Other "The Offensive Bias."

[November Blue]

I'm just thinking out loud here. It might get a bit disjointed, so bear with me.

Has anyone noticed how the majority of players seem to be obsessed with offensive Pokemon, and kinda brush off defensive or support options because they're obscure?

Maybe people just like to stick to what they know is good, but this is the perfect time for experimentation; half of the OU tier is unavailable, and we have a slew of new Pokemon and moves to play around with. So many possibilities, but when I get on the ladder, all I see is the same cookiecutter teams with a handful of the same Pokemon. Everybody is using Greninja, but when was the last time you saw a Diggersby, a Mega Banette, or even a Noivern?

We're obsessed with fast, powerful Pokemon, and defensive Steel-types. Look at Greninja, Aegislash, and Mega Kangaskhan. They're everywhere because they're powerful, popular and easy to use. On the other hand, Rotom-H, Mandibuzz, and Mega Banette are seen as often as a blue moon.

Are people just unwilling to branch out and try new things, or does the metagame now "require" certain Pokemon? The time is ripe for experimentation and trying new things, but people just aren't doing it.

Ferrothorn, Skarmory, Gliscor, Tyranitar, and Trevenant are the current set of defensive Pokes. You'd be lucky to see anyone using anything else. Mandibuzz? Nope. Gourgeist? Haven't seen a single one.

Megas aren't really seeing enough use either. Aside from Kanga, I've seen Charizard, Scizor, Tyranitar, maybe a few Venusaur... Nobody uses Lucario, and even Scizor and Tyranitar are rare. Why hasn't anybody tried Mega Alakazam? Its explosive offensive stats and Trace ability are just bursting with undiscovered potential. Or (again) Mega Banette. Ghost typing, base 165 Attack with Shadow Sneak, Prankster WoW, Taunt, and Destiny Bond... With good prediction, Mega Banette is probably a better Kanga check than Sableye. Dark-typing is really good right now. Mega Absol gets Magic Bounce and base 150 / 115 / 115 offenses. Tasty Sucker Punch, WoW, ect. This thing should be everywhere.

Or how about Slowbro? It has great typing, phenomenal defenses, good offensive presence, spreads burns, is impossible to wear down because of Regenerator... It's a hard stop to so many physical attackers that it's not funny. Where are all the Slowbros?

What's going to happen once we hit PokeBank? Are we all going to rush back to our missing half of OU? Why use Rotom-H when we have Heatran? Why bother with Mega Lucario when you have Thundurus and Genesect?

The offensive bias that I'm alluding to is our tendency to flock to all of the powerful offensive Pokemon, but gloss over the defensive and support ones. Regardless of whether Kangaskhan should be banned or not, I bet there's a great check out there that nobody's discovered yet. I suggested Mega Banette. Give it a go.

People seem reluctant to give new "defensive" Pokes a go. Mandibuzz is great right now, but everyone ignores it ("But Mandibuzz was NU last gen! It doesn't have a cool new move or ability! You know something's wrong when I have to use Mandibuzz to check something."). Sure, these things happen eventually, but it takes one of the higher-ups to eventually try it and spread the word before people will follow along with what's popular.

So what do you think? Am I crazy? Are the new Gen VI Pokes outclassed by the old favorites? Is the metagame still developing? Do you think that the samey-ness is justified, or should we be seeing more variety?

Maybe we could do something here. Set up some sort of weekly/monthly discussion thread for new stuff. "The Weekly Showcase" or something to that effect.

Whew, I think that's everything I wanted to cover. It's all random-thought-ey, but hopefully all y'all get what I'm saying.

 

[Ghostbone]

Nobody uses most of the pokes you mentioned because they're gimmicky and outclassed.
As for the megas, when there are still obviously OP megas available, justifying using other ones is difficult.

Using pokes just for the sake of variety is silly, people use stuff that works well because they work well.

 

[Monte Cristo]

Nobody uses most of the pokes you mentioned because they're gimmicky and outclassed.
As for the megas, when there are still obviously OP megas available, justifying using other ones is difficult.

Using pokes just for the sake of variety is silly, people use stuff that works well because they work well.

Mega banette isn't gimmicky nor outclassed, so are numerous amounts of pokemon he/she mentioned

While this is a competitive game and we play to win thus we rely and often use "safe" pokemon because well... we want to win. But we must all realize, there is a time for experimenting, seeing whats slaughtered or salvaged, and seeing what could make it into a bigger batch of "safe pokemon", the game gets so stale because everybody is afraid to try new things because well, they don't want their rep or ladder rank to be "ruined" or they don't see the point in trying something new when they could win with the same thing over and over again mindlessly (gen 5 rain is the perfect example,then again gen 5 was the shitiest meta of all time), Rotom-H is extremely great, it checks special threats like tornadus left and right, has the volt switch and specs overheat really fucking hurts, mandibuzz is amazing this gen with it's buffed to hell knock off and bunch of new threats it can check, I still find mega venusaur to be the 2nd best defensive pokemon in all of OU (chansey #1 imo, that thing is a bitch and maybe cress tying for #2 or getting bronze, #3) but you know why we don't have more confirmation of these kinds of mons being good? because most of everybody is playing with their safe mons, never trying anything new, and thats what really collapsed gen 5 on itself as the laughing stock of all gen OU metas (imo) and I don't want that to happen again, especially with how great and diverse gen 6 looks

 

[Jin White]

You'd be lucky to see anyone using anything else. Mandibuzz? Nope. Gourgeist? Haven't seen a single one.

Megas aren't really seeing enough use either. Nobody uses Lucario

Why hasn't anybody tried Mega Alakazam?

Maybe we could do something here. Set up some sort of weekly/monthly discussion thread for new stuff. "The Weekly Showcase" or something to that effect.

I think... you need to play more matches. And watch more videos! Mandibuzz is all over, M-Lucario's all over (and getting suspected on PO), and M-Alakazam puts in work if the trainer knows how and when to use him. I'm talking Bank OU, where there are what, 3x as many options overall?

I sort of get what you're saying, but I disagree. The only offensive cancer is (was?) M-Kanga, because it tipped the odds so heavily to one side. Every team and their Kanga-mother has a Talonflame, Aegislash, and occasionally Greninja, but Aegislash is quickly adding Shadow Ball to its main arsenal and even Talonflame is sporting WoW to annoy its usual switch-ins. Conversely, every team essentially needs to find new and creative ways to counter Talonflame, Aegislash, and the ubiquitous Rotom-W right now.

At least in PokéBank OU, people are trying weather, they're trying stall, and they're trying infuriating new forms of Baton Pass. You're not giving us enough credit.

I'll agree with you on underused/overlooked Megas. I want to see more M-Manectric and M-Houndoom and M-Medicham and... so much less M-Mawile.

 

[ryan]

For what it's worth, I've seen every Pokemon in the OP at least a few times. I've seen a shitton of Mega Lucario, which is probably a good thing because it's stupidly good. I've seen more Trevenant than Gourgeist, and I'm happy about that because Gourgeist is way bulkier and harder to take out in my opinion.

As for the whole premise of the thread, you have to remember that it's just plain easier to ladder with offensively oriented teams. If you use a more offensive team, you can crank out anywhere from 5-10 battles in the span of an hour, depending on how long it takes you and your opponents to think your plays through. If you're using a stall team or generally defensively based team, that can be cut down to just a few battles, and in some instances, even just one. I was watching a friend ladder with a stall team the other day, and it took him about an hour and a half to finish one of his matches. Few people want to spend that much time on just one or two battles.

Aside from that, people like using what they know is good. Even with our new generation, it didn't take very long for everyone to discover the top threats out of what was introduced. Of course, a lot of us like to try out new things, but even in doing so, there's still five other slots on a team. That leaves room for five solid Pokemon to fill in the gaps. This is where your Rotom-Wash come in to cover Talonflame, Mega Pinsir, etc. and your Heatran come in to cover Talonflame again, Genesect, Scizor, etc. Creativity doesn't automatically breed more creativity, so even when people do branch out and use new things, they are still going to use old favorites alongside them most of the time.

"Offensive bias" is a really good way of putting it. Offensive teams are oftentimes just so much easier to use. You can mindlessly spam your CB Talonflame's Brave Bird and your Scarf Genesect's U-turn and profit off of it much more quickly than you would with stall or defensively oriented teams. Is this a bad thing? Maybe, depends on how you look at it really. But it's very simply the nature of the game.

 

[Not a missingno]

Bruh,megazam isn't used at all because priority is such a big thing.With aegislash and shadow sneak,well...

 

[cinderkitteh]

I've seen M-Lucario everywhere, a +2 Adaptability stab attack is nothing to scoff at. And I ran into a Gourgeist for the first time in a while. It was surprisingly tanky, surviving a +2 Fire Punch from my M-Kanga (it only fainted because the first Fire Punch burned it). I've seen a few Mega-Alakazams, but they're so frail you can KO it with any decently powered attack.

I wil admit to being guilty of using such overpowered Pokémon (to be fair I will never touch a Talonflame), but it is so incredibly easy to win with them. I usually only have to send out three mons to win a match. Scolipede Baton Passes to M-Kanga, if M-Kanga dies, Scolipede comes back out to pass to Kyurem-B and it's gg everyone. But stall is, obviously, meant to stall. Most players don't want to waste their time with passive Leech Seed and Spikes/Stealth Rock Damage and other stall tactics; it's harder to win because it takes more time. Plus, when your most defensive mons are getting killed in ~3 hits from someone mindlessly spamming Talonflame's Brave Birds, Genesect's U-turns, or even (as much as I hate admitting it) M-Kanga's Returns, Stall is pretty hard to pull off sometimes.

Also, with the many Megas that are so overpowered, the either non-offensive ones or less offensive ones get so much less use. M-Lucario and M-Kanga are everywhere (I play Pokebank, and with all their coverage moved gained they're even scarier). M-Mawile I've actually never had problems with, it's KO'd by my defensive Goodra's Fire Blast. But M-Houndoom can destroy teams with proper support, and M-Banette can annoy the heck out of people, especially with burns (Bye Bye M-Kanga). Scizor and TTar are more useful in their normal form, so there are so many underappreciated Megas that people pass over.

There also seems to be this memo that went out to some people that said "If your team lacks one of the following: Talonflame, Genesect, Greninja, M-Kanga/M-Lucario, or Aegislash, you are not going to win," I understand that these mons are powerful and can win games (except Greninja, way overrated), but come on, everyone will soon be packing counters for all of these (Most already are). The only issue with that is that some of these very powerful mons, there are few checks and even fewer counters. I carry Stone Edge on Lando-T mainly, usually just for, Talonflame.

I also think that the meta is veerrryyy priority oriented. I've seen so much priority that speed becomes even more important than ever: out priority their priority so you don't have to take a crushing hit. All in all, people are offensively biased becaused it's easy, and so far, the metagame has shown us that being offensively biased wins you matches.

 

[WheresTheSauce]

Honestly I agree with you, OP.

Most of the players that I encounter take the "the best defense is a good offense" mentality far too seriously.

 

[Ajwf]

Having played bank this whole time, I can say this is true. I played about 100 matches yesterday trying to ladder (Yeah, I was experimenting with a few kinds of offenses because someone had passed me and I had deleted my bulky offensive pivot team) and I didn't see one stall team. I actually only saw three or four megas: Kan, Mawile (which is awesome, mawile was the star of my first ladder team), Lucario, charizard y... they were basically it besides the low ladder stuff.

Two things about defensive pokemon. A, games take longer when you use them. I personally prefer this as with offense I'm struggling to get my feet underneath me before the game ends (Which just makes me end up running some obscure game plan that somehow managed to materialize a few times). B, most people just have this hatred for defense. And they believe that if you aren't using a top-15 pokemon, you're doing something wrong.

Now, I'm not sure if you're talking a defensive pokemon or a defensive team, but defensive teams of course take patience to put together. I probably put together an offensive team in 30 seconds. Was it good? Well, it peaked at 2.2k and has the ability to climb a bit more (I made a few stupid mistakes...). If I did that with a defensive team, I'd probably be better off not playing.

Defensive pokemon on a team fall under bulky offense mostly, and that's not doing terribly bad. Mostly, it's just the fact that kangaskhan just wrecks everything that people can't justify them.

Also, with lucario... In the banked ladder, people are discovering how impossible it is to stop. With one free boost, it can sweep entire teams. And no one knows which side it is coming at. The only thing you have to do is survive one turn and it's game over.

Nobody uses most of the pokes you mentioned because they're gimmicky and outclassed.
As for the megas, when there are still obviously OP megas available, justifying using other ones is difficult.

Using pokes just for the sake of variety is silly, people use stuff that works well because they work well.

None of the pokemon mentioned were gimmicky, besides diggersby. In fact, most of them are more stable than the offensive variety. Outclassed? What is outclassing them? Nothing, really. They don't fall under the same class as the offensive pokemon such as talonflame and greninja. Slowbro is in fact one of the best stops to the majority of physical megas this generation, stopping phyiscal mega-lucario, taking an unboosted hit from Kan, and also stopping talonflame from doing anything productive.



tl;dr, People hate on stall/defensive styles more than they hate on mega kangaskhan. Who knows why... Maybe because THEY'RE ALL USING IT.

 

[Jaroda]

Personally, I don't want people to know how goof Mandibuzz is. >_> Same with Slowbro. I used Assault Vest Slowbro for a while and it was really really freaking good. Its main downside is being weak to Knock Off if you ask me.

Mega Lucario is everywhere. It seriously has to be number two or three in Mega usage after Kanga.

Heavy Offense psychologically is popular because it often yields immediate gratification. High damage sets that kill most things in one to two hits? Yeah, that's going to be popular. But I wouldn't say overwhelmingly so. I actually personally notice more set up strategies. I'm seeing an annoying amount of Baton Pass chains reminding me why I'm done never packing a phasing move on any team I experiment with.

The teams that are most successful that I face are semi-stall teams. Those teams with a tight 3-4 poke core that's causing lots of passive damage and status affects with move combinations you don't see coming which totally screws up your momentum. And then once your team is in shambles all it takes is a Dragonite or Mega Lucario to clean house at the end. The most dangerous teams are by far the ones you can't anticipate. I got shut down by a WoW/Calm Mind/Wish Gardevoir of all things. Kept having to switch from burns and even though I had a Guts Conkeldurr she 4x resists Fighting and I choked on her Moonblast.

I have a lot of fun and some good success with a Weakness Policy Lapras, the best Rotom-W counter (that doesn't Trick a scarf to you). Rest/Sleep Talk/Freeze Dry/Surf is insanely bulky and has amazing coverage because so many things have Ice weaknesses and if you have Water pokemon as your Ice resist you are boned royally. It's the surprise factor that is devastating. Whereas I was able to outstall a Kangaskhan with just Leech Seed damage (player not the brightest) because I kept switching from my Chesnaught and Aegeslash and he kept trying to Sucker Punch me (gotta have Crunch bro).

 

[Mettie7]

Personally, I don't want people to know how goof Mandibuzz is. >_> Same with Slowbro. I used Assault Vest Slowbro for a while and it was really really freaking good. Its main downside is being weak to Knock Off if you ask me.

Sshsshshshh, don't tell them about Slowbro

I kind of agree and I kind of disagree. I agree because I see literally every other team with Talonflame, M-Kangaskhan, and Aegislash. I don't know about you, but I like a diverse tier to play with. Yet again, I'm that guy who uses a Togetic in OU. I don't want every team to have a counter to the same Pokemon just because everyone has it on their team. Eventually, you'll be playing against someone who has a near identical team as you. Treecko brings up a good point about 'offensive bias' because they're just easier to use. I really hope Gen6 doesn't become like Gen4 where you just have a team of 6 sweepers and just have at it. I expect that when Pokebank rolls around we're going to be seeing new HA Pokemon that are currently unavailable like Iron Fist Conkeldurr and Speed Boost Sharpedo come into play and bring more diversity.

 

[Dragontamer]

I've been owning people with Slowbro. With so many TTars running 0 Atk EVs it is now possible to win 1v1 against TTar (Lol, Rocky Helmet + Slack Off vs Crunch, Scald vs the rest of his attacks).

Heavy Offense is popular right now because the metagame is broken. Defensive threats like Slowbro do NOT deal with Mega-Khangiskhan or Mega-Lucario. Your best bet at a high position in the ladder is to set up a sweep and win before your opponent's Mega-Khan or Mega-Luke sweeps your team by themselves. After all, if you spend half your team to counter Mega-Khan with crap like Rocky Helmet Garchomp and Sableye, your team is just going to lose to Mega-Luke. If you waste team slots on bulky Moltres + Spinners to keep up against Mega-Luke, your team is just going to lose against Mega-Khan.

The metagame is broken right now, but that is to be expected as long as obviously broken like Mega-Khan, Mega-Luke, Manaphy, Landorus-T, Genesect and more exist in this metagame.

 

[WheresTheSauce]

The metagame is broken right now, but that is to be expected as long as obviously broken like Mega-Khan, Mega-Luke, Manaphy, Landorus-T, Genesect and more exist in this metagame.

Not to mention Excadrill, Deoxys, and I would argue Aegislash.

 

[SergantGold]

Nobody uses most of the pokes you mentioned because they're gimmicky and outclassed.
As for the megas, when there are still obviously OP megas available, justifying using other ones is difficult.

Using pokes just for the sake of variety is silly, people use stuff that works well because they work well.

Rotom-H, Mandibuzz, Mega Lucario and the others listed are far from outclassed. Especially Mega Lucario. Mega Lucario is arguably the next most broken thing in the meta next to Mega Khan.
The only thing he listed that is actually outclassed in almost ever single way is Mega Bannete. Sableye is better except it doesn't have Destiny Bond.
@OP
I do agree with you on a lot of good offensive mons (Ex Goodra), good defensive mons (Ex. Slowbro (Seriously this checks and counters so many common physical threats so), and good utility mons (Mandibuzz, Defog Empoleon (It works amazing
in practice) often due to others being more tried and true. But Mega Bannete does not counter Mega Khan at all. It barely even checks, it needs to be mega'd before it even comes in. I've also noticed less weather teams (which is a good thing) but they are still perfectly viable. My sand team is doing pretty well.

Not to mention Excadrill, Deoxys, and I would argue Aegislash.

Excadrill and Aegislash are far from broken

Heavy Offense is popular right now because the metagame is broken. Defensive threats like Slowbro do NOT deal with Mega-Khangiskhan or Mega-Lucario.

Fyi Most Slowbro (unless they don't have defence investment) can take a crunch from Mega Cario and Burn it with scald or (if you are dumb like me and run it) Focus Miss it into oblivion. But Mega Khan crushes them.

Sshsshshshh, don't tell them about Slowbro

No one must find out the greatness of the Bro

I have a lot of fun and some good success with a Weakness Policy Lapras, the best Rotom-W counter

I understand the strategy for that, but wouldn't Rotom-W Kill you before you even attack because of switch damage and out speeding you with STAB T-bolt/Volt switch?

 

[lord_of_flood]

TBH I don't know why more people aren't using M-Banette. I've been using a more offensive variant to fairly great effect on Showdown. Just give it Screens support and watch as it slaps your Gengars, Starmies, Gliscors, and basically any setup sweepers right in their stupid little faces haha

But yeah, offense is more popular because it's easier to win with it, and that's probably how it's going to be for a while. Things like stall and phazing teams are way less common, but I feel like it's more valuable to play against those rather than your cookie cutter offensive team most of the time since I'm gaining more knowledge of how different team types work. Once I get a bit better at the game I'll be definitely venturing out and trying new team types as often as I can

 

[Ajwf]

What does AV slowbro invest in? Interested because I run lefties slowbro on the dreadnoughts and if it just goes full defensive still, I'd definitely think it'd be worth looking into. The downsides, of course, being the lefties recovery and slack off going away.

It is SO much easier not only to build a good/passable offensive team, it is also much easier to run one. The games take almost no time and you just spam ranking increases. With stall, (after the first two easy games) I got three games in in probably an hour. Won all three, but imagine losing one while laddering and knowing you're going to have to do the same thing over and over and over again... I laddered in gen 5 with stall (meru's team specifically) and got 10 games in in three days! I just got worn out by laddering so much and trying to make good decisions constantly. I laddered yesterday on bank (forgot my damn username... How the hell do people remember those...) and probably fought 100 battles in a couple hours. It's just the complete pacing change between the two. How easy it is to get a sudden sweep going with Hyper offensive teams is just invaluable to the time saving of that style.

(also, Manaphy needs to be banned... I have wrecked so many people with it. All you do is spam one tail glow and when they send in rotom-wash, you use energy ball to OHKO any defensive/non-SDef variants... It is literally destroying everything in tier, and is actually doing 88% to mega kan after one boost. Everything else is basically OHKOd and they need talonflame to drop it towards priority range... That's only because water/grass/ice doesn't hit kan for SE, too. So broken, but apparently [says some other guys I was chatting with], broken is the name of the HO game)

I am kind of irked, too, because that account had gotten to 2050 when I logged off last night.

As I've mentioned, the next few suspect tests are pivotal for the defensive styling. If a few huge bombing pokes leave, the ability to introduce more stall than the utmost perfectly tuned is viable. And those very tuned teams can relax a bit and change some parts out that were specific mega counters. Hence, goodbye cofagrigus usage...

 

[The Great Gastly]

Chandelure is my favorite pokemon nobody uses at the moment, and if Talonflame is not on my team, then Chandelure always finds its way in.

7 resists are solid for an offensive pokemon, and its 4 weaknesses are easily covered -- plus it blocks Rapid Spin!

I run Infiltrator > Flash Fire, since most things that active Flash Fire will have something else to scare Chandelure right back out. The scarf set with Infiltrator wrecks all kinds of threats (Gengar for instance), and a speedy Memento is an excellent supportive tool that gives 1 free turn to any pokemon who needs it to set-up a boosting move. :]

 

[Jaroda]

What does AV slowbro invest in? Interested because I run lefties slowbro on the dreadnoughts and if it just goes full defensive still, I'd definitely think it'd be worth looking into. The downsides, of course, being the lefties recovery and slack off going away.

You have options. I kind of like Modest with maxed HP and SpA so you get good mixed bulk, get the most HP regenerated when you switch, and can hit the things hard that you need to and actually potentially drop certain things like Ferrothorn and Scizor when they switch with Fire Blast, or a Dragon with Ice Beam. Fire Blast/Scald/Ice Beam/Psychic has good coverage, but you might prefer Shadow Ball in the last slot for certain Ghosts. Otherwise Bold with 252 HP / 126 Df / 130 SpA makes you a better switch into physical attacks and if you want to better take a +0 Talonflame before you nab it with Scald.

The point is Slowbro isn't supposed to stay in long and stall. It's supposed to be a sturdy pivot that can nab a powerful super effective hit on the switch and then get out to benefit from Regenerator and do it again.

 

[SergantGold]

You have options. I kind of like Modest with maxed HP and SpA so you get good mixed bulk, get the most HP regenerated when you switch, and can hit the things hard that you need to and actually potentially drop certain things like Ferrothorn and Scizor when they switch with Fire Blast, or a Dragon with Ice Beam. Fire Blast/Scald/Ice Beam/Psychic has good coverage, but you might prefer Shadow Ball in the last slot for certain Ghosts. Otherwise Bold with 252 HP / 126 Df / 130 SpA makes you a better switch into physical attacks and if you want to better take a +0 Talonflame before you nab it with Scald.

I prefer CMbro with Scald/Slack Off/CM/Focus Blast (I run it because it lets me get special Greninjas (I EV'd it to survive a dark pulse) and most Steel/Dark/Ice/Fighting types, including Physical Mega Lucario) the HP you get from Slack Off plus Regenerator make it super hard to kill.

 

[Meleotta3]

Bruh,megazam isn't used at all because priority is such a big thing.With aegislash and shadow sneak,well...

Mega zam is useful under a sub and calm mind

 

[Super Mario Bro]

(also, Manaphy needs to be banned... I have wrecked so many people with it. All you do is spam one tail glow and when they send in rotom-wash, you use energy ball to OHKO any defensive/non-SDef variants... It is literally destroying everything in tier, and is actually doing 88% to mega kan after one boost. Everything else is basically OHKOd and they need talonflame to drop it towards priority range... That's only because water/grass/ice doesn't hit kan for SE, too. So broken, but apparently [says some other guys I was chatting with], broken is the name of the HO game)

Not that I am the forum's Manaphy defender (well, maybe I am -- at least for now, teehee), but I think the main reason it's so effective right now is that few people are preparing for it. Because it has several perfectly viable counters and checks, I'd give the metagame some time to develop before calling for Manaphy's head.

 

[Meleotta3]

Sshsshshshh, don't tell them about Slowbro

I kind of agree and I kind of disagree. I agree because I see literally every other team with Talonflame, M-Kangaskhan, and Aegislash. I don't know about you, but I like a diverse tier to play with. Yet again, I'm that guy who uses a Togetic in OU. I don't want every team to have a counter to the same Pokemon just because everyone has it on their team. Eventually, you'll be playing against someone who has a near identical team as you. Treecko brings up a good point about 'offensive bias' because they're just easier to use. I really hope Gen6 doesn't become like Gen4 where you just have a team of 6 sweepers and just have at it. I expect that when Pokebank rolls around we're going to be seeing new HA Pokemon that are currently unavailable like Iron Fist Conkeldurr and Speed Boost Sharpedo come into play and bring more diversity.

I have an iron fist conkelkurr which hurts hard.+1 is devastating.Whatch pokemon drop and faint

 

[effyouzion]

I do think laddering with offense is easier because the games are quicker, but I think they take a lot more prediction as well. With stall, you don't need to take many risks. The only things you really have to really think about are whether you should sacrifice this poke or not. But other than that, your moves should be automatic. Genesect comes in, you go to Heatran. Greninja comes in, you go to Florges. It's pretty simple to figure out what to do.

With offense, an early switch that seems harmless can affect the game 4-5 turns later in ways that I didn't expect and cost me the game. Not saying stall is easier because of this, but I think it takes a lot more careful play for an offensive team. Stall can make the safe choices and come out on top (unless you're against M Luc or M Kanga, in which case there's no safe choice).

 

[Qoseph]

Nobody uses most of the pokes you mentioned because they're gimmicky and outclassed.
As for the megas, when there are still obviously OP megas available, justifying using other ones is difficult.

Using pokes just for the sake of variety is silly, people use stuff that works well because they work well.

What happened to the spirit of the game? Using the pokemon you like? Seems like you lost it along with many other people.

 

[Sequins]

Personally I think it's best that we should take variety into consideration when making teams. The more variety we used, the less cookie cutter and centralized the meta game gets. Remember kiddies, the key to a healthy meta-game is variety and challenge :D!

(also gourgeist is cool ok and it's sad nobody is using it)

but there is a point to overly offensive to make a battle run quicker, but it's not an excuse to use cookie cutter teams as you can still be hyper offensive while running variety.