np: BW OU Suspect Testing Round 10 - Hazard

[GatoDelFuego]

The fact that I say about deoxys not mattering if it gets one layer up because that is a worst-case scenario. Azelf can put up only stealth rock in a best-case scenario. Against any "standard" lead, such as politoed, rotom, ninetales, then both azelf and deoxys get their rocks up but deoxys gets the opportunity to put up at least one more layer. All of the deoxys counters being talked about here are being put out there in the lead spot for the purpose of making deoxys' life as difficult as possible. If these same techniques were applied to azelf, no hazards would be up. For example, leading with a prankster taunt user or a rapid spin starmie can take out azelf without any hazards, because azelf requires a focus sash and cannot hold a red card or mental herb. Azelf must try hard to obtain these rocks, because that is the best it can do. Anything that is trying to "counter" deoxys in the lead position is at best holding it to stealth rocks. When I say "it doesn't matter because stealth rocks went up", it's because something that was designed to prevent all hazards on deoxys failed. If people weren't leading with SD terrakion and Banded Tyranitar, deoxys would be already doing a much bigger number on people's teams.

 

[Jonathan]

I always lead with Sharpedo against Deoxys. They never get more than one layer up. Life Orb Crunch does like 80% the first turn, 2nd turn you outspeed and kill. Yes there are the rare ones who run TWave, but you still have a 75% chance to attack next turn and kill it, letting it only get one later up. I'm not even gonna address the tiny minority who run electric attacks. Point is, you beat the standard magic coat / taunt variants, you're immune to psycho boost, hp fire does nothing.

I still think Deoxys is completely broken, I just wanted to share another very viable OU Pokemon who can deal with Deoxys and still be useful for other stuff.

 

[Deglas]

Azelf always gets rocks up unless magic bounce seriously -.- Azelf outspeeds Starmie and kaboom so no spin there.

How does "kaboom" equal "Stealth Rocks"? Last I checked, Explosion faints the user. Azelf does not get guaranteed rocks up, if Starmie spams Rapid Spin.

EDIT @ Shurtugal: Ah, okay. I didn't realize you meant switching in after rocks were up. Still, Prankster Taunt is out there, and Donphan spamming Rapid Spin is safe if Azelf runs Thunderbolt.

 

[Halcyon.]

Azelf always gets rocks up unless magic bounce seriously -.- Azelf outspeeds Starmie and kaboom so no spin there. I never said Azelf was better than Deod, just pointing out that when you say Thundyt is not good since Deod gets rocks up that its bs since any pokemon can get SR up. Please follow the conversation before posting

Quick nitpick, actually Starmie and Azelf speed tie. Both of them have base 115 Speed. That being said, Deoxys can also come in at ANY point in the match and set up Stealth Rock or more, pretty much guaranteed. Azelf can't do that because if the opponent sets up Rocks first, then Azelf can be OHKO'd before it has the chance to setup Stealth Rock. Not saying that will happen often, but it is true that Deoxys can set up at any point in the match whereas Azelf cannot.

 

[MMII]

I'm just going to link to my post from earlier for reference. These suspect threads tend to go in circles and the post provides the principle for, at least in my case, the pro-ban position.

The best arguments for the banning of Deo-D are the ones that distinguish it from other pokemon that fill the same role, and what these arguments come down to is that Deo-D can do it earlier in a match than any other. Is that enough reason to ban it? I would say no, but if that is someone else's reason for banning it I can accept the validity of their opinion. I just find most of the other arguments presented to be either ridiculous theorymon that doesn't correspond to the reality of the game, or else they don't show anything special about Deo-D as opposed to Ferrothorn, Skarmory, Forretress, etc.

Actually, being able to setup SR and Spikes (I specify both as some seem to think it is SR/Spikes alone that make Deo-D broken) very early game is reason enough to ban it. I think we can both agree that having both of these hazards makes a very large difference when it comes to sweeping (as shown by the calcs in my linked post). The difference between setting them up in the first handful of turns and setting them up bit by bit throughout the game (which is what you do with Ferro, Forry, and Skarm sans Custap) is so drastic that it results in almost completely different team types. These three are used in Stall-Balanced team types whereas Deo-D is on the opposite side of the spectrum in the hard core HO teamtype. Deo-D gets your hazards up quickly so that you can almost instantly proceed to swarm with your hordes of sweepers before the opponent has a chance to breath. Ferro and friends quietly wait in the wings waiting for their opportunity to switch-in so that they can setup a layer to punish future switches. You can not compare Deoxys to these types of hazard setters.

Each of the pokemon I listed is different than Deoxys-D in many ways, Skarm has phazing, Forry has rapid spin, Ferrothorn resists water (super important for HO teams against rain). Each of these pokemon can do things Deoxys-D can't, but I won't argue that Deoxys-D isn't the simplest of these for hyper offense to use.
See above. Anyways, these are all long term advantages which is very different from Deo's short term effectiveness.

As for my comparison with baton pass, when I build HO teams with Deo-D I spend a ton of time considering how to support Deo-D so it isn't good 75% of the time and utter trash the other 25% of the time. To bring it to a tournament or play on the upper ladder you can't just slap it on and expect it to allow you to win 85-90% of the time that you need it to. This manifests in my team building as Deo-D+2 pokemon to allow it to function, then 3 pokemon that abuse the hazards. So now I've dedicated a not tiny portion of my team to making my strategy work, sure a baton pass team does more, but my analogy is meant to show that one does not merely slap Deo-D on a team and win.

(See bolded)
I feel you aren't giving Deoxys enough credit. He is never utter trash as long as he gets at least SR up. Mind you, that is still failing to perform his job (which isn't too often as even those intended to limit him to one layer run the risk of Red Card blowing their efforts out the window) but it wouldn't mean that he is utter trash.

Anyways, I still can't bring any solid results and conclusions as PS still isn't working for me, but with my limited testing I found that you do not need 2-3 teammates to ensure hazards stayed up. During my battles I never regretted lacking a spin blocker and I never trapped Starmie with Weavile's Pursuit (who's there, primarily, as my revenge killer, not as a Starmie trap) as the majority of the time my sweepers robbed my opponent of any opportunity to spin. The few chances they got, I had no problem letting them as it meant a free boost that would allow me to pull off a sweep or at least do as much damage as those hazards would have. Spinners were only a problem while my Forretress was still in trying to setup hazards, but those can be dealt with by one member if you feel it to be necessary. (Either Goth or Gengar/Sableye may be used) That really isn't asking for much support (Exca needed Sand, Blaze wanted Sun, Tornadus-T was always with Rain) especially as this teammate contributes a good deal to the team all by itself.

So what if SR is guaranteed? Spikes is now not guranteed and that's the entire issue in question lol. See Azelf for guaranteed rocks plz

I was hoping to ignore this as I was afraid Thundy would be the new Zapdos but some readers seem to be misinterpreting our argument. Just to make sure it is clear, my argument against Thundy and Terrakion wasn't to show that they aren't possible Deo-D checks, I intended to disprove the myth that they could take advange of Deoxys to set up a sweep. (which the calcs show to be true) The reason I didn't include Thundy in my list of Deoxys checks is that it can not outspeed and 2HKO 100% of the time. My list was intended to show the viable options that could always limit Deoxys to SR. (I overlooked 80% accuracy moves) Again, Red Card turns even these would be checks into shaky answers as shown in my linked post. This is the difference between Deo and Azelf, is that Deoxys only runs the risk of not setting up Spikes if there is a series of mispredicts. (and then it has to roll the Red Card dice) It has to make the error of failing to Taunt in time to limit Thundy to only one NP boost (unless it decided to set up both layers during those turns) or if it Taunts when Thundurus decides to finally attack. So to sum it up again, Thundurus can not set up a sweep on Deoxys and is one the lesser answers to him.

 

[Meru]

I'm loving this influx of Custap Forry on the ladder.

Putting it to sleep and watching you fight a battle 5-6 with no hazards is awesome. Please keep thinking it's a viable substitute, fellow ladderers.

 

[Shurtugal]

Fellow ladderers,

Continue to please believe that TauntGengar is never used on the ladder. Let your DeoD get taunted by it!

thats a good point; I'll never know

 

[Lavos]

Fellow ladderers,

Continue to please believe that TauntGengar is never used on the ladder. Let your DeoD get taunted by it!

why are they keeping deo-d in on gar in the first place

 

[The Grand Babido]

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in my opinion, having to play 95 battles to qualify for this test is ridiculous. generally players are only looking at around 75 battles in order to qualify, but it seems like the higher you are, the less your deviation falls. i started really strongly during this test (i think i was like 30-3 at one stage...) and i honestly think this hindered how fast i was going to get the requirements. it felt like i was going literally nowhere at times, playing four or so battles and having no change in terms of my deviation. in fact my deviation only seemed to drop substantially when i lost games and so i was honestly impartial to losing when i neared +-55 because i was sick of laddering. maybe this is just because i lost to guys i should have been beating and vice versa or something...

i pity anyone else who has to play this many battles to qualify. i suggest strategically losing to players above you if your acre is high enough...


ANYWAY i used a spikes offense team with taunt / destiny bond / ice beam / spikes froslass instead of deoxys-d and froslass performed very well. cursed body is pretty useful as if you face off against scarf jirachi, the odds are in your favour to get at least one layer. often the opponent did not have sand/anything else faster than froslass which enabled lass to get two layers or destiny bond something. good playing with taunt and destiny bond allowed me to get three layers at times and although froslass loses to tyranitar just as badly as deoxys-d, whenever i saw tyranitar i would lead with my next guy..

..stealth rock rocky helmet garchomp. he works well in terms of synergy with froslass and they can usually spike on each others' weaknesses. dragon tail and fire blast were very useful (usually i go outrage / swords dance) but getting damage on scizor and friends was crucial. garchomp can also block spin if the spinner drops below 30%

my team was based around trick room reuniclus, which some people in this thread have said is bad. the general idea was to switch garchomp into scizor and jirachi as much as possible and let them take 30% uturning, which with sr or one layer of spikes, coincidentally puts them into reuniclus' focus blast range. garchomp would also bait draco meteors and scarf ice attacks which reuniclus could abuse to set-up on.

the last three members were a scarf rotom-w heavily invested in hp, max speed mixed tyranitar with a chople berry and a lucario with cc/ice punch/bp/xspeed. froslass is not spin-blocking starmie forever and rotom-w pressures it well and rotom-w was relied upon to cover a lot of things. tyranitar did his job although sadly he often didn't outrun landorus-t so he just died to earthquake. lucario did a lot of damage and cleaned up pretty frequently with double priority or abused a cbtar and got a free kill. the biggest threats to my team were probably opposing rotom-w, keldeo and sableye. opposing water-types were incredibly annoying if they were smart and stayed in on rotom-w's volt switch.

as for deoxys-d, i don't think this metagame is an improvement at all. most of the teams i ran into were cookie cutter landorus-t sand/rain defense which were really boring to play against. the only thing no deoxys-d does to improve diversity is to encourage the use of different spikers, which is not enough for me.

so yea, i'll definitely be voting do not ban

 

[Deluks917]

I had the same experience as heist. Though I was a bit lower and gave up unlike heist :(. At the start of yesterday I was 2241 +- 68. But I was taking aproximately 2-3 games to drop a deviation point. So I just said screw it and switched from playing rain semi-stall to random team from the rmt archive. I figured it wasn't even possible to miss even if I was screwing around with random teams I didn't know how to play. Which was in fact true. At least this way I got to try out a bunch of teams.

The way GLicko works if you are above like 2150 +-70 you basically cannot miss. So if you are bored laddering just play random stuff for fun. Unless you use Farfetched or something you will get reqs.

I had to play 86 games.

The main thing I learned from all of this was that specs gothitelle is good on rain teams in this meta. Trapping hippowdon/tentacruel/defenisve starmie/forrestress is extrmely cool. If you use gothitlelle I strongly recommend you use grass knot.

 

[jpw234]

Hooooookay. Lets preface this post by saying that I don't use Deoxys-D, and I don't have a large stake on this issue. Also I'd like to preface this by saying that I got 7 pages into this thread and had to stop because my eyes started bleeding, so if I rehash something that's already been flayed to death feel free to link me to it and then tell me to shut up.

Let's, for a moment, remove the discussion about whether or not Deo-D can get up his hazards. Okay, assume he gets up his SR and 1 layer of spikes and then dies. My question is why is this actually banworthy?

I think that the presumption that this existence of hazards automatically breaks whatever 5 sweepers (or 4 sweepers and a dedicated spinblocker, more likely) he has is NOT necessarily true, it is instead indicative of the community's general stubborn insistence of sticking to predictable bulky offensive teams - rain offense, sun offense, sand offense. Let's even grant the presumption that Deo-D hyper offense has an inherent matchup advantage over these playstyles - USE SOMETHING ELSE. Just because you've been running drizzletoad/keldeo/jirachi/ferrothorn/jellicent/breloom since the beginning of time doesn't mean that you have a right to this playstyle with an even game against anything else out there. The metagame is clearly shifting, so ADAPT. I can tell you from experience that Deo-D HO does NOT have a matchup advantage against heavy stall, even with the presumption of two layers of hazards getting up. In fact I love to see Deo-D on the team preview because I know EXACTLY what's going to happen in the game with basically no room for innovation on his part and I can set up my own strategy with relative impunity while he mindlessly sets up his hazards and switches to Gengar. Basically - just because Deo-D beats YOUR STYLE of play, doesn't mean he breaks the metagame - it just means you have to suck it up and do something different.

 

[BKC]

if you think that deo-d teams don't have a huge advantage against heavy stall then i'm inclined to think you haven't had that match-up very often. stall is hard-pressed enough to counter the incredibly scary sweepers that inhabit this metagame [terrakion keldeo landorus etc] without hazards up, so imagine how hard it is to switch into these mons with sr & spikes digging into you for every switch. you can't spin them away reliably, either. gengar is always around to fuck over forretress; volt switching into scarf ttar will just result in you taking more hazard damage, plus forre can't exactly switch in whenever it likes. starmie is easy pursuit/volturn bait, and gets screwed over by t-wave deo-d. tentacruel requires you to run rain, which is not always what a team can fit in, plus gengar + ttar don't really have any issues with it. not to mention deo-d can always run a move to kill spinners itself. stall isn't known for its offensive prowess outside of cbtar, which isn't as common as it once was, meaning that you're gonna struggle killing it, allowing it to lay hazards as it wants...then it dies, a sweeper comes in, and you may as well give up.

 

[MMII]

I'm loving this influx of Custap Forry on the ladder.

Putting it to sleep and watching you fight a battle 5-6 with no hazards is awesome. Please keep thinking it's a viable substitute, fellow ladderers.

(I'm picking you out cause you were the most recent)

I agree that Custap Forry/Skarm/Crustle are not going to be Deo-D 2.0 but I feel many people are implying that they are horribly inferior. They each have a key attribute that Deo-D would be quite happy to have and they are pretty consistent themselves. Would you say that Deo-D is a poor man's Forretress because it has to rely on an ineffective Magic Spam to keep SR away for Dnite, Weavile, and friends? Is Deoxys bad because he can't mindlessly phaze out a greedy booster or provide a nifty Tailwind? Should I never consider the alien as a replacement for my Custap Crustle because he has to rely on the gimmicky Skill Swap to get past Magic Bounce? Mind you, I agree you shouldn't just mindlessly replace Deoxys with Custap Forry nor should you treat these three the exact same way you would your Deoxys. You need to take the attributes into account for each of them. However, Skarmory is probably the closest replacement to Deoxys. He may not have as fast a base speed but 70 still outruns a lot of key threats (screw you Jolly Breloom and your stupid speed ties) and Sturdy does lets it laugh at those faster hard hitters. Forretress's Rapid Spin is an amazingly useful attribute as keeping SR off your side of the field allows you to abuse Dragonite's MS to its full extent by giving you a buffer to boost again/tank Ice Shards or check opposing cleaners. You have to take that speed into account, though, and not stupidly leave it in as Spore fodder for Breloom. Crustle is probably the most forgettable of the three but it has some cool things going for it such as a lack of resistances to abuse Sturdy more easily as well as some cool offensive options. If you are interested in trying one of this hazard leads out make sure you use effective spreads and don't treat them like their non-Custap variants. (I shared my personal spreads here although you might be able to find one you like better.)

Basically - just because Deo-D beats YOUR STYLE of play, doesn't mean he breaks the metagame - it just means you have to suck it up and do something different.

I'm not sure what style of play you have to use when Terrakion often OHKO's your Hippowdon with just SR + Spikes. I provided more calcs in the post I linked in my earlier post on this page.

 

[Shikyo]

It's very rare for Deoxys-D to get stealth rock and 3 layers of spikes up, it only happens if they repeatedly switch in a slower booster that you constantly taunt, or if you magic coat their faster taunter.

If the enemy team has Deoxys-D you just need to send someone fast that can deal a lot of damage to him. Getting just stealth rock down is the most likely outcome, stealth rock + 1 set of spikes can almost be called an ideal outcome.

The taunt magic coat Deoxys-D beats boosters / taunters but loses to spinners and magic bounce. Skill Swap loses to faster taunters / prankster and also to spinners. The more offensive Deoxys-D gets killed significantly faster and while he beats some spinners he then again loses to boosters and taunters. This makes Deoxys-D very luck-based because he cannot prepare sufficiently for everything, you won't have consistent victories.

Deoxys-D is also a wasted character slot because he's completely useless outside of hazards so most of the time you'll be playing 5v6. This of course isn't necessarily a bad thing but considering how useless he is otherwise, is it really banworthy that he sometimes gets 1 extra set of spikes down in comparison to another starter getting down just stealth rocks at the cost of being completely predictable(and actually being able to deal damage for example)?

 

[Deluks917]

In DPP (when there were dedicated leads) a very common lead was aerodactyl. The entire goal was to get up SR while preventing the opponent from getting up rocks and then die. Imo going down 5-6 when you have rocks (nevermind spikes) and they do not is usually an advantage in pokemon.

 

[Shurtugal]

OK I finally made requirements. Time for me to comment on my experience and my vote.

I didn't run into too many DeoD teams (I think I ran into like one). I find more DeoD on PO, but that's besides the point. I saw more people actually using double hazard Forretress, surprisingly enough. Since I was running rain offense (not standard, I was using a few gimmicks since I got bored easy), I had Scarf Politoed and Lead Terrakion on my team and Forrey always got SR + Spikes. I found that I just really didn't give a shit. I can see how SR + 2 Spikes gurantee would be broken, but I find that DeoD can't always find an opportunity to set up 2 Spikes and 1 SR, as its hard-pressed on like infinity 50/05 scenerios just to set up spikes. I think this voting suspect really comes down to this: do you feel SR + 1 Spikes is broken? Both sides of these arguments are 100% correct; it all boils down to opinion: Do you find SR and 1 Spikes broken? Do you feel its unhealthy for the metagame?

The reason why I say its opinionated is because you can prove that something is broken. By using raw facts, usage stats, calcs, its quite easy to make good points about whether something is or isn't broken. However, in the case of DeoD, its biggest argument is that its both unhealthy, unpredictable, and guarantees SR + 1 Spikes. It's been proven in this thread that it can always get SR, with a good chance of also getting up 1 layer of spikes. However, you cannot really prove its unhealthy in the metagame when there are much bigger things that are unhealthy like Politoed and Politoed. It's unpredictability is really bullshit since half the sets have less usage than Spike + SR Custap Forrey. So like I said this suspect I feel will be decided purely on the communities opinion.

I feel that SR + 1 Spike is manageable, and that DeoD isn't too hard to set up on midgame if its still alive to "just set them back up". I don't feel you need to pack a spinner on every team. This is just me though, as I'm sure some of you feel differently. Happy Suspect laddering to you all.

~ Shurtugal

 

[Meru]

OK I finally made requirements. Time for me to comment on my experience and my vote.

I didn't run into too many DeoD teams (I think I ran into like one). I find more DeoD on PO, but that's besides the point. I saw more people actually using double hazard Forretress, surprisingly enough. Since I was running rain offense (not standard, I was using a few gimmicks since I got bored easy), I had Scarf Politoed and Lead Terrakion on my team and Forrey always got SR + Spikes. I found that I just really didn't give a shit. I can see how SR + 2 Spikes gurantee would be broken, but I find that DeoD can't always find an opportunity to set up 2 Spikes and 1 SR, as its hard-pressed on like infinity 50/05 scenerios just to set up spikes. I think this voting suspect really comes down to this: do you feel SR + 1 Spikes is broken? Both sides of these arguments are 100% correct; it all boils down to opinion: Do you find SR and 1 Spikes broken? Do you feel its unhealthy for the metagame?

The reason why I say its opinionated is because you can prove that something is broken. By using raw facts, usage stats, calcs, its quite easy to make good points about whether something is or isn't broken. However, in the case of DeoD, its biggest argument is that its both unhealthy, unpredictable, and guarantees SR + 1 Spikes. It's been proven in this thread that it can always get SR, with a good chance of also getting up 1 layer of spikes. However, you cannot really prove its unhealthy in the metagame when there are much bigger things that are unhealthy like Politoed and Politoed. It's unpredictability is really bullshit since half the sets have less usage than Spike + SR Custap Forrey. So like I said this suspect I feel will be decided purely on the communities opinion.

I feel that SR + 1 Spike is manageable, and that DeoD isn't too hard to set up on midgame if its still alive to "just set them back up". I don't feel you need to pack a spinner on every team. This is just me though, as I'm sure some of you feel differently. Happy Suspect laddering to you all.

~ Shurtugal

It's been shown in this thread many times that SR + Spikes is very unhealthy for the many sweepers in this metagame, so saying "I think it's manageable" does not counter the raw calculations that have been posted to shown that SR + Spikes is powerful, maybe even broken.

Also lol@ "I never saw Deoxys-D, I think I saw one"

Do you not know what this suspect test is about...?

 

[Shurtugal]

Yes I know what it's about. DeoD; which nobody is using and yet we all want to ban it anyway...

Like I said, I just never had much trouble. This might be because I didn't use stall but w/e (someone told me your eighty on PS and was running sand stall).

 

[Lavos]

Yes I know what it's about. DeoD; which nobody is using and yet we all want to ban it anyway...

Like I said, I just never had much trouble. This might be because I didn't use stall but w/e (someone told me your eighty on PS and was running sand stall).

i definitely wouldn't say that "nobody is using" deo-d, that's a highly inaccurate statement. maybe on showdown's ou ladder you don't see a lot of it, but in high-level tournament games the thing is everywhere. honestly with all the bw2 ou tournament games i've played i can say that deo-d offense is the most common playstyle, even more common than rain offense, and it's effective too. and as for your opinion on sr and spikes, let me present to you a scenario that might change your mind:

team 1 has: pain split gengar, choice band tyranitar, choice scarf keldeo, sub salac terrakion, and sd scizor with no hazards on their side of the field
team 2 has: specs politoed out locked into surf, life orb latios, lo sheer force landorus, sub salac terrakion, scarf keldeo, sdef jirachi with stealth rock and spikes on their side of the field

typical situation, and team 1 is at a clear advantage. with the rocks and spikes up, pokemon that would initially be decent answers to setup sweepers like terrakion and scizor are now unable to take the hits that they would otherwise be able to take like +2 bullet punch and +2 close combat because of the hazards that are up. all team 1 has to do to win is trap and kill latios, then get residual damage off on keldeo, and scizor sweeps. pretty sure that's accurate.

anyways just trying to make the point that you really need to evaluate multiple scenarios before just deciding what you think based on relatively arbitrary opinions. and this isn't a personal attack by any means, i see a lot of people making these assumptions and it's natural, but being good enough to play around sr + spikes most of the time doesn't mean that deo-d isn't broken.

 

[Shurtugal]

Hey.

Firstly, sorry Meru I did not know. I saw DeoD when I accidentely went into the OU rather than Suspect, but I wasn't aware that had any bearing at the time.

I might reconsider my vote (everyone I know is pretty much telling me to), and I can see their point. I'm going to mull over it a bit since rain and sun are pretty unhealthy and I'm pretty sure DeoD will get a re-suspect anyway once Rain and Sun leave, as they are much more threatening than SR + Spikes, at least in my experiences. I think DeoD looks worse on paper than in play. Regardless of my vote this voting session will be onslaughter just like the last! :P

 

[Cyrrona]

Qualified this morning--while I already explained the reasoning behind my stance on Deo-D earlier, I'd like to touch on a couple other points before the round ends. First...

The best arguments for the banning of Deo-D are the ones that distinguish it from other pokemon that fill the same role, and what these arguments come down to is that Deo-D can do it earlier in a match than any other. Is that enough reason to ban it? I would say no, but if that is someone else's reason for banning it I can accept the validity of their opinion. I just find most of the other arguments presented to be either ridiculous theorymon that doesn't correspond to the reality of the game, or else they don't show anything special about Deo-D as opposed to Ferrothorn, Skarmory, Forretress, etc.

...I'd just like to emphasize how important these distinctions are. My conclusions differ from Myzozoa's, but he's spot-on here--people can't use piecemeal comparisons (scattered throughout this thread) to fully distinguish Deo-D from the other effective spikers in the tier. Voters need to justify this potential ban by explaining why Deo-D (and all of its broader effects) is more detrimental to the metagame than its alternatives are. A combination of attributes (outlined in my previous post) allows Deo-D to set up more entry hazards with more speed (as Myzozoa also noted) and consistency than anything else in the tier while preventing opponents from setting up against it. This combination of setup insurance and extensive, immediate, and reliable hazard support is what leads me to believe that Deo-D creates unhealthy amounts of field pressure in OU. Whichever way users end up voting, I just wanted to encourage other qualifiers to be mindful of the quoted material and flesh out their decisions in a similar manner before we start casting ballots.

I'd also like to briefly share some assorted observations from my suspect run. While every laddering experience continues to make me question why any of us play pokemon competitively, I do think this metagame was a bit richer than anything we've seen in other recent tests...definitely agree with whoever reflected earlier on how far we've come since BW2's origins. I still encountered plenty of typical sand, rain (more sand than rain, actually), and dragon spam, but I was impressed with the prevalence and potency of weatherless teams, especially considering they lacked access to Deo-D. I know this is purely anecdotal, but fighting handfuls of competent, successful weatherless teams over the course of this test makes the "rain and sun kill weatherless as a viable playstyle" line of reasoning discussed elsewhere really flimsy in my eyes.

also heist my magic forretress sends its condolences pokemon fucked me over afterwards if that's any consolation

also also petition to raise dev requirements to 65 for future tests who's with me???

 

[Lavos]

if any of the 20+ users so far who have been demolished by the combination of hp ice terrakion, scolipede, blastoise, and dusknoir see this message, i would just like to say:

hi

(insert implications about deo-d replacements here)

shout out to lokt for putting up with my angry self

 

[SlimMan]

yay made reqs tonight

I'm Vestment

Hehe, now that I made reqs, I can battle for fun. Moltres, here I come!

I'm probably going to vote to Ban Deo-D. There have been a lot of posts since the beginning of Gen V about how hazard users are starting to overcome anti-hazard methods (I remember many posts by Lee about how we need more/better Rapid Spinners), and I feel that Deo-D finally tips that scale too heavily in the hazard-user's favor. Although we can can argue all day about whether the hazards make Deo's sweepers broken (see Melee Mewtwo's list of calcs), Shurtugal was right that it all boils down to opinion. And I am of the opinion that Deo's hazards allow his teammates to apply more pressure than is healthy for the meta.

The reason that I think Deo-D tips the scale for hazards and other users don't is because Deo-D can stop multiple anti-hazard methods, while all of the other hazard-users can stop only one. Take Skarmory, Crustle, and Forretress. Almost any special attacker is capable of easily 2HKOing them forcing them to use Custap Berry to achieve 2 layers of hazards. But with Custap Berry, there is nothing to stop you from just Taunting them. They could run Mental Herb to block Taunt, but then they only get 1 hazard up against any decent special attacker. Thus my point that they can stop only one anti-hazard method. Froslass and Roserade are more offensive Spikers, but they suffer a similar problem. In fact, they are even forced to run a Focus Sash to avoid being OHKOed by powerful attackers, meaning that they fully rely on their Speed to get 2 layers of hazards up. So if you out-speed them, bam, only 1 layer. Likewise, their reliance on Focus Sash allows them to be Taunted as well.

It's not that Deo-D can get up 2 layers of hazards and other users cannot. It's that Deo-D can probably stop you from stopping it from getting those hazards, and other users cannot stop you from stopping them. Although Deo's hazards can be spun away later, it's pretty hard to do so. If your Starmie is out against my Terrakion, do you really want to Rapid Spin? HO teams don't really switch, so my Terrakion is probably just going to throw out a LO Stone Edge. You can Spin away my hazards fine, but then your Starmie dies and my Scarf Keldeo goes nuts. This is obviously just an example, but I think that it is true that in most battles played, the hazards of an HO team stay there the whole match. And with something like Deo-D which is so much more reliable at getting hazards up than any other user, I can't help but think that it is unhealthy for the meta.

Huh, shorter post than normal for me in a suspect thread. Anyways, I plan on voting to Ban Deo-D when the time comes for those reasons.

 

[Eo Ut Mortus]

i definitely wouldn't say that "nobody is using" deo-d, that's a highly inaccurate statement. maybe on showdown's ou ladder you don't see a lot of it, but in high-level tournament games the thing is everywhere. honestly with all the bw2 ou tournament games i've played i can say that deo-d offense is the most common playstyle, even more common than rain offense, and it's effective too. and as for your opinion on sr and spikes, let me present to you a scenario that might change your mind:

team 1 has: pain split gengar, choice band tyranitar, choice scarf keldeo, sub salac terrakion, and sd scizor with no hazards on their side of the field
team 2 has: specs politoed out locked into surf, life orb latios, lo sheer force landorus, sub salac terrakion, scarf keldeo, sdef jirachi with stealth rock and spikes on their side of the field

typical situation, and team 1 is at a clear advantage. with the rocks and spikes up, pokemon that would initially be decent answers to setup sweepers like terrakion and scizor are now unable to take the hits that they would otherwise be able to take like +2 bullet punch and +2 close combat because of the hazards that are up. all team 1 has to do to win is trap and kill latios, then get residual damage off on keldeo, and scizor sweeps. pretty sure that's accurate.

anyways just trying to make the point that you really need to evaluate multiple scenarios before just deciding what you think based on relatively arbitrary opinions. and this isn't a personal attack by any means, i see a lot of people making these assumptions and it's natural, but being good enough to play around sr + spikes most of the time doesn't mean that deo-d isn't broken.

That's a really typical situation; I totally agree. In fact, I saw a battle the other day between some random and McMeghan with those same two teams. I dunno if team 1 really has the clear advantage, though, because McMeghan lost pretty convincingly, even though he played pretty well given the circumstances.

Here's the log, courtesy of the random, for reference:

Hide

Battle between Ginku and McMeghan started!

Tier: BW OverUsed
Mode: Singles
Rule: Unrated
Rule: Sleep Clause
Rule: Species Clause
Rule: Wifi Battle

Your team: Politoed / Jirachi / Keldeo / Terrakion / Landorus / Latios
Opponent's team: Deoxys-D / Gengar / Tyranitar / Keldeo / Scizor / Terrakion

Ginku sent out Loveless! (Politoed)
McMeghan sent out Kalebo III! (Deoxys-D)
The foe's Kalebo III is exerting its Pressure!
Loveless's Drizzle made it rain!

Start of turn 1
The foe's Kalebo III used Stealth Rock!
Pointed stones float in the air around Ginku's team!

Loveless used Surf!
The foe's Kalebo III lost 75% of its health!

Rain continues to fall.
McMeghan: mon dieu

Start of turn 2
The foe's Kalebo III used Spikes!
Spikes were scattered all around the feet of Ginku's team!

Loveless used Surf!
The foe's Kalebo III lost 24% of its health!
The foe's Kalebo III fainted!

Rain continues to fall.
McMeghan sent out Thyrranosis! (Tyranitar)

the foe's Thyrranosis's Sand Stream whipped up a sandstorm!
Ginku: ausfahrt

Start of turn 3
Ginku called Loveless back!
Ginku sent out Heartless! (Jirachi)
Pointed stones dug into Heartless!
Heartless is hurt by spikes!

The foe's Thyrranosis used Stone Edge!
It's not very effective...
Heartless lost 137 HP! (33% of its health)

The sandstorm rages.
Heartless restored a little HP using its Leftovers!

Start of turn 4
Heartless used Stealth Rock!
Pointed stones float in the air around McMeghan's team!

The foe's Thyrranosis used Stone Edge!
It's not very effective...
Heartless lost 144 HP! (35% of its health)

The sandstorm rages.
Heartless restored a little HP using its Leftovers!
Ginku: the plays

Start of turn 5
McMeghan called Thyrranosis back!
McMeghan sent out Horressien! (Keldeo)
Pointed stones dug into the foe's Horressien!

Heartless used Iron Head!
It's not very effective...
The foe's Horressien lost 16% of its health!

The sandstorm rages.
The foe's Horressien is buffeted by the sandstorm!
Heartless restored a little HP using its Leftovers!

Start of turn 6
The foe's Horressien used Surf!
Heartless lost 120 HP! (29% of its health)

Heartless used Wish!

The sandstorm rages.
The foe's Horressien is buffeted by the sandstorm!
Heartless restored a little HP using its Leftovers!
Ginku: lol
Ginku: i am bad
McMeghan: jajaja

Start of turn 7
Ginku called Heartless back!
Ginku sent out Loveless! (Politoed)
Pointed stones dug into Loveless!
Loveless is hurt by spikes!

Loveless's Drizzle made it rain!
The foe's Horressien used Surf!
It's not very effective...
Loveless lost 129 HP! (33% of its health)

Rain continues to fall.
Heartless's wish came true!

Start of turn 8
The foe's Horressien used Surf!
It's not very effective...
Loveless lost 129 HP! (33% of its health)

Loveless used Hydro Pump!
It's not very effective...
The foe's Horressien lost 64% of its health!
The foe's Horressien fainted!

Rain continues to fall.
McMeghan: bonjour
McMeghan: hydro pump /and/ surf
Ginku: guten morgen
McMeghan sent out Thyrranosis! (Tyranitar)
Pointed stones dug into the foe's Thyrranosis!

the foe's Thyrranosis's Sand Stream whipped up a sandstorm!

Start of turn 9
Loveless is being sent back!
The foe's Thyrranosis used Pursuit!
Loveless lost 232 HP! (60% of its health)
Loveless fainted!

Ginku called Loveless back!
Ginku sent out Bloodthirst! (Terrakion)
Pointed stones dug into Bloodthirst!
Bloodthirst is hurt by spikes!

The sandstorm rages.

Start of turn 10
McMeghan called Thyrranosis back!
McMeghan sent out Notak! (Gengar)
Pointed stones dug into the foe's Notak!

Bloodthirst used Substitute!
Bloodthirst made a substitute!

The sandstorm rages.
The foe's Notak is buffeted by the sandstorm!

Start of turn 11
The foe's Notak used Substitute!
The foe's Notak made a substitute!

Bloodthirst used Stone Edge!
The foe's Notak's substitute faded!

The sandstorm rages.
The foe's Notak is buffeted by the sandstorm!

Start of turn 12
The foe's Notak used Shadow Ball!
Bloodthirst's substitute faded!
The foe's Notak is hurt by its Life Orb!

Bloodthirst used Substitute!
Bloodthirst made a substitute!

The sandstorm rages.
The foe's Notak is buffeted by the sandstorm!

Start of turn 13
The foe's Notak used Shadow Ball!
Bloodthirst's substitute faded!
The foe's Notak is hurt by its Life Orb!

Bloodthirst used Substitute!
Bloodthirst made a substitute!
Bloodthirst ate its Salac Berry!
The Salac Berry raised Bloodthirst's Speed!

The sandstorm rages.
The foe's Notak is buffeted by the sandstorm!
McMeghan: sacre bleu

Start of turn 14
Bloodthirst used Stone Edge!
A critical hit!
The foe's Notak lost 18% of its health!
The foe's Notak fainted!

The sandstorm rages.
McMeghan sent out Kerwan! (Scizor)
Pointed stones dug into the foe's Kerwan!

Ginku: shit just got real son

Start of turn 15
The foe's Kerwan used Bullet Punch!
It's super effective!
Bloodthirst's substitute faded!
The foe's Kerwan is hurt by its Life Orb!

Bloodthirst used Close Combat!
The foe's Kerwan lost 68% of its health!
Bloodthirst's Defense fell!
Bloodthirst's Sp. Def. fell!

The sandstorm rages.
McMeghan: noir

Start of turn 16
The foe's Kerwan used Bullet Punch!
It's super effective!
Bloodthirst lost 21 HP! (6% of its health)
Bloodthirst fainted!
The foe's Kerwan is hurt by its Life Orb!
The foe's Kerwan fainted!

The sandstorm rages.
Ginku sent out Careless! (Landorus)
Pointed stones dug into Careless!

McMeghan sent out Gaspar! (Terrakion)
Pointed stones dug into the foe's Gaspar!

Start of turn 17
The foe's Gaspar used Substitute!
The foe's Gaspar made a substitute!

Careless used Earth Power!
It's super effective!
The foe's Gaspar's substitute faded!

The sandstorm rages.

Start of turn 18
The foe's Gaspar used Substitute!
The foe's Gaspar made a substitute!

Careless used Earth Power!
It's super effective!
The foe's Gaspar's substitute faded!

The sandstorm rages.

Start of turn 19
The foe's Gaspar used Substitute!
The foe's Gaspar made a substitute!
The foe's Gaspar ate its Salac Berry!
The Salac Berry raised the foe's Gaspar's Speed!

Careless used Earth Power!
It's super effective!
The foe's Gaspar's substitute faded!

The sandstorm rages.
Ginku: please do not crit me
Ginku: for the love of all things holy

Start of turn 20
The foe's Gaspar used Stone Edge!
Careless lost 209 HP! (65% of its health)

Careless used Earth Power!
It's super effective!
The foe's Gaspar lost 19% of its health!
The foe's Gaspar fainted!

The sandstorm rages.
McMeghan sent out Thyrranosis! (Tyranitar)
Pointed stones dug into the foe's Thyrranosis!

Start of turn 21
Careless used Earth Power!
It's super effective!
The foe's Thyrranosis lost 75% of its health!
The foe's Thyrranosis fainted!

Ginku won the battle!
Ginku: gg brah

 

[Nyara]

Curious how the result of the impact of Deoxys-D could be exactly the same on the log posted by Eo Ut than of the almost any hazard setter with focus on special defense, focus sash, or actually everything that those users already had most of the time, and Ferrothorn could have even did put more layers of spikes without need of sacriface itself.

On our current metagame, it's not too hard to set 2 layers of hazards or even 3, and the spinners are ok (and Excadril was great before the ban), but the fact that you need to use an otherwise useless move called Rapid Spin pretty much ruins every Pokémon focused on spin away hazards, your opponent will just spin-block you, or will just leave you spin them away, destroy your spinner while he spins or regain momentum, and just put them again.

Deoxys-D is one of those almost flawless hazard users, but I don't think the problem with hazards will be fixed by banning Deoxys-D, or even being improved at all, it will just press a bit the users of HO to find other alternatives and put their sweeping plans for few more turns if necessary. OU was already adapted to Stealth Rock to the point that the half of the tier resist it or double resist it, we also have some users of Levitate and flyers not weak to Stealth Rock in order to combat that, and stall teams always pack a Poison-type over there to absorb Toxic Spikes, and it's because you can't just pretend you will not face hazards on your face, usually Stealth Rock, but some people use Toxic Spikes, Spikes, or a combination of them on different party members.