CAP 19 CAP 19 - Part 2 - Typing Discussion

[Da Pizza Man]

This. A thousand times this. I wholeheartedly agree with the list of 'mons outlined here by DetroitLolcat as ones that MGyra can wreck and are common in OU. As well as these five-odd Pokemon, our main focus should be to build a CAP that is weak to some combination of Fire, Water, and Dark moves, as those are MGyra's key resistances. In other words, we want to lure out offensive Pokémon that rely mainly on these attacking types. I won't post typing suggestions yet, but in my opinion, if a proposed typing is not weak to at least two of them, it should not be considered.

I really don't think we should be weak to Fire or Water. Water types have pokemon like Rotom-W and Keldeo who have the potential to destroy Mega Gyarados and Fire types can burn us, it would not be a good idea for our Mega Gyarados to be burned because that pretty much nutters it. I'm not try to say we should resist these types, infact I don't think we should, but we shouldn't be weak to them

 

[Deck Knight]

I don't have a ton more to say at the current moment, but from reading some of the other posts in this thread, I get the feeling that a lot of people are ignoring the real problems we need to solve here in favor of simply trying to be a good partner for Gyarados. That is not what we want. Hell, its not even close, in my opinion. This is not Perfect Mate, and our goal is not to simply partner with another Pokemon. So many of these posts are focused on a typing that takes the things that Gyarados doesn't like, when what we want is the exact opposite. Gyarados should be handling what CAP19 doesn't like, not vice versa. Its certainly OK for us to absorb some things Gyarados is not a fan of, but the more we try to be its perfect partner, the less beneficial it will be for Gyarados for CAP19 to drop, which is what this concept is all about.

Obviously, we are not on a suicide mission, and we don't want something that just dies, but our goal in typing should be to make sure that when it does die, the things that likely killed it are Gyarados bait. The overall partnership between these two Pokemon goes no deeper than that. We have an entire team, and trying to simply make Gyarados Partner #1 completely misses the point.

This has to be the first I've heard of a selected sweeper being a desirable switch-in. Especially on this concept where the premise is in part how to best utilize a CAP sac while in the interim forcing a "keep x alive with y to prevent z from sweeping with the free set-up turn" scenario. The idea here seems to be we want CAP targeted with moves that M-Gyara can take with ease, while also providing defensive coverage for Gyara so it can be switched out if necessary. Electric/Poison does this well by baiting the two types of attacks Gyarados fares well against (well, only Psy after it Mega-Evolves, but nonetheless).

I would say as far as alternate partners for Elec/Poison, Mega Pinsir fits the bill. It enjoys CAP's flying resistance and ability to threaten Talonflame, can switch in on Ground attacks before or after Mega-evolving, and it could use the free set-up turn to Swords Dance and buff its Quick Attack Priority. A less used Dragon Dancer that would also benefit along with Dragonite is Salamence, which functions much like a hybrid between Dragonite and Gyarados. I don't think Elec/Poison would be at a lack for partners given the attack types it draws it, It's just ZardX isn't really one of them because of the shared Ground weakness and ZardX's indifference to Fairy-type attackers. Hydreigon also loves both kinds of attacks Elec/Poison draws, it just doesn't have a good boosting move and its speed tier is questionable.

It's not that I view the questions as unimportant, rather I think most of the initial posts covered Mega Gyarados' strengths and weaknesses well, and I had nothing unique to add. Gyarados' strength is in its duality of usefulness before and after Mega Evolution, which is not a quality every Mega can boast.

 

[Burt Racecar]

Mega-Gyarados can threaten a lot of things with the typical two moves it carries Waterfall and Earthquake, the archetypal fire, rock, ground, steel types. Of course there are a few exceptions, Talonflame's Brave Bird can leave it in perilous condition. With further coverage of either dark (lowly bite) or ice, it can threaten flying types, dragon types, psychic types, ghost types.
After a boost or two, it's possible to extend this to both electric and grass (ice fang). There are no shortage of what it can threat, but it can't set up on each of these.

What it can set-up on are most water types, excluding Azumarill and Keldeo, most fire types, although the fear of burn will be ever present for Mega-Gyarados and the other physical sweepers CAP19 hopes to assist. It can also set up on the occasional steel type, such as Bisharp and Excadrill.
In the non-mega-evolved form Gyarados can easily set up on ground types and a number of physical attackers with the intimidate ability.
It's important to mention that Gyarados, mega or otherwise, would struggle to set up against something that has already set up itself.

After considering this information, and that what other's have said, I'm going to suggest a typing with one big flaw going against it in terms of synergy with Mega-Gyarados. However, Jas pointed out, we're not making a perfect mate for M-Gya.

Ice/Steel
Weaknesses: Fire(x4), Fighting (x4), Ground
Resistances: normal, grass, ice (x4), flying, psychic, bug, ghost, dragon, dark, fairy
Immunities: Poison

While the double weakness for fighting is awful in terms of M-Gya, we could alleviate this issue at a later stage in the process. Or even the inclusion of a psychic or flying type mon on the team could sort out this problem. Ice/Steel resists all of Mega-Gyarados' weaknesses except for its electric neutrality. The fire and ground types it could draw in are perfect for Mega-Gyarados to set up on.
However, for me, the big attraction in this typing is how many other potential pokemon could benefit from the synergy it brings. The typing would keep fairies, dragons and ice types at bay allowing Dragon types some breathing room to set up, Dragonite, Garchomp, Lati@s, etc. Other set-up sweepers that can benefit, include but are not limited to, Azumarill, RP Lando and CM Keldeo. Furthermore, in theory, this typing should be able to deal with both Unaware users, and should cover a plethora of other common OU threats; opposing dragons, CB Talonflame, Bisharp, Thundurus, flying type walls.
Although, I have to mention that Charizard-X suffers from sharing a ground weakness, and Mega-Mawile suffers from the shared Fire and Ground weakness. Unfortunately these two would not suit what this typing has to offer.

So while not exactly perfect for Mega-Gyarados, it still provides very good synergy. Additionally Ice/Steel type match-ups may provide us with a method of including a variety of other sweepers.

 

[Empress]

Okay, after giving it some thought, I second Deck Knight's suggestion of Poison/Electric. We would be immune to a pair of statuses that Gyarados hates, and can take any Fairy, Fighting or Bug type attack launched at us. The EQ weakness isn't a huge problem, as if we're still regular Gyarados, we can switch in on the EQ user. Plus, we already threaten Ground-types with Waterfall. However, I have decided to try my hand at a typing combo that takes a bit of what jas61292 said to heart.

Proposed typing: Ice/Electric
Weaknesses: Ground, Fighting, Rock, Fire
Resistances: Flying, Electric, Ice

"Gasp! Ice-type? What are you thinking! This thing is going straight to NU!"

The reasoning behind Ice-type is that I think it's one type that can maximize the advantages of remaining normal Gyarados; don't forget that the regular forme is plenty viable on its own. When Gyara is still regular, it can take Fighting-type attacks that it couldn't if it was Mega. I don't see the Rock weakness as a major issue, either, as when Gyara does Mega Evolve, it loses the weakness and can threaten back with Waterfall; thus pokes like Terrakion aren't as threatening as they could be. We also could lose to Keldeo, as his Fighting STAB hits us SE, and normal Gyara can use him as setup fodder. We also lose to Excadrill here. The downside I see of this typing is that we do not alleviate the Fairy weakness, but it's about as much of an issue as our Rock one. Noticeable, but not detrimental. (Scratch that; we can't hit Fairies SE, so if this typing gets selected then we must cross our fingers that our CAP gets a move like Sludge Bomb or Iron Head in its aresenal.)

While jas is right that Gyara is supposed to take what CAP 19 does not like, I still feel like the relationship between the two should be symbiotic. Therefore, I believe Electric is necessary, both to tank Electric-type attacks and be immune to paralysis. It's pretty much been established that those two things are among Gyara's Achilles heels.

 

[escarlata]

Apparently the typing which I suggested on the previous page has been deleted since I explained too much in terms of the Perfect Partner route (even though I planned to edit it the moment I reached home today since I was on phone Dx ). But then again, the typing I suggested, I believe when explained well, will still fit the bill so I'm giving it another go to explain.

What Pokemon does Mega Gyarados threaten?
Pokemon's without status that can't hit it more than neutral. This seems pretty obvious, but in real practice we have Excadril, Bisharp, Ttar, Heatran, Landorus-T, Mamoswine, Lati@s after Draco Meteor, Starmie without T-bolt, Greninja without Grass Knot
What Pokemon can Mega Gyarados set up on?
The aforesaid list contains mostly of Pokemons who are unable to hit Mega Gyarados for neutral, which it obviously sets up on. In addition to that, Gyarados also finds many common Choiced resistances running around a lot. Common Choiced users that we threaten are Scizor, Ttar locked into Pursuit, Excadril locked into Iron Head, EQ, Garchomp locked into EQ, Landorus locked into EQ, Gothitelle locked into Psychic etc. As for the other key resistances MGyara has, Fire is too risky due to burns, Water is ok if we are sure they lack Scald, Ghosts are not fine unless we are sure it doesn't have Focus Blast/WoW, Ice types usually carry Bolt Beam so it's risky.

Overall, to summarise the list, we have pursuit trappers, scarfed grounds, hazard removers


Factoring in all these, what immediately stands out is a spinblocker, especially one that is Ground weak, which leaves us with Ghost/Electric, Ghost/Steel, Ghost/Fire, Ghost/Rock. Ghost/Steel gives us a weakness to Fire because burns, Ghost/Fire gives us a weakness to Rock, Terrakion in particular, and Ghost/Rock shares a Grass weakness. The problem with sharing weaknesses is that whatever kills CAP19 may not become set up bait for MGyara, which defeats the point of it dying. Hence Ghost/Electric stands out as the better typing of the 4.

Weaknesses: Ground (2x), Dark (2x), Ghost (2x)
Resistances: Flying (2x), Bug (2x), Flying (2x), Steel (2x), Electric (2x)
Immunities: Fighting, Normal

Being weak to Ground and Dark when most users of said moves are set-up bait for MGyara is really handy to have, especially when it gets Pursuit trapped by a choiced user or hit by something locked into Knock Off, effectively giving MGyara a free DD. As for resistances, I find that a resistance to VoltTurn is almost mandatory because KO-ing us with that removes any risk in KOing CAP19. Above all, this typing is immune to Thundurus's Thunder Wave, which all set-up sweepers hate to the bone.
The biggest thing about this typing is how it is a spinblocker, which the opponent does not actually want to KO since Excadril and Starmie are both set-up bait for MGyara. This inherently also supports Bisharp as a partner, whose weaknesses also just happen to be set up bait for MGyara. This basically puts the opponent into a position where they are screwed if they do not remove CAP19, and screwed even more if they do, which is something we want.

In the case that CAP19 can helps something other than MGyara to sweep, Dragonite has no problem setting up on Dark, Ghost and Ground type attackers, and MTtar loves coming in on Dark and Ghost types. (and when it is alive it helps Bisharp sweep)

 

[Agile Turtle]

We shouldn't be picking bad typings no matter how beneficial it is to the gyara sweep. The concept is about CAP 19, not gyara. We are picking types based on what is most beneficial for CAP, not gyarados. A bad typing is still a bad typing and does not help the concept. We also want to limit the mons CAP 19 is KO'd by so we can avoid watering it down.

There are many types that could lure in mons that gyara could set up on, but if it leaves CAP easily KO'd by more things than we want, that also means we end up luring mons gyarados can't set up on. If the opponent carries any of those mons, then gyarados is a lot less threatening and the opponent won't have any qualms killing CAP.

I have another point about picking bad types: If CAP ends up with a bad type, then it becomes less useful for the team and will likely become a liability, making it worthless.

 

[Empress]

We shouldn't be picking bad typings no matter how beneficial it is to the gyara sweep. The concept is about CAP 19, not gyara. We are picking types based on what is most beneficial for CAP, not gyarados. A bad typing is still a bad typing and does not help the concept. We also want to limit the mons CAP 19 is KO'd by so we can avoid watering it down.

There are many types that could lure in mons that gyara could set up on, but if it leaves CAP easily KO'd by more things than we want, that also means we end up luring mons gyarados can't set up on. If the opponent carries any of those mons, then gyarados is a lot less threatening and the opponent won't have any qualms killing CAP.

I have another point about picking bad types: If CAP ends up with a bad type, then it becomes less useful for the team and will likely become a liability, making it worthless.

Just gonna bring up Jas' post in regards to what inspired my typing.

I don't have a ton more to say at the current moment, but from reading some of the other posts in this thread, I get the feeling that a lot of people are ignoring the real problems we need to solve here in favor of simply trying to be a good partner for Gyarados. That is not what we want. Hell, its not even close, in my opinion. This is not Perfect Mate, and our goal is not to simply partner with another Pokemon. So many of these posts are focused on a typing that takes the things that Gyarados doesn't like, when what we want is the exact opposite. Gyarados should be handling what CAP19 doesn't like, not vice versa. Its certainly OK for us to absorb some things Gyarados is not a fan of, but the more we try to be its perfect partner, the less beneficial it will be for Gyarados for CAP19 to drop, which is what this concept is all about.
Obviously, we are not on a suicide mission, and we don't want something that just dies, but our goal in typing should be to make sure that when it does die, the things that likely killed it are Gyarados bait. The overall partnership between these two Pokemon goes no deeper than that. We have an entire team, and trying to simply make Gyarados Partner #1 completely misses the point.

 

[Boss jr.]

While I don't think we should be focusing on MGyara exclusively (I think that's a trap), I think we should be considering the entire list of OU Dragon Dancers but for the sake of conversation; MGyara Has no problem with Fire, Water, Ice, Ghost, Dark, Steel and Psychic and should be able to set up any of these with little issue. Clearly Electric is the biggest threat and having an Immunity to this should be a priority. It's other weaknesses include Grass, Fighting, Bug and Fairy. Mgyara can KO, cripple or set up on all of these with the proper move set: Rotom-W, Gengar, Mega Venusaur, Lati@s, Garchomp, Dragonite, Scizor, Heatran, Skarmory, Hippowdon and Espeon


The First post did mention that we should also consider other DD'ers (potentially). With that said I would like to propose the following Type combo.

Ground/Steel
Weaknesses: Water, Fire, Fighting and Ground (All types MGyara can KO and set up on (except Fighting))
Resistances: 4x Rock, 2x Normal, Flying, Psychic, Bug, Dragon, Steel, Fairy
Immunities: Poison, Electric

The biggest thing here is it gives us tools that we can use to take out Thundrus and Zapados. But this still leaves MGyara vulnerable to Conkeldurr and Breloom. Ferrothorn also still poses a problem but these can be handled in the movepool later on. This combo is also vulnerable to some of the pokes MGyara can threaten though most notably Rotom-W, Garchomp, Heatran, Skarmory (ww & roar sets) and Hippowdon.

It's not a perfect match for MGyara but it can help it as well as still being viable for other DD users which would make it more viable for other team builds. This type combo can easily benefit the likes of Mega Charizards, Dragonite, Gyarados, Latios and Mega Tyranitar as well.

 

[Yveltal]

I'd like to show support for most of the arguments for Electric or part Electric typing. A weakness to EQ always seems like the epitome of exploitable, and Gyarados in or out of his Mega form can be given a few moves for scaring off most of the Pokemon in OU that regularly use EQ. Pwnemon's phrasing about having something that's "hard to kill except for it's exploitable weakness(es)" automatically makes me think about types that have few weaknesses and Pokemon that are hard to kill either way. With the right bulk, an Electric type could match our concept by being able to take a hit so long as it isn't being forced to fare against Earthquake/Earth Power.
Some of the ones suggested so far look like attempts to take it back to being a quick sacrifice. On paper, Electric/Ice looks a little too easy to take out. Weaknesses to three good attacking types plus SR is a no-go for something that we want to be hard to kill. I'd also like to avoid a Fighting type weakness, as Gyara has nearly no options to sweep Fighting types or scare them into switching out. The other OU DD'ers besides Latios have a weakness to one or the other of Electric/Ice's weaknesses as well. Having to consider a third Mon to cover up our DD'ers weaknesses as well isn't exactly a big issue, but it'd be less heartache to get a little closer to an all-in-one by making Gyarados our most applicable solution to CAP19's weaknesses, should we make it Electric.

 

[NumberCruncher]

We shouldn't be picking bad typings no matter how beneficial it is to the gyara sweep. The concept is about CAP 19, not gyara. We are picking types based on what is most beneficial for CAP, not gyarados. A bad typing is still a bad typing and does not help the concept. We also want to limit the mons CAP 19 is KO'd by so we can avoid watering it down.

There are many types that could lure in mons that gyara could set up on, but if it leaves CAP easily KO'd by more things than we want, that also means we end up luring mons gyarados can't set up on. If the opponent carries any of those mons, then gyarados is a lot less threatening and the opponent won't have any qualms killing CAP.

I have another point about picking bad types: If CAP ends up with a bad type, then it becomes less useful for the team and will likely become a liability, making it worthless.

Having traditionally bad typing doesn't necessarily make a Pokemon unfeasible in OU. Mega-Pinsir has the worst type combination outside of Rock/Ground, and he's still doing wonderfully. Talonflame, Tyranitar, and Mamoswine have completely garbage typing, but they make up for it either in stats or offensive capabilities.

 

[FireArrow]

Why on earth would we want to be ground weak?

Mega Gyarados is neutral to ground, so we'd have to not be mega evolved yet for that even to be useful, more importantly however, earthquake users almost always carry rock coverage, making any immunities in base form null and void.

If we're gonna be talking types, Steel, Ghost, and Dark should be the types we want to bait in, but even this is still incredibly stupid. We should be focusing on baiting specific Pokemon that Gyarados can setup on.

 

[Da Pizza Man]

Why on earth would we want to be ground weak?

Mega Gyarados is neutral to ground, so we'd have to not be mega evolved yet for that even to be useful, more importantly however, earthquake users almost always carry rock coverage, making any immunities in base form null and void.

If we're gonna be talking types, Steel, Ghost, and Dark should be the types we want to bait in, but even this is still incredibly stupid. We should be focusing on baiting specific Pokemon that Gyarados can setup on.

It's better to do types since not only do we have a better range of Pokemon who we want Mega Gyarados to set up on and for us to lure, but also makes sure we don't lure in Pokemon Mega Gyarados can't set up on. Also a lot of Ground types tend to be scarfed, so really they are going to have to go for Earthquake or switcher

 

[FireArrow]

It's better to do types since not only do we have a better range of Pokemon who we want Mega Gyarados to set up on and for us to lure, but also makes sure we don't lure in Pokemon Mega Gyarados can't set up on. Also a lot of Ground types tend to be scarfed, so really they are going to have to go for Earthquake or switcher

Your first sentence just straight up isn't true. Choosing specific Pokemon to bait gives us much less of a chance of baiting things we don't want to than just saying "pokemon that use ground type attacks."

While a lot of ground types do use a scarf, a lot don't as well. We can't bait Pokemon based on items, because they could just, ya'know, be a variant that doesn't hold that item.

 

[Boss jr.]

Having traditionally bad typing doesn't necessarily make a Pokemon unfeasible in OU. Mega-Pinsir has the worst type combination outside of Rock/Ground, and he's still doing wonderfully. Talonflame, Tyranitar, and Mamoswine have completely garbage typing, but they make up for it either in stats or offensive capabilities.

That's actually a pretty good point. Most of the drawbacks to any of these type combinations could easily remedied later on in the ability and move pool. These are just examples but any of the non-paralyze immune pokemon could end up getting Limber and those that have a hard time with Breloom may get Overcoat. We shouldn't be worrying TOOOOOOO much about what these are weak against now since the idea is to find a reasonable Type Combination that can check Mgyara weaknesses and maybe bait something it can set up on since we're trying to give it a free switch. Not to mention beastly base stats and versatile move pool can catch a lot of CAP 19's weaknesses off guard.

I'm just trying to make the point that a type combination that is horrible shouldn't be counted out on that basis alone since we can easily make up for it later on in other perfectly viable ways. Let's try and think more about what these type combinations can do to help CAP 19 serve it's role and what it can teach us about the Meta Game.

 

[Da Pizza Man]

Your first sentence just straight up isn't true. Choosing specific Pokemon to bait gives us much less of a chance of baiting things we don't want to than just saying "pokemon that use ground type attacks."
You haven't said anything about the first part of my sentence, also saying something like "Hey, lets lure Garchomp" is incredibly specific and does not give us a range of Pokemon nearly as large as saying "Hey, lets lure Ground types" or "Hey, lets lure Dragon types"
While a lot of ground types do use a scarf, a lot don't as well. We can't bait Pokemon based on items, because they could just, ya'know, be a variant that doesn't hold that item.
While I kinda can agree with you here, I can kinda use this logic against you. While a lot of ground types do have Rock Coverage, a decent amount don't. Diggersby, Landorus-I, and Mamoswine virtually never run Rock coverage, and for Garchomp it heavily relies on the set wether or not it's going to have Rock coverage.

Comments in bold

 

[FireArrow]

You haven't said anything about the first part of my sentence, also saying something like "Hey, lets lure Garchomp" is incredibly specific and does not give us a range of Pokemon nearly as large as saying "Hey, lets lure Ground types" or "Hey, lets lure Dragon types"

I responded to your second point, as for the first one - you seem to have misunderstand my original post. "...Baiting specific Pokemon" is plural, as in, we could choose every single set-up bait for MGyara if that was actually possible. You seem to of think I said "...bating a specific Pokemon."

While I kinda can agree with you here, I can kinda use this logic against you. While a lot of ground types do have Rock Coverage, a decent amount don't. Diggersby, Landorus-I, and Mamoswine virtually never run Rock coverage, and for Garchomp it heavily relies on the set wether or not it's going to have Rock coverage.

The problem with that is that there's always gonna be an exception (i.e. Landorus-T.) If we choose to bait only based on types, than we will always have exceptions. Picking and choosing what we want to do is the best way to bypass that.

 

[Yveltal]

Having traditionally bad typing doesn't necessarily make a Pokemon unfeasible in OU. Mega-Pinsir has the worst type combination outside of Rock/Ground, and he's still doing wonderfully. Talonflame, Tyranitar, and Mamoswine have completely garbage typing, but they make up for it either in stats or offensive capabilities.

That's actually a pretty good point. Most of the drawbacks to any of these type combinations could easily remedied later on in the ability and move pool. These are just examples but any of the non-paralyze immune pokemon could end up getting Limber and those that have a hard time with Breloom may get Overcoat. We shouldn't be worrying TOOOOOOO much about what these are weak against now since the idea is to find a reasonable Type Combination that can check Mgyara weaknesses and maybe bait something it can set up on since we're trying to give it a free switch. Not to mention beastly base stats and versatile move pool can catch a lot of CAP 19's weaknesses off guard.

I'm just trying to make the point that a type combination that is horrible shouldn't be counted out on that basis alone since we can easily make up for it later on in other perfectly viable ways. Let's try and think more about what these type combinations can do to help CAP 19 serve it's role and what it can teach us about the Meta Game.

But that doesn't mean we should pick a "bad" typing. Finding an unconventional type with this concept would be tricky, especially after the concept assessment was consistently at risk of going down the wrong path. There were consistent reminders that this CAP shouldn't be set up to fail, so we should still actively look to keep it from becoming that by avoiding potentially bad choices. An argument for a unique typing that works well in tandem with a DD'er is one thing, but conventionally bad typings will put too much risk on CAP19's survivability.

Plus, Mamoswine and Pinsir are OU for being able to hit hard with unique STABs or have good command over favorable attacking types. Our goal isn't really to make a bulky sweeper. Giving this guy an unfavorable typing would probably give us something closer to Mollux as-designed-by-GameFreak.

 

[Empress]

Yes, being Ground weak can be detrimental, as is being weak to Rock. However, I believe that you are neglecting to account for Regular Gyara. Also, many Pokes that run EdgeQuake are weak to Water, which remedies our Rock weakness somewhat. And CAP being weak to Fighting isn't a problem if we haven't yet mega evolved. I second Number Cruncher's post as well:

Having traditionally bad typing doesn't necessarily make a Pokemon unfeasible in OU. Mega-Pinsir has the worst type combination outside of Rock/Ground, and he's still doing wonderfully. Talonflame, Tyranitar, and Mamoswine have completely garbage typing, but they make up for it either in stats or offensive capabilities.

Though being Ice-type, as I have suggested, is never, ever a good thing, the typing provides a good relationship between CAP and Gyara, as one can handle what the other cannot. And we have not even made it to movepool, stats or even ability yet, so once we reach those points we can definitely patch up our typing. Though it is too early for those discussions, perhaps something like Filter, Natural Cure, good bulk, or Hydro Pump, or things along those lines, can help us deal with the inevitable weaknesses that come with typing.

As for "hard to kill except for its exploitable weaknesses", I interpreted that as CAP having multiple weaknesses but possibly good bulk/defensive abilities. Since we're still on typing, I feel that giving it some weaknesses to build around will help sway the later discussions a little more. And on another note, hitting Rhyperior with a Close Combat, for example, is not exactly a "quick sacrifice". Being hit SE does not guarantee a KO.

 

[FireArrow]

Something I think people are forgetting to talk about is offensive stabs. Since defensive Pokemon make much better set-up bait, having the correct stabs that are walled by set-up bait is important too.

Yes, being Ground weak can be detrimental, as is being weak to Rock. However, I believe that you are neglecting to account for Regular Gyara. Also, many Pokes that run EdgeQuake are weak to Water, which remedies our Rock weakness somewhat. And CAP being weak to Fighting isn't a problem if we haven't yet mega evolved.

You see, the only way for Gyara to set up on ground types is by coming in on your regular form, and then absorbing the -1 coverage move in mega form. That's not any better than choosing any other physically based type neutral to Mega-Gyara, so if you guys are so infatuated with type baiting, then at least pick ones such as steel, dark, and ghost, that are much easier to handle. Same issue pops up though, we get blasted by coverage moves on some pokemon. So why don't we just select which ones we know we can set-up on and gear it towards that rather than pick types hoping that we end up with enough bait to make CAP19 viable? Why would we even be asking people to choose threats that we can DD on if we're not gonna use that information when picking our type?

 

[Bughouse]

Hi everyone... stern Typing Leader srk here. I gotta say, I'm not all that happy with how this thread has gone so far, so I'm going to try to get us back on track. I wish so many people hadn't immediately jumped to proposing typings. I didn't ask for that in my OP and I personally think that it's better to get easy stuff out of the way first, and then move to what typings solve that second. In my opinion, not nearly enough people have actually addressed the questions in a meaningful way other than strictly on Gyarados and Mega Gyarados's type chart interactions. There is so much more to a Pokemon than that. The question of what Mega Gyarados can set up on is not "steel moves." Aside from CB Scizor which isn't even a thing anymore, nothing is going to be using Choice locked Steel moves. You set up on Pokemon, not on moves. There was nothing said about actual sets of Mega Gyarados and how each interacts with the opponent's team. So I'm going to talk about that a bit later in this post.

Anyway, I'm going to mostly focus on the discussion parts now and may get around to typings that have been proposed so far a bit later.

The most important factor most everyone pointed out is the value of regular Gyarados' Intimidate and its ability to type change to screw over many things in OU, from Scizor and Excadrill to Keldeo and Latias. This is an essential factor to remember in choosing what Gyarados, Mega or not, can set up on.

Several users have focused in on the sorts of Pokemon that (Mega) Gyarados can beat, as I asked. The answers to these questions were kinda obvious, though I was disappointed not to see basically any mention of interactions based on more than just typing. Mega Gyarados gets to use some moves too, and that matters a good deal. The opponents are more than their typings too. For example, while Gyarados is good against Steel moves, it's not necessarily good against Steel Pokemon. Skarmory threatens to Whirlwind it out if we set up and Ferrothorn threatens Paralysis, Leech Seed, or just Power Whip. However, it's important to remember the sorts of sets Mega Gyarados runs. The last slot (first three being Dragon Dance, Waterfall, Earthquake) is probably most often Ice Fang, which adds good coverage. But it is also often Substitute or Taunt. Taunt enables Gyarados to set up in the face of things like Hippowdown or Skarmory who would normally be able to stop any set-up opportunity. Substitute on the other hand can make setting up on Ferrothorn possible as long as you're still in regular Gyarados form. Substitute also enables Gyarados to even set up in the face of Quagsire, since you can dodge both Scalds and Toxics, and as long as you remain in the base form, you evade Earthquakes too. Meanwhile, once you're good and ready to go, you Mega Evolve, gain Mold Breaker, and ignore its Unaware.

(ps a ctrl+f on the page turned up nothing for Taunt and nothing for Substitute (other than jas61292's custom title...) That made me really sad. Please try to be a little more in depth in your considerations of Mega Gyarados as we move forward in this thread.)

jas61292 rightly pointed out that in terms of Offensive threats Gyarados might be trying to set up on, Gyara is bulky, but not godly. It will take a hit ok, but not fantastically, as it tries to set up. It has few opportunities where the opponent absolutely must switch out under all circumstances, before they're dealing with a +2/+2 monster. Aside from the example DetroitLolcat pointed out of CB Talonflame locked into Flare Blitz, or similar ones like Scarf Excadrill, Landorus-T, or Garchomp locked into EQ, it's going to take a pretty decent hit as it Dragon Dances, which will hopefully then be enough to put into revenge-able range for the opponent. So maybe it has more of a chance to set up safely with Taunt or Substitute involved, given how it can easily laugh at walls who can't threaten with offensive pressure, but then it also sweeps a lot less efficiently if the opponent has something like a Dragonite or a Celebi.

So the first part of my second set of questions is the following: Should we be focusing primarily on any particular Mega Gyarados set? If so, should we favor Sub and Taunt sets that can better handle Walls or the Ice Fang set that sweeps more readily? i.e. Does the number of Pokemon that (Mega) Gyarados can set up on by forgoing Ice Fang for a support move grow significantly enough to merit being stopped by a few Pokemon Ice Fang would otherwise handle?


Second, I did want to reiterate what several users have said in this thread or on IRC. This is NOT a Perfect Mate.

I know ginganinja would love us to have CAP 19 perform well against Breloom. He'd also probably like it to do well against Thundurus, Conkedlurr, and Talonflame. I'm sure a perfect mate for Mega Gyarados would love all of those traits, as would many OU mons. However, these are not goals I'm going to have in this thread. If they happen within the scope of luring things Mega Gyarados can beat, that's fine, but I will disregard any arguments for a typing that are based on "beating Breloom" or anything like that.



Third, DetroitLolcat made an interesting point that we should not be weak to U-turn, given how easy it would be to kill CAP 19 and also NOT stay on the field for when Gyarados would like to start setting up. I agree with this point for sure. The same point could be made about Volt Switch, though there are fewer OU users of that move (and none that Gyarados can set up on exactly... which is to say that Volt Switch is probably an irrelevancy for Mega Gyarados, though it could matter if we also want to partner with Mega Charizard X). So my other question right now is this: How much weight should we place on our interactions with U-turn users? Do we need to resist U-turn? Could we just beat most U-turn users so they can't threaten to kill with a U-turn, even though we don't resist the move? Is resisting U-turn compatible with other goals we may have of drawing out Pokemon that Mega Gyarados can set up on?





p.s. I still didn't ask about specific typings, so please continue holding off on that for a little bit. I'll probably read over your thoughts on all ^this above and open up to typings again in 24ish hours.

 

[Agile Turtle]

Having traditionally bad typing doesn't necessarily make a Pokemon unfeasible in OU. Mega-Pinsir has the worst type combination outside of Rock/Ground, and he's still doing wonderfully. Talonflame, Tyranitar, and Mamoswine have completely garbage typing, but they make up for it either in stats or offensive capabilities.

Those mons aren't CAP19. Those other mons have niches that allow them to be viable. Besides that, talonflame and mamoswine and stuff are KOd very easily because of their poor typings. We don't want to get KOd easily, thats against the concept. We want to be hard to kill, outside of specific mons that gyara can set up on. Throwing a random bad type out there and hoping it sticks is not how we should go about typing. We don't want a mon with a bad typing on our team. We want a mon with a good typing. A mon with a good typing is way more useful than one without.

What can we possibly have to gain from picking a bad typing?

 

[Ununhexium]

Those mons aren't CAP19. Those other mons have niches that allow them to be viable. Besides that, talonflame and mamoswine and stuff are KOd very easily because of their poor typings. We don't want to get KOd easily, thats against the concept. We want to be hard to kill, outside of specific mons that gyara can set up on. Throwing a random bad type out there and hoping it sticks is not how we should go about typing. We don't want a mon with a bad typing on our team. We want a mon with a good typing. A mon with a good typing is way more useful than one without.

What can we possibly have to gain from picking a bad typing?

We don't want the CAP to be hard to kill, but rather we want to make the opponent now want to kill it. Note the difference.

Should we be focusing primarily on any particular Mega Gyarados set? If so, should we favor Sub and Taunt sets that can better handle Walls or the Ice Fang set that sweeps more readily? i.e. Does the number of Pokemon that (Mega) Gyarados can set up on by forgoing Ice Fang for a support move grow significantly enough to merit being stopped by a few Pokemon Ice Fang would otherwise handle?

This is an interesting question. I feel like Taunt is more focused on breaking down walls than setting up on them. I like the idea of Substitute because if Gyarados can set up a sub before Thundurus comes in, it gives it an extra turn to attack and (potentially) not be paralyzed. It also causes mindgames with walls so I guess you could say it is useful in that respect.

How much weight should we place on our interactions with U-turn users? Do we need to resist U-turn? Could we just beat most U-turn users so they can't threaten to kill with a U-turn, even though we don't resist the move? Is resisting U-turn compatible with other goals we may have of drawing out Pokemon that Mega Gyarados can set up on?

I fully agree with the point you made. We cannot be weak to these moves. I think resisting these would be the most effective course of action. The concept means that if x kills y, z will come in and destroy x; but if z could not set up because x got out thanks to U-turn / Volt Switch, we lost hold of our concept. I think just being able to beat them would be less useful because if they can tank a hit or whatever and U-turn for the KO, we lose the chance to set up. The CAP must not die to these moves. If it does, the whole strategy goes awry. I guess it could work if we didn't resist them, but it would be much more useful if it did.

 

[Boss jr.]

I don't like the idea of using MGyara with Substitute solely because it doesn't have access to healing. This set should only be used with a wish passer that can help it heal off the damage which will make it harder to keep a sweep going (because one would need to switch out to get the benefit). That's not to say that CAP 19 couldn't provide such support but we're not there yet so we should consider a different set.

Ice Fang or Taunt sets seem more viable as they can lock up a pokemon or KO them outright. U-Turn hits Fire, Fighting, Poison, Flying, Ghost, Steel and Fairy for 1/2 damage. A type combination involving Poison, Steel and/or Ghost seem to be among the most common proposed and would put a stop to U-Turn mons giving CAP 19 any trouble. That leaves two things that MGyara needs to look out for, Burn and Paralysis as either one will cripple MGyara and prevent it from sweeping as effectively. Considering this Electric can deal with Paralysis being completely immune and Ground being immune to T-Wave (but not Bounce, Body Slam etc.). Fire pokes can counter Will-o-wisp but will fall pray to Water Pokemon with Scald (Which an Electric user will be able to deal with (hopefully)). Fire isn't really a big worry anyway though because MGyara should be able to OHKO or 2HKO most of the common threats with Waterfall. However considering a Fire Type would allow us to do away with Ferrothorn and Breloom (maybe). But again, that can be fixed up in the move pool later on. Fighting types still pose a problem aside from Breloom though. Conkeldurr for instance needs to be taken into consideration.

Reiterating that we're not doing a perfect mate for MGyara we don't actually have to cover it's ENTIRE threat list in order for CAP 19 to serve it's role. We can do just fine with combinations that do pretty good like Ghost/Steel, Ghost/Ice, Ground/Steel, Poison/Electric... Fire/Fairy? ....etc.?

 

[NumberCruncher]

Should we be focusing primarily on any particular Mega Gyarados set? If so, should we favor Sub and Taunt sets that can better handle Walls or the Ice Fang set that sweeps more readily? i.e. Does the number of Pokemon that (Mega) Gyarados can set up on by forgoing Ice Fang for a support move grow significantly enough to merit being stopped by a few Pokemon Ice Fang would otherwise handle?

That really depends. Water and Ground isn't exactly the best coverage in the world, and many of Gyarados's sweep-stoppers are Flying anyway. On the other hand, we do need a way to keep Chansey, Vaporeon, and their ilk from coming in and ruining Gyarados's day. This is something that's honestly more up to how we set up CAPs stats and movepool, rather than its typing. Good wallbreaker stats would make us want to lean towards Ice Fang, while good stats and good priority would make us want to lean towards the Taunt/Sub set. While this is a good question, I feel this really isn't a concern at this particular stage.

How much weight should we place on our interactions with U-turn users? Do we need to resist U-turn? Could we just beat most U-turn users so they can't threaten to kill with a U-turn, even though we don't resist the move? Is resisting U-turn compatible with other goals we may have of drawing out Pokemon that Mega Gyarados can set up on?

Personally, with regards to Volt Switch and U-Turn, I feel we either need to make the CAP resistant to Bug and give it enough Special Bulk so that Volt Switch isn't threatening, or we need the CAP resistant to Volt Switch, but with the Physical Bulk to stop U-Turn. While the idea of beating Volt Switch/U-Turn users before they kill is nice, these moves are commonly used in combination with the Choice Scarf, which makes this approach more problematic without unreasonably high Speed.

 

[Qwilphish]

If we want a Pokemon to be sacrificed in order to allow M-Gyara / another sweeper to set-up I would hope that we going for the set that is less likely to be stopped cold, aka. the Ice Fang set. The Sub / Taunt sets may be easier to sweep with on its own / against Stall, however if we are walled then we have effectively wasted a Pokemon for no reason. Although the list of Pokemon which Ice Fang beats which Waterfall or EQ doesn't @ +1 may seem small (Dragonite, M-Venu, Garchomp, Latias) these Pokemon are common enough that Ice Fang would be the better option in the situation which we are trying to create.

Also, in terms of U-Turn and in turn [;)] Volt-Switch, I think its obvious that we shouldn't be forced out, threatened, or even care about these moves. In a random scenario, if a Rotom-W is able to Volt Switch and subsequently is able to knock us out, we lose then that takes the Pokemon which is out on the other side of the field out of our hands, and even though we technically gain momentum from this course of action, this is not the way to go in this scenario.

As for the scenario in which we do want to have, I believe that we should avoid the above situation as often as possible, the way to do so is by resisting both moves. Especially considering the reduction of strong U-Turn and Volt Switchers in the tier, by resisting these moves, even if we are at low-ish HP.

Typing this time around doesn't seem to be as difficult as it has the other rounds but here is my outline of things that the typing should do: [not going to suggest any types that may fit this bc no types in the type part you know]
- Resist Voltturn
- Is threatened by Choiced Water-type attacks (i.e. those by Azumarill or Keldeo)
- Is threatend by Choiced Ground-types attacks (i.e. those by Garchomp, Excadrill, or non Focus Blast Landorus)
- Optional: Is threatened by Choiced Fire-type attacks (i.e. those by Talonflame or Heatran)

I chose these criteria as most important because they are the situations that are most likely to show up (the Fire-type one is not as likely). Another useful aspect would be for us to threaten Thundurus as that is a cold stop to Ice Fang Gyarados, however since technically we are not facilitating a Gyarados sweep rather we are creating an opportunity to do so, this is not as important