np: BW OU Suspect Testing Round 9 - Rock You Like a Hurricane

[Princess Bubblegum]

Meinshoa's main problem is the fact that it is easily out speed by common offensive cores and easily walled by defensive cores. It also does very little for team support, it can't sweep by itself, it can't set up, it can't take a hit if need be, it can't check things, all it can do is wall break, and its terrible at doing that. Also can we stop comparing brawl characters to pokemon ಠ_ಠ.

What I am basically seeing in this thread is the (relevant) argument between Tornadus-T being a pain in the ass which comes in and out multiple times wearing down a teams defenses without much they can do in return vs Tornadus-T being very easy to check because of the fact that it can't boost and many things can take a hit from it and or check it in the meta.

I proscribe to the first argument as it can dismantle teams almost to easily and is very damaging to any defensive team / core unless to plan on running an outright counter to it, and even then it has a disgusting possibility to still break through. Yes not everything has a perfect counter, but many things have their "work arounds" and can be effectively checked, dragons are checking bait once locked into outrage, and np-Thundurus-T has a crippling weakness to rocks and is easily out speed. Tornadus-T as a wall breakever avoids all of that with regenerator and a carefull use of u-turn, hurricane, and switching, and thats just ignoring the rest of its other 2 moves.

 

[Hugin]

I feel like a lot of abilities would end up being deal breakers on the wrong (or right in this case) Pokemon.

Terrakion with Solid Rock for instance, would end up being utterly broken. TBH, I've always thought that Regenerator was a top tier ability, people just weren't paying attention.

That's why I like the ability tiering thread so much. Honest discussion of individual elements to the game which aren't as clear-cut as the standard pokemon tiers.

And yeah, Regenerator isn't the core of the problem, it's a case of straw+camel. If you dropped it's speed to 105, or switched Regenerator out, or if Hurricane was weaker, or if it got less coverage moves, then Tornadus would be fine. Heck, T-I is UU and hasn't been kicked up to BL. I think Tornadus-T is closer to the border between safe and broken than anything before, but the meta is better without it.

 

[Halcyon.]

I think, when talking about Thundurus-T as a check to Tornadus-T, it's important to think about what you would do from the perspective of the Tornadus-T player.

If I were using Tornadus-T and my opponent just switched in a Thundurus-T in on my Hurricane my first thought would definitely be "that guy is obviously scarfed. I had better switch out" as there would be little reason to actually send in Thundurus-T against a Tornadus-T otherwise. However, my next thought would be "but wait...he could be trying to force me to switch so that he can grab an agility and sweep my whole team! I had better stay in and kill him!" At this point, it becomes a classic example of risk vs reward.

Let's say that the Thundurus-T is indeed scarfed. If so, you will definitely want to switch out your Tornadus because obviously you don't want it to die; it's most likely your most useful Pokemon. On the other hand, Thundurus-T could be an agility set trying to get a free setup as you switch. In this situation, you want to stay in and hurricane again in order to kill it and prevent that sweep from happening. What it boils down to now is which Thundurus-T set provides more of a problem to your team? The obvious first choice is to not risk it and to get your Tornadus-T out of there because why stay in on him if there's a chance he might kill you? Well, that might be true, but there's also the chance that he's an agility set. If he IS an agility set, and he sets up on the switch, then you have to deal with a +2 Thundurus-T, who can then KO your Tornadus-T anyway. By this logic, the obvious choice is to stay in and hurricane, because an agility Thundurus-T is much more harmful than a scarf one. Then again, it is far more likely that said Thundurus-T is scarfed because the opponent would most likely not risk his agility one gettin KOed so easily. The point is, all of this has to be taken into account in the situation. Personally, I think Tornadus-T is broken, BUT I will say that Thundurus-T puts a lot of pressure on the Tornadus-T user. Also, after typing this I feel a little but like this guy...

 

[Dark Fallen Angel]

I think, when talking about Thundurus-T as a check to Tornadus-T, it's important to think about what you would do from the perspective of the Tornadus-T player.

If I were using Tornadus-T and my opponent just switched in a Thundurus-T in on my Hurricane my first thought would definitely be "that guy is obviously scarfed. I had better switch out" as there would be little reason to actually send in Thundurus-T against a Tornadus-T otherwise. However, my next thought would be "but wait...he could be trying to force me to switch so that he can grab an agility and sweep my whole team! I had better stay in and kill him!" At this point, it becomes a classic example of risk vs reward.

Let's say that the Thundurus-T is indeed scarfed. If so, you will definitely want to switch out your Tornadus because obviously you don't want it to die; it's most likely your most useful Pokemon. On the other hand, Thundurus-T could be an agility set trying to get a free setup as you switch. In this situation, you want to stay in and hurricane again in order to kill it and prevent that sweep from happening. What it boils down to now is which Thundurus-T set provides more of a problem to your team? The obvious first choice is to not risk it and to get your Tornadus-T out of there because why stay in on him if there's a chance he might kill you? Well, that might be true, but there's also the chance that he's an agility set. If he IS an agility set, and he sets up on the switch, then you have to deal with a +2 Thundurus-T, who can then KO your Tornadus-T anyway. By this logic, the obvious choice is to stay in and hurricane, because an agility Thundurus-T is much more harmful than a scarf one. Then again, it is far more likely that said Thundurus-T is scarfed because the opponent would most likely not risk his agility one gettin KOed so easily. The point is, all of this has to be taken into account in the situation. Personally, I think Tornadus-T is broken, BUT I will say that Thundurus-T puts a lot of pressure on the Tornadus-T user. Also, after typing this I feel a little but like this guy...

Mamoswine could easily solve this dilemma...

 

[Cyrrona]

After using both suspects extensively and qualifying a few days ago, I might as well weigh in.

I think it’s pretty simple to spot Tornadus-T’s breaking points by comparing it with Tornadus-I. Tornadus-T's two distinguishing features over its less inflammatory cousin—Regenerator and a uniquely high base speed—were enough to catapult the Therian into the suspect limelight even though its Hurricanes are relatively weaker. While these additions might not appear overtly overwhelming on the surface, they play vital roles on an offensive pokemon like Tornadus-T in practice. Regenerator effectively eliminates passive damage as a potential solution and makes stopping Tornadus-T with anything other than a flat-out OHKO extremely difficult, while the blistering 121 speed stat sharply reduces the number of pokemon that can safely acquire that kill. Sticking both of these elements together on a single pokemon that also wields impressive special firepower and an excellent attacking STAB results in a fatal combination of strength, speed, and longevity that I don’t believe the tier (as a whole) can adequately handle. Consequently, I'll be voting in favor of a ban here.

With that said, I can't conscionably vote the same in Keldeo's situation. While I agree with some pro-ban posters that Keldeo is a top-tier threat, I don't believe we can reasonably call it anything more than that. Keldeo's unusual, useful typing may have one STAB that's frighteningly powerful under rain, but the metagame already accommodates a wide variety of pokemon that either resist Water/Fighting (Jellicent, Celebi, Tentacruel, Latias/os, Toxicroak, Starmie, Gyarados, Dragonite, Venusaur, Amoonguss, Roserade, Slowbro/king, etc.) or resist select portions of the pony's moveset and situationally check it (Rotom-W, Gastrodon, Chansey, etc.). It's also worth noting that 1) a solid number of these pokemon have somewhat reliable recovery, allowing them to manage Keldeo throughout the match, and 2) some of them are completely immune to certain Keldeo STABs (a trait that I'm sure most Tornadus-T switch-ins desperately wish they had). Furthermore, Keldeo isn’t graced with Tornadus-T’s incredible ability to sidestep most hazards and entirely brush off weaker hits: Spikes punish each Keldeo entry, and lack of any recovery allows opponents to (usually) irreversibly damage it with every attack. Keldeo is definitely an imposing force, but I personally can't rationalize an "Uber" vote when so many of the metagame's preexisting rain checks also happen to double as pretty respectable Keldeo answers.

 

[ginganinja]

I think, when talking about Thundurus-T as a check to Tornadus-T, it's important to think about what you would do from the perspective of the Tornadus-T player.

I won't quote your entire post, but I will discuss it. Basically, I agree that its a nice example, but I would be careful at making judgements on the Tornadus-T player. For example, my opponent could have a team such as Toed, Thundurus, Ferrothorn, Tenta, Tornadus, Dugtrio for example, and I could assume that Thundurus is likely scarfed (assuming I have seen leftovers on Toed). Knowing the team is very important for example if you had the rest of your team resistant to Hurricane, I might accept that staying in and Hurricaning is better since a) Tornadus-T is not as usful and b) I might be weak to Agility Thundurus. Maybe I have Thundurus_T checked elseware on my yteam and your team is Tornadus-T weak in which case I would switch out. Long story short, your scenario needs more infomation I think before you can make sweeping statements similar to the following like "Tornadus-T MUST stay in and Hurricane otherwise it gets swept by Agility Thundurus".

In the situation, I would assume the Thundurus is scarfed, simply because if I am wrong and its agility, I only have to stall 2-3 attacks before Life orb ends up killing it (if it lacks LO then it lacks power so I don't mind either way). No matter how you look at it tho, its still a terrible move switching in Thundurus-T into a Hurricane, whether its scarfed or otherwise. I know you cannot always assume Stealth Rock is up, however if it is, then Thundurus basically loses 75% at the least (50% from Hurricane, 25% from rocks) just switching in. Thats too much for a sweeper, and too much for my revenge killer to be taking, when my opponent can just simply switch out, regen up, and rape with Hurricane later. Heck, losing 50% on my revenge killer is prolly something I would worry about due to priority being common, as well as residual damage.

Thundurus-T coming in after a KO is different of course, but it usually means Tornadus-T has just killed something, so you need to even up the score anyway (besides, Tornadus-T has done its job (killed something for free), now I can just bring in my Latias or whatever and check Thundurus.

 

[Halcyon.]

Long story short, your scenario needs more infomation I think before you can make sweeping statements similar to the following like "Tornadus-T MUST stay in and Hurricane otherwise it gets swept by Agility Thundurus".

Yeah absolutely. I wasn't trying to make a sweeping statement and I'm sorry if it came across like I was. I was only trying to show that I think Thundurus-T can provide pressure on the Tornadus-T player.

 

[Kidogo]

I actually agree with most of what eet said above, tornadus-t has just that extra bit above incarnate that makes it more threatening. That said, I still see there as being too many good checks and true counters for tornadus to be broken. I think I'll vote OU on this one, but I'm getting close to being swayed. Keldeo is definitely not broken imo, OU for sure.

 

[Curtains]

Tornadus-T very difficult to use with the onslaught of viable choice scarfed pokemon. Once at 75% it basically can be KOed by any semi powerful neutral move.The only real pokemon you can bring it in on is maybe a celebi on a predicted grass move or a predicted non attacking move... Rocks really keep it from being broken because it takes 25% from rocks and another from LO recoil. If you are scarfed or specs you can possibly be set up or trapped. I have asked since this thread opened which pokemon tornadus can come in on and no one has really gave an answer... If you come in on something like a landorus you can be KOed by a stone edge and if full health he can live a hurricane and KO with stone edge or rock slide (probably after rocks). Tornadus is constantly losing health very quickly with rocks up. Personally I think rocks IS the counter to tornadus simply because of all the extra curricular damage it takes + an ensuing attack. You also dont have to over prepare for it either. For the specs set a tyranitar played well can revenge tornadus 100% of the time. For the LO set all you have to do is predict the switch and keep rocks up. You can thunder wave it toxic it or burn it. Any status really cancels out regenerator. If you factor in that hurricane isnt really that powerful of a move when compared to other pokemon's signature move I do not see the need to ban it to uber. Also did anyone mention that this pokemon gets shit on by priority? Just get it down to under 60% (which isnt hard) and you can beat it one on one with priority. Does the metagame seem biased towards it? Sort of but it seems like it is just a speed creep (which is good for the prediction aspect) and not really a thing where everyone has a a certain pokemon for that threat.


Also about teams being geared towards tornadus-t.... Most teams have a purpose so the object of this metagame is to find your purpose, execute it, and keep your opponent from executing his plan. If your team is a sun team your goal is to keep rocks off the field and eliminate all weather starters so your chlorophyll sweeper can sweep. if it is a rain team the plan is the same but your sweeper might be a tornadus. If it is sand it is to keep your opponent from abusing his weather sweepers, take out opposing lati@s and sweep with a scarfed keldeo or scarfed garchomp.


tl;dr: Tornadus-T is basically a venusaur of rain with less speed. It gets shitted on by choice scarfers ,rocks, status and just plain prediction. My sleep talk tornadus on the ladder got absolutely shitted on by rock tomb breloom on the switch. Thats right. But I though this thing could waltz right in and start spamming hurricanes? That is not the case.

 

[Dark Fallen Angel]

tl;dr: Tornadus-T is basically a venusaur of rain with less speed. It gets shitted on by choice scarfers ,rocks, status and just plain prediction. My sleep talk tornadus on the ladder got absolutely shitted on by rock tomb breloom on the switch. Thats right. But I though this thing could waltz right in and start spamming hurricanes? That is not the case.

I don't like this comparation. Neither Tornadus-T has to waste a turn to setup and sweep, nor it is dependent from rain to have its speed (though it's dependent to have a 100% accurate Hurricane). Also, Rock Tomb is an uncommon move to be used on Breloom, although I am starting to see more people using Rock-type moves on Breloom, probably because of Tornadus-T.

 

[MewTheDestroyer]

Drizzle won't be banned for the sheer fact that there is no reason for it. Tornadus doesn't need rain to be effective, neither does Keldeo. They function fairly well without it, as Keldeo can be used in any weather, like Tornadus. Plus, Tornadus-I will go up in usage if Drizzle is banned due to it having Prankster. It can get priority rain and then spam Hurricane. This is my thought on this talk.

 

[Curtains]

I don't like this comparation. Neither Tornadus-T has to waste a turn to setup and sweep, nor it is dependent from rain to have its speed (though it's dependent to have a 100% accurate Hurricane). Also, Rock Tomb is an uncommon move to be used on Breloom, although I am starting to see more people using Rock-type moves on Breloom, probably because of Tornadus-T.

If you think about it venusaur really doesn't need to set up to get the maximum value. It has very good coverage in the OU metagame, KOing many threats after SR, has a semi recovery move with giga drain, blistering speed under sun (even faster than scarfed keldeo and scarfed latios (iirc)) and many opportunities to set up its finishing move growth. Against a rain team venusaur under sun is a nightmare because what are you going to do? The best you possibly can do is a sash alakazam or priority. The difference is once the smoke has cleared on a venusaur team you're fucked because non of your scarfers are fast enough. Against a tornadus team all you do is save a scarfer or a priority user last and finish it off.

Venusaur is a great comparison because both pokemon need their respective weathers to do much of anything. Although, Venusaur can actually still dominate even without sun because of it's excellent coverage against sand and rain teams.

And tornadus's speed outside of rain is mute because of the accuracy of it's moves. You are basically running a LO kadabra with a 70% or 50% main stab move outside of rain. Not very appealing. U-turn isnt a very powerful move.

 

[RabidChipmunk]

If you think about it venusaur really doesn't need to set up to get the maximum value. It has very good coverage in the OU metagame, KOing many threats after SR, has a semi recovery move with giga drain, blistering speed under sun (even faster than scarfed keldeo and scarfed latios (iirc)) and many opportunities to set up its finishing move growth. Against a rain team venusaur under sun is a nightmare because what are you going to do? The best you possibly can do is a sash alakazam or priority. The difference is once the smoke has cleared on a venusaur team you're fucked because non of your scarfers are fast enough. Against a tornadus team all you do is save a scarfer or a priority user last and finish it off.

Venusaur is a great comparison because both pokemon need their respective weathers to do much of anything. Although, Venusaur can actually still dominate even without sun because of it's excellent coverage against sand and rain teams.

And tornadus's speed outside of rain is mute because of the accuracy of it's moves. You are basically running a LO kadabra with a 70% or 50% main stab move outside of rain. Not very appealing. U-turn isnt a very powerful move.

First: Venusaur can't do shit outside of sun. It's outsped by everything and it's mother, since base 80 speed is shit, so Venusaur's coverage is completely worthless.

But I think the biggest point your missing, and one I've brought up several times but no one seems to have noticed (bitter, bitter), is that Tornadus' greatest strength is not it's power in the rain. Yes, it's power in the rain is unrivaled amongst weather abusers, but Tornadus is incredibly good at making sure rain stays up. If Tornadus-T is afraid that an opposing Pokemon will change his weather, he can U-turn off of them and bring back in Politoed to make sure his weather stays around. The power of his U-turns is completely irrelevant; I say again, the power of his U-turns is completely irrelevant. His ability to bring in counters to his own counter(s) is what makes it so powerful. Quite simply, if your opponent has a Tornadus-T, it's going to be an uphill battle keeping your own weather up. What the fuck is Venusaur gonna do to keep his own sun around? Cram Sunny Day into his already cramped move slots?

Tornadus-T creates a metagame heavily biased towards rain, limiting the options of every other playstyle. If you're running an opposing weather, Tornadus will make sure it doesn't stick around, and if you're not running weather, then you better have a powerful Scarfer or a Weavile, and you better make sure they last the entire match, because Tornadus-T will pick you apart.

 

[Ningildo]

If you think about it venusaur really doesn't need to set up to get the maximum value. It has very good coverage in the OU metagame, KOing many threats after SR, has a semi recovery move with giga drain, blistering speed under sun (even faster than scarfed keldeo and scarfed latios (iirc)) and many opportunities to set up its finishing move growth. Against a rain team venusaur under sun is a nightmare because what are you going to do? The best you possibly can do is a sash alakazam or priority. The difference is once the smoke has cleared on a venusaur team you're fucked because non of your scarfers are fast enough. Against a tornadus team all you do is save a scarfer or a priority user last and finish it off.

Venusaur is a great comparison because both pokemon need their respective weathers to do much of anything. Although, Venusaur can actually still dominate even without sun because of it's excellent coverage against sand and rain teams.

And tornadus's speed outside of rain is mute because of the accuracy of it's moves. You are basically running a LO kadabra with a 70% or 50% main stab move outside of rain. Not very appealing. U-turn isnt a very powerful move.

Finally able to post after months...

Back to the topic, comparing Tornadus-T to Venusaur is very wrong as already mentioned, because Venusaur needs sun in order:

1.to boost: without sun Growth will only give +1 in each stat which, while good still, isn't going to sweeping anything with base 100 Special Attack and 80 Attack.

2.to have Speed: Being a weaker Dragonite with a bad STAB too? No.

Tornadus-T, on top being quite fast without rain, can not be easily switched into (so a mon is probably gonna go down first before revenging, but...) and can just switch out to do it again or even U-turn on a predicted switch to a scarfer. It's counters are also easily trapped by Dugtrio (Jirachi, even Blissey etc) or easily worn down (Chansey, Ferrothorn etc), which is easily done with U-turn.

Don't bring up frailty as an argument. Seriously, Deoxys-A and Thundurus (who is slightly frailer then Tornadus-T and slower, so by your logic, should be easily handelable) didn't stay OU due that.

Hide

On a side note, I hope I can post some more in the coming weeks, hopefully not taking nearly 3 months for another post again.

EDIT:Ninja'd in terms of made points.

 

[Halcyon.]

Inside their respective weathers, I think the comparison between Tornadus-T and Venusaur is passable, because weatherless teams still have to play around them in similar ways due to their speed, but honestly, that's probably the only thing they have in common. Tornadus isn't useless outside of rain, as even without Hurricane, his specs coverage moves still hurt. Not to mention that hurricane is only dropped to 70%, which means you'll still be hitting more often than not. Plus, Tornadus still has that Regenerator+U-Turn combo to keep his strength up if he needs to. But Tornadus-T is also susceptible to scarfed Pokemon, whereas Venusaur isn't; however, like I said, with Regenerator + U-Turn + immunity to spikes means that Tornadus-T doesn't risk as much switching in and out as Venusaur does.

 

[Vemane]

After actually playing with specially defensive zapdos for a while, I am extremely impressed. It walls so much of the standard rain team, and can simply u-turn out of a threat.

http://pokemonshowdown.com/replay/oucurrent7078977

Here's an example of its utility. Not the best battle in general, but it showcases zapdos quite well imo.

And of course, using it completely stops tornadus from being any sort of threat to your team. I feel as if it's much more viable then the people in this thread have given it credit for.

 

[Schpoonman]

That certainly makes a strong argument, by why U-turn? You'll be getting more damage with Volt Switch as well as avoiding those pesky Iron Barbs/Rough Skins hits. You get prevented from switching by Ground-types switching in, but at the same time you're not susceptible to Arena Trap.

 

[Vemane]

That certainly makes a strong argument, by why U-turn? You'll be getting more damage with Volt Switch as well as avoiding those pesky Iron Barbs/Rough Skins hits. You get prevented from switching by Ground-types switching in, but at the same time you're not susceptible to Arena Trap.

I changed it mainly because my team was struggling against gastrodon (which decided to show up 4 matches in a row...) and it took way too many double switches to kill the damn thing.

In normal cases, volt switch is the better option.

 

[Curtains]

First: Venusaur can't do shit outside of sun. It's outsped by everything and it's mother, since base 80 speed is shit, so Venusaur's coverage is completely worthless.

But I think the biggest point your missing, and one I've brought up several times but no one seems to have noticed (bitter, bitter), is that Tornadus' greatest strength is not it's power in the rain. Yes, it's power in the rain is unrivaled amongst weather abusers, but Tornadus is incredibly good at making sure rain stays up. If Tornadus-T is afraid that an opposing Pokemon will change his weather, he can U-turn off of them and bring back in Politoed to make sure his weather stays around. The power of his U-turns is completely irrelevant; I say again, the power of his U-turns is completely irrelevant. His ability to bring in counters to his own counter(s) is what makes it so powerful. Quite simply, if your opponent has a Tornadus-T, it's going to be an uphill battle keeping your own weather up. What the fuck is Venusaur gonna do to keep his own sun around? Cram Sunny Day into his already cramped move slots?

Tornadus-T creates a metagame heavily biased towards rain, limiting the options of every other playstyle. If you're running an opposing weather, Tornadus will make sure it doesn't stick around, and if you're not running weather, then you better have a powerful Scarfer or a Weavile, and you better make sure they last the entire match, because Tornadus-T will pick you apart.

Venusaur can't do shit? What? Venusaur is alot better than tornadus-T outside of rain. First of all venusaur outspeeds 3-5 pokemon of a defensive rain team on his own.Second, venusaur demolishes politoed with giga drain and doesn't give two fucks if he gets burned in returned since we got all our health back. What can tornadus do? U-turn? okay now hes out of the battle and will take some LO and SR damage. I will be ready to slam him when he wants to come in again... Hurricane? Good luck with 70% accuracy. In sun don't even think about it as your hurricane is less accurate than hypnosis. One miss and a neutral move finishes you off. Focus blast? Good luck. The only thing tornadus-t has going for it is 100% hurricanes in rain. And Guess what? All of his other moves are situational and require massive prediction and guessing to keep tornadus from being dead. Tornadus-T is a brilliant revenge killer in rain. Thats it.



How is tornadus sweeping a team with 2 scarfers, mamoswine and a scizor? Lets add on a special defensive jirachi and a wild card. Never. The metagame with tornadus-t just creates an awareness for tornadus just like all the other dozens of threats that can crush you without an option for them. Lets take terrakion for instance. I bet the last team you made had a dedicated switch in for terrakion's choice band adamant close combats.. Am I wrong? Same thing with tornadus-t. I think the community is good enough to keep tornadus from sweeping everyone. It is not a scary pokemon.

 

[BdB4445]

Drizzle won't be banned for the sheer fact that there is no reason for it.

That is exactly why. Good call.

Tornadus doesn't need rain to be effective, neither does Keldeo. They function fairly well without it, as Keldeo can be used in any weather, like Tornadus.

I agree Keldeo is still great without Drizzle (although when rain has won, he can pull a pseudo choice scarf+specs), but Tornadus-T would not be very useful with Drizzle Banned. The best it can do is run an Acrobatics+Bulk UP set because Hurricane would become too unreliable. As you say below, Tornadus-I may gain more usage. Tornadus-T could still work considering the rest of his merits (U-turn, regenerator, superpower, 121 speed)

Plus, Tornadus-I will go up in usage if Drizzle is banned due to it having Prankster. It can get priority rain and then spam Hurricane. This is my thought on this talk.

It probably will, but I honestly don't see this as a "problem" if that is what you're implying. He still has to take a hit, so he may not have a chance to spam hurricane (Plus he gets worn down by life orb + hazards due to no regen). Kingdra has a better chance of setting up rain for a sweep because he can take a non-dragon type attack, use RD, and activate Swift Swim + water-type bonus.

Speaking of Kingdra, I would rather see him as a meta poke rather than an anti meta one.

Just didn't want to leave you hanging.

 

[Deluks917]

Note in that replay if your opponent had stayed in against confused (first time) Zapdos he would have taken down the zapdos. I actually think he should have since that would have given him about a 50% chance to win if you stay in (withoutzappy you are in trouble) and a free kill if you switch out. He was down alot and should have taken the chance imo. He had another shot to beat zapdos late game and he switched out again that time for no reason.

 

[qedragonite]

@vemane, that match was completely decided when your opponent failed to get stealth rocks up (and you made a great double switch to get Zapdos in against tornadus t for free, allowing you to roost). Rocks really hinder Zapdos' attempts to wall Tornadus T (his tornadus was doing about 30% with hurricane. Including Rocks and Lefties, Zapdos needed to be at 79% or higher to switch in). Your team supported Zapdos well, with Tentacruel able to spin and tenta and ferro able to take powerful water attacks that Zapdos can't, but not all teams can say that.

You'll also notice that your own Tornadus T got 4 Ko's in that match, so probably not the best argument that it should stay in OU.

 

[doublenikesocks]

You'll also notice that your own Tornadus T got 4 Ko's in that match, so probably not the best argument that it should stay in OU.

The same could be said about any offensive mon in the game. Even some defensive mons, as Ferro can kill much of the standard rain team with Leech Seed/Power Whip/Gyro Ball

 

[Vemane]

@vemane, that match was completely decided when your opponent failed to get stealth rocks up (and you made a great double switch to get Zapdos in against tornadus t for free, allowing you to roost). Rocks really hinder Zapdos' attempts to wall Tornadus T (his tornadus was doing about 30% with hurricane. Including Rocks and Lefties, Zapdos needed to be at 79% or higher to switch in). Your team supported Zapdos well, with Tentacruel able to spin and tenta and ferro able to take powerful water attacks that Zapdos can't, but not all teams can say that.

You'll also notice that your own Tornadus T got 4 Ko's in that match, so probably not the best argument that it should stay in OU.

I'm not arguing it should stay ou (I really don't want it to), I'm just presenting zapdos as a counter.

And, actually, most teams CAN say that... in fact almost all rain teams at this point can considering tenta and ferro are virtually staples.

As you mentioned, if my opponent got rocks up, they would be spun away, allowing zapdos to do its job most efficiently. (Though it still stands up to quite a bit even with rocks up)

 

[Ningildo]

And, actually, most teams CAN say that... in fact almost all rain teams at this point can considering tenta and ferro are virtually staples.

So you're promoting a counter to a rain based sweeper when said counter is best used on a rain team...ok.