking moves. If the Meta moves in response to CAP23 to prioritize switching out, CAP23's secondary Ability will give is a second pair of teeth.

In Short: The threat of being Trapped is a strategy all too itself. More than other Mon. CAP23 will face down it's Threats more often than it's Targets. I see this as a future challenge we should consider now before we limit CAP23's responses.
 

Drapionswing

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7. What kind of Pokemon should CAP23 aim to trap? Why should we target this group of Pokemon?

I feel like removing a Pokemon for another Pokemon to have a better matchup would be beneficial to the success of Cap 23's role as a trapper. This being said, I believe defensive Pokemon would be our best targets entirely, as this allows Cap23 to be able to support a team rather than just go at it. I think this is important as EpicUmbreon29 makes a very valid point in that trapping Pokemon to allow us to setup could lead to very intense snowballing. Targeting defensive Pokemon as trappers is important as they are much more likely to switch into a trap move than an offensive Pokemon. For efficient trapping we would need the initial recipiant of the trapping move to be beatable. This then opens a door for counter play that doesn't completely stop Cap23 as a better response would be to make more aggressive switches to prevent being trapped. In this we lose less momentum than if a defensive Pokemon were to switch in, as defensive Pokemon commonly run utility moves such as Rapid Spin or Stealth Rock.

8. What role should CAP23 play? How does this role work well with trapping moves? Should CAP23 have more than one role?

I feel as if the best role for Cap23 to play would be a pokemon that exerts pressure through the threat of breaking a wall. I feel this would be a good combination with trapping moves as it really plays into the mindgames of trapping.

When it comes to Cap23 having multiple roles, I feel as if we need a role that would beat the opposite of what we intend is our most suitable target for trapping. In doing this Cap23 becomes less predictable and encourages trap targets to switch into you more, thus giving trapping sets opportunity to trap. Vrin made a really key point today in the chat about playing on our weaknesses to lure in trap victims. Here's an example, if Cap23 happened to only have one set that trapped and we targeted fairies, eventually people would just stop using fairies to switch into Cap23 as they aren't solid answers and will end in a loss, however if we were to make a set which was beaten by fairies, then people would still have reason to switch their Fairy-Types in.

9. If it's important that the trapping move isn't run on each set CAP23 runs, how can we ensure CAP23 won't always drop the trapping move? What are some other strategies that we can use to maximize trapping moves' effectiveness?

For us to properly execute this we would need Cap23 to be able to preform opposite to it's offensive role as a wallbreaker, which is why I think a utility role would work well alongside this. If Cap23 was able to execute a less offensive Hazard Remover set, for example, then initial responses would be Hazard Setters to keep up pressure on Cap23, now if Cap23 was meant to trap Hazard Setters this allows Cap23 to have opportunities to catch the setters. Giving Cap23 a utility option can also create mind games as trapper sets could run the utility move to lure in unsuspecting responses. To ensure that moveset doesn't just outclass it's non trapper moveset, I think we'd need to give the secondary set a move to then help the consistency of set. Which would then lead to two moveslots being lost, meaning that you lose out on a vital target that the other move would provide an answer to, similar to Plasmanta previous to it's update, in which it had to choose between HP Ice to hit Ground-Types or HP Fire for Ferrothorn, but in this case that could be as simple as recovery.

This leads me to my next point about the trapping move and it's interaction with our typing. Having the trapper use the trapping move as a spammable stab may be harmful to the success of the concept, due to us inviting in natural counters. If we were to lure in natural counters then we'd have to opt for a coverage move to beat said counter and at that point you'd be more inclined to click your coverage move on the initial switch rather than your trapping move.
 
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7. What kind of Pokemon should CAP23 aim to trap? Why should we target this group of Pokemon?

Well, you're going to want to trap any threat to your team. However, in general, it's going to be the ones that hate being trapped the most. At the top of that list is bulky pivots. Then it is specialised walls. We should target them, because they have the most to lose from being trapped and therefore, trapping them does the most damage

8. What role should CAP23 play? How does this role work well with trapping moves? Should CAP23 have more than one role?

I think that having more than one role is beneficial. It allows us to explore trapping as much as possible and makes it harder for the cap to be predicted and easily countered.


That said, as it has been decided to be more offensive (and, to a lessor extent, supportive), it would make sense to go for a wall breaker/tank with options to set supportive field effects like hazard-stacking/screen setting/tailwind/terrain and weather setting etc. Hazard stacking makes the most sense to go for of those options.

The latter option benefits from trapping a non-threat in order to get a chance to set things up for teammates. The former option benefits from ensuring their Z-moves hit. They also benefit if their strongest moves are ones which certain pokemon are immune to (or even if there are many pokemon which resist them) as again, you don't want to waste a move on a switch. It also lets you set up, but that direction is something where we must be careful to ensure that trapping is still something that is beneficial to do. A move like Charge is interesting on a trapping wall breaker, as it powers up the next electric move and the opponent cannot switch to a ground type, or Voodoom or something.


9. If it's important that the trapping move isn't run on each set CAP23 runs, how can we ensure CAP23 won't always drop the trapping move? What are some other strategies that we can use to maximize trapping moves' effectiveness?

One thing we can do is give it STAB on Spirit Shackle or Anchor Shot and avoid giving it stronger Ghost/Steel moves. Giving it a way to hit Ghosts is a good idea, though that is easily accomplished with other things. Giving it access to Knock-Off to get rid of Shed Shell and similar important items is useful. Having a way to punish or prevent Rapid Spin and pivot moves is a good idea. A way to restrict opponents' moves, such as Taunt should be helpful. Having ways to boost trapping moves directly in some way is also helpful of course. A trapper should also be able to take a few hits in general to give it time to set its trap and take advantage of the trapped pokemon. Having high HP would at least give it incentive to run Ingrain and/or Leech Seed, which benefit from trapping.

As for restrictions, to ensure that the pokemon wants to use a trapping move to cope with its problems, I suggest limiting its coverage so that its moves can be walled if the opponent can switch. Next, having it need to depend on setting up would be good. Geomancy would be great for this if it wasn't a legendary signature move. Giving it a large vulnerability to an uncommon type might discourage it from trying t plow through teams and ensuring that it wants to trap a safe option instead of just taking out any member of the opponent's team without bothering to trap.
 
7. What kind of Pokemon should CAP23 aim to trap? Why should we target this group of Pokemon?

Well, you're going to want to trap any threat to your team. However, in general, it's going to be the ones that hate being trapped the most. At the top of that list is bulky pivots. Then it is specialised walls. We should target them, because they have the most to lose from being trapped and therefore, trapping them does the most damage

8. What role should CAP23 play? How does this role work well with trapping moves? Should CAP23 have more than one role?

I think that having more than one role is beneficial. It allows us to explore trapping as much as possible and makes it harder for the cap to be predicted and easily countered.


That said, as it has been decided to be more offensive (and, to a lessor extent, supportive), it would make sense to go for a wall breaker/tank with options to set supportive field effects like hazard-stacking/screen setting/tailwind/terrain and weather setting etc. Hazard stacking makes the most sense to go for of those options.

The latter option benefits from trapping a non-threat in order to get a chance to set things up for teammates. The former option benefits from ensuring their Z-moves hit. They also benefit if their strongest moves are ones which certain pokemon are immune to (or even if there are many pokemon which resist them) as again, you don't want to waste a move on a switch. It also lets you set up, but that direction is something where we must be careful to ensure that trapping is still something that is beneficial to do. A move like Charge is interesting on a trapping wall breaker, as it powers up the next electric move and the opponent cannot switch to a ground type, or Voodoom or something.


9. If it's important that the trapping move isn't run on each set CAP23 runs, how can we ensure CAP23 won't always drop the trapping move? What are some other strategies that we can use to maximize trapping moves' effectiveness?

One thing we can do is give it STAB on Spirit Shackle or Anchor Shot and avoid giving it stronger Ghost/Steel moves. Giving it a way to hit Ghosts is a good idea, though that is easily accomplished with other things. Giving it access to Knock-Off to get rid of Shed Shell and similar important items is useful. Having a way to punish or prevent Rapid Spin and pivot moves is a good idea. A way to restrict opponents' moves, such as Taunt should be helpful. Having ways to boost trapping moves directly in some way is also helpful of course. A trapper should also be able to take a few hits in general to give it time to set its trap and take advantage of the trapped pokemon. Having high HP would at least give it incentive to run Ingrain and/or Leech Seed, which benefit from trapping.

As for restrictions, to ensure that the pokemon wants to use a trapping move to cope with its problems, I suggest limiting its coverage so that its moves can be walled if the opponent can switch. Next, having it need to depend on setting up would be good. Geomancy would be great for this if it wasn't a legendary signature move. Giving it a large vulnerability to an uncommon type might discourage it from trying t plow through teams and ensuring that it wants to trap a safe option instead of just taking out any member of the opponent's team without bothering to trap.
The problem with your suggestion of making Anchor Shot / Spirit Shackle the best STAB they have is that there would be absolutely no reason to not run them, even when they aren't needed.
 
The problem with your suggestion of making Anchor Shot / Spirit Shackle the best STAB they have is that there would be absolutely no reason to not run them, even when they aren't needed.
Hmmmm ... I suppose that does violate the "shouldn't always trap" part, yes. Still, limiting more powerful STAB moves may still be appropriate to make them loo better in comparison.
 

S. Court

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7. What kind of Pokemon should CAP23 aim to trap? Why should we target this group of Pokemon?

In general, I think CAP23 should aim to more defensive Pokemon: walls, pivots in bulky offense/balance archetypes, because those are foe's response options to player's sweepers, if we can make CAP23 can sistematically trap a good portion of those Pokemon, the player will have access to a good tool to create a scenary for a cleaner

8. What role should CAP23 play? How does this role work well with trapping moves? Should CAP23 have more than one role?

Well, CAP23 should have more than one role because the premise is making the foe thinks it can trap one of its mons, but we don't want that be their unique role

I think CAP23's main role should be as a setup stallbreaker, probably using Z-Moves nuking/luring abilities to achieve easier this goal. but I think we should be sure CAP23's role against more offensive archetypes is more limited (not saying useless against them because that'd actually would be counterproductive to make people use it)

9. If it's important that the trapping move isn't run on each set CAP23 runs, how can we ensure CAP23 won't always drop the trapping move? What are some other strategies that we can use to maximize trapping moves' effectiveness?

This is my main concern about CAP23 actually: usually the Pokemon that can use trapping moves (like Heatran, Fini or Toxapex) have better things to do (Heatran main set is SubToxic iirc, Fini works as a utility or Calm Mind mon and Toxapex Infestation + Toxic trick is niche as it best)

I think Decidueye in UU should be a kind of good example, because its match up against offense is not that good, so it focus specially in trapping and removing walls (of course, we should aim to make a better Pokemon than Decidueye because... Well, Decidueye) and its best STAB move is Spirit Shackle, so even when it's not necessarily designed as a trapper, its main STAB move actually lets it make this work.

I think it should be able to remove opponent Shed shell and having at least a semi-consistent recovery move to make CAP23's work against pivots/walls can be made with more consistency.
 
Forewarning! This is a bit of an abstract thought and as a result, it isn't tied to a question in particular, but I wanted to get my idea out there.

9. If it's important that the trapping move isn't run on each set CAP23 runs, how can we ensure CAP23 won't always drop the trapping move? What are some other strategies that we can use to maximize trapping moves' effectiveness?

I think we're focusing on how we use the trapping move effectively, we're forgetting how TrapCAP is going to benefit from said trapping, and as a result, we seem to be approaching this in quite a direct way of "which trapping move should we use". I propose we look at things differently and look at "how we should use the trapping moves". And that's what I'll be basing my post on. To do this, I want to draw your attention to reachzero's mascot by now; Zygarde.

Zygarde is a very interesting Pokemon, because with a fistful of moves it can take on so many sets and roles. It can stallbreak, wall, set up, tank, deal out damage, wall break and that isn't even getting into the customized sets. Throughout that, Zygarde has a decently large amount of checks, which to shorten, basically consist of most bulky fairies, waters and any offensive ice type move. But, and this is the interesting bit, depending on the set which Zygarde runs, a Pokemon is either annihilated or given free reign. A good example of this is Arghonaught, who can take Dragon Dance and Coil easily but can't do squat when faced against a SubTox variant.

If we apply this to TrapCAP, we can take this a step up. Because Arghonaught can switch out into Clefable and beat Zygarde, but what if we can restrict that with a trapping move? Working a role similar to Gothitelle, where you're trapping a specific threat who struggles against that Pokemon, but you don't apply immediate pressure with your trapping ability, but rather allow the opponent a chance to predict correctly, making the game more fair and not detracting as, simply put, this variant of trapping punishes the player who predicts wrong and doesn't make the right play and analysis.

If we decide to go this route, then we don't have to restrict our typing to making it STAB to the trapping move, instead, we are granted more creativity to help it fulfill its role as a punisher. This is important as we are focusing on how we are utilizing the trapping move as opposed to being so centered around the move that we lose sight of the end goal of actually getting rid of the target. If we give the Pokemon a STAB Spirit Shackle or a STAB Anchor Shot not only are we making it an oh-so-spammable move which people would be more interested in clicking mindlessly. This means that we can always see the move coming and we can predict and adapt because of it. This particular reason actively discourages the idea of having a STAB move as the trap move as we lose the unpredictability. Not only this but if we refer back to Zygarde, the typing is a large reason why Zygarde is so successful as it grants plenty of resistances and a couple of immunities but gives enough fairly common weaknesses which makes Zygarde balanced. If we worked this into TrapCAP then suddenly we have a balanced Pokemon who can be controlled but not overridden.
 
Out of interest, does the specific targeting of mon not fall down down to the problem of the game evolving, like we've already seen with Voodoom being chosen a dedicated partner with X and ultimately failing (through bad design or concept, I'm not sure), while Arghonaut's entire concept was about decentralizing the meta (similarly, poorly designed, or poor concept?), and thus ending up in the trash tier as the game evolved and the top threats were no longer top threats (again - whether or not that was through the execution of the concept being irrelevant).
 

nyttyn

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The thing to keep in mind is that both Anchor Shot and Spirit Shackle blow ass for coverage (steel is a very shit attack type and even shittier in CAP's meta, and ghost is...well, it hits for neutral on a lot but that's not really what you want in a non-stab move), and are both on the weak end of what's considered acceptable, at 80 BP each. There's a serious opportunity cost in running a 80 BP move that has lackluster coverage, both in giving up a move set slot, and in using it in battle when you could be clicking your STAB move or hitting a coverage move instead. Trapping moves just are not as inherently useful or spamable as pivot moves.

Keep in mind you're going to want to use trapping as an incidental benefit, it's not nearly good enough inherently to justify a moveset slot as the primary draw. Like...If I have the coverage to kill anything that switches into me that I otherwise can't beat, why wouldn't I just use that move instead of a weak off-stab option? Why would I give up a move slot for that when I could run another coverage move that increases the pool of mons I threaten? And if we try to limit the move pool to where that's not really a option, why wouldn't I just use something with superior coverage?

If I'm aiming to use trapping moves to gain momentum...Why wouldn't I just use one of the plethora of U-turn or Volt Switch users, moves that are far superior for grabbing momentum? And jacking up the stats to high hell to make up for that isn't a solution either, because then the mon will just ignore the trapping moves and use other things unless we give it the world's worst movepool known to man, and then we're back to the "why aren't we just making it STAB to begin with" issue.

I understand the desire to make a pokemon that can do more than "just trap," but keep in mind we're working with an extremely limited number of viable moves (2!), neither of which work really well as coverage moves. And frankly what's wrong with having the concept itself be spammed? That's the entire point of this CAP, to use trapping moves. And as it turns out, the only good trapping moves are only good if you use trapping as an incidental benefit, because neither of them are particularly strong nor good at coverage, and because trapping itself is much more reliant on rolling the dice to get that one good trap you can get a benefit from - as opposed to U-Turn or Volt Switch, where you rarely go wrong with grabbing the momentum then and there.

Or to put it in other words - u-turn and volt switch work even as non-stab, even as non primary attack stat options because you usually get at least a considerable benefit in momentum if you think your opponent's going to swap or even if they don't swap. Spirit shackle and anchor shot do not, because the delayed nature of a trapping move means you'll want to use it as many times as possible to catch your opponent out, and you need some degree of power backing that or else you'll just run a different pokemon entirely. As such, we want to first provide incentive via STAB to run the trap move, and then have other sets be the surprise options - not the other way around, because steel and ghost just aren't the right types for that.

Edit: Guys you have to keep in mind CAP 23's probably going to get one, maybe two traps that matter in a good match even if it spams the move. Trapping isn't a role or anything, it's a incidental benefit to two moves that have not quite ideal but workable power. That's just a consequence of how trapping moves work in this game, and I advise anyone who hasn't yet to play some games with magma storm heatran (or if you'd like thousand waves zygarde) to see how trapping works in practice.
 
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snake

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I believe we're very close to having some direction with this concept, so this is the 24 hour warning. Any last thoughts need to be in the thread by this time tomorrow. Any questions you might have missed along the way can be answered now if you'd like, but I think the last thing we really need to analyze further is "fearing" vs. "expecting" trapping moves. Let's look at a couple of examples:

Generation 6 Heatran: It could be specially defensive, it could be a scarf set, it could be an offensive set, or it could be the trapper set. You wouldn't know it was a trapper until you risked your Chansey to tank the possible Fire Blast, but if Magma Storm connected, your Chansey was likely a goner. That's fearing a trapping move.

Generation 7 Decidueye: Yeah I know it's UU, but think about it: if you see a Decidueye, what do you think? "Oh no, it's going to trap me if it hits me with Spirit Shackle!" because it will always run it. In essence, trapping is simply a bonus here. This is expecting a trapping move.

I have one last question to emphasize on this concept:
10. Is it more important for the concept to make the opponent "fear" the trapping move or "expect" the trapping move? Why?

Again, 24 hour warning starts now. This has been a great discussion so far, so let's finish strong.
 
Is it more important for the concept to make the opponent "fear" the trapping move or "expect" the trapping move? Why?

I think it is more important for the concept to make the opponent fear the trapping move. If the opponent expects it, than CAP23 cannot use trapping moves efficently as everything will just switch out into a counter immediately, rendering CAP23 completely useless. If this happens, we have failed to explore the effects of a user of trapping moves on the metagame and we have failed. If it is feared, it makes the opponent think twice about switching their Tomohawk or Static Cyclohm (Shield Dust is immune LOL) into your physical attacker. If they get trapped, they might not live to tell the tale. At that point, the metagame will adapt to it and we will have successfully explored trapping moves in the CAP metagame.
 

Deck Knight

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To be honest I don't think the ideas of fear vs expect are mutually exclusive. If, for example, we keep with both and one of them is STAB and the other coverage (conceivably, a Ghost type with a Fairy or Rock weak or a Steel type with a Ghost weak) which would mean CAP would run both as effective trapping moves and opponents would have to fear the STAB if that's more effective or the coverage if that is more effective. Now again, the parameters of this would all be discussed in the typing stage.

Generally speaking though, whenever we do a CAP Playtest, people overcompensate for the presence of CAP and so it will be assumed there is an effective trapping set in effect. The exact trapping move could vary if we make multiple viable sets, and I think that is achievable. I don't think it's possible not to "expect" trapping from CAP23, however switching into the trapping move with the coverage or a set with the appropriate coverage move to address that threat would be one way CAP could continue to be "feared" even if trapping is "expected."
 
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nyttyn

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Realistically speaking, you're usually screwed if you make a bad swap expecting your opponent to not swap anyway. The fact they might be trapped doesn't particularly change how they approach that - in fact it's usually worse than just killing them with a coverage move, since they get a chance to fight back.

And that's how swaps in pokemon work, anyway. You tend to avoid bad swaps that would screw you over if you guessed wrong as to what set it is unless you absolutely have to or are feeling like you've got a read on your opponent and think they'll use a certain move. So regardless of if CAP 23 runs a trapping move on every set, people will assume de facto that it'll run a trapping move on every set until proven otherwise, and play around it accordingly. Which actually doesn't mean all that much in this individual case since anything that beats CAP 23 will beat it regardless of if its trapped or not - likely speaking, a bigger consideration as Deck said would be be what coverage moves CAP 23 has open to it, and at that point there's not much counter-play anyway since if you're trapped, you're dead. If you'renailed by coverage, you're probably dead. Either way, you're dead, but being trapped just draws it out, it doesn't actually affect how you approach the situation unless CAP 23 can set up in your face (which isn't actually a major concern in CAP since tomohawk exists).
 

Quanyails

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10. I mentioned this on Discord a few hours before the question, coincidentally. I apologize if I'm repeating or off-tangent, as I haven't been following the thread too much.

Expecting the trapping move not only makes the CAP more likely to succeed but opens up more interesting competitive gameplay. You know that the CAP is good at trapping you, and that all but forces a switch, causing you to lose a turn and take residual damage. That's not necessarily a bad thing that the trapping move is predicted and doesn't "work". The reaction it incites effectively changes the tide of the battle. It reminds me, actually, of an older CAP concept, Psychological Warfare, which similarly says that it's less so about the success of the move itself and more about what decisions are made because of the move.
 
10. Is it more important for the concept to make the opponent "fear" the trapping move or "expect" the trapping move? Why?

Regarding this, I've got to agree with many of the points mentioned by the people above me. Already the idea of having a Pokémon potentially trapped, even if it is a check to CAP 23, can exert pressure on the opponent and influence the way in which said player handles the situation, leading to potential misplays and giving an advantage to CAP23's player.

This could work even better if CAP23 has some good coverage to handle certain threats, creating a guessing game where the opponent has to either risk having his/her Pokémon trapped by CAP23, or having his/her potential check hammered by some coverage move. Hence creating a sense of "fear", if CAP23 is played correctly.

Besides, if CAP23 will be equipped with pivoting moves, it could be able to regain momentum even if it trapped the wrong target, which means that even in the worse case scenarios CAP23 would still have accomplished its goal, since its player can still "trap" the CAP23's check by sending out a counter-check.

So, in both scenarios, CAP23 would still accomplish its duty as a trapper due to the other player being induced into expecting the trap which, ironically enough, could make him/her fall into yet another trap.
 
10. Is it more important for the concept to make the opponent "fear" the trapping move or "expect" the trapping move? Why?

I think its more important for the trap move to be expected by the opponent. If the trapping move is expected because it would show that CAP 23 succeeded in making a trap move set usable without crossing the line and becoming feared. Expectation also forces your opponent to play around your strategy to get rid of CAP 23 allowing for said CAP to essentially control the momentum of the battle.
 
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Since snake asked

I would like to point out that fearing the trap means they will expect it, but if they expect it, that's when you trick them. Its when you don't click pursuit but click knock and nab a kill you would have missed. It's all about the 50/50. The best way to "succeed," since in reality thats all subjective, is to make a trapping pokemon that makes the opponent expect the trap. If they are forced to respect the trap, in reality they will play a lot safer around it. This will give cap 23 the opportunity to really shine with the other tools we give it, whatever we decide those tools are. We should be focusing less on the actual trapping move itself, and what the move itself does, but on the impact the moves presence has. I know this isn't exactly the same but think about it this way. 90% of Dugtrio's strength in the metagame is the fact that he can trap you at any time, and he makes you think twice before making any move. You don't want to lose your Pokemon, and you respect what Dugtrio is able to do. In this way, he has much more control of the match. In reality, Dugtrio maybe gets like 1 kill, then gets sacked off later. However, the simple fact that Dugtrio is there has an effect on the entire match, and makes the person facing it have to play a certain way, allowing the person using Dugtrio to control the pacing, depending on how they see fit.

We should strive to achieve this same effect with CAP 23. A Pokemon that truly controls the pace of the match, with its ability to trap a Pokemon, and really turn the match in the user's favor.
 

LucarioOfLegends

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10. Is it more important for the concept to make the opponent "fear" the trapping move or "expect" the trapping move? Why?


I think it is important to "expect" it to be there due to its nature as a trapping move. Anchor Shot and Spirit Shackle are absolutely incredible moves simply because of their secondary effect (P.S. trapping is counted as a secondary effect, and is effected by Shield Dust and Sheer Force) and 80 base power is suprisingly high for those types physically, especially Ghost. Because of this, there is likely no reason not to run these moves on any moveset that you run. Because of this, you can instead make the opponent fear that they are actually not carrying a trapping move, but are carrying a coverage move for one of its checks. With this idea you can play serious mind games with the opponent. This is why I think it is important to expect the trapping move.

As coverage.

I personally think that Decidueye is a terrible example of what "expecting" a move is, as expecting something means that it is likely that something will happen. With Decidueye, Spirit Shackle is pretty much guaranteed to be run cause there is no better Ghost STAB option than what Spirit Shackle can offer. This is why STAB move trapping is bad for this question, as it turns the "most likely" into a "will".
 
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T
I understand the desire to make a Pokemon that can do more than "just trap," but keep in mind we're working with an extremely limited number of viable moves (2!), neither of which work really well as coverage moves. And frankly what's wrong with having the concept itself be spammed? That's the entire point of this CAP, to use trapping moves. And as it turns out, the only good trapping moves are only good if you use trapping as an incidental benefit, because neither of them are particularly strong nor good at coverage, and because trapping itself is much more reliant on rolling the dice to get that one good trap you can get a benefit from - as opposed to U-Turn or Volt Switch, where you rarely go wrong with grabbing the momentum then and there.
Just to continue about this part of the discussion, The only Ou-viable trapper is Heatran, and the reason it's effective is because of the spamability of Magma Storm, partially due to the fact that it IS stab. It makes would-be hard counters to Heatran not want to come directly into it, such as Duggy, due to the fact that Dugtrio can just instantly be deleted since the %dmg goes after the sash is consumed. A player using Heatran doesn't need to predict too often, as the poke coming in on it is being forced to stay in for the next turn, and I feel that it's the consensus that we're going for the same approach with TrapCAP. The fear of coming into a somewhat hard hitting STAB attack would definitely dissuade some checks that could be easily worn down if they come in repeatedly, such as a bulky Lando-T.

This fear of trapping is already shown in the only viable trapping poke, Heatran, and I feel that CAP23 should instill the same fear into would-be checks. Also, I agree with nyttyn that it should be a STAB attack, since both ghost and steel coverage is extremely bad, and the fear of coming into this STAB boosted somewhat-high-base-power move should be the reason that Pokemon fear switching into it.
 
10. Is it more important for the concept to make the opponent "fear" the trapping move or "expect" the trapping move? Why?

For this question, rather than answering it directly, I'm just going to throw some general thoughts about the answer out there.


Basically, we want this Cap to be defined by using trap moves effectively. As such, if the opponent sees the Cap and wonders if the Cap will have bothered running a trap move, it gives a hint that we failed to define the Cap as an effective trap user. That said, if the opponent is certain that the Cap will run a trap move, the trap move becomes so predictable, it loses effectiveness, thus we reduce the Cap's ability to use traps effectively. Neither is ideal. As such, we want t make sure that the Cap will usually want to run traps, because that is usually the most effective ting to do with the Cap, but that the opponent cannot be certain they'll run a trap as one could run something else to punish the opponent for predicting a trap move. It's a fine line, but that's the ideal target. Personally, I think that the opponent expecting a trap move is less of a problem than the opponent expecting there to not be a trap move, as the latter indicates a failure to define the Cap as a trap user, while the former can still be used effectively and taken advantage of.
 
10. Is it more important for the concept to make the opponent "fear" the trapping move or "expect" the trapping move? Why?

I think they should fear the trap moves, but I am afraid that they will be expected instead. Obviously fearing includes expecting but I think the question is more will they be worried or not be worried, In which they could always prepare. A solution to this is making the pokemon have a very diverse selection of trap moves, all with some sort of use, that way making the enemy know there will be a trap move but not necessarily know what it is.
 

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10. Is it more important for the concept to make the opponent "fear" the trapping move or "expect" the trapping move? Why?

Opponent should expect it most of time, but CAP23 should have more than one option, it's important to make CAP23's role less predictable and mitigate foe's counterplay, because if it gets too obvious, CAP23 will start to fail in its work.

My concern is how can we make CAP23 most used set is a trapper set without restricting to it, but I guess this will be discused in another part of this project.
 
10. Is it more important for the concept to make the opponent "fear" the trapping move or "expect" the trapping move? Why?

Having people Fear it seems like it would work better in the long run, but having people expect it may be easier to pull off. For the former, both sets would need to be similarly viable (although making the non-trapping set(s) more viable is fine, as long as they don't invalidate the trapping set), since it would be harder to make an educated guess on what set the TrapCAP in front of you is running. This will occasionally work in your favor, especially if we can make both trapping and non-trapping sets work well against different kinds of Pokemon, as your opponent may guess wrong and make a decision you can the capitalize on for an easy KO. However, much like all other types of psychological aspects in the game, the idea of making an opponent fear a potential trapping move is far from perfect.
 
Dang, I missed Q's 7-9 due to illnes :/ I'm still gonna touch on some of them briefly, since it matters for my answer to the current question.

10. Is it more important for the concept to make the opponent "fear" the trapping move or "expect" the trapping move? Why?

I think it's better if the opponent fears the trapping move. It means CAP23 can pressure the opponent with mind games instead of him always having the trapping move on his mind. If he would, he would be more likely to switch into a counter to CAP23, making the trapping less usefully or even pointless.
Also we earlier came to the conclusion that using a trapping move alone is already a cost of momentum in itself (in comparison to a trapping ability), so it should be in our interest to minimize any further losses of momentum.

8. What role should CAP23 play? How does this role work well with trapping moves? Should CAP23 have more than one role?

Following my answer to Q10, I think a pivotal role would greatly benefit CAP23, because it gives it a ways to gain momentum for the team. This also can make the opponent predict a switch-out of CAP, instead of the trapping move, making him stay in and get cought with the trapping move instead.

9. If it's important that the trapping move isn't run on each set CAP23 runs, how can we ensure CAP23 won't always drop the trapping move? What are some other strategies that we can use to maximize trapping moves' effectiveness?

The easiest ways would be to make CAP23 prone to 4MSS, this way the user has to choose whether to run the trapping move or another move instead.
 
Dang, I missed Q's 7-9 due to illnes :/ I'm still gonna touch on some of them briefly, since it matters for my answer to the current question.

10. Is it more important for the concept to make the opponent "fear" the trapping move or "expect" the trapping move? Why?

I think it's better if the opponent fears the trapping move. It means CAP23 can pressure the opponent with mind games instead of him always having the trapping move on his mind. If he would, he would be more likely to switch into a counter to CAP23, making the trapping less usefully or even pointless.
Also we earlier came to the conclusion that using a trapping move alone is already a cost of momentum in itself (in comparison to a trapping ability), so it should be in our interest to minimize any further losses of momentum.

8. What role should CAP23 play? How does this role work well with trapping moves? Should CAP23 have more than one role?

Following my answer to Q10, I think a pivotal role would greatly benefit CAP23, because it gives it a ways to gain momentum for the team. This also can make the opponent predict a switch-out of CAP, instead of the trapping move, making him stay in and get cought with the trapping move instead.

9. If it's important that the trapping move isn't run on each set CAP23 runs, how can we ensure CAP23 won't always drop the trapping move? What are some other strategies that we can use to maximize trapping moves' effectiveness?

The easiest ways would be to make CAP23 prone to 4MSS, this way the user has to choose whether to run the trapping move or another move instead.
I think that making it too prone to 4MSS discourages the Cap from running the trap move as it takes up a lot of moveslot space which could possibly be used better for something else. As long as the Cap has options which are too good in comparison to trapping, the cap will always use those options instead of trapping.
 
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