BW2 In-Game Tier List Discussion [Updated 7/24]

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Stellar

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There is a list of Pokemon locations in the OP. I spent a good chunk of time on it, so make use of it. I can also answer any questions about TM/HM locations, but I'm not sure if I'll create another list.
 
Okay, I just beat Iris so now I'll write what I thought about some of the members of my team.

Roserade

Serperior who? Girl please, I have a Roserade. There is no doubt in mind that Roserade is the best ingame Grass type by far. There is just no stopping this thing's Petal Dance. I'm not exaggerating when I say that you will be using this move 99% of the time. It easily OHKOs most neutral pokemon and often 2HKOs pokemon that resist it. The only things 2 rounds of Petal Dance couldn't take out were the bulky Poison types + Golbat, Altaria, and some steel types. When I first got Roselia, I taught it Venoshock for coverage and switched to Shadow Ball when it became available but I can honestly say that there was almost never a situation where those moves were more useful than Petal Dance. It is just that nice.

You catch Roselia before the 4th gym and it automatically comes with useful moves like Giga Drain, Stun Spore, and Leech Seed. Admittedly, it's not too useful against Elesa because of Emolga and Zebstrika's Flame Charge but it can help out with its status moves. I only beat her because I had Roselia put up two layers of Toxic Spikes when it was up against the Flaafy. Even against a bad matchup Roserade was never dead weight, which is one of its best qualities I think. It even served as a decent Hypnosis and Thunder Wave absorber with Natural Cure.

After Elesa, Roselia wipes the floor with Clay's entire gym except for Excadrill. You find your first Shiny Stone in Driftveil City but DON'T YOU DARE evolve it until it learns Petal Dance at level 37. It can't do much in Skyla's gym but it can hold its own against some of Drayden's gym trainers with just Petal Dance and can single-handedly destroy the 8th gym. The only time it really struggled was on Victory Road where a lot of the trainers carry unexpected TM moves for coverage.

Roserade's only real flaw is its frailty. Every so often it gets OHKOd after the first turn of Petal Dance but it's still an outstanding pokemon to have on the team.

Roselia is high tier like nobody's business.

Metagross

Metagross is the only fully evolved pseudo legend available before the E4 because lolDeino and Zweilous and for some ridiculous reason Tyranitar is in the regional dex but is only available in the postgame. Didn't they say months ago that you could use Tyranitar and Metagross during the story? That's ridiculous false advertising Gamefreak.

Anyway, you can get Metang in the Giant Chasm after all 8 gyms and right before the Team Plasma plot. It shows up at or around the same level your team should be at that point and you can easily evolve it with a rare candy as soon as you get it. Once I got it I did some quick backtracking to tutor Ice Punch onto it and re-teach it Zen Headbutt and Hammer Arm. At that point in the game you should have enough Heart Scales and Red Shards to tutor anything you want onto it.

Metagross is powerful and has a movepool for days but it felt almost irrelevant on my team at that point. Like, if your team is on the weaker side and you need something strong to fill in the last slot then Metagross is perfect. But if your team already has a lot of fast and strong hitters like mine did, Metagross feels redundant. It's strong, yes, but it never did anything that any of my other pokemon couldn't do. Plus it was slower than all of my other pokemon too and ended up taking way more hits than them too.

Metagross is just late game filler basically. It can take out Black Kyurem easily (White 2 players oviously have to watch out for Fusion Flare) and it does decently against Ghetsis and every Elite Four member but can't really touch Iris because all of her pokemon except Lapras carry a ground or fire type move. Like I said, if your team's weak, Metagross is perfect to bridge the gap but if your team already does fine on its own, you can leave the spot open for an HM slave or something and still do fine.

I'm going to say mid tier only because its brute strength and versatile movepool stop it from being low tier.

Edit: changed Metagross to pure mid tier.
 
Availability is a huge factor in these rankings. The sheer amount of luck and time required to capture Lapras prevents it from being anywhere near mid-high in my opinion. I'm also not sure about your ranking for Jolteon. While it is easier to get than Lapras, you are still stuck with Thunder Fang/Pin Missile/Thunder Wave until right before Skyla's gym, if not immediately after. It has a completely terrible moveset for at least a third of the game.
Couldn't you use Volt Switch TM and then learn Signal Beam in Driftveil ?
With Thunder Wave, you have nice coverage move against Grass, Ground types.

Then, you can learn Shadowball too
 
Heracross (Black 2): High Tier.

Available reasonably early (before the 4th gym - Lostlorn Forest). Really strong, decently bulky and ok speed. It has Brick Break and Aerial Ace early on, then Close Combat mid-30s and Megahorn mid-40s and just wrecks everything. Has access to other TMs such as Rock Slide and Shadow Claw too. It can also handily take on two of the Elite 4 no problem - it retains its usefulness throughout the entire game. It also gets Guts, if you manage to catch one with it, which is really handy at times, as NPCs love to spam status moves.

C'mon, it's Heracross. Like I need to explain how useful it is. Definitely belongs in High Tier.
 
Volt Switch is mentioned already and Signal Beam costs 6 shards so you'll have to grind in PWT a bit (also there is a better candidate for the SB tutor in Volcarona but I'll let that pass).

The only thing is that Volt Switch forces you to switch out, which may be quite annoying especially if you are playing on Set.

edit: heracross is pretty rare for an encounter but if BW Sawk is one of the best Pokemon in the game then I don't see why Heracross shouldn't be when it has better stats/movepool
 

Stellar

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Yeah... I don't really consider Volt Switch a boon during an efficiency-oriented playthrough. Having to switch out after every attack seems like it would lower Jolteon's ranking rather than raise it.
 
Volt Switch is mentioned already and Signal Beam costs 6 shards so you'll have to grind in PWT a bit (also there is a better candidate for the SB tutor in Volcarona but I'll let that pass).
I can't check ATM, but I'm toldthere's an NPC at Nimbasa's Center who gives you 10 free Red Shards. Unless the guides are mistake, wouldn't that mean Signal Beam's cost is mitigated?

I suppose it'd just bring up the argument that you're better off teaching a different move with the shards, though.
 
I can't check ATM, but I'm toldthere's an NPC at Nimbasa's Center who gives you 10 free Red Shards. Unless the guides are mistake, wouldn't that mean Signal Beam's cost is mitigated?

I suppose it'd just bring up the argument that you're better off teaching a different move with the shards, though.
...now that's news. I'll check it up.

EDIT: Confirmed. There is this old man at the Pokemon Centre who does give you 10 Red shards.

Well this means Volcarona gets a useful STAB move to abuse now. Definitely supporting High Tier for him.

EDIT2: Jolteon doesn't get a better move with the shards. The only other special move in there is loluproar and you aren't going to get anywhere with physical moves.
 
Gentleman in Nimbasa Pokemon Center.

And I rate Guts Heracross Top. Especially with Toxic Orb. He's capable of obliterating everything, especially supported with X-Speeds. He's without a doubt one of the best pokes to get for main game playthrough and deserves to join Magmemite Tier ;p
 
Guts Heracross definitely seems legit, getting stuff like Close Combat early (i'm looking at you Lucario) and actually has great STAB combination. X-Scissor by Skyla doesn't hurt too.
 

Stellar

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Guts Heracross definitely seems legit, getting stuff like Close Combat early (i'm looking at you Lucario) and actually has great STAB combination. X-Scissor by Skyla doesn't hurt too.
Heracross doesn't learn X-Scissor. You have to wait for Megahorn at 46.
 
...now that's a surprise. I was sure it could learn it o.o

well it means Heracross doesn't get a decent Bug STAB, but its not like Bug is a really important attack to have.
 
You could always use a heart scale to relearn thunder shock on jolteon until you get charge beam or discharge if you don't like volt switch.
 

Stellar

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The point is that Jolteon was nominated for (mid-)high tier. High tier Pokemon should not require anywhere near this level of support to function well.
 
Jolteon can forego an Electric STAB imo (or at least use Volt Switch, no matter how dumb it is) for a while, since Electric isn't really required from Elesa - Skyla, and you get Discharge at L37, which is around Skyla's levels anyway.
 

Jibaku

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Just finished the E4 earlier today and would like to share experiences with a few Pokemon

Volcarona
Although it starts off with a horrendous moveset, its stats are incredibly high at the time of capture. You can also get Signal Beam easily on it, especially since there's a guy who gives you 10 Red Shards, and it will deal massive damage to a lot of things. Unfortunately, Volc won't have anything new for a while, until Undella town where you can pick up TM 38, Fire Blast, from the Pokecenter, and TM 29, Psychic, from the route above it. As shaky as Fire Blast is (5 PP and 85% acc; I PP upped mine lol), it provides Volcarona with a much needed fire move (go die, Fire Spin and Ember), and by then you'd have all the coverage you need. Volcarona, sadly, doesn't fare too well against the last three gyms, but once you get it to Lv.59 for Quiver Dance it will absolutely murder the Pokemon League almost singlehandedly (beats Dark/Ghost/Psychic/Iris (her Aggron doesn't have Sturdy) without a sweat, since it can set up on their first Pokemon). Volcarona imo is at least Mid tier, but I can see it being in High.

Set after E4's completion: Quiver Dance/Fire Blast/Signal Beam/Psychic @ Leftovers. I could've gone Flamethrower but I already pp upped fire blast so i'm not wasting that.

Magnemite/Zone
I don't need to say much about this but it's a strong Pokemon all game long and walls soo much stuff with its 13 resistances. Decent coverage too for something with 130 base SAtk. Sturdy + Thunder Wave offers some backup utility if ever needed. Also singlehandedly destroys Kyurem-B. Top tier

Set after E4: Thunderbolt/Signal Beam/Flash Cannon/Thunder Wave @ Shell Bell (lol).

Staryu/Starmie
Comes at a reasonably high level in Undella (up to 40). Unfortunately, that's pretty late, but its coverage by the end of the game (and its Speed), is amazing. A simple Surf/Psychic/Ice Beam/Thunderbolt (SPIT) @ Expert Belt can clear trainers and much of the Elite 4 with ease. Water Stone can be picked up in Route 19. I'd say this one is Mid tier.

I've had moderate success with Zubat as well, really only due to the sheer strength of Acrobatics. Unfortunately its physical movepool is pretty trash (Acrobatics/Return/Fly/...Bite?). No matter, Acrobat is usually all you need to spam. Also, Acrobatics is just cool.

My full team at the end of the game: Volcarona/Starmie/Virizion/Magnezone/Crobat/Haxorus.

I expect old titans like Sandile/Darumaka/Drilbur to still perform well in this game, even though I didnt use them this time. Unfortunately Drilbur isn't available really early on anymore but the best ones are in Chargestone cave anyways (also the cave at the bottom of pwt).
 

breh

強いだね
Ok, after a bit of play, I nominate Psyduck for Low or Bottom tier. I haven't finished the game, but if there's anything I can say about it, it's that it's terrible throughout the whole of its time as a Psyduck. I've boxed it now - Psyduck has a lot of problems, namely:

-It's oddly weak; to put it into perspective, imagine a shittier panpour that doesn't learn anything good at all and doesn't evolve until around the sixth gym. It can't 2HKO most of the gym trainers in Clay's gym, let alone 3HKO anything he has.
-It's frail; even with eviolite, it WILL get 2HKOed by just about anything it faces. Even the stupidest shit will 2HKO it.
-It's slow.

Honestly, you're better off catching a Panpour in lostlorn or something lol; it's a really inferior water type and I cannot be arsed enough to keep using it. It sits there and eats experience but does little else.

(On a side note, Dunsparce and Flareon have been going pretty ok.)
 
I talked about Growlithe a couple of pages ago and gave it low tier but I want to reconsider it only because I was only taking physical (Flare Blitz, Outrage, etc) Arcanine into consideration but didn't think about evolving Growlithe early and using its special moves (Flamethrower, Fire Blast, tutored Dragon Pulse).

I still don't think Arcanine is high tier by any stretch of the imagination because:

-Growlithe is frail and underpowered in the beginning half of the game. Even Tepig is better than it at that point because it at least evolves early and gains fighting STAB.
-It's a heavy exp drain throughout most of the game.
-It's hard to get all of its best moves no matter what route you take. You don't get 10 free Blue Shards so it's a lot harder to get Dragon Pulse and if you're not using Dragon Pulse you're doing it WRONG. And sticking with Growlithe until 45 for Flare Blitz or even 43 for Outrage is definitely not worth the effort.

I think what saves Arcanine is its strong stats and Intimidate hijinks. If you evolve it after it learns Flamethrower at 34 you'll have a pretty powerful pokemon for the middle portion of the game whose biggest weakness is its movepool.

I don't want to say low tier again because of all of the new things considered so I'll say mid tier.

Magnezone

This guy, on the other hand, is awesome from start to finish. I'm not going to comment on Magnezone much because everything that's already been said about him is true, Magnemite is basically in its own damn tier. But I want to add that if you keep Metal Sound you won't really need any coverage moves outside its STABs. It can even take out other Steels and Electrics if you soften them up with Metal Sound first. And even though it doesn't learn any really good Electric moves by level up, Thundershock tides you over until you can get Thunder before the 7th gym. The accuracy problem is less of a big deal than you might think.

Top of top tier, baby.
 
Metagross

Metagross is the only fully evolved pseudo legend available before the E4 because lolDeino and Zweilous and for some ridiculous reason Tyranitar is in the regional dex but is only available in the postgame. Didn't they say months ago that you could use Tyranitar and Metagross during the story? That's ridiculous false advertising Gamefreak.

Anyway, you can get Metang in the Giant Chasm after all 8 gyms and right before the Team Plasma plot. It shows up at or around the same level your team should be at that point and you can easily evolve it with a rare candy as soon as you get it. Once I got it I did some quick backtracking to tutor Ice Punch onto it and re-teach it Zen Headbutt and Hammer Arm. At that point in the game you should have enough Heart Scales and Red Shards to tutor anything you want onto it.

Metagross is powerful and has a movepool for days but it felt almost irrelevant on my team at that point. Like, if your team is on the weaker side and you need something strong to fill in the last slot then Metagross is perfect. But if your team already has a lot of fast and strong hitters like mine did, Metagross feels redundant. It's strong, yes, but it never did anything that any of my other pokemon couldn't do. Plus it was slower than all of my other pokemon too and ended up taking way more hits than them too.

Metagross is just late game filler basically. It can take out Black Kyurem easily (White 2 players oviously have to watch out for Fusion Flare) and it does decently against Ghetsis and every Elite Four member but can't really touch Iris because all of her pokemon except Lapras carry a ground or fire type move. Like I said, if your team's weak, Metagross is perfect to bridge the gap but if your team already does fine on its own, you can leave the spot open for an HM slave or something and still do fine.

I'm going to say low mid tier only because its brute strength and versatile movepool stop it from being low tier.
I'd argue Mid for Metagross. He has great power, great bulk, and fantastic coverage. Yes, his Speed is pretty horrible, but he learns Agility to patch it up and can set up in the face of many opponents. Even though he comes late, he's still pretty useful against the E4 (except Iris, as you mentioned). You say he's a good pokemon to pick up if you need extra power late-game, and that perfectly describes him. However, I think you're underestimating how valuable something like that can be, especially since you don't really need to baby him at all to get him to an acceptable level. I would even make a case for High Mid if it weren't for his laughably horrible catch rate.
 
Now that you mention it, I think Agility is a much better option than Ice Punch. I only taught it that to for Iris but I never got to use it. 10 perectly good shards down the drain... And don't get me started on that catch rate. Trying to catch Metangs in BW has taught me to just Master Ball those bitches as soon as possible. You can get another Master Ball later so it's not that big of a waste if you use the first one on a Metang. Whoever gave these things the same catch rate as legendaries should be arrested.

@breh
You can catch a wild Golduck on Route 14 and, even though I can't imagine it will be that much better, maybe it's worth a shot ?
 
Just started playing through (at Cheren) and man, Snivy is bad. Like...really bad. No offense or defense to speak of. My other Pokemon is Psyduck, who's at least competent so far. Snivy though....wow.
 
Actually they put a catch rate of 3 because the Beldum family was not intended to be catchable (it was given away as a gift by Steven in RSE)

Silly short-sighted asses >.>

On other Pokemon:

Deerling - Pretty meh. Doesn't deal much damage and is a pain to grind. He doesn't even have a grass STAB to fight Clay. Useless against Skyla and not of much use until Marlon. >.< Mid Tier

Roggenrola
- Comes before the 3rd gym which it theoretically beats (but lolno leavanny). Ok against 4th gym but seriously wishes it's a ground type. Meh against 5th gym, decent against the 6th (lolswanna), meh against the 7th, lol against the last.
really nothing noteworthy throughout, but it has stealth rock which helps a bit... kinda. Mid
 
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