The Ideal BW OU Metagame Thread Discussion

[Oglemi]

Disclaimer: This thread will not have any bearing on the actual BW OU metagame played in tournaments or elsewhere, this is simply for me to see exactly what people think the "Ideal" BW OU metagame would look like out of sheer curiosity (and dadoux's thread was a thinly veiled version of this so might as well address the elephant in the room).

While Smogon has not been against retesting aspects of old metagames (ADV BP ban, BW UU Chandelure/etc. ban) and then using them as the official tier/ruleset, I'm simply doing this to gauge what people actually think about the current BW OU metagame, because to me it seems like the playerbase is generally split down the middle between liking it or hating it.

Firstly: Do you like the current BW OU metagame and think it's competitive?

Two separate questions here really because you can like the metagame but think it's not competitive and vice versa. But anyway, what about the metagame do you like or dislike? What makes it competitive or not competitive? Are you neutral, what aspects do you like and which do you dislike?

Secondly: What would you change, if anything? Starting with bans:

There is a large list of candidates for the broken Pokemon of the current BW OU metagame. Most commonly it's the following from what I gather, but there may be others or you may disagree with the following:

Drizzle
Kyurem-B
Volcarona
Keldeo
Garchomp
Venusaur

Thirdly: If any or all of the above were banned, what would you unban?

Again commonly it's the following:

Tornadus-T
Thundurus
Manaphy


Is there a perfect combination of bans and unbans that you feel would work best?

I'm sure most would agree that Keldeo would probably be more balanced in the tier with Torn-T and Thund back in the mix but others might say that their presence would make Keldeo even more broken.

Basically, get your theorymon fix here.


If there's enough of a demand after discussion has taken place for a bit I'll probably host a mini-tour (or regular tour we'll see) with the perceived "Ideal Metagame" just for kicks.



Finally, since I know this'll be asked, if there is ever a retest of some aspect of the BW OU metagame I assume it'd be handled much in the same way the ADV BP ban was; if you're curious what that was like I suggest taking a look at the results in PR. Note how long after ADV had ended that that test took place, and note that it centered on a very small aspect of the metagame and it resulted simply in a nerf. It is highly unlikely anything in BW OU will ever be retested, so don't use this thread as a means to get your hopes up. Read the disclaimer at the top.

This is not a thread to criticize or bash the BW OU leaders. This is not a thread to criticize the BW OU suspecting process or voters. This is not a thread to air your complaints. This is not a thread to "wonder why this never happened" or questioning the reasons behind the past votes/suspects. Discuss the current BW OU metagame in a vacuum. Punishment will be harsh and swift for breaking any of these decrees.

 

[Alfalfa]

Unbanning TornT would be a nightmare on wheels. That thing was literally an ass on wheels that was so difficult to stop. I was not here for the Thundurus or Manaphy suspects, so I will leave no comment on them.

Volcarona would be an interesting suspect, as although it is inherently flawed, it puts so much pressure on the opposing team.

Garchomp is good, but it really is not worth banning again. It is good, but it is not a complete ass to deal with, since Sand Veil is banned.

Keldeo is an ass for sure, but Ebelt is dead, so most people just use Scarf now. You definitely need to prepare for it, but it still is not 6-0ing most teams, as most teams usually carry a Pokemon that can deal with.

I used to really support a Kyurem-B suspect, but from my experience using it, its lack of speed really hurts it from beating offense without resorting to a Choice Scarf.

If Drizzle was banned, sun and sand would probably become over-dominant to begin with. Plus, most teams prepare for rain offense, though some rain abusers, such as Moltres, can be an absolute ass to deal with.

If anything was going to be suspected, I guess Volcarona, but we need to look at this question first: are we overreacting, or is Volcarona truly a problem?

 

[psVoltage]

Torn-T is a 100% no, that thing was a nightmare.

I would love to see drizzle suspected, but then Drought would more then likely become the new rain, and I'm not really for banning all the weathers haha. It has been a problem all through gen V, but at the end of the cycle I thought it was decently balanced.

Garchomp, Volcarona, and Keldeo are all good, but not really ban worthy. (Keldeo could be possibly, but its not a major problem anymore)

Kyurem-B suspect I wouldn't like to see tho. Its pretty versatile fitting on many team archetypes including stall, but its weak to some of the most common offensive types (fighting, steel, dragon) which really puts a stop to it if you have anything like Latios or scizor. It can be hard to switch into sometimes though.

 

[Ranger Mike]

Alright I just recently started playing bw ou so go easy on me :] Anyways I'll just go down the list:

Drizzle: Honestly if we are considering banning drizzle why don't we just resuspect keldeo, if we kill the main abuser we neuter the playstyle don't we? But yeah a rainless meta would be really interesting like alfalfa said sand and sun would just be amazing possibly too amazing considering one of the problems with sun is when you're matched up against rain with sun being the matchup reliant playstyle it is. don't ban

Kyurem-b: Haven't played much with kyurem b but, like alfalfa said, it is kind of slow scarfless. abstain

Volcarona: I think that the general consensus is that this thing is broken and I am indifferent. Heatran is kind of a counter but you can just go into duggy as your opponent goes into tran. (Or use the almighty u-turn volcarona ) Also I guess you can just run hp ground but you lose to gyara and dnite when you can just run duggy. That's another thing does volcarona have counters? Yes. If its counters are gone does it sweep most teams with ease? Yes. Honestly if we ban rain then this guy has to go cause rain might be the only thing making him slightly below broken. But yeah it's for the most part broken and I wouldn't mind a ban at all. ban

Keldeo: Like I said if rain is a problem then kill its main abuser (this thing) and then you nerf rain hard. ban

Garchomp: This thing is really good but it just has flaws that make it not broken such as non scarf sets are sometimes just too slow and scarfchomp sometimes just doesn't have enough power. don't ban

Tornadus-T: If rain is banned then unban this thing. It can no longer just spam hurricane for free. Will think about this one a bit more but for now unban

Will add thoughts on the other two later.

 

[MoxieInfinite]

if anything should leave its volc. i think were fine otherwise. but if rain leaves, shit like manaphy should probably get unbanned idk.

 

[Lord Ninjax]

Yeah, the Volc ban is the only one needed. Kyurem-B is very specific in wrecking, with a Scarf it can't beat stall, with LO it can't beat offense. Scarf Keldeo is handy, but gets checked by a bunch of stuff, so it cant sweep without rain and/or a lot of stuff being taken out. Chomp really doesn't deserve a ban cause no Sand Veil, it's really versatile but doesn't win games, always does well in a lot of ways though. Rain actually balanced the meta, always requires a few checks per team but yeah it's not nearly as good as it was with Torn-T, and definitely not ban-worthy. I already explained why Volc needs a ban in dadoux's thread so I don't think its necessary to say so here, if so tell me.

 

[Lyconik]

Firstly: Do you like the current BW OU metagame and think it's competitive?
I love the current metagame, because it have a large variety of different playstyle, more than XY or DPP. And all these playstyle are usable and balanced, thought sand balanced is more reliable than sun wich is very matchup dependent. Also, I started pokemon when BW was the main tier, so it will always be my favorite tier.

Secondly: What would you change, if anything?
I'm okay with this metagame, and I wouldn't change anything. Sure, pokemons like volcarona and garchomp are harsh to deal, but I think it doesn't deserve a suspect test. Volcarona can sweep an whole team but need support, when garchomp doesn't need support but have a harder time in order to sweep since people run at least 2 checks per team.

You should also add drought on your list. I know some people want it banned, even if I disagree with that.

Thirdly: If any or all of the above were banned, what would you unban?
Since I doesn't want any ban, I'm against unbanning monster like thundurus, tornadus-t, manaphy. And I don't think banning drizzle will add more diversity to the metagame, because pokemons like toxicroak, feraligatr, tornadus, tentacruel will be useless. Sure, infernape, thundurus, tornadus and manaphy will be used, but you just change one threat to an other.

Is there a perfect combination of bans and unbans that you feel would work best?
Like I said, no ban, no unban. I think this metagame is the best we can have.

Maybe a suspect test without drizzle + Tornadus-T / Thundurus / Manaphy unban, and an other with drought ban.

 

[Mr.378]

I've already said my piece on drizzle in the other thread so I will not repeat too much of it here. The basis is though that I think drizzle should be banned and Thundurus-I/Manaphy/Tornadus-T should be brought back. In addition, the more I think of it the more I realize that Volcarona is ridiculous and should be sent to ubers. The reasons for this have already been stated, and getting rid of rain would only bolster Volcarona's power even though I would lose it's neat Fire Blast/Hurricane/Bug Buzz/Quiver Dance rain sweeper set. As for the other pokemon mentioned, they're all fine.

 

[Lavern]

Lol, i just finished building some BW OU teams and the first thing i see on smogon is this.

Firstly: Do you like the current BW OU metagame and think it's competitive?

I don't get how BW OU gets so much hate when it's actually a rather balanced and fun metagame. Most of the complaints are either completly wrong or aren't according to the current metagame. So yeah, I think it's a competitive metagame. Not as competitive as DPP and ADV, because of Team Preview, but still competitive unlike XY.

Secondly: What would you change, if anything? Starting with bans:

I'll just talk about everything you mentioned.

Drizzle: It's funny that Drizzle is the first thing on the list because that's one of the typical complaints that aren't according to the current metagame. Rain was only broken when things like Tornadus-T and Genesect were still around. Sand is actually the better weather right now (imo) and the only broken thing about rain is Keldeo, which can work as good, if not better, on sand-teams because of Tyranitar's Pursuit.

Kyurem-B: Kyurem-B shouldn't be banned, imo. It does really well against stall and bulky offense, but it can't really do that much against offense. The mixed Set is too slow to be a threat to offensive teams and scarf KyuB is easily revengekilled, because of its bad typing.

Volcarona: Get that broken piece of shit out of BW OU.

Keldeo: Keldeo should be banned as well. While it has a shitty movepool and ability, it has the stats and typing to be a huge threat to any team. The thing I hate about Keldeo most is that you have to scout for its HP before you could safely switch into your check. There's a HP for every of Keldeo's checks (besides Toxicroak but that only fits on rainteams) and the use of E-Belt makes that even deadlier. Back when the Keldeo suspect was announced I was actually against the ban, because I was inexperienced at that time, but now I think it should be banned.

Garchomp: That thing is far from being broken, lol. Garchomp is good, but banning Garchomp would be like banning Jirachi, stupid.

Thirdly: If any or all of the above were banned, what would you unban?

I wouldn't unban anything becuase banning Volc and Keldeo wouldn't make anything broken not broken.

Is there a perfect combination of bans and unbans that you feel would work best?

As I said there isn't anything I would unban, but a suspect to both Volcarona and Keldeo would be the best thing for BW OU right now.

 

[Luckstard.]

Firstly: Do you like the current BW OU metagame and think it's competitive?

Yes, there is a lot of things that are playable and it's good.


Secondly: What would you change, if anything?

Drizzle : No. I'm against it since I don't even get why poeple are complaining about weathers anyway. Weathers are cool guys. And if you wanna ban Drizzle, then ban Drought, sand are not a problem for Sun teams, they would overcentralize the metagame.

Kyurem-Black : No. Even if he strikes like a truck, he is slow, even with a scarf (common scarfers such as Terrakion, Keldeo, Latios or Jirachi outspeed and KO it easily) and it's without counting on priority weaknesses Bullet Punch from Scizor or Mach Punch from Breloom does a lot of damages. And if you are running a scarf set, in my opinion, you are loosing too much power.

Volcarona : No. I'm against because, like I said on the dadoux's thread, if you ban Volcarona, then Defensive Mew got less pressure. If Volcarona is really effective at the moment, it's mainly because the metagame became really bulky (especially Sands), and bulky teams are weak to Volcarona. Yes I know there is still great mon to deal with Bulky Sand Teams, such as Hydreigon, but still, Volcarona is what, in my opinion, the things that allows the metagame to not become stallish (and boring) as fuck. Also he is suffering the 4mss, you always had to choice what is gonna wall you, and more, your item also, run passho berry to be less weak to Hpump Keldeo? Run Lum Berry to check status? Leftovers are good too you know...

Keldeo : No. I was in favor of the ban of Keldeo when it was retested at the end of the BW era, but now I'm against. Simply because, if you think a little, Keldeo is a really good mon for the tiers. He is RK'ing Modest Venusaur (assuming there is still poeple using it lol), Stoutland under Sand, Dragonite at +2 (be aware of eSpeed). Also, he is faster than Garchomp, which is nice because you can kill it easily. And I'm not talking about the 4mss with Hidden Power.

Garchomp : No. The best mon of the game, really. It fits in every playstyle, has a lot of possible set, can be used as a lure, really, he is very good. I don't think he is unhealthy to the metagame, he is one of the best Jirachi check, dont forget it.

I would add Mew here, this mon is really a pain in my opinion, and I'm talking about the defensive one. As a Weatherless HO player, I can say Mew is a pain to deal with, when a mon is able to stop CB Scizor (the best Psychic defensive mons counter) when a mon is able to stop even specially attackers such as Latios, Keldeo and even Starmie, I think it's broken. I know he is weak to some other mons, but they are not played in good Weatherless Hyper Offense team.


Thirdly: If any or all of the above were banned, what would you unban?

Tornadus-Therian : No. He is the mon I hated the most, really. Because I don't want to ban Drizzle, I don't want to see it unbanned.

Thundurus : No. Even if he could be useful, the +1 T-Wave would stop some threats whic are using speed boosts (Volcarona, Venusaur,...) I don't think it's a good idea. Currently, there is, like I said earlier, some scarf users in BW OU, if you look at XY metagame, where Thundurus is allowed, there only one scarf user : Landorus-Therian, which is not affected by T-Wave. A scarfless BW metagame would be bad, in my opinion.

Manaphy : No. It's obviously broken since I'm against a drizzle ban.


Is there a perfect combination of bans and unbans that you feel would work best?

If you ban Drizzle, Manaphy / Tornadus-Therian could be retested, they are broken in rain, but without it would be different.

If you fear a rise of DragMag, then ban Latios, Garchomp and Kyurem-Black, we'd be fine I guess. It'd ruin the tier, but there won't be weathers anymore :]

I will just add something, if you ban Keldeo and Garchomp, weatherless hyper offense would be nerfed. I'm not talking about DragMag, I'm talking about real weatherless HO like Ojama and Reymedy presented you in some RMTs.

 

[dadoux]

You don't just say that you can't ban volcarona because you need it to check mew lol, so you wanna keep an ubalanced metagame to avoid a metagame when an already annoying pokemon becomes more annoying even with the possibility of having a more balanced metagame so a new way to answer some threats...it feels weird even when i'm explaining that lol

Edit: Imma answer the thread too, i don't mind if it works the same as my thread as long as we have a better metagame

Volcarona : Cancer, no positive purpose whatsoever in the metagame like Leftiez and I said here
Keldeo: I don't know about this one, i just want to see him being suspected after a volcarona ban, this thing is just too good, and with rain it gets even better (ScarfKeldeo under rain victims knows what's up)
Drizzle: I don't think they are as stupid as VolcaDug sun tbh, without Keldeo i think it's not a problem at all
Garchomp : Garchomp is like the best mon in BW imo, but it's not a concern, it's a great hasard setter but you can deal with it, without sand veil you can't have a good reason to clearly ask for a ban imo, even though it can be strong, threatening an all that.

 

[Luckstard.]

That wasn't my point,

1. I never said I found the metagame unbalanced, that's your point.
2. I never said I needed Volcarona to deal with Mew, I even said there was other way to deal with Mew 2 or 3 times in my post.

 

[Jirachee]

I've seen someone earlier in this thread suggest that we ban Keldeo instead of Drizzle, which I believe is not a very good idea. Keldeo is actually more of a Sand Pokemon anyway because it appreciates Pursuit support from Tyranitar a lot more than Rain support. It already hits hard enough to kill a lot of offensive Pokemon and having stuff like Latias completely removed helps it a lot more. As for a Rain abusing Water type, Starmie is probably better at that thanks to the increased Speed and the sheer stupidity of Analytic Life Orb Rain boosted Hydro Pump. A lot of teams rely on the Lati twins for checking Water types and they can't really beat offensive Starmie, especially when said Hydro Pump is stripping away more than half of their health.

I think BW would be a lot better without Drizzle and Drought because while they increase the variety of team archetypes, they really limit the creativity you can have when you teambuild. Not a lot of Pokemon can check Sun teams, and you have to add to that multiple Water resists to make sure Rain Hydro Pump doesn't truck you. Some overlap (like Dragonite) but you can't really use those on every team right? Anyway I've accepted a long time ago that they would never be banned and for that reason I've thought of other ways to improve the tier.

I think that Venusaur is currently the most broken Pokemon in the tier. It surprises me that it wasn't included in the initial discussion list because it's really the most dangerous thing you can face. Unlike the other Chlorophyll / Sand Rush Pokemon, Venusaur combines power, a boosting move, and bulk, while also having access to Sleep Powder. I don't need to explain why Sleep moves are retarded in BW but having it on a Pokemon with 526 Speed kinda overdoes it. Venusaur is the big reason why Sun teams are even viable and why they rape Rain teams even if they can't trap Politoed. Venusaur vs Weatherless is the most unfair match up of all time. A lot of people complain about the team match up issue in BW and I think they exaggerate most of the time, except for Venusaur. It really decides games before they even started.

Volcarona is the other thing that forces the match up issue so much and I think Leftiez's post in the other thread perfectly sums up why it needs to get banned.

Firstly: Do you like the current BW OU metagame and think it's competitive?

Two separate questions here really because you can like the metagame but think it's not competitive and vice versa. But anyway, what about the metagame do you like or dislike? What makes it competitive or not competitive? Are you neutral, what aspects do you like and which do you dislike?

I actually quite like BW. I think it could be a lot better though. I like it, just not as much as DPP or (god forbid) XY (in its current state). I'm not sure how you can call it uncompetitive and I'm pretty sure people started throwing that around because idiots called LC uncompetitive.

Secondly: What would you change, if anything? Starting with bans:

There is a large list of candidates for the broken Pokemon of the current BW OU metagame. Most commonly it's the following from what I gather, but there may be others or you may disagree with the following:

Drizzle
Kyurem-B
Volcarona
Keldeo
Garchomp

Keldeo and Kyurem-B are the two other things I think are suspect worthy because they just limit some of the playstyles so fucking much. Playing full Stall in BW is really hard but I guess they're not the only ones to blame. Garchomp is just really good, I don't think it's broken.

Thirdly: If any or all of the above were banned, what would you unban?

Again commonly it's the following:

Tornadus-T
Thundurus
Manaphy

Tornadus-Therian and Manaphy would probably be balanced without Rain. I'm actually not sure if they would even be good. They're alright in XY I guess so maybe they'd be a little better than that, but I can't see people running Tornadus all that much without guarenteed Hurricanes. Thundurus is incredibly metagame defining and as Luckstard explained earlier BW without Scarfers would be incredibly stupid. Not to mention that the NP set actually destroys everything, it's ridiculous

Tagging BKC for a mad@kyub post

 

[Tokyo Tom]

I just wanted to second Baha's comment about stallbreaking Mew, which is being seen more and more now. This could partly be due to its success in XY, which I know is definitely why a bunch of people I know started using it. Before I go /kinda/ in-depth I'll assume the "standard" Mew to be something like

@ Lefties w/ [(Ice Beam/Psychic) | Will-O-Wisp | Taunt | Softboiled] w/ max HP and the rest thrown into Speed and SpDef.

I just want to throw down some calcs real quick:

Calcs

252 Atk

Crunch vs. 240 HP / 0 Def

: 270-318 (67.3 - 79.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after sandstorm damage and Leftovers recovery
252+ Atk Choice Band

Return vs. 240 HP / 0 Def

: 229-270 (57.1 - 67.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252+ Atk Choice Band burned

U-turn vs. 240 HP / 0 Def

: 189-223 (47.1 - 55.6%) -- 76.2% chance to 2HKO
252 SpA Choice Specs

Draco Meteor vs. 240 HP / 92+ SpD

: 285-336 (71 - 83.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

Basically, Scarf Ttar is risking a burn just to push damage on Mew, and that's assuming you win the Crunch/Pursuit 50/50. A powerful CB user like Stoutland can only hope to 2HKO Mew with its strongest STAB if it gets absolute max rolls on each hit (assuming it's burned for the second hit), and Scizor sacrifices any usefulness it could've had later in the game to get a measly 50% off, while Mew finds more opportunities to Softboiled back to full against many different builds (Breloom, Jirachi, Scarf Keld, Washtom, Land-T, Ferro, Bulky Starmie (Anal Starmie's application and usage have decreased significantly) Draco Chomp, etc.). Specs Latios, the most powerful Latios variant, is beaten by Mew 1v1 (either way, there has been a decrease in Specs Latios and an increase in LO Latios, at least from my experience). Keep in mind that this is a relatively fast Mew, and I'd assume a lot of people opt to run less speed (around 267) and more bulk.

Stuff like Sand Offense (like a lot of KeldTar/KeldLoom builds), Sand Balance, Sand Stall, Rain Stall, and as Baha mentions, Weatherless Offense, can be easily broken down by Mew w/ minimal team support.

The way I see it, packing a [semi] solid answer to Mew boils down to:

Checks/Counters

1) Having a Fire type (probably the most solid), and of these many are uncommon (Moltres, Victini, Darmanitan, Chandelure, Houndoom) or require a significant amount of team support (Moltres, Volcarona, etc.). Additionally, Sun is considered not /too/ consistent of a weather to use in BW2, and therefore Ninetales is not as prevalent as, say, Politoed or Ttar.

2) Having something that can spam special Dark/Ghost type attacks. Reuniclus /can/ pressure Mew if it's like, the TR set, since it doesn't mind Burns and can force it out w/ the threat of Shadow Ball drops. Cofagrigus, Houndoom, and Chandelure are in a similar boat, but they are all much less common than Reuniclus. Even with Life Orb, Gengar can not hope to OHKO Mew and is OHKOed in return by Psychic (yeah, Psychic s less common than Ice Beam on Mew, but I've seen it enough that it's worth a mention), and although the SubDisable set can beat Mew, the only thing you can really switch in on is a Softboiled. Hydreigon is the best of the bunch if it carries Dark Pulse, but at the same time, a reasonable amount of variants don't. (And Hydreigon isn't /too/ common in OU atm)

3) Carrying Sableye, which can't switch into Taunt and is crippled by Will-O-Wisp, but otherwise can deal with Mew pretty well. However even though Sableye does have its niche in OU, like a lot of the other 'Mons mentioned here, it's not too common.

Most to all of these are assuming 1v1 scenarios, but when you only have 2 different kinds of checks/counters (I'll exclude Sableye here), it's pretty easy to fit 1 or 2 Pokemon to support Mew, especially since a lot of Mew's checks/counters are such rare sights in OU. For example, Ttar can deal with a lot of the stuff listed, while fulfilling many other roles for the team and being perfectly viable in OU (basically, it's not a niche Mew supporter). At this point the IDM Sheperd would probably point out something like the fact that the pair are easily beaten by Specs Water Veil Wailord, but I mean realistically, what's stopping that monster.

The reason why Mew isn't broken in XY is because XY buffed Fire-types ("nerfing" SR in a way with Defog's new mechanics, nerfing Rain, and adding the resistance to Fairy-types), while introducing ZardX, ZardY, Mega Houndoom, SD Talon, etc. which all check Mew pretty effectively. Also, because of Knock Off's buff, physically attacking Dark types became more prevalent and dangerous (ex. Bisharp, Weavile), and is also a reason why Gliscor checks Mew in XY (because Mew runs Knock Off > Ice Beam). Finally, more specially-attacking Dark types like Greninja surfaced that could take on Mew. Even with all this stuff, Mew is one of the most annoying 'Mons to face in XY, and is arguably even better in BW2 OU.

TL;DR, I think Mew is a really solid threat in OU and would probably deserve a suspect if it were possible, because of its ability to dismantle so many different builds and because its checks/counters are either rare or easily beaten w/ just a little team support.

EDIT: Uh, a lot of the times when I say stuff is common or uncommon it's usually coming from either personal experience or gazing over the ST18 usage stats, so if I've made any misinformed statements mb and lmk

 

[badabing]

mew never felt suspect worthy to me. your checks and counters list seems pretty suspect, many not really existing in standard play and i would never rely on sableye as a mew check. it overlooks standard methods of playing around mew such as pivoting (or forcing it to recover) with something that doesn't mind a burn ex. celebi/rotom-w/lati into something that can overwhelm it in the case of offense or generally throwing a bulky water (starm/gastro/jelli/rainstall) at it and crippling it with scald in the case of stall/balance. strategic placements of lum berry are also pretty easy to accommodate in the case of offense as well. the way bw already adapted to deal with scald and rotomw (nat. cure mons, certain satkers) makes it so that a lot of countermeasures against the stallbreaker aren't ultra-specific or constrain teambuilding by any means. i can see how it would seem like more of a threat on paper tho. i don't have time to go into more detail but ive never heard anyone say mew is broken.

 

[Tokyo Tom]

mew never felt suspect worthy to me. your checks and counters list seems pretty suspect, many not really existing in standard play and i would never rely on sableye as a mew check. it overlooks standard methods of playing around mew such as pivoting (or forcing it to recover) with something that doesn't mind a burn ex. celebi/rotom-w/lati into something that can overwhelm it in the case of offense or generally throwing a bulky water (starm/gastro/jelli/rainstall) at it and crippling it with scald in the case of stall/balance. strategic placements of lum berry are also pretty easy to accommodate in the case of offense as well. the way bw already adapted to deal with scald and rotomw (nat. cure mons, certain satkers) makes it so that a lot of countermeasures against the stallbreaker aren't ultra-specific or constrain teambuilding by any means. i can see how it would seem like more of a threat on paper tho. i don't have time to go into more detail but ive never heard anyone say mew is broken.

Just want to say, regarding the checks and counters list, it's meant to be suspect - my point being that most of them are extremely rare and/or require too much team support to function properly besides the sole purpose of checking Mew.

Anyway, as you said, I've found that pivoting on [insert special attacker here] means you have to force Mew's recovery to get in the overwhelmer safely in without risking the double Wisp. That being said, a lot of stuff that would overload, say, Washtom are outsped and burnt by Mew (ex. CBNite), or can't push damage fast enough (like LO Starmie, which relies on shaky accuracy). Regarding Lum 'Mons, I guess stuff like LumZor would be relevant, but other common Lum 'Mons like SD Chomp and Dragonite are both OHKOed after rocks by Ice Beam (or in DNite's case, after a turn of Sand damage).

I also wanted to mention about the Scald/Washtom thing, the difference is that Mew is able to beat Nat Cure 'Mons 1v1 (with the exception of, like, the uncommon Shaymin maybe) and can generally outstall a significant amount of Sp. Attackers in OU.

I have delved a little into the "on paper" kinda thinking, so my bad for that, but also just generally from experience playing and watching battles involving [well-played] Mew I find that it's not as easy to play around as people say.

 

[george182]

Drizzle: Honestly if we are considering banning drizzle why don't we just resuspect keldeo, if we kill the main abuser we neuter the playstyle don't we?

Couldn't let this slip, but while that makes sense on paper, many rain abusers have been nerfed and it's still complained about.

One thing that can be learnt from gen5 is to keep bans simple. So if you want to prevent rain abuse, prevent rain.

 

[Alfalfa]

I've seen someone earlier in this thread suggest that we ban Keldeo instead of Drizzle, which I believe is not a very good idea. Keldeo is actually more of a Sand Pokemon anyway because it appreciates Pursuit support from Tyranitar a lot more than Rain support. It already hits hard enough to kill a lot of offensive Pokemon and having stuff like Latias completely removed helps it a lot more. As for a Rain abusing Water type, Starmie is probably better at that thanks to the increased Speed and the sheer stupidity of Analytic Life Orb Rain boosted Hydro Pump. A lot of teams rely on the Lati twins for checking Water types and they can't really beat offensive Starmie, especially when said Hydro Pump is stripping away more than half of their health.

I think BW would be a lot better without Drizzle and Drought because while they increase the variety of team archetypes, they really limit the creativity you can have when you teambuild. Not a lot of Pokemon can check Sun teams, and you have to add to that multiple Water resists to make sure Rain Hydro Pump doesn't truck you. Some overlap (like Dragonite) but you can't really use those on every team right? Anyway I've accepted a long time ago that they would never be banned and for that reason I've thought of other ways to improve the tier.

I think that Venusaur is currently the most broken Pokemon in the tier. It surprises me that it wasn't included in the initial discussion list because it's really the most dangerous thing you can face. Unlike the other Chlorophyll / Sand Rush Pokemon, Venusaur combines power, a boosting move, and bulk, while also having access to Sleep Powder. I don't need to explain why Sleep moves are retarded in BW but having it on a Pokemon with 526 Speed kinda overdoes it. Venusaur is the big reason why Sun teams are even viable and why they rape Rain teams even if they can't trap Politoed. Venusaur vs Weatherless is the most unfair match up of all time. A lot of people complain about the team match up issue in BW and I think they exaggerate most of the time, except for Venusaur. It really decides games before they even started.

Volcarona is the other thing that forces the match up issue so much and I think Leftiez's post in the other thread perfectly sums up why it needs to get banned.



I actually quite like BW. I think it could be a lot better though. I like it, just not as much as DPP or (god forbid) XY (in its current state). I'm not sure how you can call it uncompetitive and I'm pretty sure people started throwing that around because idiots called LC uncompetitive.



Keldeo and Kyurem-B are the two other things I think are suspect worthy because they just limit some of the playstyles so fucking much. Playing full Stall in BW is really hard but I guess they're not the only ones to blame. Garchomp is just really good, I don't think it's broken.



Tornadus-Therian and Manaphy would probably be balanced without Rain. I'm actually not sure if they would even be good. They're alright in XY I guess so maybe they'd be a little better than that, but I can't see people running Tornadus all that much without guarenteed Hurricanes. Thundurus is incredibly metagame defining and as Luckstard explained earlier BW without Scarfers would be incredibly stupid. Not to mention that the NP set actually destroys everything, it's ridiculous

Tagging BKC for a mad@kyub post

Kyurem-B can be really annoying for more defensive teams to play against, but it is rather lacking vs. offense due to its lack of speed. Whenever I use Kyurem-B, it always finds itself too slow to beat offense without resorting to a Choice Scarf, which inhibits its ability to beat more defensive teams.

Venusaur and Volcarona are indeed major titans on their own. Sure, Heatran helps, but Heatran can be easily be trapped or lured out so these Pokemon can sweep. Venusaur is almost impossible to revenge kill; even Scarf Starmie that have enough speed to outrun Timid 172 Spe Venusaur cannot even OHKO it with its Psychic STABs. Rain teams also do not have the luxury of being able to use Heatran effectively, meaning that they have virtually no security against Venusaur, unless they are stall teams that run Chansey or Blissey. Volcarona is in a similar vein, we are lucky that Heatran exists or else Volc would destroy all of OU.

(RIP MoxieInfinite, I do not know the details of your ban, but I hope you get unbanned soon.)

 

[HeIIraiser]

Firstly: Do you like the current BW OU metagame and think it's competitive?

I think the current BW OU metagame is just fine. Of course weather wars are the reason why BW OU is known as the "team archetypes" metagame, but I dont really see this as a bad or unhealthy thing in a tier. Of course this limits team building, but it is how it is. Threats like Greninja and overpowered megas also force team archetypes in the current XY OU metagame, for exemple, and everyone knows how popular the classic FGW cores are in DPPt, or that 90% of the competitive Adv teams are either CM spam+trap, DD spam+trap or Skarm+Gengar generic stalls (If you disagree, feel free to show me I am wrong presenting statistics that deny what I just said). Of course you can avoid these team archetypes when team building in all these gens, but the chances you can end up with a competitive high win rate team wont be in your favour. My point is: people give too much shit for the cool metagame BW OU is, blaming "team archetypes" which is a thing that will always be present in all metagames of all generations, whether you want to see it or not.

Secondly: What would you change, if anything? Starting with bans:

Drizzle: it would have been cool to have it suspect tested instead of TornadusT in early 2013. Nevertheless, Im against its suspect now. There is no point in suspecting stuff from a dead metagame (lets be real here, BW has a competitive player base of what, 40 users?).

Kyurem-B: totally against. Sure this is threatening for defensive playstyles, but its just a useless pokemon against offensive ones. Banning it or even suspecting it at this point would be very biased (as in, stall or balanced BW players want to get rid of it so their playstyle is more effective) and nonsense.

Volcarona: the same for KyuB; suspecting it at this point would be biased. Sure its a big threat, but Volcarona needs the whole team giving it support and most times you will have to do midgame gambles and take risks for it to get a clean sweep. Of course "with the correct moveset" it can sweep, but so do Dragonite (who has more than 20 viable movesets, like subDD, DD3atkCB, Rain Abused, Twave Special, defensive DDsub+Dragontail [which destroy many stall teams without the rare Perish Song Celebi]) and Jirachi (considered the best pokemon in the tier for a reason).

Its not that easy to pull a Volcarona sweep if the opponent even considers it in his team building process (which is a thing many players considered good BWOUers just dont do and prefer to blame matchup and say "volcarona is dumb, it forces matchup .cry" when they lose to one). Just to ilustrate what Im talking about, I would like to show you a battle I had against Limitles sin round 1 of WC. I had a Volcarona and a Dugtrio, and he had a Heatran and pokemons weak to Volcarona. I won, but it was very hard and many intense mindgames wore needed for me to finally trap the Heatran and in the last few turns of the game. He played well, pressuring me the whole game and didnt let me pull a Volcarona sweep.

http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen5ou-13452 (replays are offline at the moment im writting this, so you might not be able to see it)

The mindgames that happen in battles like this are the reason why I love BW. Its not ridiculously aggresive tier where you click stab with your broken Mega and kill something (no offense to XY OU players), it has its own perfect balance and I believe the tier is just fine like that. Suspecting Volcarona is really not a correct thing to do at this point. Its there, and you gotta be prepared to face it. Knowing your opponent and considering the probabilities of him bringing Volcarona to the match is part of the mindgames behind BW. Just banning it so your playstyle gets upgraded is not a fair thing to do in my opinion.

Keldeo: this is the pokemon that forces team archetypes the most in my opinion. It just forces Latios/Latias + Starmie in Offense Rain Teams, Tentacruel for Rain Stall, Jellicent for Sand Stall, RotomW/Slowking/Amoonguss for Sands Bulky, Venusaur for Sun, etc. Sure without Keldeo such pokemons in such kind of teams would still exist, but the thing is: Keldeo just forces their existence. But no, its not even near ban worthy. Its a threat, its there, and you will have to deal with it (which is not that hard of a task, but I doubt you can do it well without falling into team archetypes) when team bulding.

Garchomp: no lol. Its a threat, best SR user in the game, but not even near ban worthy.

Venusaur: no lol. Sure sleep is broken in BW, but it its existence is restricted pretty much to Sun teams. Banning or even suspecting it would be as biased (as in, sands/balance players want their paystyle to get better) and nonsense as suspecting KyuremB. Sure its a threat and sure it forces team archetypes, but it alone is not ban worthy at all.

Thirdly: If any or all of the above were banned, what would you unban?

Again commonly it's the following:

Tornadus-T: I actually enjoyed the metagame with this guy. But no, this is broken and centralizing as fuck.
Thundurus: Just a no, this is broken for real.
Manaphy: Just a no, this is broken for real.

Is there a perfect combination of bans and unbans that you feel would work best?

I would like to have seen a Drought+Chlorophyll and a Drizzle suspect years ago, but doing it at this point is just as worthless as unbanning Latias in DPPt. The metagame is just fine as it is right now.
----

Free gif for those of you who could read all that:

Hide

 

[BKC]

Do you like the current BW OU metagame and think it's competitive?

NO! I hate weather. Everything about it just makes me miserable. From the more obvious things like Venusaur in sun being unstoppable and Tentacruel in rain being unkillable to the smaller things like rain cutting out Jirachi and Ferrothorn's fire weakness and sun making Volcarona even more absurd, it just makes me angry, since it is ridiculously hard to beat them without... cutting off their weather. I'm sure someone can give me some nice objective reasoning as to why weather is good (besides the whole "they make the gen ~special~ and not DPP 2.0" argument which is a load of horseshit) but they won't make me hate it any less! Also I disagree with the "don't touch dead metagames" thing but that's minor. Also I really disagree with "if you ban weather you make a lot of pokemon unviable" because not only is that stupid and irrelevant but there are a lot of pokemon who are unviable because of weather.

What would you change, if anything? Starting with bans:
Drizzle: I think rain's boosts are retarded - to name a few examples, Politoed's Specs Hydro Pump is dishing out damage equivalent to Modest Specs Latios' Draco Meteor, Thunders and Hurricanes are thrown around willy-nilly, Scald's power is equivalent to Hydro Pump, FerroCruel is insanely hard to break, and Keldeo / Starmie's power reaches new levels of ridiculous. However, since it seems we decided BW would be more "bearable" than "good" I suppose it's fine. If we were getting rid of every single stupid thing around I'd throw rain out and never look back but we aren't so I can live with it around.

Kyurem-B: I'm not mad at K-B, I'm furious at it. That said, see the last two sentences on rain.
Volcarona: I'm split on it really hard, like if you held a gun to my head and asked me whether or not it should be b& I'd respond with "eh idk man" or something. I think it leans a bit more toward the broken side due to how easily it sets up and sweeps but I think there are bigger issues.

Keldeo: It's not outright busted like say Genesect but play some BW and you'll see how absurdly good it is. Amoonguss is a total sack of shit that wouldn't see the light of day if it weren't for Keld. It's definitely not the hardest thing in the world to check though and most of the time you'll have it handled naturally, but it can still fuck you up depending on the set. I'm split on him similarly to Volcarona except I'm a bit more pro-ban since it's really fast and can put in major work against any kind of team.

Garchomp: BW Chomper might be the best non-broken Pokemon ever. It will never be useless. I don't think it's broken though, it's very nearly there but falls just short.

Venusaur: Fuck this guy. The main reason sun is fucking dumb. Outspeeds and kicks the shit out of everything.

If any or all of the above were banned, what would you unban?

Tornadus-T: If you ban rain, absolutely!
Thundurus: He was kinda strong, although I think sand teams with Thund were better than rain ones so Drizzle isn't really a factor. It was outspeeding Lati@s / Terrakion that made him so dangerous (and now in BW2, Keldeo). Hhe would definitely be a boon to weatherless offense though thanks to Prankster TWave slowing down Venu / Volc on sun. Worth a try!
Manaphy: If you ban rain, absolutely!

Is there a perfect combination of bans and unbans that you feel would work best?

This is what happens in my ideal world:

- ban Drought
- ban Drizzle
- ban Kyurem-Black never should've been unbanned
- ban Sand Stream + Sand Rush (no, I don't care that Stoutland and Sandslash are worthless now, neither should you)
- free Excadrill (wouldn't be anywhere near broken without 550 speed and god knows we need more spinners)
- free Tornadus-T
- free Manaphy

This is what I think could realistically happen:
- test Drought + Chlorophyll ban
- test Thundurus

This is what I really want to happen for my personal amusement:
- free Kyurem-White

fuck bw

 

[Lord Ninjax]

Do you like the current BW OU metagame and think it's competitive?

NO! I hate weather. Everything about it just makes me miserable. From the more obvious things like Venusaur in sun being unstoppable and Tentacruel in rain being unkillable to the smaller things like rain cutting out Jirachi and Ferrothorn's fire weakness and sun making Volcarona even more absurd, it just makes me angry, since it is ridiculously hard to beat them without... cutting off their weather. I'm sure someone can give me some nice objective reasoning as to why weather is good (besides the whole "they make the gen ~special~ and not DPP 2.0" argument which is a load of horseshit) but they won't make me hate it any less! Also I disagree with the "don't touch dead metagames" thing but that's minor. Also I really disagree with "if you ban weather you make a lot of pokemon unviable" because not only is that stupid and irrelevant but there are a lot of pokemon who are unviable because of weather.

What would you change, if anything? Starting with bans:
Drizzle: I think rain's boosts are retarded - to name a few examples, Politoed's Specs Hydro Pump is dishing out damage equivalent to Modest Specs Latios' Draco Meteor, Thunders and Hurricanes are thrown around willy-nilly, Scald's power is equivalent to Hydro Pump, FerroCruel is insanely hard to break, and Keldeo / Starmie's power reaches new levels of ridiculous. However, since it seems we decided BW would be more "bearable" than "good" I suppose it's fine. If we were getting rid of every single stupid thing around I'd throw rain out and never look back but we aren't so I can live with it around.

Kyurem-B: I'm not mad at K-B, I'm furious at it. That said, see the last two sentences on rain.
Volcarona: I'm split on it really hard, like if you held a gun to my head and asked me whether or not it should be b& I'd respond with "eh idk man" or something. I think it leans a bit more toward the broken side due to how easily it sets up and sweeps but I think there are bigger issues.

Keldeo: It's not outright busted like say Genesect but play some BW and you'll see how absurdly good it is. Amoonguss is a total sack of shit that wouldn't see the light of day if it weren't for Keld. It's definitely not the hardest thing in the world to check though and most of the time you'll have it handled naturally, but it can still fuck you up depending on the set. I'm split on him similarly to Volcarona except I'm a bit more pro-ban since it's really fast and can put in major work against any kind of team.

Garchomp: BW Chomper might be the best non-broken Pokemon ever. It will never be useless. I don't think it's broken though, it's very nearly there but falls just short.

Venusaur: Fuck this guy. The main reason sun is fucking dumb. Outspeeds and kicks the shit out of everything.

If any or all of the above were banned, what would you unban?

Tornadus-T: If you ban rain, absolutely!
Thundurus: He was kinda strong, although I think sand teams with Thund were better than rain ones so Drizzle isn't really a factor. It was outspeeding Lati@s / Terrakion that made him so dangerous (and now in BW2, Keldeo). Hhe would definitely be a boon to weatherless offense though thanks to Prankster TWave slowing down Venu / Volc on sun. Worth a try!
Manaphy: If you ban rain, absolutely!

Is there a perfect combination of bans and unbans that you feel would work best?

This is what happens in my ideal world:

- ban Drought
- ban Drizzle
- ban Kyurem-Black never should've been unbanned
- ban Sand Stream + Sand Rush (no, I don't care that Stoutland and Sandslash are worthless now, neither should you)
- free Excadrill (wouldn't be anywhere near broken without 550 speed and god knows we need more spinners)
- free Tornadus-T
- free Manaphy

This is what I think could realistically happen:
- test Drought + Chlorophyll ban
- test Thundurus

This is what I really want to happen for my personal amusement:
- free Kyurem-White

fuck bw

The long awaited BW hate post. Lol

In all seriousness, chill. BW may not be the best metagame ever (it's actually not that high on my list even though I started out here), but that's no reason to make a ginormous hate post in the middle of people trying to see how we can fix an older meta.

 

[Lavern]

Since when is Venusaur unstoppable?

 

[Aerodactyl Legend]

The long awaited BW hate post. Lol

In all seriousness, chill. BW may not be the best metagame ever (it's actually not that high on my list even though I started out here), but that's no reason to make a ginormous hate post in the middle of people trying to see how we can fix an older meta.

Uh, you actually read his post? He answered the questions and supplied ideas for courses of action.

 

[mertyville]

I guess I can try this and obviously I will get a lot of hate for this.

The BW OU Metagame was by far the most fun experience I have ever had. So many things that can be considered broken like Keldeo, Terrakion, Dragons and more Dragons.
But seriously, BW OU had by far the most viarity in terms of play styles like Sand Offense, Rain Offense, Rain Stall, Sun Offense, Sand Stall, Hail Stall, Hyper Offense, Dragmag (a playstyle in my book). A lot of things you would never have expected were viable like Parasect..freaking Parasect had a place in OU.


What I could see happen is:

From the ones that are suggested
- Keep Drizzle, Keldeo, Kyurem-B, Venusaur
- Ban Garchomp (no skill required to use this thing)
- Ban Volcarona (Hurricane that never misses, Quiver Dance, Roost or Morning Sun under the sun, bulky, powerful, fuck stealth rocks)

My personal opinion
- Ban Sand Stream (if both player have similar skill level, the Sand users has a higher chance of winning simply because of the passive damage of Sand)
- If Sand Stream is gone, Excadrill could be worth coming back to OU
- Ban Salamence (Moxie Scarf...just spam dat Outrage for the win, Dragon+Fire coverage on DD = GG OU)
- Unban Reshiram (slower than other dragons, sun needs love, Flame Charge/Scarf manatory to outspeed, can't switch into primary attackers named Keldeo, Terrakion, Hydreigon, Selemence, Kyurem-B, Ttar, Latias, Latios etc.)

 

[Alfalfa]

I guess I can try this and obviously I will get a lot of hate for this.

The BW OU Metagame was by far the most fun experience I have ever had. So many things that can be considered broken like Keldeo, Terrakion, Dragons and more Dragons.
But seriously, BW OU had by far the most viarity in terms of play styles like Sand Offense, Rain Offense, Rain Stall, Sun Offense, Sand Stall, Hail Stall, Hyper Offense, Dragmag (a playstyle in my book). A lot of things you would never have expected were viable like Parasect..freaking Parasect had a place in OU.


What I could see happen is:

From the ones that are suggested
- Keep Drizzle, Keldeo, Kyurem-B, Venusaur
- Ban Garchomp (no skill required to use this thing)
- Ban Volcarona (Hurricane that never misses, Quiver Dance, Roost or Morning Sun under the sun, bulky, powerful, fuck stealth rocks)

My personal opinion
- Ban Sand Stream (if both player have similar skill level, the Sand users has a higher chance of winning simply because of the passive damage of Sand)
- If Sand Stream is gone, Excadrill could be worth coming back to OU
- Ban Salamence (Moxie Scarf...just spam dat Outrage for the win, Dragon+Fire coverage on DD = GG OU)
- Unban Reshiram (slower than other dragons, sun needs love, Flame Charge/Scarf manatory to outspeed, can't switch into primary attackers named Keldeo, Terrakion, Hydreigon, Selemence, Kyurem-B, Ttar, Latias, Latios etc.)

Salamence is not even that good. While Choice Scarf MoxieMence is a good cleaner, it struggles with breaking more defensive Pokemon, and it still needs opposing teams, even frailer ones, weakened in order for it do an efficient job at cleaning. It is not a terrifying sweeper that 6-0s all teams effortlessly. Mixed Salamence is almost completely outclassed by mixed Hydreigon and Kyurem-B, which are far more terrifying for opposing defensive cores. The Dragon Dance sets are not bad, but they are not particularly difficult to beat, as most teams will often have an answer to them anyways.

I think you are overestimating sand's passive damage. Most teams are fully capable of adapting to sand's passive recovery. Almost all teams carry at least one Pokemon that is immune to Sand damage, because Pokemon like Jirachi, Garchomp, Landorus-T, Ferrothorn, Scizor, and Terrakion are that good. Furthermore, if you are worried about Sand's passive damage on a Pokemon weak to it, just carry Leftovers

Garchomp is not bannable either. While it is really good, it is more just really good at being to fit a team's needs than being borderline impossible to beat. Not everything is going to need skill to use. Setting up Stealth Rock requires little skill. Shadow Tag does not require skill either, and while people complain about it all the time, we have been able to adapt to it, so the lack of skill really is not a good argument.