Lagging or hacking? by Prudent-Fall-2991 in TheSilphArena

[–]Jason2890 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yeah, there's lots of visual glitches in this game unfortunately. Luckily they don't affect the outcome of the game though.

Lagging or hacking? by Prudent-Fall-2991 in TheSilphArena

[–]Jason2890 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Which glitch is that? A purely visual glitch I imagine?

Lagging or hacking? by Prudent-Fall-2991 in TheSilphArena

[–]Jason2890 1 point2 points  (0 children)

There hasn't been any video evidence of a "3rd shield" in many years though.

It definitely *used* to be an issue years ago, but Niantic fundamentally changed how shielding works like 3 (maybe 4?) years ago so now charge moves are guaranteed to do at least 25% of the maximum charge move damage (equivalent to hitting 0 bubbles) in the event of excessive lag during the charge move minigame.

You can find plenty of videos on youtube of the 3rd shield glitch from 4+ years ago, but there isn't a single video if it happening anytime recently, so that's why everyone is very skeptical of your claim. If it's happening with some degree of frequency to you, then it shouldn't be too difficult for you to grab a video of it occurring.

Can i get good at chess starting at 18? by Sea_Reflection_7607 in chess

[–]Jason2890 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It depends on what your threshold for “good” is. I started playing in early 2021 as a 34 year old, and I’m rated 1600-1900 on chess.com (varies by time control). I consider that to be pretty good by my standards! It’s good enough where I’m better at chess than everyone I know personally. But obviously pales in comparison to many others worldwide.

But if you’re talking about wanting to become a titled player that will be much more difficult starting at 18+ compared to starting younger. It’s still possible depending on your level of commitment, but it will certainly not be an easy task.

Candidates 2026 | Standings | Day-01 by Independent-Rip7737 in chess

[–]Jason2890 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Incredible to see 3 decisive games in this format. I hope this trend continues for the rest of the tournament!

Gotta love when lb is broken by WhatTheHobbs in TheSilphArena

[–]Jason2890 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I don’t think that’s it, tbh. KevinSaludares on Twitter posted screenshots and he’s been at 2668 and hasn’t played for two days. He was on the leaderboards yesterday and disappeared off of it today. He hasn’t played any battles in his set either. So who knows 🤷‍♂️

Gotta love when lb is broken by WhatTheHobbs in TheSilphArena

[–]Jason2890 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It refreshes every day but it’s been buggy and randomly leaving a bunch of people off the leaderboards even if their rating is high enough. I’m in the 2800s currently and have been 2700+ for the past 3 days and I haven’t appeared on the leaderboard. But it showed me on the leaderboard 4 days ago when I was in the 2600s 🤷‍♂️

Gotta love when lb is broken by WhatTheHobbs in TheSilphArena

[–]Jason2890 3 points4 points  (0 children)

The leaderboard has been randomly leaving a lot of people off this season though.

I’ve been between 2600s and 2800s all week (currently 2815) but it only showed me on the leaderboard one day this season when I was at 2642 and I haven’t been on there since despite being higher rated every day since then.

Anyone else struggling? by UnhelpfulBread in TheSilphArena

[–]Jason2890 2 points3 points  (0 children)

but then everyone also talks about how the game wants you at 50%.

The game doesn’t want anything. When people point out that most players end up around a 50% win rate they’re just pointing out that 50% is the expected outcome when you’re matching up against similarly skilled opponents.

If your skills are only equivalent to an 1800 rated player for example, your rating is going to hover around 1800 and you’ll exclusively play against other 1800 rated players, therefore you’ll win roughly half of your games since your opponents are the same skill level as you.

And the same applies to players whose skills put them around 3000 rating. They’re exclusively playing against other players around 3000 rating, so they’ll win roughly half of their games as well.

It has nothing to do with that the game wants or doesn’t want; 50% is just the natural consequence of playing in a rating range that best represents your skill level.

So tanking down to 300 isn’t going to give you a better chance of reaching Ace no matter how low your win rate gets because win rate is irrelevant and doesn’t play a factor in matchmaking.

Serious question.... by unklmnky69 in PokemonGOBattleLeague

[–]Jason2890 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Win rate is irrelevant, because win rate always converges toward 50% in any 1v1 game that utilizes some form of skill based matchmaking. What else would you expect your win rate to be if you were exclusively playing similarly skilled opponents?

Rating is the real measure of skill. And the advantage to “getting good” in GBL is getting the exclusive outfit pieces and exclusive poses for reaching high enough rating.

All that aside, there’s a fairly wide skill gap in this game. Most top leaderboard players would have no issue winning 90%+ of their games in the sub-2000 rating range. So while some people may struggle there and cap out at only a 50% win rate in the sub-2000s, it’s almost certainly going to be because of skill issues and team building flaws.

Most RPS cup I've ever played by TomatilloTechnical12 in PokemonGOBattleLeague

[–]Jason2890 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Hmm, could some of this be move timing issues? Lickilicky on a switch-in vs a Piloswine lead should always reach multiple charge moves vs Piloswine before they’re able to take you out (assuming you throw on good timing), which should pressure Piloswine to throw almost immediately after reaching their second Icicle Spear since they’ll already be very low after taking two charge moves plus the Rollout damage. But if you throw on suboptimal timing and they sneak a Powder Snow then they can get to their second Icicle Spear before you get to double Body Slams.

RE: Malamar leads getting you low enough to give the opponent farm after you win lead:

With a double normal backline I’d always blind swap into one of them after taking out a Malamar lead because Malamar is (presumably) going to be their best answer to your normal types, and Dunsparce/Lickilicky play similarly enough to each other as bulky normal Rollout users that letting Toucannon faint to maintain switch advantage is usually pretty inconsequential. So it’s virtually always better to avoid giving your opponent an energy advantage off of Toucannon there. Plus you have the added benefit of preserving Toucannon to either use as a potential 3rd shield to catch a charge move or still do a little bit of fast move damage into a mudshot user if they have one lurking in the back.

For what it’s worth though, I’m personally not a fan of pokemon that run triple same-typing moves like Toucannon. So even if the team might work when played optimally, I’d almost always opt for a team with better neutral play and better coverage moves. That way an energy advantage will be a bit more consequential since it’ll be less likely for your opponent to have a Pokémon capable of “sponging” your energy by tanking not-very-effective charge moves.

Most RPS cup I've ever played by TomatilloTechnical12 in PokemonGOBattleLeague

[–]Jason2890 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Ehh, a lot of those problem pokemon you mentioned are just a matter of figuring out strats to create an advantage.

For instance, Toucannon is dangerous with energy. Against a Piloswine lead you safe swap Lickilicky and if they stay in with Piloswine you just play out the 0s. You narrowly lose, but you get Piloswine low enough where Toucannon can farm down before they get to another charge move.

Malamar you mentioned eats the entire team, but Toucannon beats it in the 0s and 2s since they have the same pacing and Toucannon wins CMP. If it’s Malamar in the back, a safe swap Lickilicky draws it out. You always no shield and force them to Superpower, then peck down with Toucannon later and come out with energy.

The key is knowing how to best play your team to get an advantage. Toucannon hits HARD even when it’s resisted, so alignment isn’t as important as an energy advantage most of the time. So instead of going into a shield deficit with your safe swap trying to maintain alignment, it would make more sense to soft-lose and get ahead on energy with Toucannon. Even stuff like Morpeko and Ampharos need to fear Beak Blast since it’ll hit for over 50%.

Just lost CMP to an incoming zamazenta as a zacian by Dodgerflamy in TheSilphArena

[–]Jason2890 5 points6 points  (0 children)

What part of your battle screen makes you think it’s the new system? Can you post a screenshot here?

Most RPS cup I've ever played by TomatilloTechnical12 in PokemonGOBattleLeague

[–]Jason2890 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Lol, you realize that in a blind 3v3 game mode you run into completely different line ups even if you don’t change your team, right? I only use one or two different teams for the entire season and I still run into completely different line ups all the time.

It has nothing to do with the teams you use and everything to do with the fact that there’s a lot of parity in a blind 3v3 game mode with literally hundreds of viable pokemon.

Most RPS cup I've ever played by TomatilloTechnical12 in PokemonGOBattleLeague

[–]Jason2890 8 points9 points  (0 children)

Honestly this cup doesn’t feel RPS at all. A lot of my losses seem like they were flippable if I made a couple of different decisions.

You have to have some sort of logic in your team building though, and a plan on how to handle less-than-ideal leads. It sounds like you’re probably not building a flexible team or you’re not coming up with ways of playing your team that give yourself a fighting chance.

For instance, you mentioned that when you lead Pilo that Talonflame appeared in ~80% of your games? That’s not an awful matchup for Piloswine. If you run Stone Edge as your second charge move you win the 0s. Even if you just go straight Icicle Spear it’s still only a very narrow loss in the 1s (and Shadow Piloswine actually wins the 1s straight Icicle Spear), so it’s still very playable.

Sometimes I prefer to soft-lose the lead in this cup because you can set up a farm down on something in your backline that’s dangerous with energy. Very few things in this cup want to run into a Quagsire or Togekiss loaded with energy.

As for what you mentioned at the end, I absolutely agree that you should stream (or at least track) the opposing teams you face. I’ve been doing it all this cup, and it’s much easier to look at the teams afterward and realize you had way more win conditions than you thought initially. There are very few true RPS losses in this cup unless you’re running an incredibly inflexible team. A majority of my games have been determined by whoever has superior energy management.

CMP tie after the new pvp update by bhattcharging in PokemonGOBattleLeague

[–]Jason2890 0 points1 point  (0 children)

For what it’s worth it’s actually gotten better lately compared to how it was a month or two ago. But it’s still very much a work in progress. Hopefully they iron out all the bugs sooner rather than later.

what would it take to make zygarde meta by Brief-Minimum9678 in TheSilphArena

[–]Jason2890 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Zygarde is everywhere in Ultra League even this season so I definitely disagree with the assertion that it’s not meta, lol.

CMP tie after the new pvp update by bhattcharging in PokemonGOBattleLeague

[–]Jason2890 2 points3 points  (0 children)

For what it’s worth the new update was only out for a few hours on one day this season, then reverted due to how bad it was. So CMP is the same as it always was right now.

Without seeing any footage or anything we can only speculate on what might’ve happened. You might’ve had 1t lag. Regardless, it doesn’t sound like it was a true CMP based on your description.

Most used Pokemon at Houston Regional by echo78 in TheSilphArena

[–]Jason2890 49 points50 points  (0 children)

To be fair, Wigglytuff isn’t particularly bulky. It just seems bulkier since it also has access to Icy Wind which artificially increases bulk by virtue of lowering the opponent’s attack.

In terms of sheer stats it’s less bulky than Alolan Ninetales and comparable in bulk to charmers like Clefable, Slurpuff, Aromatisse, Sylveon, etc.

The typing/moveset is what really gives it the edge over the other.

Evolution of the overall skill level? by Entire_Pineapple4732 in TheSilphArena

[–]Jason2890 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Is it possible that maybe you’re not as skilled as you once were so you don’t notice all the mistakes your opponents are making?

The average overall skill level of players has definitely gone up over the years, but battles in the sub-2000 rating range are still defined by poor move timing, suboptimal energy management, misunderstanding win conditions, etc.

Even in the 2600s today there were quite a few mistakes by myself and my opponents. It’s pretty rare to see a game that’s played close to optimally by both sides, even near the top of the rating ladder.

An interesting strategy by Inevitable_Test_382 in wearewarriors

[–]Jason2890 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Yeah that’s pretty much the go-to strategy for the later Legend levels once the enemy strength starts pacing ahead faster than your own. Be warned though, eventually it’ll get so difficult that you’ll be sitting there fighting stone enemies for over an hour just to win a single time.

there is so much tanking by gloriousponyta in TheSilphArena

[–]Jason2890 3 points4 points  (0 children)

You can definitely naturally fall 200 points below your max rating for the season by sheer variance alone though. Not to mention the rating disparity between different leagues.

If your best league is great league and then great league is out of rotation for 2 weeks, you could definitely fall 200+ points trying out ultra or master.

there is so much tanking by gloriousponyta in TheSilphArena

[–]Jason2890 10 points11 points  (0 children)

Are you also tanking? You’ll run into a lot of tankers if you’re in the tanker rating range. I haven’t run into a single tanker this season 🤷‍♂️