np: OU Suspect Testing Round 1 - ...wait, I'm not Jumpman16!

[Rhys DeAnno]

You'd have to be immensely ignorant to even imagine that they don't deserve to be told that they utterly dropped the ball when it came to Drizzle and Manaphy. If they didn't ban one, they should've at least banned the other.

What really happened here was a struggle between two ideological camps which resulted in a questionable group decision. The anti-drizzle crowd (predominantly old school Smogonites) wanted Drizzle gone, and thought Manaphy would be fine without it. The pro-drizzle crowd (predominantly newer players or people less affiliated with smogon in the past) wanted Manaphy banned and Drizzle to stay.

The Drizzle vote was fairly close, and it received a strike. As planned, most of the pro-drizzlers voted for Manaphy to be banned in the Pokemon round. However, the anti-drizzle crowd mostly declined to ban Manaphy, even knowing Drizzle would exist in the next round. Though the meta as a whole will experience Manaphymania in round two, this was actually a sensible decision for them, as this way Drizzle will seem much stronger and almost surely meet its end this round. If Drizzle had been able to exist for a round without Manaphy (especially this new Manaphy unfettered by Skymin), it would have seemed much less overwhelming and the vote to ban it at the end of round two would be much less sure.

At the end of the day, the way our system works has basically caused a political lockup which will result in a round two that nobody even vaguely expects to be balanced. With both Drizzle and Manaphy as auto suspects this round, I wish we could test them individually in separate ladders to determine which was the better idea, as the main question to be settled in round two is if the meta is better off without Drizzle and with Manaphy or without Manaphy and with Drizzle.

 

[TheValkyries]

Can you say how we've dropped the ball?? For your information, Drizzle and Manaphy were both deemed too powerful by the majority of voters, and it's only due to the fact that two simple majorities are needed that they aren't bring removed right away (which has it's own reasons, which isn't hard to think of why).

Petty insults aside, it's obvious why the voters didn't vote one or the other immediately uber. Clearly one is broken because of the other, and they worried about overbanning. What I'm saying though is that because of the indecision to ban one or the other now, we have effectively shot ourselves in the foot. No new knowledge can possibly be gained on either, so a definitive picture on which one the true culprit is cannot be reached.


EDIT: Also, what Rhys Deanno said is exactly what I'm thinking. The deadlock we've cast ourselves into is unnecessary, achieves nothing, and puts us at a higher risk to ban something that may truly not be broken.

 

[Ice-eyes]

Magnezone is stupidly good in this metagame. It can check a lot of stuff with Balloon and most teams fall apart to a huge number of threats without their Skarm / Nattorei / whatever.

 

[Plusle]

but in rain hp fire does like 30% to natorei

 

[gvmgvm40]

but in rain hp fire does like 30% to natorei

That's why you run HP Fight if you are running Zone on a Rain team.

 

[deimos]

That's why you run HP Fight if you are running Zone on a Rain team.

HP Fighting has the same power against Nattorei as HP Fire in the rain (140).

 

[Flareon]

Am I the only one who hasnt been in awe of Shaymin-S, Darkrai, Manaphy, or the Latis? They're not overwhelming at all.

Not sure if we're allowed to discuss tiering, but As a player of 5th gen ubers, I've been using Latias and Skymin on my team. Latias is great, it has a slight defensive edge over latios, but it's not invincible. I think she'll go to users if/when Soul Dew comes out in BW. As for Skymin, I've found him to be a monster. I've been using a life orb set:

Shaymin-S@Life orb
252spa/252spe timid/Modest
-Seed flare
-Air slash
-Earth power
-HP Fire

Hp fire kills Scizor who otherwise stops him cold. Earth power notably hits Dory. Also, the power from life orb and modest means you can bluff specs, so when something comes in you can catch them off guard. Also, whilst he is somewhat lacking defensively, he has that godly speed combined with that huge sp.atk and just enough moves to work with. Because of that, I think Skymin will end up either top OU or maybe Uber.

 

[Ice-eyes]

Yeah now Skymin, Darkrai, Deo-A and Inconsistent are gone we might actually get a playable metagame!

 

[November Blue]

You're a bit too late flareon, skymin was banned.

Poor little cute, innocent, defenseless shaymin-s has been ravaged and exiled to ubers, never to be used again....

Anyway, I'm pretty happy with the results of the vote. Realistically, I was expecting the big 5 to be banned (darkrai, deoxys, skymin, manaphy and sudden impulse.) I was hoping that rain would be given a second chance! ^_^

Shadow tag was voted Oh You as well, which surprised me. It's going to be interesting.

I got kinda scared when I saw latios up for voting. I'm so relieved that he stayed. I really think that he balances the metagame, being the fastest dragon. Without him and latias, garchomp would possibly become too powerful again, especially without skymin.

 

[BurningMan]

HP Fighting has the same power against Nattorei as HP Fire in the rain (140).

its still more usefull overall because hit hits TTar 4x SE and you can grill the other things you trap with T-Bolt anyways (you don't hit Scizor or Forretress SE, but since you dont OHKO them you can 2hko them with T-Bolt anyways)

 

[Urza]

last gen, i can understand rain being uber and sand not being. with the upgrades that sand got this generation...it just doesn't make sense. i feel like people are trying to ban weather because they're not used to it, whereas sand, and to a much lesser extent hail, have been omnipresent battle effects for two gens, so people got used to it. is rain incredibly threatening? yes, absolutely. is it hard to build a team that functions well and can do it's own thing without being utterly raped by rain? no. simply include a weather changer of your own on a non weather focused team and watch what happens. 'tails may have the most neutral weather, but remember how little your vaporeon cared about playing in the sand last gen? he still doesn't. i think it's a lot of old school bias, and an earlier poster commented on the politics of banning rain with manaphy...the whole thing just kind of stinks, imo. i get what the site is doing and why, but i think that there needs to be a modicum of oversight that just isn't there now.

 

[zfs]

Since Manaphy and Drizzle both topped a simple majority, they'll probably both get the axe next round of suspect voting. Which is funny, because I guarantee you in the 3rd round, someone will nominate Manaphy to be tested from ubers back into OU, with the rationale that without Drizzle, it isn't uber.

 

[smashlloyd20]

Which is probably true, so somebody should nom it back to OU but only after Drizzle is banned.

 

[Lamppost]

last gen, i can understand rain being uber and sand not being. with the upgrades that sand got this generation...it just doesn't make sense. i feel like people are trying to ban weather because they're not used to it, whereas sand, and to a much lesser extent hail, have been omnipresent battle effects for two gens, so people got used to it. is rain incredibly threatening? yes, absolutely. is it hard to build a team that functions well and can do it's own thing without being utterly raped by rain? no. simply include a weather changer of your own on a non weather focused team and watch what happens. 'tails may have the most neutral weather, but remember how little your vaporeon cared about playing in the sand last gen? he still doesn't. i think it's a lot of old school bias, and an earlier poster commented on the politics of banning rain with manaphy...the whole thing just kind of stinks, imo. i get what the site is doing and why, but i think that there needs to be a modicum of oversight that just isn't there now.

How can you say it was banned because were not used to it? Obviously if you get higher up on the ladder you will have played plenty of rain/ss teams and you will know which one is broken.

 

[Redtype]

How can you say it was banned because were not used to it? Obviously if you get higher up on the ladder you will have played plenty of rain/ss teams and you will know which one is broken.

I think he meant that since sandstorm was THE weather during the past 2 generations, people got used to its domination and thus aren't pressing for it to be banned, whereas rain just got it's first (non-Uber) auto-inducer and, not willing to accept this change, many old school battlers want it gone.

 

[Arc Tech]

Well, since pokemon get voted after abilities, we'll know if Drizzle gets banned before we vote on manaphy. So both of them getting banned at once probably won't happen.

 

[astrohawke]

It is definitely much harder to stop a rain team than a sand team and it isn't just a matter of being used to sand. Sand has always been a very defensive/stall oriented weather. It wears you down with residual damage and it boosts SDef on rock types and it can be dealt with.

Even with the addition of sand throw this gen, Doryuuzu is arguably the only pokemon using this in the current meta and it may or may not get banned. Regardless, it is still only 1 pokemon with crazy speed and power and can be handled with the right check like gliscor or hippowdon.

Then you look at rain and the amount of pokemon that can use swift swim. These pokemon, unlike doryuuzu, also get their stabs boosted in rain. So instead of 1 pokemon with ridiculous speed and power, you've got 4 or 5.
One after the other, attacking from both sides of the spectrum.

From a team building perspective, you usually have 1 pokemon to handle similar threats. For example, I might have a gliscor and it stops doryuuzu, roobuushin and anything else that might use non SE physical attacks. The chances of me putting another pokemon that does the same job like hippowdon is pretty low. After all I only have 6 slots and I need coverage elsewhere and against other threats.

That's what rain takes advantage of that sand can't. They have enough powerful swift swim pokemon to keep coming at that single check and eventually break through. And as most teams will not have another pokemon that can take these rain boosted hits, nor be able to outspeed for the revenge kill, it's pretty much over.

 

[idiotfrommars]

How can you say it was banned because were not used to it? Obviously if you get higher up on the ladder you will have played plenty of rain/ss teams and you will know which one is broken.

Thats why I am surprised that rain got as high of a vote as it did. I was playing at the top of the ladder most of the time and found sand to be a much more dominant force than rain was. Obviously some of my fellow voters had different opinions on the matter, and I think that the drizzle vote may have been a bit hasty. As someone else said, it might have been that people weren't used to it, not that it was truly broken. Anyway, after this round the voters will have had more time to play in a multi-weather environment and will be more educated on their decision. Other voters might have been seeing something that I wasn't though, and hopefully the correct decision can be made next round.

 

[Ice-eyes]

Sandstorm sweepers have a wide variety of versatile counters. Doryuuzu can be checked by most Levitators or physically bulky sweepers (Garchomp), and countered by Skarmory, Gliscor, Hippowdon and pretty much any other physical wall. Rain sweepers are countered by Nattorei and Blissey. That's basically all that stands between a Manaphy / Kingdra / Ludicolo core and the game being over, and Ludi can easily switch into and break through Nattorei while Kingdra can use physical attacks to defeat Blissey.

 

[Lamppost]

Sandstorm sweepers have a wide variety of versatile counters. Doryuuzu can be checked by most Levitators or physically bulky sweepers (Garchomp), and countered by Skarmory, Gliscor, Hippowdon and pretty much any other physical wall. Rain sweepers are countered by Nattorei and Blissey. That's basically all that stands between a Manaphy / Kingdra / Ludicolo core and the game being over, and Ludi can easily switch into and break through Nattorei while Kingdra can use physical attacks to defeat Blissey.

Yes, and manpahy can beat blissey no problem at +6 with the boosted surf.

 

[Kefka Palazzo™]

Can Blissey even DO anything to Manaphy?
Toxic? Hydration cures it.
Seismic Toss? HydraRest heals Manaphy back to full HP

Blissey just allows Manaphy to set up.

 

[tubbablubba]

I feel like the voters did great. I'm not keen on drizzle getting banned but its definitely good and worth more investigation. Everything that needed to get banned will. And I'm excited to see what this meta will look like. I feel like it will be a lot less weather centric and people are going to come up with some crazy entertaining new strategies.

 

[Ice-eyes]

Why would the metagame be less weather-centric? No weather strategies got banned. The best non-weather strategies (and a good weather counter in skymin) did...

 

[Texas Cloverleaf]

TBH I think the biggest threat in rain is Zapdos. It takes the electric attacks for a free set up and kills the Ubers (Rai, Shay, Lati) that you were couting on the take out Manaphy.

 

[Forte.EXE]

TBH I think the biggest threat in rain is Zapdos. It takes the electric attacks for a free set up and kills the Ubers (Rai, Shay, Lati) that you were couting on the take out Manaphy.

It can't take Electric-type attacks for free. It takes neutral damage. LightningRod Zapdos hasn't, IIRC, been released from Dream World just yet. It also doesn't out-speed any of those Pokemon.

Besides, LightningRod Seaking is the only just the best LightningRod Pokemon ever.