Revamping the RMT section: what content can we allow?

Question

In this week's edition of Fizz Posts Another Overlong Discussion Thread, I want to talk about the RMT section. I think it has been brought up before that the RMT section is perhaps our weakest in terms of activity and user retention. While I can't find the thread my memory says went up some time last year, the topic did stick in my mind and got me thinking about how we could liven it up a bit. The number one thing we should do is of course change it into a forum, but I think there's more we can do to make sure it stays active, even in the interim.

At this point we'd all agree that the current rules system we have for RMT area is quite restrictive. We don't allow in-game team questions at all, and we only allow threads where people post a full team to be rated. I don't think we've ever had a proper discussion about how optimal this is, so here we are. You all know where this is headed:

Can we allow new types of content on the RMT section?

Particularly, I want to get stuck into this in-game team rule we've kept for years. Can we allow in-game team questions on the RMT area, in any form?

Competitive teams only: In other words, teams for competitive battling with other people or the advanced post-game sections like Battle Tree or Pokemon World Tournament. No teams for regular gameplay: there are too many variables for these questions to be useful, and in-game teams do not need much work, just a variety of Pokemon types and moves. -- rules page

There's a discussion to be had about whether this reasoning is enough to justify banning a type of content new users come to us for, literally on the daily. It's clear in-game team posts are 'useful' to somebody, so I think this thread should pertain more to the second argument: could in-game team posts actually make an interesting discussion every time, or will it just be 'level up your Pokemon and git gud'?

In my opinion, there are certain types of posts that are never going to be interesting to read. The type where the person just names six Pokemon and asks you to 'rate it' is awful, and I'm not saying we should start allowing that type of content. But many times I've clicked reject on a well-written and articulate in-game team post with a bunch of detail and explanation, and all I've thought is what a shame it is that our blanket policy denies good quality content like that. Tell me if I'm wrong, but I think that high-effort posts will attract high-effort responses, and I think that applies to in-game teams as much as any other content.

Obviously, this is all hypothetical. But I want to pitch this idea to you all: perhaps try allowing in-game team posts, but make it so they are required to give detail. Make it so you must specify moves, abilities, levels, items and natures. Put it in the rules that you need to explain your team, and what you're trying to do with it that you need help with. Even make that last bit apply to competitive teams too -- anything to increase the quality of content on the section. This level of detail would surely open the door for discussion or analysis of different options -- even for in-game questions. At that point, we're talking about more than just 'a variety of Pokemon types and moves' -- would this be a workable solution to in-game teams that suits everybody?

This is just one aspect of what we could potentially allow on the section, though. One of the issues I think holding the RMT area back is a lack of content diversity -- even if we allow in-game content, the whole section is just teams teams teams. So, I also want to ask...

Can we allow non-team content in the RMT section?

What we could do here, is allow any post relating to a specific team, moveset or deck build that someone wants advice on. There would be no 'rules' for what you post in the section, except that you supply a team, moveset or deck build for advice -- with full detail and some explanation. To me, this open approach would achieve two things at once. It would give content diversity to the RMT section, but also a focused place to put some content that fits awkwardly on the main section. I posted this thread in December about some types of questions that are hard to place in terms of our rules. They would fit perfectly under a more open RMT section:

• 'What move would be best to finish this moveset?'
• 'What Pokemon would be best to finish this team for [game]?'
• 'What Pokemon can do [a, b, c] for this team?'
• 'Which team member should I replace for [Pokemon]?'
• 'Which Pokemon of [a, b] would be best for this team?'
• 'Does [Pokemon] fit this team well enough?'
• 'Is this moveset/strategy effective?' <---- so essentially, 'rate my moveset'
• 'Is this team good enough for [game]?'

There's another type of question that might fit there as well -- our 'What is a good moveset for ...' and 'What is a good in-game team for ...' posts, funnily enough. These have always presented a bit of an issue in the main section, since they're always bumped to the front of navigation, and are a general disturbance unless you're actively interested in reading each new set. I'm not sure of the technical limitations of it, but maybe those threads could be shifted across if we go through with something like this? The main issue I see is they might lose their search engine ranking with a new URL. Would a manual redirect would be possible, if we collected the addresses?

And of course, we'd have to rename the section (again!) to something more fitting if we changed the section up. I thought 'Strategy' might be a good title for it, but that might mislead you to post anything related to strategy there. (For example, if someone was asking principally about the mechanics of a move and whether their strategy would execute, not to get advice, it would go on the main section.) Maybe 'Strategy Advice' is more to the point... open to ideas here lol.

Anyway I'm done with my ramble. Do you guys think any of this is viable? Any major problems I glossed over? As always please do leave your thoughts!

Comments

too long didn't read. The condensed message or a summary.

---

My problem with in-game team rates is that all playing in-game requires you to do is have good type match ups and be leveled high enough. There is no team building strategy required besides that, so asking for a rate is pointless. I always just pick the coolest looking Pokemon for my in-game teams and do fine.

This is not a competitive battling site. There is not a healthy population of competent competitive battlers who are willing to be active in the RMT. Why should the RMT exist if hardly anybody even gets a rate from somebody who knows what they're talking about?

---

Yeah, that’s fair enough and I agree with you. It’s just that people still want and ask for advice from us on both subjects, and I think it’s a better look to at least try to accomodate it. If we take an inclusive approach then we’re pissing off less people, at least. I agree pretty much anything works with in-game, but there is definitely still leeway to find the best movesets or strategies if people put effort into their threads. No problem if individual people still think it’s trash — clearly enough people still value it enough post on it.
And to be fair, we had a pretty good thing going in terms of a competitive scene a few years ago. I don’t see why we can’t have that again if we crack down on content quality and ride the Switch hype well enough.

---

The arguments used for ingame teams that you can win the game by doing whatever you want can be applied for other games, yet advice can still useful.

---

It's worth a shot I guess since the RMT couldn't be worse than it possible is now.

Answer 1

I been writing this response for a few days now... Hope this isn't supposed to be a comment.

Anyways, I figured I would piggyback off of Fizz's question here with some of my thoughts.

First:
The In-Game Team Thing

There are so many different options with In-game team building, and that’s why I think it should be allowed.
Here’s my example.

The only games I’ve played to completion are the Generation 3 games. In RSE, one of my favorite strategies is to use Dustox for the second Gym (Dewford, Brawley). He resists all of Brawley’s attacks, and hits back hard with Gust and Confusion/Psybeam. This is a totally sound idea. Dustox can provide good support in-game with Toxic and Light Screen, as well as Reflect (TM). Yet this strategy is not mentioned ANYWHERE!

Also, the Pokemon are incredibly different.

Example:
Aggron.

In-game, he’s not the best option. (Gen 3) he takes forever to level up, and his learnset is terrible. The only way to really utilize him is with TMs. Plus, his Special Defense is terrible. A lot of NPC trainers are mixed, and he gets OHKO’ed a bunch, unless you grind.
Competitively, however, he is a completely viable Physical wall.

Often times, stronger pokemon are HARDER to use in-game, as they take forever to level up effectively, and can be outsourced to faster exp gaining pokemon.
All I'm saying is that strategy in-game IS a thing. Personally, I wanted to join this site for years, but I realized that in-game questions really coudn't be asked, so I didn't join.

Deck Builds:

I am ENTIRELY inexperienced with the card game; my best card is a Torchic. (my ONLY card is a Torchic)
Still, I know a few people that play, and deck-building advice could be really helpful. We could have a link to a PDF that summarized deck-building basics.

Individual Movesets:

The first obvious argument against this is that moveset questions already exist.
However, those questions were asked a long time ago, and upvotes on the newer answers are rare.
If you have a new idea for an old Pokemon that you want feedback on, you should be able to ask that in RMT. Right now, those questions are regulated to the Pokebase.

Older questions being relocated:

We could just ask the questions again, instead of moving them, and get some new ideas. Also, Movesetbot could just post a link on the new question to the older thread and a link on the old question to the new thread.

Renaming the section:

RMT, in my opinion, is not a great name anyway, since I've only seen one "rating", and it was in the comments, not an actual answer.
https://pokemondb.net/pokebase/rmt/48980/rate-my-team
Honestly, it seems to be more of a advice bar.

Some ideas for names:
Battle factory
Team Building
Pokemon Help

However, my big problem with all of this is the SOLUTION. The only one who can actually change the policy is Pokemaster, and from my point of view, that won’t be happening really soon.

What we could do is have a vote or a poll, deciding whether the majority of users want to expand the use of RMT. The Moderators/Editors could then petition Pokemaster to allow us to implement it. If he agrees, the new questions are allowed, and we move on. Eventually, Pokemaster does a complete re-vamp.

If PM is planning on doing a format change in the near future, then having a vote wouldn’t really matter, as the changes would be in place for a very short time.

Comments

Wow thanks for the detail! I agree with virtually everything here — especially glad you mention that you didn’t make an account here due to the lack of in-game content. This was a massive part of my bringing this up at all. I think it is a lost opportunity for a lot of people.
Posting new moveset questions is definitely an option, though doing that would probably stagnate content on them for a long time until they work their way back into Google’s search indexes. Our current threads are sort of valuable as they’re all really well established at this point; no guanatees that a new batch would be as successful. This could be an issue, as those moveset threads probably drive a lot of our growth in new users. Pokemaster suggested he could do some custom code to sort answers, maybe that’s the best solution? https://pokemondb.net/pokebase/meta/60727/
I do hope Pokemaster considers everything we’ve discussed, because all he has to do to change this is say yes and update the rules page; that’s it. Big changes don’t always have to involve big effort.

---

People, I'm pretty good at the card game (I've won some tourneys in my town and neighboring towns) but I'm not good at giving advice about anything, nonetheless telling someone how to be good at the TGC. Also, a lot of people have their own play-styles. For example, I like to have a lot of control over what happens, so I'll have a lot of switching and status cards to set up and protect myself. I've beaten many Mega-Raquaza EX and other powerful cards by setting up a Bibarel. That's right, I swept decks with yawn Bibarel. Also I rarely use Megas/EX/GX. :P

---

or maybe I could type something about it :P
IDK, I'd probably need more people to help out a bit.