NU Stage 10 - Suspect Discussion

[Raseri]

Hey guys, it's that time you've all been waiting and pestering me for. The suspect thread! The purpose of this thread is to discuss potential suspects and whether or not they're broken in NU. Senate members, as well as people who wish to vote, are expected to contribute to the discussions that take place in this thread. Examples of things that should be talked about in this thread: your experience with said threat (using it and facing it), what beats said threat, your opinion of its effect on the metagame (whether positive or negative), etc.

When choosing people to vote alongside the senate, we will take into account both ladder score and excellent posting. Anyone who wishes to be a part of the vote is expected to PM Raseri, Zebraiken, and FLCL a picture of their peak ladder score with a minimum of 100 battles. Note that meeting the ladder requirements will not guarantee you a vote, it will only improve your chances.

This thread will remain open until a suspect is decided on by the NU mod team, and at that point we will announce what we are voting on, and who will be participating in the vote. More details about how to vote will be posted by Zebraiken at a later date.

We will also be encoring strict quality control on the posts in this thread. Nominating a suspect without great reasoning will result in your post being deleted and potentially infracted. Posts like "ban liepard watch me 6-0 ladder noobs" are not allowed in this thread. Only serious discussion is allowed. We will be enforcing this rigorously.


Zeb may make a few edits to what I said in this thread, so nothing is law until he is able to come online and make sure everything here is accurate. Thank you!

 

[Annoyer]

The most obvious suspect in my anyone's opinion is definitely Jynx. Ever since it came back to NU, it has had a defining force, and whether its been a good or bad force is up for debate! A couple of main reasons why Jynx is sooooo good is because of its typing, Dry Skin, high base Special Attack and Speed, and movepool. Let's dissect each one !_!

Typing: Ice/Psychic is really good offensively considering the fact that Ice already has phenomenal coverage in NU and Psychic basically provides perfect neutral coverage because Steel-types are not too common in NU outside of Metang and Probopass (which became more popular due to Jynx). These two STABs allow it to pierce through even special walls and makes its scarf set excellent too. The downside about this typing is the weakness to SR which hinders its ability to switch in or tank hits as well as making it weak to Pursuit (which has also gotten more popular on Tauros, Scolipede, Munchlax etc because of Jynx).

Dry Skin: Before Jynx came in the tier, special Samurott and Ludicolo could spam Hydro Pump for days without much resistance, but Dry Skin Jynx is one of the best offensive checks to these mons. This also balances out how powerful Water-types were before this meta, but Water-types still have ways getting past Jynx (ludicolo 2hkoing, samurott megahorn, gorebyss signal beam, carracosta outspeeding non-scarf etc).

High Special Attack and Speed: It has the same SpA and Speed as Haunter but its moves have a higher base power which makes it much stronger as well as its STABs hit things more super-effectively than Haunter. It's 95 base Speed basically made the new metagame from the old 80 being the fast to now 95 being the speed tier to be considered fast. It also gives it's Choice Scarf a much better range to revenge kill even allowing it to outspeed Scarf Rotom-S and SS Costa.

Movepool: This contains the main goodies Jynx has. First off, Jynx gets two pretty good STAB options in Ice Beam and Psychic/Psyshock which are pretty much a staple on every Jynx set. Jynx also gets LOVELY KISS which allows it to put any mon on the opposing team to sleep (75% accuracy but who care) and with Jynx's great base Speed, she utilizes it pretty well. With Lovely Kiss, you can pretty much neutralize a counter (which Jynx doesn't even have too many) or also go for free setups with either Substitute or Nasty Plot. On that note, Jynx also gets Nasty Plot which it doesnt use too much because it is generally better off attacking but it can break through walls such as Lickilicky or Regice much easier after a boost. Jynx also gets Focus Blast to hit most special walls harder (Lickilicky, Regice, Audino etc) along with nailing the few Steel-types in the meta such as Probopass, Bastiodon and hitting Metang for a good chunk too.

So basically Jynx is a fast Special attacker with a sleep inducing move, a set up move, two great stabs, and a great immunity for offensive teams. But those are just the pros of Jynx. Some cons of Jynx are being incredibly frail, especially on the physical side being taken out by a lot of priority except for Aqua Jet (which is pretty common in NU) or faster mons. Jynx also has a slightly crippling Stealth Rock weakness which makes its job a bit harder but once Jynx comes in, it will do work regardless of being at full health or 75% health (not always the case js lol). Pursuit from Skuntank or other mons makes trapping Jynx easy to get it out of the match but the move is hard to fit on some mons as well as fitting a Pursuit mon on general on a team. After quite a bit of adapting, the metagame has seemed to handle Jynx well enough, but is it still broken or do you think it is just fine in balancing the meta?

ban liepard watch me 6-0 ladder noobs

 

[Fusxfaranto]

Jynx is really an incredibly strong Pokemon; it's pretty much inarguably the biggest influence on the metagame as a whole. Annoyer did a great job of summing up why that is already, so I want to focus a bit on what makes Jynx really stand out as a potentially banworthy Pokemon.

It cannot be emphasized enough how important Lovely Kiss is to Jynx's success. Seriously, unless you're running some crazy lure set, using Jynx without Lovely Kiss, even on choiced sets, is a huge waste. There have been other sleep abusers in the past (e.g. Tangela, Exeggutor, Amoongus), but the very important difference with Jynx is its speed. With slower sleep abusers, you can often use Taunt or Substitute and make them waste a turn (at the very least), or just KO them outright. However, once Jynx comes out, it's practically impossible to stop it from sleeping one of your Pokemon without a sleep immunity. The combination of this incredible sleeping ability and very good offensive presence makes Jynx a really scary Pokemon to face.

Of course, it's not all rainbows and sunshine for Jynx. It has some huge glaring flaws that, for me, make it not quite strong enough to ban. The most notable one is a big hazards vulnerability: being both weak to Stealth Rock and grounded, Jynx really does not appreciate having hazards out on its side. Though it has a very nice water immunity, its frailty makes it very easy to KO with one bad switch into a coverage move. Aside from Aqua Jet, Jynx can't really take any form of priority, which really doesn't help it as a fast offensive Pokemon. Finally, it has a number of hard counters that make it useless while they remain in play (e.g. Metang, Munchlax). These issues certainly don't stop Jynx from being a metagame-defining threat, but they do stop it from being an unstoppable monster.

 

[watashi]

jynx: the most obvious suspect. honestly i haven't ever been overwhelmed by it because of its glaring flaws. the mono attacking set will not sweep any team that's well built because of its major coverage issues and reliance on lovely kiss to hit multiple times. the life orb set is strong, but only really useful against really defensive teams, which are not as common among the better players. against offense, it will probably be forced out after getting one or zero kills and struggle to come back in again because of its weakness to hazards. the scarf set is my favorite, but it is nowhere near as game-changing as the other two sets. it is an extremely useful revenge killer that also performs well against stall, but is easily trapped and worn down by stealth rocks.

tl;dr: jynx is really matchup reliant. life orb destroys stall but mono attacker does really bad against it. offense can handle any set is built well and will probably lose one pokemon but no more than that. mono attacker probably gives it more problems than life orb. scarf performs well against all play-styles but is not too powerful or overwhelming in any way.

 

[Plus]

I'm not sure if Jynx is broken or not, but as I've been watching many of the current suspect discussions unfold on other various tiers, I don't know if anyone can truly come up with a definition of broken. For me, I'll replace the word broken with overpowered, because I feel that it's simpler to define and associate a pokemon with it, and dubs Jynx as one of the top threats in NU as opposed to the absolute ruler of it. But don't get me wrong -- I believe wholeheartedly that we should suspect Jynx because I believe that it's a perfect example of what we consider to be banning something that is truly unhealthy for the metagame, or if we are simply banning the next best thing.

I'm also not sure if we still go by Jumpman's portrait of a Uber, but even if we don't, I think that there's some value to what he has said that can be applied here. I quote:

Offensive Characteristic
A Pokémon is uber if, in common battle conditions, it is capable of sweeping through a significant portion of teams in the metagame with little effort.

Lovely Kiss, in my opinion, is the main culprit that allows Jynx to fulfill the offensive characteristics that allow for it to be perceived as an overpowered, overbearing threat to the NU metagame. Running stall in NU requires you to run something to beat Jynx, and the best pokemon to do it are Munchlax and Metang. If Jynx is able to sleep any of these two threats, I sure as hell hope you have Sleep Talk ready, or at least a Bullet Punch in Metang's case. But let's be honest here, Munchlax and Metang are weak by themselves, and they are niche pokemon. They are pokemon that you intentionally use to help you prepare against Jynx -- so you don't have to switch around crazily on a defensive team that lacks priority or speed just to whittle down its health with Life Orb. I don't want to repeat the facts that Annoyer has already stated, so I'll just give you my take on things, because you guys are all aware of Jynx's traits and movepool moreso than myself. The sleep mechanics in 5th gen give your opponent free turns depending on what pokemon they have slept. You may even consider it a pseudo kill given how your Pokemon can't do anything other than wait for a cleric to come and Heal Bell -- if you bring in a sleeping pokemon, that's just pure set up fodder right there in most cases.

Having these offensive characteristics in sweeping prowess via Ice Beam, Psychic, and Lovely Kiss -- maybe we don't consider these to be overpowered because we have moved on as a community to perceive NU as the tier where everything is happy go lucky and aren't banhappy compared to other tiers. But is Jynx truly healthy for the NU metagame? From my experience, NU is probably the most diverse metagame there is to offer because of the choices of pokemon you can use, not necessarily the style. Jynx really does limit the amount of freedom you can have with defensive teams, because the easiest way to deal with Jynx is through speed, mainly associated with offense. For offense, it's easy to scarf pokemon willy nilly, and we won't perceive it to be unhealthy for the metagame right away because we're still using a wide variety of pokemon in NU. I repeat: I believe Jynx is unhealthy for NU because it is limiting to the style of play that can be used in NU, rather the diversity in Pokemon.

In regards to the arguments for entry hazards keeping Jynx in check, the question to be asked is if having a crapload of entry hazards is truly common battle conditions. Under common battle conditions, I will go out on a limb and say that nearly every viable NU team has at the very least Stealth Rocks on their team. We will now factor in Stealth Rock in Jynx's sweeping potential -- It sure makes Jynx easier to pick off, but it's not that overbearing that it topples Jynx off the cream of the crop. Some teams may even run Spikes, and some Toxic Spikes, but definitely not to the extent of Stealth Rock. You can take care of Jynx even better by running those two entry hazards on top of Stealth Rock, but unless I'm seeing every team run Spikes and Toxic Spikes, I really won't consider that common battle conditions. With only Stealth Rock up, Jynx is still very much so capable of sweeping a significant portion of the metagame with minimal effort.

I don't know if its grounds for being overpowered, but Jynx deserves to be suspected, absolutely. Jynx is probably one of the best, if not the best pokemon in NU in my opinion. I can see the case regarding entry hazards that hurt Jynx's case for being overpowered in NU, but I believe that it's still able to sweep a significant portion of the metagame regardless. It's a glass cannon, and it's the best glass cannon. Jynx doesn't get hit that much from my experience because you hit and run with it all the time -- and when you don't, it's sweeping your opponent's team instead. Just the fact that it can dismantle stall almost singlehandedly is unhealthy for the diversity of NU in terms of the type of teams you can run -- and I repeat, not the types of pokemon you can run.

 

[ebeast]

Suspect: Jynx. I used to be really against Jynx staying in the tier when it first dropped, but now that we've had time to let it settle in and have had the metagame adjust I cannot say that I see Jynx in the same light as I once did. Jynx is extremely good, but it has definite flaws that keep it from breaking the metagame like it did a little more than a year ago.

Annoyer already tackled most of what I wanted to say; it has a lot of things going for it, but the way those perks function is not absolute. For example Jynx has Dry Skin, but outside of switching into a Water-type attack it has difficulty coming into Water-type Pokemon such as Samurott, Ludicolo, and Seismitoad. (Even Alomomola can be annoying to switch into because Toxic seriously puts Jynx on a timer) Jynx has high base Speed to outspeed a ton of Pokemon, but is really weak to priority attacks due to its awful Defense. Jynx has fantastic Special Attack and excellent STABs in Ice Beam and Psychic, but, assuming the Scarf set, it cannot hit everything at once; Ice and Psychic resists are everywhere in NU and not just for Jynx. The Life Orb set gets around Scarf's problem of being unable to hit everything at once by having the freedom to use whatever move it pleases, but now it has to deal with being worn down much faster due to Life Orb recoil while having more trouble against offense and still being pressured hard by priority. SubNP can get around both Scarf and LO's weakness to priority by hiding behind a Substitute, but now it faces even bigger coverage issues than Scarf did. The clear pattern is that while Jynx's sets have strengths and weaknesses, there is no set that provides that high reward all of its sets are capable of giving without having to deal with some sort of inherent problem, be it with Jynx or the set itself, that prevents it from being totally unstoppable.

If anything has any chance of breaking Jynx it would have to be Lovely Kiss. The problem is that the best set Jynx can run, Scarf, can't always utilize it to the best manner. (Don't get me wrong LK is still great on Scarf) Life Orb utilizes LK the best because it can put something to sleep and then start attacking, however LK doesn't stop LO from having its inherent flaw of having difficulty vs offense; it simply makes Jynx better suited against it so its not a liability. Even with LK, SubNP still has a whole bunch of problems particularly in that it relies on monocoverage to get things done. Even with LK, the Scarf set doesn't immediately lose its counters; the fact that its locked in means that it's forced out, and has to take more entry hazard damage while that counter is still alive to take on its attacks and force it out again.

Just for fun I had a discussion with Annoyer the other day about Jynx and he said something about it that I liked. Would Jynx leaving benefit the metagame or not? This is a question I would like to see other people who are going to post here answer. In my opinion I think Jynx right now benefits the metagame by making it easier to check dangerous Pokemon, mainly Carracosta, Scolipede, and some Water-types. Even though I'm primarily a defensive player and I like my stall, I don't think Life Orb Jynx's existence making stall harder to function is anything to really be worried about. What I think makes a metagame ideal is being one that is competitive and skill based rather than one where every strategy or Pokemon is viable and usable; and Jynx doesn't hurt that.

 

[Punchshroom]

Ah Jynx, easily one of, if not the most influential pokemon of all of NU. Not preparing for this can lead to a harsh loss, but is she manageable otherwise?

Pros: Base 115 Special Attack means she has very little trouble OHKOing anything she hits SE, 95 Speed is a huge step up from the 80-85 range inhabited by former meta-shaping threats in Gardevoir, Sawk and Braviary. Previously, anything that could hit that range can considered usable (Arbok) and anything above that range are much more notable threats (Zangoose, Kangaskhan, Sawsbuck, Rotoms) than they are today, but now base 95 is the speed to hit. I wouldn't say Jynx is solely responsible for the speed creep, but she is definitely a big contributer. If you can outspeed Jynx, you stand a decent shot at success already, since Jynx's success relies hugely on being able to outspeed opponents, which she can do against a good majority of the tier.

Dry Skin grants Jynx one of the greatest gifts she could ask for: free switches. Every Water-type has to be wary about spamming their strongest / only attack whenever Jynx is lurking around, and must aim to strike her down with other moves (usually physical), such as Megahorn from Samurott (even special variants), Stone Edge from Carracosta and Earthquake from Seismitoad. As a result, other Water-types that cannot heavily damage Jynx, such as Ludicolo, Wartortle or Alomomola, are pegged down a notch in terms of usability. The fact that I even saw a Gyro Ball Wartortle have shown just how important it is to not give Jynx free turns to setup.

Jynx's Ice and Psychic typing gives her fantastic coverage, although Ice is so good on its own due to no immunities and great SE coverage that most Jynx flat out forgo Psychic. Due to her speed and access to Ice Beam, Jynx is the fastest and likely the most reliable Ice attacker we have in NU to date: Glaceon is powerful but too slow, Articuno has dual STABs but isn't too powerful and is massively SR weak, Regice's coverage is great but is much too slow, and Rotom-F does not have the reliable Ice Beam.

Jynx's movepool, oh boy. This may be the biggest factor for Jynx's suspecting, because with moves like Lovely Kiss, Nasty Plot, Focus Blast, Trick and Substitute, as well as STAB Ice Beam, Psychic and Psyshock at her disposal, Jynx can threaten any team archetype if she gets just one chance to rev up.

• Lovely Kiss is the most notable move here, as Jynx can use her speed to shut down an opponent and get away with it easily, but that isn't the worst part. Jynx has the power (or at least, not yet) to easily destroy your sleeping pokemon should it attempt to stay in and wake up, so cornered people are either forced to sac one of their pokemon to Lovely Kiss and send in their counter/check later, or equip the counter/check with Sleep Talk. Using up a whole moveslot primarily to deal with one pokemon signifies how much of an impact Jynx has had on the tier. It's fine and dandy if your counter happens to utilise RestTalk, but any pokemon relying on that isn't seen very often in high level play.
• Substitute is the next big thing about Jynx. While Substitute helps a lot of pokemon, it is especially deadly in Jynx's hands when you consider her speed, ability, typing, decent special bulk, sleep-inducing move and setup move. Sub allows Jynx to block status such as Toxic Alomomola, Sleep Powder Tangela and Thunder Wave Musharna, who usually do not sport the means to threaten Jynx directly. Sub also provides a safety buffer against fast-waking opponents or faster attacks. What this means is that even if you have 5 pokemon that are faster than Jynx and can immediately KO her, if Jynx gets in on that one pokemon that cannot do much to Jynx, you'll lose all momentum and possibly a couple of pokemon (one, to sleep, the other from a KO).
• Other moves can make things even easier for Jynx: Focus Blast maims bulky Steels (Probopass, Bastiodon) and Normals (Thick Fat Miltank, Licklicky) and Regice; Psyshock owns specially bulky mons (Mantine, Munchlax, Flareon, Articuno, Regice), Nasty Plot overpower stall or KOs anything in offense; Trick screws up stall/defense and grants Jynx the freedom to switch attacks;.

As far as items go, Jynx commonly makes use of Leftovers and Choice Scarf, because they are excellent in helping Jynx to sweep. Leftovers combos with Substitute and gives Jynx ample time to build herself up for the big sweep. Choice Scarf means Jynx comes out guns blazing, using fast and powerful Ice Attacks to steamroll over much of the tier, or use a quick Lovely Kiss to stop a threat she cannot KO. If she is up against a more defensive team, she can Trick her Scarf away to not only cripple a pokemon, but also have the freedom to switch moves, more than likely Lovely Kissing something to put 2 pokemon out of commission.

Cons: Absolutely horrid base HP and Defense means she would take crazy damage from any kind of physical hit. Any faster mon/Scarfer with a physical move is likely to KO Jynx right there. Most priority moves (bar Aqua Jet and Ice Shard) can also hurt Jynx significantly. Pursuit can likely KO even a remotely weakened Jynx regardless of whether she stays in or not. Her frailty will also punish her should she miss a Lovely Kiss or Focus Blast.

Her typing may be strong offensively, but easily exploited defensively, some of which are weaknesses Gardevoir lacks. Firstly, the hazard weakness. Stealth Rock, Spikes and Toxic Spikes all tear Jynx a new one, especially if more than one is on the field at a time. This restricts Jynx so that she cannot switch in and out as freely, or have her sweeping time shortened. Jynx also bears weaknesses to Fire and Steel, meaning faster Fire-types such as Charizard, Rapidash, Simisear, Jolly +1 (+2 for Scarf Jynx) Combusken, as well as Bullet Punch can stop Jynx, although slower and bulkier Fires (Flareon, Camerupt) or Steels (Metang, Wormadam-T) can simply weather the attack and OHKO back.

Conclusion: Jynx's advantages far outweigh her disadvantages, especially when some of the latter can still be worked around (Sucker Punch is risky against Jynx, and the hazard weakness is mitigated considering Jynx doesn't need to switch all that much).

I am still torn on Jynx's suspect placing, if anyone has anything to add to my list of pros and cons feel free to let me know~

 

[Cherub Agent]

Agreeing with the others that Jynx needs to be suspected. I was initially dead set against banning it, but after playing over 100 games (around half with Jynx) I'm no longer that certain that it needs to be banned, but I do believe that the metagame would be more enjoyable without it. I think that the main thing that worries be about Jynx is her unpredictability: I don't know if she's a Life Orb wallbreaker, a Scarf revenge killer or a setup sweeper. And the problem is that even if I do know what it is, obtaining that information means that I'll often either have a wall Tricked, a Substitute thrown up in my face on a switch or status move, or a Pokemon severly crippled/killed by a powerful attack. And it doesn't stop there. Lovely Kiss is incredibly lethal on a Pokemon such as Jynx, who you need to be really careful around just because of that combination of offensive STAB, power and Speed. Throw in Lovely Kiss and 75% of the time you can really pretty much guarantee that Jynx will strip away at least one third of the opponent's team by herself: due to BWs insane sleep mechanics a snoozing Pokemon is almost certain not to wake up, especially when Jynx is still on the field, and another Pokemon lost to Jynxs amazing offensive presence. Jynx has pretty much warped the metagame around it: setting a new Speed tier to beat, causing Pokemon to run some really bad gimmick sets (I saw the dude with Gyro Ball Wartortle as well, along with Pokemon such as Sleep Talk Metang) and basically being a massive threat to all three major playstyles (Offense, Balance and Stall). It may not be able to beat all three at once single handedly, but can be customized to thrash one playstyle almost by itself and still be highly efficient against the other two. Jynx also isn't that vulnerable to Pursuit. The most common, Skuntank, can just be slept by Lovely Kiss (the ladder still hasn't caught on to LumSkunk), whereas the other one that's been rising in popularity, Scarf Tauros, just provides a free setup opportunity for another Pokemon.

Sure it has its flaws like any other broken Pokemon, but priority (immune to Aqua Jet and can play around Sucker Punch like a pro), physical frailty (eh this is pretty big BUT counteracted by fine special bulk for an offensive Pokemon) and hazard vulnerability (again pretty big, but Jynx can be happily partnered up with hazard preventers such as Choice Band Sawk, and Taunters such as Samurott, as well as the fact that Jynx is pretty much built to come in once and then proceed to wreck) seem a bit exaggerated.

Yeah leaning towards banning Jynx at the moment, as I consider its influence upon this metagame unhealthy. I think I'm in the minority here, but NU has beem a balanced tier for so long that I sort of get the feeling that people don't want to give up this status :s Although of course I could be way off. To sum up: Jumx was broken before, and I don't think all that much has changed for it (iirc it's even better now because it has Trick + Dry Skin?

 

[ryan]

Of all scary threats that we have down in NU right now, I feel like only one of them deserves a suspect right now. I've talked to some people who think that Scolipede and Gothorita deserve to be suspected, but ultimately, I just don't find them nearly as difficult to handle as I do Jynx. I wasn't around back when Jynx was banned the first time, so I don't really have anything to draw comparison to when analyzing it now. Even so, I'm still pretty torn on whether or not Jynx is ban-worthy. However, I am positive that it needs to be suspected.

Pretty much everybody else has gone over Jynx at this point, so there's not much more to add. However, I do want to cover some of the things that have already been said though.

Just for fun I had a discussion with Annoyer the other day about Jynx and he said something about it that I liked. Would Jynx leaving benefit the metagame or not? This is a question I would like to see other people who are going to post here answer. In my opinion I think Jynx right now benefits the metagame by making it easier to check dangerous Pokemon, mainly Carracosta, Scolipede, and some Water-types. Even though I'm primarily a defensive player and I like my stall, I don't think Life Orb Jynx's existence making stall harder to function is anything to really be worried about. What I think makes a metagame ideal is being one that is competitive and skill based rather than one where every strategy or Pokemon is viable and usable; and Jynx doesn't hurt that.

I think that this is a really good thing to keep in mind. There's no doubt that Jynx gives both stall and bulky offensive teams a hard time. The fact that few of these types of teams rarely carry more than two Pokemon that can outspeed Jynx and that typically the ones that do outspeed can't safely switch in makes it really difficult for them to handle it. Probably the easiest way for these types of teams to handle Jynx is with a slow U-turn or Volt Switch, but few Pokemon can provide that without taking a lot of damage from Jynx. Probably the main examples I can think of are Probopass, Mandibuzz, and Eelektross (though it's 6 AM here so excuse me if I forgot something that can do this well), and all of them take a pretty sizable chunk of damage from Ice Beam or Focus Blast.

Still, despite this, Jynx's ability to check opposing offensive teams well is pretty healthy for the metagame. While it might not be able to switch into any of them, Choice Scarf Jynx can come in and revenge kill a good number of setup sweepers, including Carracosta, SD Samurott, Gorebyss, SD Charizard, +2 Timid/Jolly Combusken, CM Serperior after some prior damage, and more. To be honest, Dry Skin doesn't even really grant that many switches for Jynx. Almost anyone facing a Jynx will hold back on using Water-type attacks bar maybe Aqua Tail on Scolipede, and if the Jynx user mispredicts while switching Jynx in, it's usually going to be dead. If anything, Dry Skin helps make Jynx's presence in the tier more appreciated, as there aren't very many offensive Pokemon that can handle Water-types and rain as efficiently as Jynx often does. That said, while Jynx might make the nature of the metagame more offensive, it simultaneously makes offense less of a threat.

More specifically on Jynx versus stall and bulkier teams, these types of teams have adapted to Jynx over time without the slight tweaks drastically affecting the viability of the team itself. For instance, some people have been running Earthquake on Seismitoad and Sleep Talk on Metang to help handle Jynx, neither of which is a change that drastically hurts either. On top of this, Munchlax and Grumpig (which isn't even that bad like everyone kept telling me >:/) can both handle most Jynx relatively easily and phaze it out, thus adding up the entry hazard damage it takes by the time it comes back in later on. Skuntank might not have the perfect matchup against Jynx, but if Sleep Clause has already been activated, the opponent is going to struggle against it. Most of these team archetypes also typically carry a Heal Bell user as well, so once Jynx has been disposed of, it's not too difficult to deal with the sleep that it left behind. Sure, dealing with Jynx isn't easy on these types of teams, and it typically takes either good prediction or just general good playing to beat it, but to me, that makes it a threat that you should prepare for and not ban-worthy.

To compare it to Nidoqueen's suspect in RU, yes, it does make some Pokemon a bit of a liability (heh), but unlike Nidoqueen, it doesn't have so strong of an influence that otherwise unviable sets need to be used in order to beat it. Sure, you might want to get creative to lure and beat it with Gyro Ball Wartortle; props on whoever decided to run that. However, I don't know that Jynx forces you to run such niche movesets and Pokemon that its presence in the metagame is stifling and unhealthy. I'm still not 100% convinced whether or not Jynx needs a ban. I'm glad that we waited a few months before opening this up as well. A month after it was released, I would have undoubtedly pushed for its ban, but after playing against it as much as I have, I'm not so sure.

 

[Hot N Cold]

Jynx here best special sweeper avalaible on NU tier and one of the best mon on the entire tier because the great moveset about her, with a lot of offensive options. I dont agree with make a list about "pro" and "cons", isnt so simply since didnt matter in a sense, the lacks of bulk sometimes i didnt miss honestly means that a good defense is a good offense since Jynx outrun is fast for the metagame, checks waters types and put a lot of presure against almost all.
About every set Jynx is great with each one of their sets, all out attacker set with Lovely Kiss + 3 atk which is probably the most dangerous set because this set works very well against everything, hko or 2hko everything on offense and cancel an opponent mon with LK, this set is just dangerous in terms to hit and run; Mono attacker set is scarier against balance teams if lacks of something like Sleep Talk Metang since Jynx outrun almost all on balance teams and work this: Jynx vs Missy, Jynx uses LK and Misdreavus fell sleep, Jynx uses Substitute and then Nasty Plot and kill him, if in this process Misdreavus awake, Jynx can use LK again.. so finally kills Misdreavus and get a free sub with a Nasty Plot boost and then now she can kill another or mon or get a free LK again, i put like example Misdreavus but when i say Misdreavus is every slower mon than Jynx that isnt stuff like Grumpig / Munchlax / Regice or Metang (some of them are terrible and another are hard to fit in a balance teams) if you're using a scarf or a faster mon you're gonna broke the sub first but then Jynx is gonna kill you one of the mons that outrun her and then your time is hard. Finally, Choice Scarf Jynx is one of the best scarfer on the NU tier being avalaible to Revenge Killer stuff like Shell Smash Carracosta or Samurott SD something that cant do the big part of the Scarf users on the NU but Jynx thanks to Dry Skin does this job very well, isnt so powerful like the another set but is very useful and work very well against offensive teams.
If you're using stall sadly you need 2 checks to Jynx at least, one of them for the all out attacker version and other check for the mono attacker one, for example: mixed wall Alomomola + Munchlax / Regice. Like FLCL said, Jynx is very matchup reliant, a mon where is super easy to fit on every team. Another thing i think that is missing is the nature of NU is very hazards abuser with a great spikers (Scolipede / Garbodor/ Roselia) and another a lot of Stealth Rock users, with a decent spinblokers some of them very bulk like Misdreavus or Golurk while that the spinners are very bad in overall, the only decent is Foresight Wartortle this makes Jynx more dangerous also is hard to comparate Nidoqueen metagame RU with the right metagame NU with Jynx by a bunch of reasons, are very different i think so. RU is less hazard abuser than NU with some solid spinners such Kabutops and Cryogonal, spinners on rarelyused are useful than the spinners avalaible in NU, while that Nidoqueen had some hard counters like Uxie, Gallade, Gardevoir, almost Clefable / Licki, the problem with Nidoqueen is that was scarier with a good support (Pursuit mostly) while that Jynx dont need a specific support, another thing about this comparison is the bulk of Nidoqueen was better, so definitely i should to say that they are different.
I'm not sure if Jynx is broken at all but i'm sure that before metagame was better since makes avalaible a lot of mons than the current metagame, the only bad thing about the past metagame was that "musharna staple" but now should be handle this a bit better with the new Mandibuzz, U-turn/Punishment Primeame and Munchlax, also people was learning to handle Musharna better with another underrated and a good threats like Metang or Shiftry. Now the problem is that the metagame is very hazard abuser and around Jynx / Scolipede making a lot worst some mons on the current metagame.

 

[Lolk]

I totally agree with everybody here about Jynx and her Speed, Power, Diversity, and annoyance in general, so I won't repeat anything of that discussion. One cool thing I would like to add onto, however, is how Jynx impacted the metagame. Because of this lady, players started to dig into the pits of NU to find reliable checks for her, and because of this, NU has grown into a more diverse and full tier. Some pokemon that have gained usage and became actually viable because of the mistress.

I am using the May stats cause i can't find a June version of "the differences from last time"

| Metang | +0.88018% |
| Floatzel | +0.62856% |
Bastiodon | +0.55795% |
| Ninjask | +0.57893% |


I dont want to do too many and spam, and even though these are May, im sure June's is similar. But as you can see, Steel-types have become more popular, like Metang and Klang, because they resist her STABs. Underrated fast attackers who were never used are seeing some usage and fame such as Floatzel, offensive Ninjask, Scarf Magmar, scarf Ebuzz, and Sneasel. Defensive mons like Grumpig, Regice, and Skuntank have made surprise appearances on my teams as well as Jynx checks.

In conclusion, while Jynx is a guaranteed threat and should probably be suspected. Just remember that its placement in NU has diversified the tier, and with its absence, a lot of cool mons that are viable in this meta will lose their niches and wont be used nearly as much competitively.

Edit: Another thing to mention is the loss of Jynx lessens the importance of the base 95 scarf tier. Even though Primeape is still 95, a lot more slower scarfers will become more viable with Jynx's absence.

ANOTHER Edit: I guess when you look at it, my whole opinion could be looked at the whole opposite way. While new Pokes see the limelight to check Jynx, a lot of Pokemon have lost the limelight because of Jynx, like Gardevoir. So whichever way you see it, the important question to ask yourself is: which meta was more diverse and enjoyable?

 

[scorpdestroyer]

Like many people before me, I find that Jynx is pretty manageable and not as powerful as I once deemed it. However, I feel that Jynx does deserve a suspect test. It is now a point where every team has to have a Jynx counter, which Jynx can easily incapacitate with Lovely Kiss or Trick. Thanks to Jynx's unpredictability, it's "counters" such as Metang are not entirely safe because it has to avoid switching in on the wrong move, and I start becoming wary of switching into Lovely Kiss, or staying in and letting Jynx set up for free. In fact, Metang have started to run Sleep Talk just so it can counter Jynx, and some teams even run two Jynx counters. Without Jynx, would you run Sleep Talk Metang or even Bullet Punch Metang? I'm not saying that Jynx is uncheckable, but it has given rise to do many new things just to check it. Since it is such a threat that every team needs to have a way to counter it, I believe it is worthy of a suspect test.

 

[Sweet Jesus]

It doesn't seem to necessary to explain how powerful jynx is because everybody's already covered eveything so I'll just explain my own opinion here. To me, the Life orb set is really the main reason jynx would be suspected but after seeing it work for the last few months (and it's surprisingly not that common). I realized jynx is better on paper than it is in game. First off, 2 of it's moves (lk and focus blast) have pretty bad accuracy which is always an embarassing situation because in game, playing on a predicted miss is a completely stupid thing to do but it still makes the move less reliable than if it had 100% acc. As an example, jynx actually has less than 50% chance to 2hko licki with a life orb boosted focus blast. The complicated part is that the player using jynx doesn't want to rely on 2 focus blasts but the one facing it doesn't want to rely on it missing either which makes it hard to determine if it's broke or not.

The second point is that jynx actually really isn't that easy to send in. As other users said, pretty much every water type has a way around jynx although it sometimes comes to the cost of saccing other moves. This still makes the jynx user very scared of switching in jynx on the majority of the meta. Even some stuff that will barely ever hit it hard like musharna can still paralyze it on the switch or simply set up a clam mind and have jynx struggle to kill such a bulky mon.

Revenge killing jynx can be easy just like it can be hard. Sneasel get's a special notice for resisting both it's stab, outspeeding it and trapping it with pursuit but many other mons can also threaten it with u-turn since it takes such a pathetic attack stat to threaten to ohko. This means even if your opponent wants to save jynx, something else will take hazards +u-turn damage and he still won't be in a good position. Not to mention that jynx herself takes big damage from all hazards which when summed up with LO recoil makes it die rather fast. On the other hand, jynx can put to sleep anything trying to sucker punch it and is immune to aqua jet which are probably the 2 monst common priority moves in the tier.

When you sum this up, you realize once jynx is in, it's usualy a true pain to deal with if it hits its moves but in the end, dry skin doesn't help it come in for free as much as some could think and the NU meta was very capable of adapting to it with revenge killers. Not to mention we do have some mons that completely wall jynx even though they aren't that good (hypno grumpig). I would consider putting jynx up for suspect because if something needs to go it's her, but I wouldn't be pissed not seeing her get there either.

 

[Ashley11]

I know that we already talked about this on the other thread, but i have discussed it with other people and i feel like i should bring back up the discussion of liepard being broken in this metagame. I dont care if we suspect prankster+swagger, or liepard itself, or confusion in general, i just feel like it needs suspected. Liepard is just totally broken. With access to prankster+Swagger, it can deal massive amounts of annoyance and frustration to a player, and even change the game totally around. Liepard can single handedly take down entire teams with hax, and its a big problem. A noob could beat an uskilled player just by using Swagger Sub and Foul Play alone. Liepard also has god speed which allows it to ko pokemon with foul play after one swagger, which makes it all the more easier for it to break teams down.

Imagine having a rank of lets say 2050 ACRE, and you are #1 on the ladder. You face some guy on the ladder with a liepard, you get him down to one pokemon left, which is liepard, but liepard haxes your team to death in the end. Your rank plummets down to the low 1900s. How would that make you feel? Im sure many people have experienced this before already.

In conclusion i feel that liepard's hax set should be suspected in some way. It completely ruins teams without any problems. Some of you might say, "Well, theres plenty of ways to work around liepard!" Like what, own tempo licklicky? You would have to go out of your way to find a liepard counter (out of the VERY few) to put on your team whether it has synergy with your team or not to beat liepard.

 

[Infernis]

I don't think Liepard is absolutely broken in the sense that Jynx might be, or adding Garchomp to the tier would be. However, I do find Liepard to be detrimental to the metagame in a 'fun-first' sense. Playing against Liepard is no fun. It's obnoxious, and worse yet it has a chance of completely shutting down most teams, though the chance is vanishingly small that you will invoke confusion 100% of the time over the course of a long match. On the other hand, you might give a wall +6 Attack and let them start rampaging through part of your team if Liepard fails. If I were merely slapping a team together at the last minute for a tournament or somesuch and I knew I would be playing a really good opponent, I would use Liepard to try to even it up a bit. Well, I would if I didn't despise the set so much. I don't know if it needs to be banned, but I suppose a suspect test would be a good way of finding out.

EDIT: No words on Jynx from me as of yet. I've found it fairly easy to deal with except when it isn't. I'll wait and see.

 

[atomicllamas]

Okay so everyone has thrown their weight behind a Jynx suspect (which is probably right) and given the reasons why she should be suspected. That being said if (when) Jynx is suspected, I don't know if she is actually worthy of a ban. The choice scarf set is obviously not the problem as it is reliably revenge killed by faster scarfers/most priority, has trouble switching in, and can be forced out easily if it is locked into the wrong move, or even lovely kiss. The life orb set is harder to switch into as it has the freedom to switch moves, but it also can be revenged by p much any scarfer and still has a huge weakness to priority. The set I've played most with is the mono-attacking set, which is a ton of fun to use and can plow through an unprepared team, that being said, it isn't the easiest to set up with, and relies on a 75% accurate move to do anything at all. Jynx is also weak to stealth rocks and susceptible to spikes and t-spikes, which limits it's ability to switch, which isn't good for such a frail mon, especially when it is equipped with a scarf or a life orb. Stuff like Sneasel, Scolipede, and Skuntank can trap Jynx/put it in a no win position (yes, scoli gets pursuit).

Even though I don't think Jynx is broken, it may be over-centralizing, as any team that wants to be successful in the current meta needs either 2 counters or a counter and 2 checks, as otherwise Jynx will just blow through your team with ease. Stuff like Metang, Magmar, Seismitoad, and Electabuzz have all seen a rise n usage, in part due to the rise of Jynx. This makes Jynx extremely worthy of a suspect test, so we can all decide if Jynx is actually reducing diversity, is broken, or if Jynx is part of a healthy NU meta.

Would Jynx leaving benefit the metagame or not?

I honestly don't think Jynx leaving would benefit the meta game, I think it keeps certain things, like Scoli, Costa and even the newly dropped Mandi, more manageable than they otherwise might be.

In regards to liepard/confusion, I think that it is skill-less and obnoxious, and I actually hate the people that use it. It isn't broken at all, just noncompetitive, but I know Zeb doesn't want to suspect it, so we should probably drop it.

 

[DTC]

I agree that Jynx deserves a suspect, but let me make these two points clear.

Jynx is very frail. This fragility makes her a hit-and-run Pokemon, as if she fails to ko something, it's extremely likely for her to either die or get crippled by Thunder Wave/Toxic. However, despite her great power, she has 4 traits that make it hard to effectively "hit-and-run" with her: Stealth Rock weakness, Pursuit weakness, U-turn weakness, and inability to switch in besides on Water-type attacks (and if you predict wrong, you probably lost your high impact Pokemon!). I do not think Jynx is super troubling for stall, because most Pokemon on stall can survive an attack from her and kill her, and then heal back through their natural recovery or Wish from something like Alomomola. In addition, Pokemon like Metang / Flareon / Regice / Alomomola / Lickilicky do pretty well against her. That said, she is a powerful wallbreaker.

From my experience, Jynx's success is very dependent on how many Pokemon on the opposing team it can OHKO. If she can't threaten the OHKO, and if she has already used Lovely Kiss, she can't do much. Lovely Kiss is very annoying, but there are some ways to handle it. Many Pokemon in the tier can use Heal Bell well to cure Lovely Kiss, and certain Pokemon don't mind using Lum Berry as an item, which helps for more than just Jynx.

 

[Swamp-Rocket]

The thing about Liepard is no matter what tier you are in, it does the exact same thing. The only reason why it would be more annoying in NU is because its more common. Its not really broken moreso than just completely annoying/obnoxious. Liepard has a negative presence in NU, but that presence literally does nothing to change the metagame whatsoever. It is never fun to play against Liepard due to that, but even then, without Liepard, you could run Murkrow, which learns the main set (Sub/TWave/Swag/FPlay) and take over the obnoxious factor that Liepard is exerting (except without the option of using Encore).

Running Liepard is a risk in and of itself, because Liepard is mostly completely luck based. Because it offers no real synergy or bulk, you may screw yourself over badly. Heck, if Swagger fails for you and the target never ends up hurting itself, you may have something like a +2 Sawk that is threatening to completely wreck you. For this reason, I do not think that Liepard should even be considered a suspect.

 

[wiitle]

Ah Jynx, the mon we've all been waiting to suspect for quite some time now.

Honestly, at the beginning of the drops, I was sure as hell that I did not want Jynx sticking around in the tier. I mean, it has 2 great offensive STABs, a sleep move to get rid of its checks and counters, Trick to cripple anything that can take some hits from it or a teammate, a water immunity, AND a great speed. What the fuck was this monster doing in NU??

Then, as I kept playing, I realized Jynx is good. Great even. But it's no different from any other "great" mon we have in the tier. There are a ton of ways to check Jynx, one of them being just the simple task of keeping Stealth Rocks on the opponent's side of the field. Every single time Jynx comes in, it is getting 25% of its health chipped away with no reliable recovery outside of Leftovers, and if the opponent IS running leftovers this means Jynx is also losing power on its attacks and it also loses any mindgames you could be playing with yourself on what item it could be carrying. Another extremely easy way to check Jynx is to honestly just carry some form of Physical Priority not named Ice Shard, which should be on the majority of Balanced and Offense teams anyways. Jynx has absolute shit for defense and between rocks and a single priority attack, (not to mention LO if the opponent is running that) Jynx's amount of time to do damage to your team is severely limited.

As for getting Jynx in, good luck getting it in safely without saccing something or pivotting with something first. Some argue that Dry Skin allows you to switch in a lot easier, but consider what you might be hit by on the switch in. Alomomola can Toxic Jynx on its way in, Samurott can Megahorn it, Carracosta can Stone Edge it, even some Gorebyss have began running Signal Beam.

I don't think the main question here is: "Is Jynx broken?" Rather, I think a more accurate question has been posed by ebeast in the form of: "Would Jynx leaving benefit the metagame or not?" And in my opinion, it would not benefit the metagame by leaving. It has given rise to a decent number of mons that have utility in checking Jynx, while also filling other niches. This has only made the tier more diverse and I think that is something universally accepted as a good thing. Not to mention, Jynx makes it a helluva lot easier to check some top tier threats while not wasting a teamslot.

Does Jynx deserve a suspect? I'd argue yes, only because of its sheer impact on the meta.


As for the recent Liepard discussion, this thing can be a huge asshole to huge variety of teams. We are constantly striving for a skill-based meta and this thing is the epitome of luck. You can watch your well-built team crumble to dust under the paralyzing confusion it inflicts on your pokemon. Some are too scared to even move while others feel the need to hit themselves. Meanwhile, Liepard has setup a toy doll and is now hitting you with your own boosted attack stat. Whether you win or not, is now completely up to some coinflips.

I am of the opinion that Liepard is a seriously toxic presence in the meta and deserves a suspect of some form, but I don't expect I'll be getting much support for that.

 

[JCM.]

So everyone has been talking about Jynx as a suspect, and I'll make a post about it later, but first things first:

One Pokemon that I feel like should be suspected: Gothorita.

Gothorita @ Eviolite
Trait: Shadow Tag
EVs: 248 HP / 176 Def / 84 Spe
Bold Nature
~ Rest
~ Calm Mind
~ Psychic
~ Reflect

Ok, so this set is very straightforward. Gothorita comes in on any wall that doesn't carry Leech Seed or Sleep Powder (you can come on those, it's just that Goth's job becomes much harder), and proceed to get to +4 SAtk and SDef with Calm Mind, and heal off all the damage with Rest. You then kill off the wall, and then either switch out so your sweepers can, well, sweep, since the walls have been removed, or actually stay in and kill everything with Gothorita. Reflect ensures that you are not killed by strong physical attackers such as Sawk and Scolipede, who are then handily killed off by Psychic.

• 252Atk Scolipede (Neutral) Megahorn vs 248HP/176Def Eviolite Gothorita (+Def) behind a Reflect: 31% - 37% (102 - 120 HP). Guaranteed 4HKO
• 252Atk Scolipede (Neutral) Megahorn vs 248HP/176Def Eviolite Gothorita (+Def): 61% - 73% (200 - 236 HP). Guaranteed 2HKO
• 252Atk Life Orb Scolipede (Neutral) Megahorn vs 248HP/176Def Eviolite Gothorita (+Def) behind a Reflect: 40% - 48% (132 - 156 HP). Guaranteed 3HKO

Basically, Gothorita can easily get up to +4 SAtk and SDef, tank physical hits like a fucking champion, and become nearly impossible to break through behind a Reflect, even with a strong super-effective attack. You win the game at that point if the opponent doesn't carry a Dark-type, and the only one is Skuntank, who isn't all that common. People have been swept by this countless times because there's nothing you can do to prevent it if you don't have a Skuntank, and to a lesser extent, Sneasel. Even then, if you're behind a Reflect, you take pitiful damage from Pursuit even if you switch out.

I feel like Gothorita is suspect-worthy, even ban-worthy, because there's nothing the opponent can do once you've set up. Not all good players use Skuntank because Psychic-types are not as dominant as before, and the most common one, Jynx, can defeat it with Lovely Kiss if it doesn't
use Lum Berry.

Pro-suspect arguments:

• Easily removes any wall the opponent has without him being able to do anything about it.
• Can easily get to +6 and remove another Pokemon, and if the opponent doesn't have a Dark-type, the whole team.
• It doesn't only set up on walls, it can also set up on special attackers that don't have a move to hit it super-effectively, such as Choice-locked Jynx.
• It can even PP Stall a move with low PP, so then you can get to +6 really easily.

Anti-suspect arguments:

• Walls aren't all that common.
• A good player won't let you many opportunities to set up (usually by double-switching, etc etc)

So guys? What are your thoughts about Gothorita? Are you pro-suspect or anti-suspect?

ps: Spare me the ''we r nut pokemun unlyne !1!!!1''

 

[Ashley11]

Well it makes since that gothorita is a huge threat if you play it right, switching into walls and setting up on them with ease, There are many ways to get around gothorita. If you have a dark type you already have it beat, if you have dragon tail or roar it gets phased out, and if you have perish song, you can just get it out within 3 turns.

Now this thing sets up on walls, and walls are usually seen on stall teams most of the time, besides for a pivot on offensive teams. On every good stall team there is almost always a phazer, perish song user, or both which beats this thing hard. many pivots in offensive teams have access to the move uturn or volt switch to stay away from gothorita.

This thing cant do anything against offensive teams unless it comes in on a CB sawk Close combat or something, but a good player wont be that stupid.

I say dont suspect gothorita unless i get convinced

 

[Celever]

I dont think that Gothorita should be suspected, i think that ability like Shadow Tag are dumb in BW i agree with this but i dont find that this is broken, at least if this should be broken just they should to ban any Shadow Tag users. Also, many walls, more bulky mons can handle Gothorita like BP Musharna, dont touch Skuntank / Mandibuzz, Taunt Missy, Meteor Smash Metang with x4 resist to Psychic, some another walls can phaze her like Bastiodon. I found a big potential on the ability than in a single mon. Against offense Gothorita has also an hard time since is slow, lacks to leftovers, only recovery is Rest and is weak to Pursuit with a bad coverage.

I think it should be Gothorita if this were to happen, since banning shadow tag would also mean banning Wynaut, a pokemon with a small niche but is still usable, only far from broken. I personally don't find Gothorita or Jynx broken, but if I had to go with one Gothorita is much closer to being broken. Jynx is strong and fast, but there are clear counters. It is said to over-centralize the meta-game, but I find that completely untrue. It's not like Gardevoir isn't being used in favour of Jynx, and if Jynx were to leave other stuff would come up and be broken, such as Scolipede.

idk just my two cents.

 

[ryan]

On the topic of Gothorita, I mostly agree with what HotNCold said. I understand where someonnte might feel that Gothorita is broken or unhealthy for the metagame, but I don't feel that it's a broken threat. Gothorita works best on offensively oriented teams where it can trap and defeat walls that might give your sweepers a hard time. This means that it plays best against balanced teams that may only have a couple of walls to begin with. Stall typically has a couple of ways to handle Gothorita from the moment it enters the battlefield. Most stall-based teams carry a phazer of sorts, many of which can easily tank a +6 Psychic coming from an uninvested base 75 Special Attack stat. Examples of these include Bastiodon, Grumpig (which doubles as a good Jynx check), Munchlax, and Lickilicky. Even if the team's phazer has fainted, Dark-type Pokemon, such as Skuntank which can remove spinblockers, Mandibuzz, and even specially defensive Zweilous aren't all that rare, and it can't touch any of them with or without Toxic since they all have a way to circumvent it. To add onto this, there are other Dark-types out there, such as Liepard, Shiftry, Cacturne, and Sneasel. Most offensive teams will never give Gothorita a chance to set up to begin with, as while it does have good overall bulk with Eviolite, it needs a chance to set up Calm Mind and Reflect in order to be so difficult to break. Offense rarely (if ever) gives Gothorita this opportunity. And coming back to balanced teams, the best way to handle Gothorita is simply to never give it the opportunity to set up. Admittedly, relying on smart playing is a lot less reliable than the tools that stall and offensive teams have to combat Gothorita. However, even in spite of this, there is a reason why Gothorita is seen so little:

[17:39] <TIBot> Gothorita: #186 in NU | Usage: 0.34116% | Raw count: 500 | Weight: 0.778013692472

Even with 1850 stats taken into account:

[17:39] <TIBot> Gothorita: #150 in NU | Usage: 0.44583%

While I do understand that low usage does not inherently mean that a Pokemon is not broken or ban-worthy, you also can't even say that it is having an incredibly negative effect on the metagame when it is rarely even seen in the metagame. Aside from this, while Gothorita may be able to trap and defeat a wall (or two if you're lucky) on the opposing team, other Pokemon can defeat many of the walls in the tier while also providing other utility. It doesn't take nearly as much tweaking to a well-built team to handle Gothorita as it does something like mixed Eelektross, Jynx, or Misdreavus.

I agree that Gothorita is an underused and underappreciated threat; however, I don't think that it is worthy of a ban—or even a suspect—for the reasons outlined in this post.

 

[Audiosurfer]

Gothorita is definitely not suspect worthy. While trapping might seem very deadly, there are plenty of ways built into most teams to handle a Pokemon like Gothorita. As Treecko said, most stall teams can handle it, so it's not picking apart good defensive teams anytime soon, and it is dead weight most of the time vs offense since there's not much to setup on in the typical offense team. It is a niche mon that can be useful on teams in need of specific threats gone, but it's not tearing apart the tier any time soon (most people didn't even consider Gothitelle to be OP during its time in the tier.)

My opinion on Jynx is that it should be banned. I don't think it's something impossible to check on a team, but the strain that it puts on teambuilding is something I think is unhealthy for the tier. As Hot N Cold said, it limits the amount of Pokemon that are viable in the tier, and it's bad for metagame diversity in general. It's already impossible to truly counter which means that most teams have to rely on a limited amount of checks. People have said you can check it using things like priority, but when you look at the amount of viable priority users in the tier and take out Aqua Jet users, you have a pretty limited pool of viable mons (Kangaskhan, Gurdurr, Skuntank, Metang). You could try and outspeed it but the Choice Scarf set is pretty popular as well and that argument could be used with any number of Pokemon. While hazards can wear it down, it can still come in a healthy amount of times and put a lot of pressure on the opposing teams. You only need to bring it in like once or twice for it to start blasting away at teams anyways. This wouldn't be as bad if you didn't have to guess at what set it's using all the time. If you switch something in, you could end up crippled by Trick, having a Substitute set up in your face, etc. Even then, you'd still have to sac something to Lovely Kiss before you could really get started trying to beat Jynx. While Jynx is admittedly not the easiest thing to switch in, it's also very hard to switch into as well. You can 1-2HKO most things in the tier with a LO + 3 Atks set, especially with hazards support (increasingly common as of late). So yeah, Jynx affects teambuilding and the metagame in a way that's p. negative, with the metagame being alot more offensively and hazard oriented.

 

[Fuzznip]

My thoughts on Jynx:

Would Jynx leaving benefit the metagame or not?

First of all, Jynx must be suspected without a fraction of a doubt. It's clear to everyone that it's a stellar Pokemon and arguably one of the best, if not the best, offensive Pokemon available for reasons already stated by others. In terms of the question above, I believe that Jynx leaving the metagame will be beneficial. To me, it's pretty obvious as to why.

You know something is wrong when people are using Metang and, to a more desperate extent, Bronzor to check Jynx from a defensive standpoint. I don't see why anyone would use either of those Pokemon for different reasons because they have such a niche playstyle. The fact that people wishing to play defensively/stall in NU are forced to carry a Jynx counter is enough to make it bannable in my point of view. Jynx has the power and coverage to single-handedly destroy slow-paced teams, and has the ability to even shut down its counters via Lovely Kiss. This makes it significantly harder to manage, and, thus, an overpowered threat because its usual defensive checks and counters can even be bested by Jynx itself. I find it absurd that people will even attempt to come up with the most gimmick of sets to lure and beat Jynx (Specially defensive Exeggutor with Wood Hammer? Are you kididng me?). Again, you know something is wrong when people are going out of there way to accommodate for Jynx and resorting to gimmick methods. It's ridiculous.

People may argue that this fact is what makes the metagame healthy. The rise of Pokemon that were previously non-existent, such as the aforementioned Metang and Bronzor, makes for a more diverse metagame. But that's not how I look at it at all. It seems to me that NU has become a more controlled metagame, the leader of which metagame is Jynx. It's literally forcing every single competitive battler to carry Jynx counters and checks, no matter the playstyle. If you don't, then you're in for some sinister seduction. Jynx simply makes the metagame less enjoyable when people are strained into always remembering "oh wait, I forgot my Jynx check." People don't do this in other metagames in that they are not forced to prepare for one single extremely dominant sweeper, why is NU an exception to this?

Another thing is that the two main sets that Jynx runs, Life Orb and Choice Scarf, each defeat what the other cannot. The Life Orb set destroys stall, which Choice Scarf would have a harder time to do, while the Choice Scarf sets has an easier time sweeping offensive teams because it's not easily outsped or revenge killed by faster Pokemon due to its own speed. I just hate how whenever I build a team, I have Pokemon that synergize well with each other and take care of a lot of threatening sweepers like Swellow, Sawk, and Zangoose, only to realize that I have a huge gaping hole for Jynx to play around with. It just gets annoying and I'd love to have some more freedom within NU and not worry about that ugly bitch anymore.