Do you think the power creep has benefited or hindered battling?

Or do you think that the power creep is nonexistent or too minor to make a difference?

From Wikipedia:

Power creep is the gradual unbalancing of a game due to successive releases of new content.

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Pokemon are usually given better stats nowadays (see: Garchomp, Conkeldurr, Reuniclus, and so on). As more moves are made, Pokemon are given wider and wider movepools, making them much more difficult to check or counter. Not to mention the Dream World abilities that have drastically changed many Pokemon like Politoed, Ninetales, Sableye, and Xatu.

I personally dislike it a lot, back in Gen IV a stat of 100 was considered good. Nowadays a stat of 100 is merely average, it also makes stall harder to play due to how powerful offensive teams can get. I also feel with so much offensive Pokemon at your disposal the element of strategy is somewhat lost (not entirely of course but a little bit).

Anyways I think Gen V has become too powerful. I mean look at some of the UU Pokemon like Zapdos and Kingdra. They were big threats in DP OU and now relegated to UU. I'd say current UU has close to what DP OU had in terms of firepower. Honestly I feel it's too much and Gen VI doesn't overdo it.

In my opinion the power creep has made the game more interesting. It, if anything else, adds an unexpectable variety to the game that just increases the thrill. Think about it this way. What fun is Pokemon if you can anticipate every move your opponent makes? If the ability and strength of your Pokemon will be able to rival those you face? Basically, I just think that the constant expansion of outcomes and drastic changes simply add to suspense and benefit the game in a positive way.

Its hindered battling imo.

Back in GSC and RSE and even in Dp you had to actually work to get around counters by using your brain and lures and strategy. Now any idiot can pick up a team and just click Outrage and see the words "Haxorus/Kyurem-b used Outrage Steelix was 2hkod" or mindlessly spam weather or volt turn. So many Pokemon cannot be countered or even checked its actually ridiculous tbh.

Back in Dp i could be all like "hmmm im weak to special attackers, ill just use Blissey or something" and now we have things on the special side that actually EASILY bypass Blissey and there are ALOT of them. Thundurus-T, Special Landorus, Psyshock anything, Reuniclus, Chesto Rest Volc are just a few that come to mind. Sure there were a few back in DP and RS that beat Blissey too but those were few and far between but i digress. Same on the physical side only its much worse this gen.

Strategy is a dead and lost art now. BW "strategy" might aswell be called "lets compare our guns, if mine are bigger i win".

Hopefully XY salvages that by giving us more defensive pokemon (no Jellicent and ferrothorn is not enough) rather retarded things with base 140+ attack so people actually need to THINK again when teambuilding/battling.

i don't really see how it could benefit a metagame when it's slowly destroying one of the playstyles, a balanced meta is what most players define as desirable and such a meta inheres viability of all playstyles, offense, stall and balance, when you release ridiculous stuff like Landorus that straight up ruin stall with the combo of Keldeo and Tyranitar then that just unbalanced the metagame more

also im glad elf hasnt played BW2 a lot, hed probably end up throwing his comp out the window if he thinks volc, reuniclus and thundurus are huge problems for stall, they kind of pale compared to Landorus, Breloom, etc

I'd actually like to see older pokemon, even the ones considered NU or RU be able to compete in higher tiers. A general stat balancing would be what I like the see, instead of the ever increasing stat caps. Though, for this reason I tend to shy away from Uber/OU, and keep to UU and below. (That and most of my favorites happen to be in there. : /)

I don't mind power creep. I think it forces you to think harder and deeper about your strategy if you're going to run defensively, and the problem I encounter with most defensive strategies is that you really can't have enough moves to defend and attack. This is balanced in it's own way.

I think that walling or playing defensive needs to be somewhat on the disadvantaged side, especially when defensive pokes have a wide suite of methods to deal out damage like burns, poison, curses, spikes and weather. Not to mention that stalling is as easy as having a pokemon able to use a recovery move or item/ability/move combo to recuperate lost HP while absorbing damage and dealing out their own attacks.

I don't believe defensive tactics stop at absorbing damage. It encompasses raising your defensive stats like speed, evasion, lowering your opponent's attacking stats or accuracy, inflicting statuses on them or even stopping them entirely by putting them to sleep, freezing them, or causing flinches.

It's because Smogon is so banhappy with all of those things that defensive pokemon really have a hard time, because they get nerfed because "OMG I HATE HAX" or "OMG IMPOSSIBLE TO HIT" or some stupid crap like that.

Hax is no reason to ban something. Hax is amusing, Hax is a part of the game and Hax is really the luck component of Pokemon that I believe keeps it fresh. So yeah, we need to open the floodgates and let the game shine to it's fullest. Don't ban things like Moody if it makes an otherwise weak pokemon a viable threat. Don't discourage things like Brightpowder, Double Team or evasion raising moves!

I would like to see tiers and banlists based on faith that Game Freak knows what the hell they're doing, and that optimizes not only the fun of battling, but respects the intent of the original game...no matter how much losing to THAT ONE STRATEGY pisses you off.

Ledgetheorc said:

I'd actually like to see older pokemon, even the ones considered NU or RU be able to compete in higher tiers. A general stat balancing would be what I like the see, instead of the ever increasing stat caps. Though, for this reason I tend to shy away from Uber/OU, and keep to UU and below. (That and most of my favorites happen to be in there. : /)

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Yeah, this pretty much sums up my feelings. The new Pokemon keep getting more and more powerful with wild stats, and older Pokemon can't really keep up. Not to mention it's basically all offense. I think it's becoming a bit much, I hope gen 6 will tone it down a bit.

Going to echo a lot of the anti-power creep stuff. As much as I find stall to be boring, lethargic, and unimaginative even when done well, it definitely should be healthy enough to be viable. BW always felt like too much of a crapshoot to me and maybe that's changed but power creep...whyyyyyy

Do we really need a Dragon with a bazillion base attack or Pokemon that are instantly boosted by switching in your Tyranitar? ehhhhhh