Finally I've typed this up, lol.
You all know at this point that I support the test to a certain extent. Salamence is probably not Uber. No one here thinks it is that I know of. However, I don't see how this makes a test unnecessary or its result a foregone conclusion. For a long time just just assumed that Latios and Latias were Uber and that Garchomp was OU, as if it was just so obvious that it was out of the question. However, once they were tested, two of them switched tiers, and Latios was to some extent controversial. Given that history, I don't necessarily see what bad could come out of the test, assuming paragraph submissions are required. Poor logic will not ruin the test, and we could find that Salamence was more dominant than we thought. I'm not saying that this is likely (since IMO it's quite unlikely), but it is possible. Keep that in mind.
The main reason I am a proponent of the test is because I either disagree with or am disgusted by the arguments (or random hyperbole) against the suspect test. The hyperbole speaks for itself in its large amounts of inaccuracies and annoyances. But this thread is for serious arguments, not stupid and useless ones, so I'll move on to those.
The first serious argument against the test is that everything (or most everything, aka the damage calculations) is theorymon...just look at D_A's signature/practically all of Vance's post. Really, all damage calculations do is demonstrate something's power. With both the support and offensive characteristics, the amount of damage Salamence does is
directly related to how it fits or does not fit one or both of the characteristics. In order to sweep a significant portion of the metagame with little effort, you have to do a lot of damage. How the damage calculations that show how much damage Salamence does is theorymon is beyond me. After all, if Scizor comes in on a Draco Meteor, will it not do 49-58% damage? I mean, I know D_A has cited that as his way of beating New MixMence, so if he does that in actual battles, that certainly can't be theorymon. Of course, they can't be the only argument since damage calculations are just facts and evidence. If you don't link how they are important to the original claim--this is either "A Pokémon is uber if, in common battle conditions, it is capable of sweeping through a significant portion of teams in the metagame with little effort" or "A Pokémon is uber if, in common battle conditions, it can consistently set up a situation in which it makes it substantially easier for other pokemon to sweep," and the fact that the OP in the policy review thread makes it seem like theorymon. But this isn't "let's find the weakest argument on Smogon and then counter that." This is "find the strongest argument on Smogon and then counter that" (since I would imagine the burden of "proof" is on those in favor of the test, though it's unclear how much evidence or proof you need to actually get a test rolling). If you guys are picking on Phil's post specifically, then it's really hard to disagree with you (considering I would then agree with you lol...), but just because the OP was bad does not mean that the damage calculations in it are not important. I will get to their importance later.
The other serious argument that I've seen with regard to the mixed set (which I think is much more worthy of a test that DDMence) is that you can outplay it. Outside of Outrage (which is exclusive used as a Blissey killer and a late-game sweeping move), outplaying Salamence will always be a temporary solution. In my opinion, this is what sets it apart from the Dragon Dancer, whose main sweeping move is Outrage, so being outplayed will end its sweep and likely get it killed. However, with the mixed set (and this is where damage calculations come into play), there is not the same price to pay for being outplayed. First of all, MixMence will do damage right away, and despite Draco Meteor being resisted, it does a load of damage to things like Scizor, as the damage calculations show. How is this relevant to the support characteristic? Significantly weakening some of the best defensive Pokemon in the game
despite predicting incorrectly sure sounds like setting up another Pokemon to sweep to me. That bolded part brings me to my next point, which is that the main logical flaw I find in the "outplay it" argument is that it is assuming that it is reliable and you will always or nearly always be able to win the prediction battle. I think on PC this comes from the fact that people using this argument (D_A especially) are so good and such a step above most of their competition that it is an expectation to outpredict them, and rightfully so. But remember, when something is essentially a 50/50 chance, you can't say something will happen nearly 100% of the time (or at least enough that the risk is rendered hardly relevant) just because of your skill. I was always under the impression that you had to assume for the purposes of this test (or argument for/against it) that both the user of Salamence and the defender would be of the same skill level. After all, very good players like the D_As of the world aren't the only people playing on the ladder--in fact, as many of you have cited before, skilled players tend to be in the minority on the ladder. I see the "outplay it" argument in the same light as someone who says that you should go to Vegas because "you
will win a lot of money" rather than "you
could win a lot of money." The idea that outplaying it someone will suffice in beating the monster that is MixMence baffles me a bit. Not only does it seem to fail to take the risk into account but it also assumes that the defender is more skilled than the user of Salamence, and hopefully I covered these points earlier. Now I will go back to the damage calculations (and yes I realize this argument is not very well-organized, so hopefully you won't miss the forest for the trees in the inevitable disagreeing with me). I'm going to take risk out of it hypothetically for a minute. Let's say you outplay MixMence and thus can always outpredict it when it first comes in. You send in Scizor without the risk of being OHKOed (even though in real battles that exists), but it still takes 50% from a Draco Meteor (average damage of Naive MixMence vs CB Scizor), which becomes 62% with Stealth Rock down. This leaves your Scizor at 38% health assuming it has not taken any prior damage. If you Bullet Punch, assuming Salamence has taken SR damage (plus LO recoil from Draco), you still are not guaranteed to KO Salamence, so if it stays in, it could beat your Scizor; given how important Scizor is to most teams, this is a huge loss. Why does this matter? My point is that D_A pointed this out as an ideal situation for dealing with MixMence yet Scizor still has a chance to lose (especially if it thinks you will switch and uses Pursuit only to find out that Salamence used Fire Blast and didn't switch). I know the theorymon police will be at me on this, but that would be missing the point. I know that these situations are unlikely and I'm not saying they would happen. But, even if Salamence dies, the minimum impact it has is pretty good. But, as a user of Salamence, and I'd like to think a good one at that, I rarely get the minimum impact out of it. My opponents have been burned before thinking that I will Fire Blast specially defensive Skarmory when his Scarf Latias gets massacred by Draco Meteor. Sometimes Scizor is weakened early (or any other Steel-type really, as not all teams carry 3 Steels lol), and Draco Meteor and Outrage can just run through everything. These possibilities do not always happen. But they are important too. Note that this whole paragraph is more or less my opinion on the "outplay it" argument and these are not my reasons for being for the test. I will get to those now.
As I mentioned earlier, those in favor of a test have the burden of proof. However, in this case, all we need to prove is that there is a reasonable concern that Salamence could be Uber. I will ignore DDMence since I do not believe there is reasonable concern that it is Uber, and though I think I briefly mentioned it earlier, I will elaborate further if anyone wants me to. MixMence and the support characteristic is what I want to prove. So I'll get to it now.
Jumpman said:
Support Characteristic
A Pokémon is uber if, in common battle conditions, it can consistently set up a situation in which it makes it substantially easier for other pokemon to sweep.
First of all, I would like to mention that MixMence has almost no good counters or checks. You have to "outplay it" to win, which I covered a few moments ago pretty extensively. Why is this relevant to the support characteristic? Because you can't clear the way for other sweeps if you are just stopped by a common counter and forced out. Then your Pokemon has not accomplished anything. The fact that unless your opponent has Cresselia, a well-played Blissey, or a few others I'm sure I have forgotten about, they will risk losing an important Pokemon every time Salamence comes in because they are forced to outplay it. With losing an important Pokemon comes potentially opening up a sweep. We all know this, but this is if Salamence wins the prediction war. what if it does not? Salamence still does a ton of damage, even when its attacks are resisted. a Scizor at 40% health is no longer much of an answer to Latias. In my experiences, Salamence usually does far more to Steel-types since they will have to switch in again on it or Draco rolls max damage and it already had to come in on a Latias Dragon Pulse earlier, or some similar situation. Even when Salamence is thoroughly outpredicted, it still has a notable impact, and even when it is outpredicted all but once, its impact becomes much larger. This, I believe, is enough to nominate MixMence under the support characteristic. If you don't feel like that's enough, I'm only going to agree to disagree since I can see why some people don't think it is. If you want to argue with how I logically came to that conclusion, I would be happy to argue =)
However, I did mention Blissey earlier. My one and only major doubt about the conclusion I have come to is that MixMence does have trouble with Stall teams--indeed, only they can truly be prepared for any form of Salamence with the possible exception of the Choice Bander, but that is hampered by being locked into one move, something MixMence does not have to worry about unless it foolishly uses Outrage. However, since almost all stall teams run Blissey, Salamence will be forced to use Outrage (and thus sign its own death warrant) or it will have to remove Blissey by luring it with another Pokemon. This certainly goes against the
consistently part in the support characteristic, something that I don't even think is violated by needing at least decent prediction (since it's rare that Salamence is thoroughly outpredicted, as I covered earlier). However, stall teams wear it down very quickly and can play around it with a much less significant risk than other styles do, in large part thanks to Blissey. While I do think that a Salamence test is justified, I find difficulty being completely confident in what I have said except for my disagreements with what has been said about theorymon and merely "outplaying it." When the need to outplay MixMence fades to a certain extent (which some stall teams accomplish), it becomes much more average compared to its huge impact against offensive teams. Indeed, such a threat (one that is only dominant against certain play styles) might not need tested at all. In my opinion this is completely subjective. I don't see how a test that could potentially erase any doubt (or confirm it) is harming anyone.
Cute Note: This post is ~500 words shorter than the first set in the Giratina-O analysis. LOL