CAP 14 CAP 3 - Part 7 - Secondary Ability Discussion

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The final duel started with a bang - literally, as Rising_Dusk opened with a Silver Bullet Punch. Korski was fighting back with as many of his ships and guns as he could, but the momentum was on Rising_Dusk's side. In fact, Rising_Dusk was picking off Korski's armada one ship at a time. Suddenly, however, Korski disappeared, and Rising_Dusk immediately found himself surrounded by missiles that had appeared out of nowhere. He could not escape the attack.

Korski scoffed from afar as Rising_Dusk got up again. "So, I see you didn't escape the earlier combination attack unscathed. What a shame."

"Well, I see that Scoopapa hasn't been your only 'donor'," Rising_Dusk retorted. "Don't think I'm not aware of the underlying mechanism behind srk1214's 1214 Slaps technique."

"How perceptive of you to recognize when someone can slow time down. Perhaps you are also aware, then, that you have already lost." He summoned a gigantic sword. "This '1214 Fury Cutters' combo will go by in the blink of an eye for anyone else, but for me it will be more than enough time to finish you off!"

"We'll see," Rising_Dusk replied.

Korski rushed toward him, time slowing as he got closer. It seemed Rising_Dusk was not even prepared enough to try another Silver Bullet Punch at least. Each Fury Cutter strike was naturally stronger than the last. When the 1214th strike was finished, Korski stood triumphantly as time returned to normal. "Ha! I was actually wondering what I'd be eating for dinner! I guess you will d- WHAT THE!?"

"Protect, bro." Indeed, Rising_Dusk had not taken any damage.

"But... but..."

"Also, you said you saw my best attack. I don't have a best attack. Every attack has its own situation. Like this one. HURRICANE!!!"

A devastating wind blew all around Rising_Dusk. The remaining ships were blown away along with Korski. They tried to fire at Rising_Dusk, but the cannons could not hit their mark due to the sheer wind speeds. Korski's armada met its end in the windswept skies. The Golden Scizor was victorious.

Meanwhile, a famine swept through the lands nearby...

...Oh hey, remember abilities? We still have to decide what (if any) other competitive ability to give on this CAP! Remember to keep everything that we have already decided in mind (i.e. concept, stats, typing, and Dry Skin) when talking about possibly secondary abilities. Be bold in your suggestions, but be realistic.

Remember this is not a place to discuss flavor abilities (especially in relation to the art thread), but a place for discussing the competitive aspect of having an ability on CAP3, especially in relation to the already chosen ability Dry Skin.

CAP 3 so far:

Name: Extreme Makeover: Typing Edition

General Description: The idea here is to create a Pokemon who's typing, while normally considered poor defensively and/or offensively, becomes a strong selling point of the Pokemon itself via help from an ability, stats, and/or movepool.

Justification: There are a lot of typings we scoff at on a daily basis because of their serious flaws, often forgetting about their strong points. For example, Poison is a really terrible offensive typing, but a decent defensive typing, while the Ice typing is good offensively, but awful defensively. Instead of just accepting that some typings will just ruin a Pokemon, this CAP concept aims to take that "terrible typing", and find ways to fix it (usually via ability, movepool, or stats) to the point where the formerly terrible typing becomes the CAP's strong point! The reason this CAP could benefit OU is because a Pokemon who makes a "bad typing" into a great one could find many unique offensive and/or defensive niches that aren't currently found!

Questions To Be Answered

-What does it take for a Pokemon to overcome its "bad typing" so much that its typing becomes good? Are the stats the biggest contributer, is the ability the thing that saves it, does movepool make it a force, or is it a combination of the above?

-How does the typing makeover effect the Pokemon's playstyle? Does the Pokemon become a unique wall that uses its makeover to overcome its typing's normally fatal flaws, does the make over make a terrible offensive typing into a fearsome sweeper, does the makeover make it into a formidible combination of deffense and offense to a typing that brings it neither, or does the makeover bring forth something none of us see coming from the typing?

-Which resistances and immunities are the most relevant to the metagame? Sure, this concept is aiming to have a "bad typing" become good, but part of that will require the bad typing to have some key resistances and/or immunties to certain typings to defend against or set up on, while still having a very unorthodox competitive typing. This works the other way around too, what are the typings most relevant to hit super effectively or at least neutral?

-How will the rest of the OU metagame react to this extreme type makeover? Will Pokemon start carrying moves they normally wouldn't carry to break through a new defensive threat, will some Pokemon take on new defensive roles due to resisting the unorthodox STABs CAP 3 may carry? Or will This Pokemon, despite being a very real threat, not have many "custom made sets" to beat it, being more of a Pokemon that is a reaction to the metagame than causing a metagame reaction?

-Finally, how will this effect the teams CAP3 is on? Will this be the kind of Pokemon who needs a lot of support to become a threat, will this Pokemon be more of key team member to execute another strategy, or will this be the kind of Pokemon that's part of the glue that holds the team together?
Typing: Fire / Poison
Base stats: 95 HP / 45 Atk / 83 Def / 131 SpA / 105 SpD / 76 Spe
Abilities: Dry Skin / ??? / (???)
 

Deck Knight

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So we're onto the secondary ability discussion. Now we have a semblance of stats and can move on to the next phase of what we want to achieve.

In this topic we should discuss what other qualities we think might emphasize the type, and how those factors keep the threat list in mind while providing our CAP a further niche. As it stands we have a Pokemon that is excellent in Rain, competent in Sand, useful in Hail, and most risky in Sun.

Weather compatibility is not our only concern. The main thrust here will be answering the question of a secondary competitive ability or No Competitive Ability. Dry Skin and our stats are quite good, but there are other abilities we could give CAP 3 that could help emphasize the unique contours of its type.

A few ideas on the shortlist that have been brought up in #cap and the previous thread:

Drought - the argument here would be how do we give CAP 3 Drought without letting it walk all over the Pokemon that are supposed to check.
Regenerator - aids CAP 3 in overcoming the Stealth Rock weakness by always being able to come it if it switches out, save multiple layers of Spikes and SR.
Trace - Gives CAP 3 an answer to Sun Teams since many of their sweepers don't run +Spe and otherwise would be susceptible to an opponent tracing their Chlorophyll, as well as giving CAP 3 a lot of latitude to switch into Rotom-W's Volt Switch and pick up a Ground immunity before the latter switches out.
Suction Cups - Since CAP 3 is immune to traditional methods of residual damage, being unable to phaze it out could prove quite useful.

No Competitive Ability - Dry Skin is already marvelous, this would simply give CAP 3 a flavor ability that would let it operate in Sun without as much of a drawback. Several flavor abilities could actually be fairly useful, like Flame Body to put that 4x Bug resistance to good use or Magma Armor to avoid being frozen by random resisted Ice attacks, giving CAP 3 a third status immunity.
 

erisia

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I'm a big fan of Regenerator, as it still lets CAP3 boast its amazing HP recovery outside of weather, and as stated it really helps it as an offensive Pokemon by lowering its susceptibility to hazards. The only other comparable Pokemon is DW Ho-Oh, and apparently that's really good.

As for other abilities, I don't think we should label them "Non-competitive" as this restricted the ability options with Necturna significantly last time. While this was justified as an ability would take the focus away from Sketch, CAP3 doesn't really have that issue. Flame Body wouldn't see a lot of use as the primary physical attacks aimed at it would be Stone Edge, Rock Slide and Earthquake, none of which are contact moves. However, both it and Rough Skin would be useful for dealing residual damage to the Fighting types you can switch into, in addition to CB Scizor, so they'd be more helpful when you're switching CAP3 into its resistances rather than when it's already out. Vital Spirit is interesting, in that it would give CAP3 a third status immunity and it'd be a hard-counter to Breloom that lack Stone Edge, although there probably aren't enough Sleep inducers in OU to justify its use.

Water Absorb would also be a good, if safe choice, as this lets CAP3 maintain its Water immunity while being weather-neutral, meaning it can be used on Drought teams more effectively but it won't be as good when opposing Drizzle teams are being used.
 
I rather like Suction Cups, myself. The ability to effectively shut down many stall teams would be a god-send. If they can't use burn, poison, and so on, and in addition can't force switch-outs and let SR/Spikes build up, CAP3 would be a serious obstacle.
 

Stratos

Banned deucer.
We have a higher special attack stat than heatran, and amazing defensive stats. But a good question is: is poison/fire typing better defensively or offensively?

Instead of taking this concept the route of rain/sun with Dry skin and Drought, I am a fan of tmon's proposal to complement the already incredibly powerful but offensively neutering Dry Skin with an ability that favors offense. After all, what better way to explore a typing than to find the most suitable role for it?

As such, I am in support of either Sheer Force, Adaptability, or Tinted Lens, in order of increasing power they would provide. Most Psn/Fire moves are sheer force boosted; however, it is a slightly weaker boost to STAB than Adaptability (1.3*1.5 = 1.95). Furthermore, it makes our typing less fun because it reduces the beautiful hax chance on our STAB. The upside to Sheer Force is that it can also boost many potential coverage moves the mon could have (this ain't Necturna, people, coverage moves are a possibility.) Adaptability is the middle of the three; turns Fire Blast into base 240 attack and Sludge Bomb into base 180. We also retain the special effects of our moves. The downside to Adaptability is that it unfortunately does not provide any boost to our coverage.

That brings me to Tinted Lens, the secondary ability I would personally support. Tinted Lens fire/poison is unresisted bar Heatran, for whom we could run a coverage Hidden Power (offensive sets would still outspeed and Earth Power; defensive ones would be KOed). It retains the secondary abilities behind any potential attacks, and it makes our STAB significantly better, playing to the strength of its good SE coverage while eliminating the weakness of its poor neutral coverage (ohidere concept). It turns CAP3 into a highly formidable attacker. But rest your fears for it does not break it. Observe the Threats Discussion: Tyranitar can take a hit (bar HP fighting which has nothing to do with TL), ko back with Stone Edge. Gliscor can do that too. While Terrakion and Duggy can no longer switch in, once they're in, CAP3 is hopeless (unless it runs Scarf which is ENTIRELY possible.) Blissey would be unbreakable with that beautiful base 45 atk. And when in Rain, Jirachi could still take CAP3. Broken is *almost* impossible with this CAP Nevertheless, Tinted Lens turns CAP3 into a strong offensive force, and it would be interesting to determine whether the typing is better at an offensive or defensive role.

Another thing i would like to address briefly here is the idea of Three competitive abilities. I don't know the logic behind not giving Tomo this option so I will not jump into a lengthy explanation, but why not?
 
I propose that we give it the ability limber which would give it the usefull niche of being the ultimate status absorber, being immune to the main three types of status which would, as the general description states, "create a Pokemon who's typing, while normally considered poor defensively and/or offensively, becomes a strong selling point of the Pokemon itself via help from an ability, stats, and/or move pool." Why I feel limber is superior to magma Armour or vital spirit is because being frozen and put to sleep are less common than being paralyzed and if your really that paranoid about freeze hax then we could give it one of the moves that thaws the user when used.

edit: As I was typing my response Pwnemon posted his, I agree with his chose and thing any of his suggested abilities are good and that we should in fact have three competitive abilities but if I was forced to chose I would pick limber, slightly out of narcissism and partly because those abilities feel like an attempt to succeed in spite of typing not because of it, which was something that we wanted to avoid with this Pokemon.
 
No Competitive Ability - Dry Skin is already marvelous, this would simply give CAP 3 a flavor ability that would let it operate in Sun without as much of a drawback. Several flavor abilities could actually be fairly useful, like Flame Body to put that 4x Bug resistance to good use or Magma Armor to avoid being frozen by random resisted Ice attacks, giving CAP 3 a third status immunity.
I love that last idea. I'd suggest Vital Spirit or Insomnia so they can't sleep it, burn it, or poison it. Limber would be decent as well, but I can't see CAP3 running much speed anyway, barring a gimmicky Choice Scarf set. It'd be a very interesting side route to take, having a pokemon completely immune to three statuses, and one I don't think any other pokemon has.
 
I believe that CaP3 must have a somewhat competitive ability to complement Dry Skin out of necessity if the typing is to be a strong point. Fire typing, while usable due to CaP3's incredible Special Attack, is seriously devalued by an ability that makes it best in the rain. While some would argue that this would make fire by far the dominant typing, there are other ways to make a typing an integral part of a Pokemon than "it gets STAB on an attack it uses." Just look at any steel type that doesn't frequently run Bullet Punch or Iron Head. Even Tentacruel is a good example of how the poison type can be a valuable component of a Pokemon without using its secondary STAB.

Therefore, I find that an ability that makes its Fire STAB far more used than its Poison STAB by the means of not nerfing fire is not only acceptable but to be encounraged.

I've already mentioned several times how the most valuable aspect of this typing is probably how well it deals with residual damage, bar entry hazards and weather. This makes it a natural stallbreaker or bulky booster, especially when its high special attack, moderate bulk, and low speed are taken into account.

There are three abilities that I was looking at in particular to help with this.

Regenerator is my favorite choice for an ability, as it effectively allows CaP3 to switch in multiple times to take Toxics, Will-o-wisps, and absorb Toxic Spikes, and complements its moderate bulk quite well. It also grants CaP3 an ability to be "immune" to entry hazards, bar Stealth Rock and multiple layers of spikes, as has been referenced previously. This effectively gives CaP3 a major advantage against stall that would require very good play to work around, and makes CaP3's typing a very large part of its ability to decimate stall with one ability, and rain with the other. This keeps the two abilities more or less even as well.

Intimidate is my second favorite. While this may seem like a foolish idea at first, given that most of CaP3's checks and counters are physical, it makes sense when further considered. If given Intimidate, a number of desirable outcomes follow. Primarily, CaP3 can switch into and threaten most fighting types when they're at -1, allowing CaP3's poison typing to be seen to its fullest extent. It also makes CaP3 take almost nothing from Scizor given some defensive investment, although it still has to come in on a Scizor locked into a move in order to get what is effectively a free turn to set up. This also allows CaP3 to build up a more neutral relationship with Dragonite, where whatever switches in to the other will have the advantage in most cases. This also allows CaP3 to switch in on more, to take advantage of the natural resistances of the typing.

As for the argument that Intimidate beats its counters, this is untrue. Given their standard sets, CaP3 with maximum Physical Bulk still risks being KO'd by any threat faster than it provided that it switches in on the most powerful move and Stealth Rock is up. Non physically-maxed CaP3 are still KO'd by most powerful Ground attacks and Band Terrakion. This means that bar a recovery move, CaP3 can still only switch into its counters one time max, and then it will be at risk of getting KO'd anyways. Admittedly, Tyranitar is made much easier to handle by Intimidate, but CaP3 still has to risk that its a Dragon Dance variety or carries Earthquake if it tries to switch in, and it will not like taking Stealth Rock, sandstorm, and a -1 Stone Edge if it mispredicts.

Overcoat is another option I felt like mentioning. While its largely outclassed by everything, it would be a decent ability for CaP3 as it allows CaP3 to function in most weathers, and serve as a pretty good counter for Hail if anyone's seriously worried. None of its checks really need Sandstorm to KO, but this does give CaP3 some more bonus points against residual damage without altering its playstyle too much.


I considered giving Prankster a section, and decided it was a bad idea due to the priority burn/toxic/weather change it could unleash on counters. It would give CaP3 a priority Taunt to deal with stall, but that's about it in terms of benefits.
 
Compound Eyes

Compoundeyes is the perfect move for our mon. First of all, it brings distinct advantages to the STAB moves. Fire Blast has less than perfect accuracy, and everyone hates when Fire Blast misses. Compoundeyes would raise this accuracy all the way up over 100%, meaning that it's safe to use Fire Blast over Flamethrower. Even Inferno is a usable option, with the accuracy up to 65% (72% with Wide Lens). That's not perfect, but it's usable and its seriously threatening. This helps accomplish some of the tanking abilities of the pokemon by threatening to burn physical mons, especially because our Def is lower than our SDef.

As for the coverage options, it opens up a lot of possible doors. Because we would lose Dry Skin, there still needs to be a way to check water types reliably. This is where something like Thunder comes into play. A super effective, reliable Thunder with about 90% accuracy coming from a 131 SAtk is sure to keep water types away. Focus Blast also becomes usable, which is always something useful to have to fend off mons like Tyranitar.

From a support standpoint, there are many options that will benefit. The most notable is Will-O-Wisp. A 91% accurate Will-O-Wisp is incredibly dangerous from a support standpoint, and helps the mon tank physical hits and threaten physical powerhouses. This is especially useful because our Def is lower than our SDef. Other notable options are improved Toxic, which doesn't suffer from any misses ever. There are other moves that can be thrown in there like Hypnosis, Sing, etc. These become incredibly dangerous when coupled with an accuracy raising ability.

Alternatively, I would also support Adaptability. This mon is about making bad typing good, and Adaptability really accentuates the Fire and Poison STABs. Instead of finding ways to sneak around the typing, it makes us rely even more on the Fire and Poison typing and even raises its power. For once, it might be a good idea to spam Sludge Bomb. Adaptability doesn't help with coverage, but it helps make moves like Sludge Bomb hit water types and other mons hard. The neutral typing suddenly becomes threatening.
 
Compound Eyes

Compoundeyes is the perfect move for our mon. First of all, it brings distinct advantages to the STAB moves. Fire Blast has less than perfect accuracy, and everyone hates when Fire Blast misses. Compoundeyes would raise this accuracy all the way up over 100%, meaning that it's safe to use Fire Blast over Flamethrower. Even Inferno is a usable option, with the accuracy up to 65% (72% with Wide Lens). That's not perfect, but it's usable and its seriously threatening. This helps accomplish some of the tanking abilities of the pokemon by threatening to burn physical mons, especially because our Def is lower than our SDef.

As for the coverage options, it opens up a lot of possible doors. Because we would lose Dry Skin, there still needs to be a way to check water types reliably. This is where something like Thunder comes into play. A super effective, reliable Thunder with about 90% accuracy coming from a 131 SAtk is sure to keep water types away. Focus Blast also becomes usable, which is always something useful to have to fend off mons like Tyranitar.

From a support standpoint, there are many options that will benefit. The most notable is Will-O-Wisp. A 91% accurate Will-O-Wisp is incredibly dangerous from a support standpoint, and helps the mon tank physical hits and threaten physical powerhouses. This is especially useful because our Def is lower than our SDef. Other notable options are improved Toxic, which doesn't suffer from any misses ever. There are other moves that can be thrown in there like Hypnosis, Sing, etc. These become incredibly dangerous when coupled with an accuracy raising ability.

Alternatively, I would also support Adaptability. This mon is about making bad typing good, and Adaptability really accentuates the Fire and Poison STABs. Instead of finding ways to sneak around the typing, it makes us rely even more on the Fire and Poison typing and even raises its power. For once, it might be a good idea to spam Sludge Bomb. Adaptability doesn't help with coverage, but it helps make moves like Sludge Bomb hit water types and other mons hard. The neutral typing suddenly becomes threatening.
Compound Eyes isn't really something I could see being very useful. It gives up our water immunity for increased accuracy on a few moves that don't really need it. For example, if we assume like your example that CaP3 has Thunder, why would it need compound eyes? We're a rain tanking fire type, if we have thunder we can already get 100% accuracy. Also, you've poll jumped in a few moves we're unlikely to have, most notably Focus Blast, which destroys two of our counters (Tyranitar and Heatran) on the switch. Not that it isn't a good ability, but I don't see much use for it on Cap3.
Still don't like Drought. I'll cross that bridge when we come to it.
Right now, in favor of Regenerator or No Competitive Ability.
 

erisia

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I'd just like to say that I don't really like Tinted Lens, in that it just completely undermines Poison STAB attacks. Why would we bother using Sludge Wave when a resisted Flamethrower will do just as much? Almost nothing 4x resists Fire, so outside of Hidden Power Ground or Earth Power for Heatran, CAP 3 wouldn't need to run any coverage moves at all, meaning that it wouldn't make the most of its typing. Giving CAP3 Tinted Lens would just bypass its Poison typing offensively, which isn't something we should be trying to do.
 
Hmmmmmm..... well, we could always try to make use of its unique typing.

I mean, fire/poison is already immune to BURN and POISON status, so if we gave the CAP Limber or Insomnia/Vital Spirit, we could make it immune to even MORE status effects.
 
For Drought, I'm just going to quote what I said in the primary ability poll because it summarizes it pretty well imo.

Drought

Drought achieves the following:

- puts CAP 3 into a "win condition" role that makes its Poison typing a valuable asset

- threatens Water-types in the way they were intended to be threatened (making CAP 3 function well against rain), rather than just countering them for the lulz

- uses the Fire type in a way that few other abilities can, and does not use other types in the same fashion

- leaves CAP 3 with many of the same weaknesses as other weather starters, except with the Toxic Spikes absorption, to have a very good idea of what such a trait could do for a weather starter

I also like Dry Skin but I feel Drought needs all the support it can get.
I also want to point out that we should only consider abilities that are good alternatives to Dry Skin. Otherwise, the ability might as well not even be there. You think people would pass up Dry Skin for a full-powered STAB? I'm not so sure. Dry Skin is stupidly powerful (3/16 healing PER TURN in rain with Leftovers, without actually expending each turn) and it's only fitting to give CAP 3 another powerful ability that can convince battlers to use it. That's why I'm not very convinced right now of the viability of abilities like Rough Skin, Compoundeyes, and Water Absorb. And Water Absorb is pretty strong.

Out of Deck Knight's initial list (other than Drought, because I've said my piece on it), only Regenerator sticks out as something that would be used over Dry Skin. Trace is way too niche in this generation's OU. You'd think the ability to Trace stuff like Poison Heal and Natural Cure would be enough to keep Porygon2 in OU usage, but nope. Many of the abilities in OU are much more fitting for their users than for Porygon2 or potentially CAP 3. Suction Cups is better, but considering so many of CAP 3's threats are just going to beat its face in, it's not very compelling to me.

Regenerator, on the flip side, is too powerful for CAP 3. Now, you're probably protesting that Drought is also too powerful... and maybe it is more powerful than Regenerator. However, the kind of "too powerful" I'm referring to is with reference to Regenerator's intent. Barring having to switch into both Stealth Rock and Spikes, Regenerator heals more on switch-out than it does on switch-in. Let's look at an existing example of an offensive Regenerator Pokémon in Mienshao. I don't know about anyone else, but nearly every time I beat a team containing Mienshao in battle, it's the last Pokémon I KO. Is that the kind of role that fits this concept? It might have been a great idea if CAP 3 were doubly weak to Stealth Rock, but as it stands...

Regarding Sheer Force / Adaptability / Tinted Lens: Sheer Force is the only one that's relevant to the concept. Adaptability is just a 4/3 power boost to the STABs, or, conversely, reducing the relative power of coverage moves. How is this relevant to anything we're doing? Are we just that scared of Drought? I'm not even sure why Tinted Lens is being suggested, since it turns this into: "Hey, you know how our typing has offensive weaknesses, just like every other typing? Yeah, screw that."

What remains from what's being talked about, then, are Intimidate and Sheer Force. I'm not sure that we really need the universal power boost of Sheer Force, though. Intimidate is interesting just for making CAP 3 more viable overall. In the end, though, I prefer Drought for its greater synergy with the typing.

That's my take on everything for now.

@ below: Run Away does not affect Arena Trap. Unaware does not affect your own attacks (see: Curse Quagsire).
 
I liked pwnemon's idea for Tinted Lens and agree that it would be a great ability for CAP3. But I'm also liking the idea of Trace...
Another option I see is Battle Armor/Shell Armor, to protect CAP3 from crit-haxes, which do matter for walls/defensive pokemon like CAP3... We could also use Unaware or Contrary so Overheat could be a viable option without the need to switch out.
Or Filter/Solid Rock to power down SE moves..
Quick Feet makes paralysis a good thing, but it'll probably not be used much
Serene Grace for a 60% burn Lava Plume... (and a 60% badly poison Poison Fang?)
EDIT: thanks kingtrace, I thought run away worked in battles, but I guess I was wrong.. Also, I agree contrary might be a bit over the top, but Unaware is still a good option that has the 'same' reasoning.
 
Drought is still an ability that I stand in opposition to for the primary reason that it doesn't bring anything that would be unique to CAP3. We already function fairly well against rain thanks to Dry Skin, so I'm fairly sure that we're a legitimate threat to rain teams without it. On the flipside, Drought doesn't make CaP3 valuable against rain, the only thing it will be good for is switching in, firing off one move, and then switching out when poli comes back in. Without the water immunity, he'd be in bad sorts against a lot of rain teams. The toxic spikes removal that comes with a poison typing is certainly a boon, but it's the same boon that all poison types have. Sun teams have a fairly good t-spike absorber already, in Venusaur.
In summation, Drought isn't really a good complementing ability to Dry Skin, as one or the other is likely to eclipse the other. However, Capefeather does bring up a good point about Rengenerator being pretty strong as an ability, and so I put my support fully behind No Secondary Ability for the time being. Dry Skin is already fantastic, and I don't see many of these abilities being useful above it.
Edit: I just saw Contrary on Sunny E's list. If it happens, it's really unlikely that we're putting overheat on it, otherwise we might as well slap a choice scarf on it and call it Serperior. As for Run Away....
Run Away

If this Pokémon is in battle, they will be guaranteed the ability to flee so long as they aren't under the effects of full-trapping moves or abilities. This does not apply to trainer battles, where fleeing cannot occur. This does not allow escape from the trapping abilities Shadow Tag or Arena Trap, or the moves Mean Look and Spider Web.
Competitive Use

There is no competitive use to this ability as it doesn't do anything in competitive matches.

Hmmm... Unaware.. Interesting, but I'm going to need a lot of convincing to support it. I don't think it has that many merits over Dry Skin, but I could be swayed.
 
I like Solid Rock, it's an ability I thought of way back during the first ability discussion but to give it something so rigged like contrary?? Nope.
 

bugmaniacbob

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I should like to remind everybody that the point of having a competitive ability, and particularly a second one, is not for any kind of general utility or to make the Pokemon more powerful, but to introduce something that enables us to explore the concept - here, trying to make the typing a strong selling point of the Pokemon in question. With that said, I'd like to propose something that I very much doubt anybody will like or want, but I feel is at least worthy of consideration:

Pure Power

And that's not as silly as it sounds. Now, there are definitely issues with it and certainly there are good reasons why this is not a good idea, but I feel that this takes the Pokemon in a very nifty direction. With Pure Power and 45 base Attack, CAP3's attacking power just exceeds that of Salamence, which is quite impressive indeed. Why would we want to give CAP3 this kind of physical attacking power? Well, there are several reasons, but the only one that is relevant to the concept is that this allows us to explore all facets of Fire as an offensive typing - not only the access to high-powered STAB attacks, but also the immunity to burn and the 50% Attack reduction that would come with it. Burn immunity is a precious commodity indeed, and it saddens me that we are not making greater use of it.

Overpowering? Doubtful. Even with max Attack and LO, you still can't 2HKO Chansey with Poison Jab. More to the point, the strongest physical STAB attacks available without serious drawbacks are Fire Punch and Poison Jab (I am against recoil moves being used under any circumstances they are counterproductive to a defensive Pokemon), and if we don't give it any important coverage moves, it will struggle to break through pretty much most-anything in OU. Not to mention that it is then out-damaged more or less completely by Darmanitan and Victini. Even if we go mixed, neither Fire Punch nor Poison Jab can 2HKO Blissey without investment, it isn't really worth it. So the question becomes "Well, what's the point of it, then?"

Well, in practical terms, very little. Specially-based variants will be stronger and more importantly will be able to use Dry Skin. But on the other hand, it is a stronger ability purely if there is a vested interest for us in going physical - if there is a way for CAP3 to be usable both over Darmanitan/Victini and over the special variant. Coverage? Perhaps. At the moment I'm more interested in seeing whether this could indeed amount to something - whether we can make physical CAP3 usable for its burn immunity. I am of the opinion that we can.

*Insert rhetoric about covering new ground and golden opportunities and doing something we've never done before and this is the only logical choice etc. etc.*

No other abilities make sense in relation to the concept, so I'd rather go with No Competitive Ability if such is the case.

On the other hand, I would support Solar Power purely because then CAP3 would always be losing HP in the sun regardless of ability, which would be fun both in terms of balancing it and in screwing over the established weather roles

No, I'm not being serious, and apparently I have to mark up whenever I do frivolity nowadays
 
I still find Drought to be an ability that would take us too far in the wrong direction. Again, it wouldn't be a typing extreme makeover to have a Fire-type that uses the sun...

I do suggest Storm Drain, however. It nicely follows the theme of being a Water-type counter via threatening things like Politoed even after they switch in. Dry Skin is ideal for more defense sets and in general Rain-use, but Storm Drain would provide CAP 3 with two things: the ability to come in and start hitting hard, and the utility of being usable in not just one type of weather. As such, if our first ability provides situational defensive variants, then our second ability should compliment that in being an all-purpose offensive threat. Water Absorb might have the same utility, but would otherwise have the same purpose as Dry Skin in coming in on Water-types to start setting up. Storm Drain pivots that in taking CAP 3 into an offensive role instead, entering the field and immediately wrecking things reliably with Flamethrower and Sludge Wave.

I also support the idea of three competitive abilities, but I suppose that's to be discussed another time.
 
Bugmaniacbob, my mind is now blown, since I was confident no one would come in with an ability I liked AND good reasoning to boot. Pure Power is really decent idea, considering our already low base Attk. I'd love to see what kind of movepool we could generate to allow this ability to see use above Dry Skin.
 
Of all the ones mentioned so far, these are the ones I support

- drought
- solid rock
- pure power (maybe DW)
- sheer force
- storm drain
- water absorb
- regenerator

While I think that we should get our bases covered for this ability (through regenerator, stormdrain, water absorb, etc) for this ability. I think we should focus on giving the CAP3 more versatility with its DW ability.
 

Birkal

We have the technology.
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I'm not going to make a huge mega-post, but I still think Drought is by far the best way to go. Capefeather's post really says it best, so go read that. It gives us a significant path to counter Water-type Pokemon further AND decreases their usefulness within OU by hindering Rain. It also fits the concept really well (I don't see how it couldn't) by letting us focus on the defensive capabilities of Fire-typing, especially with how well it can take out Water-types as a whole due to providing sunlight.

Also, please PLEASE do not support No Competitive Ability. Remember that we chose the typing of Poison/Fire for a reason: it is not very good. Especially with the stat spread we have chosen, we currently have a mon that is similar to a worse Heatran. We must differentiate ourselves to some degree if we ever have a hope for CAP3 to be OU. I fear that if we don't splurge here, we might regret it later on.
 

verbatim

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I should like to remind everybody that the point of having a competitive ability, and particularly a second one, is not for any kind of general utility or to make the Pokemon more powerful, but to introduce something that enables us to explore the concept - here, trying to make the typing a strong selling point of the Pokemon in question. With that said, I'd like to propose something that I very much doubt anybody will like or want, but I feel is at least worthy of consideration:

Pure Power

And that's not as silly as it sounds. Now, there are definitely issues with it and certainly there are good reasons why this is not a good idea, but I feel that this takes the Pokemon in a very nifty direction. With Pure Power and 45 base Attack, CAP3's attacking power just exceeds that of Salamence, which is quite impressive indeed. Why would we want to give CAP3 this kind of physical attacking power? Well, there are several reasons, but the only one that is relevant to the concept is that this allows us to explore all facets of Fire as an offensive typing - not only the access to high-powered STAB attacks, but also the immunity to burn and the 50% Attack reduction that would come with it. Burn immunity is a precious commodity indeed, and it saddens me that we are not making greater use of it.

Overpowering? Doubtful. Even with max Attack and LO, you still can't 2HKO Chansey with Poison Jab. More to the point, the strongest physical STAB attacks available without serious drawbacks are Fire Punch and Poison Jab (I am against recoil moves being used under any circumstances they are counterproductive to a defensive Pokemon), and if we don't give it any important coverage moves, it will struggle to break through pretty much most-anything in OU. Not to mention that it is then out-damaged more or less completely by Darmanitan and Victini. Even if we go mixed, neither Fire Punch nor Poison Jab can 2HKO Blissey without investment, it isn't really worth it. So the question becomes "Well, what's the point of it, then?"

Well, in practical terms, very little. Specially-based variants will be stronger and more importantly will be able to use Dry Skin. But on the other hand, it is a stronger ability purely if there is a vested interest for us in going physical - if there is a way for CAP3 to be usable both over Darmanitan/Victini and over the special variant. Coverage? Perhaps. At the moment I'm more interested in seeing whether this could indeed amount to something - whether we can make physical CAP3 usable for its burn immunity. I am of the opinion that we can.

Darn you for beating me to the punch. Bug covered most of what I had to say about Pure Power/Huge Power.

In defense of how this will not break CAP3 I'd like to draw a comparison to Medicham. Medicham has Pure Power, Hi Jump Kick, (we are not getting anything nearly this strong) 15 more attack, and is faster, yet its not OU. I know that CAP3 will bring the ability to go mixed to the table, but with moves like Poison Jab and Fire Punch (Or Cross Poison/Flame Wheel) Pure Power is offering this pokemon interesting options on a mixed set, not breaking it.
 

Deck Knight

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Power boosting abilities in general:

I'm willing to entertain Drought because it's reversible by another weather starter. I still would like an argument as to why Drought would not allow CAP 3 to walk all over the threats list, consdering Fire STAB off 131 Special Attack and a Choice Scarf obliterates Gliscor and Landorus, and short of denying Solarbeam, that takes out Tyranitar and Terrakion (remember, CAP3 can come in on any of their attacks except Stone Edge and Earthquake)

Adaptability and Pure Power are out of the question though. CAP3's STABs don't need an additional power boost when they have a 131 Attacking stat, this isn't mono-Poison physical where that might be a good option. Much as I like mixed attacking, Medicham is nowhere near as bulky as CAP 3, and I really think we should abide by the will of the voters here. They had a chance to vote for mid and high Atk spreads, and they lost. The focus here is how do they help the typing fill niches specific to it, which something like Suction Cups does because of the immunity from statuses that have residual damage, etc.
 
I definately back Regenerator. Most, if not all Pokemon that have it now, really don't have the best of abilities to chose from besides Regenerator. Being able to shift between the two will play a lot of minds games with the opponent (especially if you have a Zoarark in the midst as well), is a fantastic competitve ability and keeps with the healing theme of Dry Skin for non-weather teams.
 
So far the best arguments have been for Regenerator and Pure Power.

Regenerator allows it to come in multiple times and offset hazard damage means that it isn't forced to be run on/against Rain teams.

Pure Power gives a nice unpredictability aspect, as there's the chance of getting hit by a decently strong physical move instead of its excessively hefty special attack stat.


I think Insomnia/Vital Spirit sounds interesting, but I'm on the fence about how useful those would ever stand a chance to be. However, as a complete shut down to Brelooms, it could be fun. He wasn't on the threat/threaten list, granted, but blocking Spore would pretty much shut down Breloom that lacked Stone Edge.

The only ability I think should NOT be considered is Drought. I realize there are tons of good arguments for why Drought should be an ability on this Pokemon, but in the end all it will amount to is a better Ninetales. There's a reason that ability was given to an uber at first and then, much later, given to a relatively weak Pokemon. If Drought was picked, it would almost completely outclass Dry Skin as an ability.
 
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