What's the point of making items you can never use?

[Pokeplayer44]

This applies to more than one area of competitive battling, so I chose to not use a prefix. For instance, in VGC you cannot use the last few berries (Custap, Rowap, Enigma, etc.). That really doesn't make sense when you think about it, because some Pokemon in the Battle Subway on B/W and the Battle Frontier on HG/SS have Rowap and Jaboca berries, as well as ocasionally holding Enigma berries. Not only are these berries banned, they're nearly impossible to get anyways. Recently, I came up with a strategy involving Aggron. It was to activate Sturdy, Metal Burst to KO the 1st attacker, then activate the Custap Berry and use Head Smash, hopefully KO'ing both the user and the defender. Upon trying this out in Random Matchup, I was told there was a problem with my Pokemon. I figured out that was the problem, removed the item, and was allowed to battle. I know the Soul Dew is also banned, but that is a good thing, as it would make Latios completely broken (it's close in VGC as it is). What are your views on this? This is the specific Aggron set I wanted to try out:

Aggron @ Custap Berry
Brave
Sturdy
EVs: 252 HP/252 Atk
Moveset:

• Head Smash
• Metal Burst
• Earthquake
• Protect

The strategy is simple. Take damage, maybe all the way down to 1 HP, retaliate with Metal Burst. Next turn, barring a priority move, Custap Berry for a double KO with Head Smash.

 

[PMJ]

You're referring to official metagames here (VGC, Battle Subway). "Competitive play" does not solely refer to official metagames - the one created by the players is very enjoyable and has no restrictions placed on it, so you can use whatever item you like in whatever tier you like (ubers for Soul Dew).

 

[Xous]

Official Pokémon tournaments will always have silly restrictions ("silly" depending on who you ask, of course), and Items are no exception.

What confuses me is why they simply don't have other battle style options like "Anything Goes" (or maybe a checklist you can use to find players who match the rules you've chosen). It seems like something that would make everyone happy, right? Limiting people to using only what the game makers will allow limits the experience players can have with a game, so I don't see a positive side to the restrictions (except during events where they want to have a set list of rules, which is acceptable). It's frustrating to have to follow a set of rules you don't agree with when trying to battle with your favorite team on Wi-Fi, but that's just the way it's set up.

 

[DNA]

The worst bit about Wi-Fi in Gen 5 is the only modification it makes is "Flat LV50 Battle". Gen 4 had auto-50 and auto-100, which was really great as it saved us the trouble of raising our team all the way up. Nope, not anymore.

If they actually gave us more options for what to pick for our Wi-Fi fights and stuff, Gen 5 would have been great. Now it's just like PMD2 - it tries so hard to make us happy but it leaves out the one thing we really wanted most of all.

 

[Pokeplayer44]

Official Pokémon tournaments will always have silly restrictions ("silly" depending on who you ask, of course), and Items are no exception.

What confuses me is why they simply don't have other battle style options like "Anything Goes" (or maybe a checklist you can use to find players who match the rules you've chosen). It seems like something that would make everyone happy, right? Limiting people to using only what the game makers will allow limits the experience players can have with a game, so I don't see a positive side to the restrictions (except during events where they want to have a set list of rules, which is acceptable). It's frustrating to have to follow a set of rules you don't agree with when trying to battle with your favorite team on Wi-Fi, but that's just the way it's set up.

Of course you can if you go to the Union Room and Wi-Fi Club too I think, but I don't have any friends I battle over Wi-Fi and I'm sure many other players are the same. That is a very good point, they could do that as an added feature in Random Matchup, and they could even make it where ratings were never applied in it to be fair.