The Most Controversial Strategy in Singles 

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Baton Pass strats are either really satisfying when you do them or absolutely miserable once the opponent uses them

You reference it so much in other videos, that I want to see one on Power Creep as a whole. What caused it, how it invalidated hundreds of Pokémon, and what old Pokémon did to keep up with it sounds like a really interesting topic to me. EDIT: I'd like to think I had a hand in this becoming reality.

"Given the opportunity, players will optimize the fun out of a game." - Sid Meier (creator of the Civilization series). That quote is universal in gaming and definitely applies to Competitive Baton Pass teams

Man, I remember when people brushed off full Baton Pass chains as an unviable gimmick. Also, Zapdos only gets Baton Pass because of XD, amazing how a spinoff-exclusive move did so much.

Well, now i know why Zapdos, Ninjask, Smeargal, Celebi & mawhile were placed on the thumbnail as the 5 pieces of Exodia

Smogon Community: “You don’t fight with honor!” Passer: “No, he did.” *points to a meteor mashed trainer*

Gen 4 Ubers has probably the nicest and most helpful playerbase out of any tier on Showdown in my experience, because the people just reallly enjoy the tier and think that the metagame is cool, as do I. Which is why I was extremely surprised to see somebody getting absolutely cursed out for running double dance pass mew into dialga when I was just randomly spectating a game one day. It shows how hated BP is when all the Dracos in the world won't get you yelled at but one small pink cat will get you absolutely flamed.

It's fascinating on how a single move has become so infamous, that no one ever wanted it used ever again.

Belly Drum passing to Exploud with its Soundproof was one of the most terrifying ways to turn an NU Pokemon into something that makes Swords Dance Rayquaza look average in comparison.

You could say that everytime Baton Pass got "neutered", it just Baton passed to a new Pokemon capable of abusing the new "neutered" BP Strategy.

I’m liking more of these videos where they analyze specific moves or themes. Not saying I don’t enjoy the “How GOOD was x ACTUALLY” videos, but they bring more variety. Speaking of Baton Pass, it is the first pivoting move and it makes sense as to why it got more restricted in later gens, due to more Pokemon having access to stat boosting moves.

Back when playing Gen4, I only saw the move's animation when an opponent used it, and thought to myself: "Why would you waste a move slot on switching out?!" Oh boi...

Its crazy how the most broken ability of all time, Moody, pairs perfectly with Baton Pass aka the most broken move of all time

Fun fact: in gen 3, when smeargle was first banned from using baton pass, people started using assist of all things. Since every mon on your team has a boosting move or sub/protect, assist was actually able to carry the chain since you call baton pass 50% of the time, and dont really risk anything the other 50%, which made it even more frustrating to both use and face

The fear and dread I felt when I saw that one of the pokemon insurgence's elite 4 uses a full baton pass chain will always stay with me

Can I just say that these new thumbnails great? Like the artstyle is really cool and it actually has to do with the video topic.

OU Mon: You can't defeat me. *Uses Baton Pass.* Smeargle: I know, but they can.

I was one of those honorable BP users back in gen 3-4, fighting the full chains was really annoying and unfun. Then once I saw Espeon getting Mirror Bounce I knew things were about to get really insane.

Ahh the Baton Pass. Thought it would be covered in the "How GOOD was Ninjask Actually?" video, but yeah, makes sense to see the full history of Baton Pass!

As a mostly casual player, I always loved BP. I never did full BP chains though, usually 1 or 2 or with something like Ninjask. I understand why it was banned, but it was fun in low ELO!

Seems weird that everytime it was limited, the final nail in the coffin was a pokemon with Speed Boost... almost like that's an insanely busted ability when you have protect and substitute available lol

For anyone who isn't aware, the thumbnail is a reference to the five Exodia cards from Yugioh, that game's first and original instant win condition. Once you got all five pieces together, it was literally unstoppable.

With the recent reveal of Farigiraf, I can only imagine how absolutely broken it could potentially be with Baton Pass and Cud Chew, using Petaya/Salac Berry as a potential free Nasty Plot/Agility boost without wasting a move slot, and just regaining boosts with Recycle.

I know that it might be too late, but I’d love to see a “How good was Gen 8 OU actually” video as a send off for this Gen. I think it would be interesting to look back at the new trends and strats that came from Gen 8.

Whoever was the first one to run a BP team was an absolute genius

Some missing info for Gen 8: Baton Pass was legal until DLC 1 for Ubers, polteageist was the main passer mainly because it was immediately a threat in itself after a shell smash, so it could bank on the mindgame of having to attack that even full chain baton Pass teams feared it when nothing usually is immune to the combination of stored power and stab shadow ball. Even tyrannitar was not safe despite being the hardest counter since it would have to decide whether if polteageist was staying in to take a thunder wave, or just attack it and it'll pass to someone that resist rock blast / crunch. It's main recepient was Galar-weezing since despite everything else being absurdly powerful when it received the boost, ditto was extremely common being the only best revenge killer around. Not only did it stopped imposter but also weather reliant abilities as well thanks to Neutralizing Gas When HOME re-introduced some legendaries, lunala seem to be able to phase or blast Weezing into oblivion since it tanks one of its moves even with dynamax if it was specially bulky, but eventually Weezing started to run Shadow Ball over sludge wave because of that Of course the other obscene factors were around and by the time Isle of Armor was released, Baton Pass was banned for reasons you can expect + polteageist being an absurd and efficient passer

Aaaand now Cyclizar gets both Baton Pass and Substitute combined into a single move in the form of Shed Tail. Depending on what buff moves it gets it either sets up and sheds or sheds into a pokemon to set up.

Its a shame that Dry Passing was a casualty of the ban. In gen 6, WishPass sylveon was used as a wonderful pivot, and pyukumuku in gen 7 got a lot of his viability destroyed without it. Maybe one day it may return, but I sincerely doubt it.

you guys doing the mock battles for the footage is so good. Thank you so much for showing the gameplay examples during the video, its way more entertaining and its exciting to imagine even playing some of these older titles competitively. I never had the chance to really play the comp. environments for GBC/GBA back in the day even though i played those games.

Gen 9: Okay, hear me out: Substitute, and Baton Pass. In one move.

I think it's important to mention one more thing in regards to Baton Pass in Gen 7: Eevee's Exclusive Z-Move, Extreme Evoboost. Now, on its own, Extreme Evoboost is not really that big of a deal. +2 to every stat, but locked to a 1st stage Pokémon that doesn't have much coverage, it would likely be OHKOed before pulling it off, and it + Adaptability Last Resort is a gimmick at best. However, Eevee also had another trick up its sleeve: Baton Pass. One would think that, since Baton Pass is banned to Ubers, and Eevee would die to a mere sneeze of a Legendary, it wouldn't do that much damage, right? ...right? Now enter Krookodile and its signature move: Power Trip. Power Trip functions like Stored Power, but Dark-type and physical. The most Krookodile would accomplish with it is Rock Polish + Swords Dance, and using it in Ubers would get you laughed out of the tier. It just needed one element to go from joke to broke. As you can imagine, Extreme Evoboost + Power Trip utterly wrecked Ubers. Anything that didn't die to _base 220_ STAB Power Trip, further boosted by Moxie, died to +2 STAB Earthquake. It was way too much to handle. Thus, Baton Pass became the first move, that wasn't Double Team or OHKO moves, to be banned to Anything Goes.

Gorebyss and Huntail were Smashing and Passing over a decade before Markiplier

Glad the wait was worth it. A surprise for Monday. I was about to polish my rock, but I will wait until after this video.

I love the art that you’ve guys been commissioning for the thumbnails, hope you continue to comm them in the future

My team comp’s sets have no attacks, Kaiba, but they do contain… the unstoppable Baton Pass!

5:37 that is the most scary thing I saw in my life, a snorlax jump kicking someone

As a kid, baton pass made no sense to me. “Why would I want to use a move to switch? I can do that anyway from the menu, lmao.”

Loving this recent style of videos (on top of the regular stuff ofc) Also the thumbnail art for these is amazing

I really enjoy these new style of videos! Keep up the great work!

Well done once again! I am gonna keep suggesting this: what is in a role? What's a tank, what's a lead, what's a sweeper, what makes something good or bad? Have one for each role, make it into 1 big playlist at the end

These types of videos are always my favourite on this channel. Hope you keep putting them out.

I personally think "dry passing" should probably be allowed. It does the same thing U-Turn moves do, but without any chip damage (in return, you avoid Pursuit damage). You would just be forbidden from using moves, berries, or abilities that raise your stats on the Pokemon with BP. That should lock out the real problem, though it does make things more "complex" than just a straight BP ban.

Looking at this, you should also do "How BROKEN was Dynamax actually?" Given the mechanic had some well warranted bans very fast almost akin to the issues Baton Pass has.

With you guys putting so much effort into these “side vids”, I’d absolutely LOVE to see you continue the Type overview videos. Pretty sure ice was the only one that ever got it, and I’d like to see the history of how types performed throughout the generations

I'd rather get baton passed 400 times in a row than ever deal with Para-fusion again in this life

I'm so happy to see you upload. I thought we had lost another week :(

Ninjask: "I Baton Pass!" Opponent: "Please... No more..." Celebi: "I'LL HYUCKIN DO IT AGAIN"

Baton Pass really went a long way From Cheesy and unreliable strategy to a game ending tactic with almost no counterplay.

Video series idea: how each VGC season played out, which strategies dominated, how they changed as the season changed, how they influenced future mechanic changes, etc.

I remember discovering baton pass as a kid and sweeping my friends teams at school all the while thinking I was a Pokémon master

Really enjoying the alternative videos beyond the usual "How good was" series. Keep up the great work everyone at False Swipe Gaming!

Dude these thumbnails recently give me LIFE I love them 💕💕💖💖

I love baton pass. It is an awesome strategic option to add to an otherwise viable team. But, as noted in this video, teams built around it are just toxic in competition. Fun the first time or two but growing old, fast.

At first i didnt understand why the miniature had yu gi oh cards, but now i get it : advanced and onward BP works exactly like a yu gi oh combo deck ! It might explain why i love the concept so much

I was always waiting for a video on this EDIT: I also would love to see a video on power creep too!

I guess you can say it is appropriate to talk about Baton Pass now as it is very scary to deal with if those boosts are passed on. Been loving this new type of content btw!

Colosseum Miror B was really the high point of Pokemon game music

Loving the quality of these videos

I love this channel. I realized how regularly I've been watching it. Thanks guys!!

I don't really play competitive Pokemon or anything like that but these videos are are my favorite of your channel keep up the work👍

This reminds me of a card in yugioh called Mystic Mine. For those not familiar with the game, its a spell card you only need to draw to activate, that basically stops your opponent from using any monsters or attacking with monsters so long as you don't use any monsters yourself. The thing is pretty much every deck in the game can only win by using monsters to deal damage directly. Also the answer most decks have to remove cards are monster effects, so there are a lot of situations where a player will simplify the game state to the point that they can stick a mystic mine down and then deck out the other player, since they would have gone through a lot of their deck in their turn one play and thus deck out first. The thing is there's a lot of risk in doing that, because you can't advance your own game state yourself, for most decks, under mystic mine, because you gotta keep the monsters you control to 0 if you want to ensure it stays in affect. Also any competent player is only going to remove the mystic mine when they are in a position to win that turn, so if you try to deck someone out with the card you'll lose. It becomes a game of chicken, because the person with the mine up has an incentive to play because the opponent is going to win when they have the out, but that also runs the risk of giving an out to the card in a situation the opponent couldn't have done so otherwise. People found out however, that like baton pass you can optimize the strategy to make it unreasonable to play against. A normal deck using the card means you get into games of chicken where the moment to try to play is important and people have to consider a lot of other things. But you can run cards that protect mine and other flood gate traps that constrain what the opponent is able to do, and it ends up being a total pain to deal with. Not necessarily good, because there's a lot of set up needed to get into a place where you can lock down your opponent entirely, but its definitely not something people wanna have to deal with.

I like how in the beginning there was a sense of honor

Such a well done video. I've never been one to play Singles because of things like this, but it was fun learning about this side of competitive Pokemon.

im loving these new thumbnails, really cool and unique art style!

I was always curious why it got banned when I first found competitive Pokemon. I quickly found out while using Ninjask in a playthrough lol

Making the thumbnail be pokemon on the format of yu-gi-oh cards makes is top teir trolling

Such a good thumbnail art. Had me chortling in an unladylike fashion.

I love these videos for the fact that we get to hear music from Pokémon Coliseum!

That snorlax was out for blood with that mega drop kick 3:24

I don't know why, but Exodia looks different from what I remember. Must be age catching up with me.

Great video today! I’d really like to see a video on hidden power sometime In the future! How it changed over time and its impact on the meta. 💙👏

Loving the new thumbnails!

I think once gen 9 comes out it would be cool to see a gen 8 retrospective for both VGC and smogon

I like how Baton Pass is the equivalent to Yu-Gi-Oh’s Exodia: satisfying when it works, but needs a dedicated strategy to even work in the first place.

I remember the first (and only) time I made a Baton Pass team. 12-year-old me had been playing a lot of VGC in Gen. V, and when I got to Gen. VI, I tried out Smogon singles. The literal first thing I discovered was Speed Boost Baton Pass Scolipede. I built a 3-Pokémon chain where Scolipede stacked up Speed and Defense boosts, passed to Drifblim for Special Defense and Substitute, then finally passed to Azumarill who would Belly Drum and sweep. It was totally unoptimized in terms of Baton Pass, but was still so unstoppable that I got bored of it and started building other teams.

these new art works for the thumbnails R sooo good

A lot of the bans were "no passing speed alongside another stat," but why not just "no passing speed, period?"

I'm really liking the newer videos about general competitive pokemon, it's something most people on the channel would be interested in, whereas if someone didn't care about a specific pokemon, they might not watch the episode for the How Good Was Actually series. I also think the thumbnails should be modernized somehow for the How Good Was Actually series, because they look outdated compared to the digital art thumbnails for these types of videos.

I always wondered why I never saw Baton Pass strats in competitive videos. This makes perfect sense

I thought the most controversial strategy was using Evasion moves or the Moody ability! Those kinds of things get insta−banned!

So controversial, a fan game, Pokemon Insurgence, has an elite four member basing their entire team around it.

I love that BKC writes these it's so neat

Great analysis video! Thanks for uploading!

Awesome thumbnail!!! :)

It’s crazy how this move has so many ways to get used no matter how many bans and limits where put on it.

The thumbnail for this video is beyond perfect

This does make me ponder a bit. There's a Touhou Project fangame based on Pokemon mechanics, and though I'm not versed on it's competitive meta, it seems that while Baton Pass is still strong when it goes off, it's a lot harder to set up. Notably, Topsy-Turvy is on more mons (albeit also blocked by Soundproof) and the only mon with Magic Bounce + Baton Pass is effectively Shedinja (as in 1 HP base stat. And picking Magic Bounce means giving up Wonder Guard.) There's also two mons with unique abilities, one that's Contrary, but for your opponent, and another that if a foe's stat changes, so does the user.

WHY ARE YOUR NEW THUMBNAILS SO BEAUTIFUL??????

That thumbnail is a work of art.

an interesting video would be the effect on terrain and maybe condition setting abilities in general (like drizzle or electric surge). it seems almost too powerful to get a free turn (that is both offensive and defensive) by doing the most defensive move of switching. even if the effect only lasts 5 or 8 turns

Man i hecking love your videos, cheers!

I’d love to see a video on the history of rain! Or just weather in general

Thumbnail game on fleek today

So I’m not allowed to use baton pass because it’s “un-honorable” but everyone and their mother gets to run the god of honor zacian online?

Ayo as a player that dabbles in both competitive Pokemon and YuGiOh, I LOVE this thumbnail

I love how false swipe used the pieces of Exodia as the cover, considering how having the baton pass team usually meant a win.

I can tell from the pic that it'll be BP-chain teams, but other controversial strats included FEAR, the FEAR/Hail stall teams with the clefairy line, DiveCats, and, only controversial for how weird but effective it was, ChainComp.

Of all of my college lectures of Earth Science or Film and Media, False Swipe Gaming is my favorite professor.

Thanks for including the Intro timestamp, so I knew where to skip to to skip the Raid segment.