Smogon University

About

Smogon University, commonly shortened to Smogon, is a website whose content encompasses competitive Pokémon battling. It offers guides on battling strategies for people of different Pokémon knowledge backgrounds. The website was founded by 'chaos' (one of the developers of NetBattle, the most popular battling simulator back then) and is a considerably well-known website, visited by competitive Pokémon battling enthusiasts.

The Smogon motto is "Pokémon on the Internet: Let's make it happen" and their mascot is the Pokémon Koffing, the name Smogon itself being the German name for this Pokémon.^[1]

Since its founding in late 2004, the site has been a subject of much debate and mockery among the Pokemon fandom.

History

Though officially established on December 18th, 2004, many of Smogon's battlers have been part of the online competitive Pokemon scene since 1999, originating from sites such as GameFAQs, Azure Heights, RPGamer, Pojo, and The PokeMasters. Top battlers from these websites held a number of tournaments, hosted on the original "Pokémon Battle Simulator," a web based sim written by Blizzard for the RBY Pokémon games. Other battle simulators were made, more strategies were developed, and a close knit community began to form around the game. In order to give this community a unified prescence and definitive home, Smogon was founded.^[2]

Clauses

In order to balance the game, many restrictions are placed on teams. These clauses vary between tiers, but below are the universal ones.^[3]

Endless Battle Clause: Any moveset on any Pokémon that is capable of intentionally causing an endless battle is banned from competitive play.

Baton Pass Clause: Only one Pokémon per team may know the move Baton Pass.

Evasion Clause: The moves Double Team and Minimize are not permitted in play.

Moody Clause: Pokémon with the ability Moody are not permitted.

OHKO Clause: A Pokémon may not have the moves Fissure, Guillotine, Horn Drill, or Sheer Cold in its moveset.

Sleep Clause: Only one Pokémon may be put to sleep on the opposing team at a time, if not induced by a move such as Rest.

Tiers

Smogon's metagame uses a usage-based tier system, in which Pokemon are divided into tiers based on how often they are used. Generally, Pokemon in higher tiers are more powerful and useful than ones in lower tiers, though this is not always the case.

Suspect Testing

If a Pokemon is deemed too powerful for a tier by its playerbase, the Pokemon may be suspect tested. This is accomplished by creating a suspect test ladder on the simulator, and setting a certain COIL rating that players must achieve in order to vote. The Pokemon's fate is then decided by the players who qualified to vote.

Search interest

External References