np: ORAS OU Suspect Testing, Round 1 - Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles [Greninja is Uber]

[zbr]

You cannot be more wrong.
First of all, my arguments were never "4MSS"

Ok. I know this was a reply to Mertyvile but I feel like I need to break this comment apart.

My arguments were more like:
My point is - yes, Greninja has STAB on everything but his STABs are not comparable to STABs of other Pokemon. His STABs on coverage moves outweights his not so good stats and his strongest STAB is not as strong as for example Gallade's Close Combat because it simply is not different from power of his coverage.

Greninja usually forces to some easy predictions, thats right, but there are still many situations you can switch out against Greninja and survive and possibly Revenge kill it.

This isn't the main reason why Gren was suspected. The thing about Gren is that it has this crazy speed tier and flawless coverage that allows it to cover what the team lacks (or on the opposite side of the spectrum, demolish as much of the opposing team as you deem fit.) It doesn't force easy predictions. Quite the contrary, the 50/50s that you are forced into when playing against a Gren is actually lesser than a 50/50 because if your clairvoyance fail you for even a turn, you could pretty much lose a mon or get dented really hard.

THE OTHER FACT is that you say "Greninja gets kill everytime it comes out" - thats not right, it might fail to kill if it fails to predict and those are not rare situations, imagine using Ice Beam while Scizor switch onto him... then you did not get the kill because of prediction. And you cannot forget that same as you cannot switch onto Greninja reliably -

he cannot switch onto anything as well...

Again, to mitigate this, Gren is commonly paired with volt turning which is very common in our current metagame because it eases prediction. This pretty much reduces a major stress on Gren when it comes to switching in as a good pivot on the team is always considered when team building.

well actually to be honest, you may switch some Pokemon into majority of his attack, but with residual damage from SR and LO Greninja can basically switch into nothing.

That means BEST CASE SCENARIO revenge killer that gets 1 for 1, worst case scenario 0 for 2 (Scizor situation if you dont switch - predicting for example roost, using HP Fire, wore down by Bullet Punch).
So I cannot see really point why it should be banned.

This can be pretty much said for any attacker. The thing is, that is a heavier stress on you with regards to keeping your Gren checks alive than for the Gren user to attack. He loses nothing from keeping the heavy offensive presence and once you lose your Gren checks or are within range of clean up, then Gren would've already peformed it's roles well enough.

You could as well consider that there is Mega Metagross and Slowbro, quite OP now, that Greninja can counter and those are really powerful threats.

Check is the word you are looking for. Not counter. But this is true only to a certain extent.

SPEED

I feel like you want to ban him because you can't deal with him... because otherwise somebody would react to my arguments... but there are only arguments "It is not 4MMS, so BAN HIM".

Wait, so how are we going to deal with him? by packing a check that would die if he had another coverage move? or by recklessly slapping passive mons onto and offensive team (or conversely, recklessly slapping scarfers on a passive team). Please give me more details on how it would not limit team building.

"Greninja has an amazing speed tier that is only matched by scarfers such as Latios" - you don't need Scarfer that fast like Latios to match his speed, so he is not outspeed by only Pokemon like that, he is outsped by almost EVERY SCARFER in the metagame

Whoopdiedoo. Of course. Isn't that the role of a scarfer? You should think of Gren as an unboosted scarfer that has the versatility to switch up moves.

"and few Megas like Mega Sceptile, Mega Aero or Mega Beedrill." - I feel like there is more than 7 Megas that can outspeed him... + there are megas like Scizor and Pinsir with priority attack included.
+ there are non-megas that can outprioritize him (Scizor, Talonflame, Bisharp) and also Pokemon faster than him, like Noivern
Many DDancers like M-Altaira and M-Charizard X can outspeed him after +1 DD

LOL let me list a whole list of mons that can outspeed him after getting setup. Guess what else they outspeed? Scarfers too. Your point being? So your point to deal with Gren is to set up with a sweeper? That sounds like desperation.

STABS

"If Mew had Portean for instands, it could run Shadow Ball + Aura Sphere* and had more space for its last 2 slots." - maybe, I think Mew would be uber because Modest Protean with Rock Polish would break the whole Meta... but Greninja must be Timid with his low stats. His STABs are powerful ONLY when they're super effective, when they're not, they're pretty weak.

They are not actually that weak. I would put calcs here. But they would prove nothing. The main thing is that Gren has the ability to break teams down to the extent where they can either be cleaned up by another mon, or cleaned up by Gren himself. And with LO, he gets 10 chances to do so. If you factor in SR, then it's probably around 5-6. That's really enough to break your team down solidly.

I feel like Greninja is not different from Azumarill... tell me, what Pokemon can reliably switch into Azumarill? Tentacruel... ehm... Amoonguss? Okay, but since most of your arguments are "but my mommy said that Tentacruel isn't effective in OU" and Amoonguss is lower in the ladder that makes Azumarill more powerful than Greninja, doesn't it?
Yeah, it is not that fast, so it can be revenge killed ... but Greninja can be EASILY Revenge killed by 90% of REVENGE KILLERS.

Any set up sweeper can be stopped if you can see it coming from a mile away. Revenge killing Gren is definitely easy, but the point of the matter is that it has and will always be putting major strains on your team by having unparalleled stabs that has the capability of denting your entire team while in the process of letting you scout for it's moveset. Gren's real trait is in its ability to mask what it truly aims to do, which is mainly as a lure and a denter. Less so of a sweeper. Azu, on the other hand, is different because the sets he run has similar counters in the form of Ferro, Amoong, Tenta, Mega Venu. Whereas, for Gren, you really have to be clairvoyant to truly counter it.

SO TELL ME, WHATS BAD ABOUT GRENINJA? WHERE IS HE "BROKEN" and "UNHEALTHY"?

I think he is not different from other REVENGE KILLERS.

What's so bad and unhealthy? He is forcing a whole entire playstyle down the drain. He is also not a revenge killer.

 

[KztxL7]

1) How will you successfully get the Scarfers in on Greninja unless you know all 4 Moves he packing? Considering his incredibly diverse movepool and the fact that Protean + Life Orb means he can hit most of the Metagame hard, you'll either have to let something die to get in, risk getting OHKO on the switch, taking massive damage on the switch or the final option of you getting lucky and properly predicting the correct move and forcing Greninja out. Understand that a 25% chance of success every time Greninja gets in.

2) If you throw out and obvious Scarfer or Priority, why the fuck will I leave my Greninja in?
You people keep devolving back to this shit and pretend as if this is a 1v1 Game but its a TEAMPLAY. He has 5 other teammates. Holy shit.

3) Greninja, like Azumarill? I can name off the top of my head immediately Skarmory and Celebi as things that can switch into Azumarill.

 

[Karxrida]

Just a little sidenote : I've been running through the suspect ladder with CM Clefable and just like chimpact pointed out, it's strong and difficult to stop. However, Clefable isn't entirely self-sufficient as Pokemon such as Heatran and Bisharp either counter or check Clefable ( but should you run LO EQ Latios, then it's easy $$$ ). So Clefable becoming the next "Greninja" of OU, is simply unrealistic. But to be fair, Mega Gardevoir will become much more difficult to stop with the removal of Greninja, as Greninja was one of the most reliable answers to Mega Gardevoir.

Why are people complaining about Clefable NOW? Literally nothing has changed for it since XY except Greninja beating it with Gunk Shot and Mega Metagross now eating it alive, so I can't see it becoming banworthy after Greninja leaves when we already know how to deal with it consistently.

Also, Mega Gardevoir is slow enough that Balance and Offense can easily revenge it without having to resort to Scarfers, while Stall still has Doublade (and I fucking hate Stall so I love how Gardey can 6-0 those teams).

 

[Spiny-Z]

BAN

Greninja isn't really overpowered because of only 103 BS in special attack.But Protean gives stab to every one of his move, so it's quite simple for him to 2hko almost every pokemon,exepting Heavy stall like Mix-Chansey... even if he haven't the best special attack of the game,just like talonflamme wich is the physical attacker of the OU with the less attack (only 81),the Protean ability change everything...

Offensive:

Special:
-HydroPump/Surf/Scald
-IceBeam
-Extrasensory
-DarkPulse
-GrassKnot/HP Grass
-HP Fire
-Any Other HP but they are useless most of the time
Physical:
-GunkShot
-Lowkick
-U-turn
-RockSlide

Support:

-Taunt
-Spikes
-ToxicSpikes

All those moves make Greninja really hard to predict,
You can switch on Venusaur but you don't know if he haves Extrasensory,you can switch on Kyurem-B but you don't know if he haves Lowkick,you can switch on Ferrothorn but you don't know if he haves HP Fire,You can switch on Rotom-W but you don't know if he haves HP Grass, etcetera...

In the XY OU metagame,pokemon like Azumarill AV,Sylveon or Clefable (After 1 CM) was countering him quite Easily,but he have get gunkshot and almost everyone of them get rekt by GunkShot in the ORAS OU metagame.

4 Atk Life Orb Greninja Gunk Shot vs. 252 HP / 220+ Def Sylveon: 315-374 (79.9 - 94.9%) -- 50% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
4 Atk Life Orb Greninja Gunk Shot vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Azumarill: 390-460 (96.5 - 113.8%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock
4 Atk Life Orb Greninja Gunk Shot vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Clefable: 283-338 (71.8 - 85.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

If greninja predict you,you are almost screwed because of the fact that he can 2HKO almost everything,and U-turn can give him the oppurtunity to scout and make a pressure on the oppenent team.

Some OverUsed Pokemon:
252 SpA Life Orb Protean Greninja Hidden Power Grass vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Rotom-W: 151-179 (49.6 - 58.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock and Leftovers recovery
4 Atk Life Orb Protean Greninja Low Kick (60 BP) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Eviolite Chansey: 218-257 (30.9 - 36.5%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Stealth Rock
4 Atk Life Orb Protean Greninja Low Kick (60 BP) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Eviolite Chansey: 218-257 (30.9 - 36.5%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Stealth Rock
4 Atk Life Orb Protean Greninja Low Kick (120 BP) vs. 4 HP / 0 Def Kyurem-B: 322-382 (82.1 - 97.4%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock
252 SpA Life Orb Protean Greninja Hydro Pump vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Mega Charizard X: 227-269 (76.4 - 90.5%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock
252 SpA Life Orb Protean Greninja Hydro Pump vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Mega Charizard Y in Sun: 174-205 (58.5 - 69%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock
252 SpA Life Orb Protean Greninja Extrasensory vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Keldeo: 315-374 (97.5 - 115.7%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock
252 SpA Life Orb Protean Greninja Extrasensory vs. 0 HP / 252 SpD Assault Vest Conkeldurr: 198-237 (56.4 - 67.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock
252 SpA Life Orb Greninja Hydro Pump vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Heatran: 276-328 (71.5 - 84.9%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock and Leftovers recovery
4 Atk Life Orb Protean Greninja Low Kick (120 BP) vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Heatran: 307-361 (79.5 - 93.5%) -- 43.8% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock

For physicall wall:
252 SpA Life Orb Greninja Hydro Pump vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Skarmory: 265-313 (79.3 - 93.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252 SpA Life Orb Greninja Hydro Pump vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Quagsire: 281-331 (71.3 - 84%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252 SpA Life Orb Greninja Hydro Pump vs. 252 HP / 4+ SpD Sableye: 161-191 (52.9 - 62.8%) -- 99.6% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery (Mega-Sableye)
252 SpA Life Orb Protean Greninja Ice Beam vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Mandibuzz: 338-400 (79.7 - 94.3%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock

This is why i think Greninja should get banned.Sorry if there are some faults in my comment,i learn english and i hope you have understand everything.

PS: If greninja really goes to Uber,i hope Smogon will make a New BorderLine because if Greninja goes to Uber,he will be useless...just like Deoxys-Normal who is useless in Uber (because Deoxys-attack form is better and -20 BS in the 2 defenses don't really matter) but too strong for the OU...

 

[benjamin4321]

Okay sorry I will try to go into more detail. There is balance hyper offense and stall as the 3 main categories, under those mixtures of the play styles like semi stall. Cores are a big part of the game and greninja absolutely destroys balance cores that cant afford to run passive mons like mola, chansey etc. Heatran+ clefable+slowbro, any FWG (Heatran+Slowbro+Amoongus), and so on so forth. Further more, after your defensive core you then fill in with the remaining pokes, wall breakers, revenge killers, sweepers. That's why I said there is alot of gravitas to the greninja > balance statement. Balance teams can ill afford scouting that greninja unless you play flawlessly consistently which is not a luxury for those who are high up on the ladder. There is so much flexibility to balance that to say greninja is at a intrinsic advantage over it is big. Sorry for clogging up the thread by not elaborating, and sorry for wasting your time NixHex

 

[boltsandbombers]

For those who are saying that clef / garde are so much better without greninja, which I don't totally agree with, I'd like to remind you that ORAS brought us yet another solid check to said Pokemon in Mega Metagross. Similar to all other steels it must fear a fire move or a random twave on the switch, but it is a much more aggressive check to them unlike ferrothorn and Heatran which are somewhat passive. What it can do to fairies is pretty self explanatory, a tough claws meteor mash will really sting.

 

[mertyville]

You cannot be more wrong.
First of all, my arguments were never "4MSS"

My arguments were more like:
My point is - yes, Greninja has STAB on everything but his STABs are not comparable to STABs of other Pokemon. His STABs on coverage moves outweights his not so good stats and his strongest STAB is not as strong as for example Gallade's Close Combat because it simply is not different from power of his coverage.

Why are you telling me that you didn't post that anti-ban argument when I specificly addressed to those who did?
Anyways, I don't know if you are comparing Greninja to Gallade or Mega Gallade but that does not matter.
Simply because Greninja hits with everything equally hard compare to Gallade which can only hit with 2 types of moves really hard.
Funny enough, I would thing that if Greninja had the same damage output as Mega Gallade with moves like Gunk Shot or Hydro Pump, Greninja would most likely have got quickbanned instead of starting this suspect test.

Greninja usually forces to some easy predictions, thats right, but there are still many situations you can switch out against Greninja and survive and possibly Revenge kill it.

THE OTHER FACT is that you say "Greninja gets kill everytime it comes out" - thats not right, it might fail to kill if it fails to predict and those are not rare situations, imagine using Ice Beam while Scizor switch onto him... then you did not get the kill because of prediction. And you cannot forget that same as you cannot switch onto Greninja reliably he cannot switch onto anything as well... well actually to be honest, you may switch some Pokemon into majority of his attack, but with residual damage from SR and LO Greninja can basically switch into nothing. That means BEST CASE SCENARIO revenge killer that gets 1 for 1, worst case scenario 0 for 2 (Scizor situation if you dont switch - predicting for example roost, using HP Fire, wore down by Bullet Punch).
So I cannot see really point why it should be banned.

There is 1 thing that makes this arguement completely irrelevant: "it might fail to kill if it fails to predict".
Ok, lets say Greninja is going for Ice Beam and your Scizor comes in. Greninja just switches out and since your opponent knows that you are likely bring in your Scizor again to try revenge kill it, it could go for Hidden Power Fire.

What is that, you want to create a best case senario in order to make your flawed argument look good?
Lets see what Choice Banded Scizor has to say on a 1v1 against Greninja?

252+ Atk Choice Band Technician Scizor Bullet Punch vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Greninja: 112-132 (39.2 - 46.3%) -- guaranteed 3HKO

This is Technician Boosted Choice Banded STAB Bullet Punch from 252 Adamant Scizor and it is not even a 2HKO against Greninja

"but entry hazards..."
252+ Atk Choice Band Technician Scizor Bullet Punch vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Greninja: 112-132 (39.2 - 46.3%) -- 27.3% chance to 2HKO after Stealth Rock

On the other hand:
252 SpA Life Orb Protean Greninja Hidden Power Fire vs. 248 HP / 8 SpD Scizor: 520-614 (151.6 - 179%) -- guaranteed OHKO

You could as well consider that there is Mega Metagross and Slowbro, quite OP now, that Greninja can counter and those are really powerful threats.

Maybe they are, but here on Smogon we aren't keeping broken things to check broken things or we would have, like multiple times mentioned in the past and in this thread, brought down something like Lugia to OU and that could be even more controversial.
Besides Greninja does not counter Mega Metagross but check.

SPEED
I feel like you want to ban him because you can't deal with him... because otherwise somebody would react to my arguments... but there are only arguments "It is not 4MMS, so BAN HIM".
"Greninja has an amazing speed tier that is only matched by scarfers such as Latios" - you don't need Scarfer that fast like Latios to match his speed, so he is not outspeed by only Pokemon like that, he is outsped by almost EVERY SCARFER in the metagame
"and few Megas like Mega Sceptile, Mega Aero or Mega Beedrill." - I feel like there is more than 7 Megas that can outspeed him... + there are megas like Scizor and Pinsir with priority attack included.
+ there are non-megas that can outprioritize him (Scizor, Talonflame, Bisharp) and also Pokemon faster than him, like Noivern
Many DDancers like M-Altaira and M-Charizard X can outspeed him after +1 DD

ZANBAKUResh already destroyed that argument so I don't feel like adding anything to it.

STABS
"If Mew had Portean for instands, it could run Shadow Ball + Aura Sphere* and had more space for its last 2 slots." - maybe, I think Mew would be uber because Modest Protean with Rock Polish would break the whole Meta... but Greninja must be Timid with his low stats. His STABs are powerful ONLY when they're super effective, when they're not, they're pretty weak.

252 SpA Life Orb Greninja Hydro Pump vs. 248 HP / 100 SpD Mega Scizor: 179-212 (52.1 - 61.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

If having the power to 2HKO standard Bulky Swords Dance Scizor is not considered powerful, then I don't know what to say. Besides, Greninja will hit a lot of the Meta for super effective damage simply because of its great coverage being boosted by Life Orb + Portean. You don't need to run Modest because you already hit hard enough.

I feel like Greninja is not different from Azumarill... tell me, what Pokemon can reliably switch into Azumarill? Tentacruel... ehm... Amoonguss? Okay, but since most of your arguments are "but my mommy said that Tentacruel isn't effective in OU" and Amoonguss is lower in the ladder that makes Azumarill more powerful than Greninja, doesn't it?
Yeah, it is not that fast, so it can be revenge killed ... but Greninja can be EASILY Revenge killed by 90% of REVENGE KILLERS.

Azumarill has a lot more reliable counters and they aren't as passive as those of Greninja. You mentioned a few to which you can add Mega Slowbro, Mega Venusaur and Celebi (some other notable answers). Being a fully physical attacker it is a great bait for WoW users such as Rotom-W and generally has a lot more checks than Greninja which you slap in your team without usually realising it and relies on Aqua Jet to threaten faster Pokemon.

SO TELL ME, WHATS BAD ABOUT GRENINJA? WHERE IS HE "BROKEN" and "UNHEALTHY"?

I think he is not different from other REVENGE KILLERS.


EDIT : almost forget. Deoxys-A is like 2x stronger than Greninja. I explained that earlier (Page 8 - http://www.smogon.com/forums/thread...ant-ninja-turtles.3525033/page-8#post-5939174 )

Greninja is unhealthy because it is shifting the meta like it pleases.
Tenta gets popular? It exchanges one of its coverage for Extrasensory. Now you have to run another check.
Scizor proves to be a viable switch in and can reliabily beat it? It starts running Hidden Power Fire.
That Manaphy with its great HydrationRest set is really useful against Greninja? Oh, Greninja addapted to it by running Hidden Power Grass.

It is a never ending circle of prepering against 1 Pokemon. 1 of about 600 Pokemon of which only 2 or 3 can safely switch in and beat it? That does not really seem fair to me.
When building a team, I have to consider what coverage of Greninja has become more popular currently which makes the game not fun for me and I have to go and play another tier.

And by justifing that Deoxys-A hits twice as hard as Greninja does not change a thing. If the "frail" argument could work on Greninja, then it should work on Deoxys-A as well since it can't switch into anything at all while Greninja at least can switch into resisted hits.

 

[ajnauron]

1) How will you successfully get the Scarfers in on Greninja unless you know all 4 Moves he packing? Considering his incredibly diverse movepool and the fact that Protean + Life Orb means he can hit most of the Metagame hard, you'll either have to let something die to get in, risk getting OHKO on the switch, taking massive damage on the switch or the final option of you getting lucky and properly predicting the correct move and forcing Greninja out. Understand that a 25% chance of success every time Greninja gets in.

2) If you throw out and obvious Scarfer or Priority, why the fuck will I leave my Greninja in?
You people keep devolving back to this shit and pretend as if this is a 1v1 Game but its a TEAMPLAY. He has 5 other teammates. Holy shit.

3) Greninja, like Azumarill? I can name off the top of my head immediately Skarmory and Celebi as things that can switch into Azumarill.

1) Prediction goes both ways. Neither you nor your opponent can predict perfectly so it is not reasonable to assume your opponent will get all predictions correct. You could say this about pretty much any mixed sweeper with a wide movepool.

2) Who says I'm going to try to attack your greninja super effectively? The whole idea of bringing in obvious scarfers/priority users is not as much to kill you as much as it is to force you out and make you bring in your walls, which I will either chip away at with hazard damage, u-turn/volt switch, status, or even resisted hits. The cost of leaving your greninja in on scarfers/priority users is far higher than switching out, so you'll switch out. Once this is done a few times your walls will be gone, and then your greninja has nothing to hide behind. That's when I can kill it easily with scarfers and priority users.

3) Azumarill has nothing to do with this thread or greninja.

 

[danilo]

The meta without Greninja is just full of fairies or speed ties. Clefable is the most simple pokemon to use and it literally just wins games. you have to play so meticulously to beat it and even then it can still win. it has so many opportunities to come in. i need ninja!

LMAO idk if youre trollin here chimpster but your youtube celebrity isn't gonna absolve you of this post. Clefable has a whole fuckin station wagon of checks; talon, gengar, landorus-i, mega venu, scizor, bisharp, heatran, versace jirachi, the list goes on, some of them like taunt tran even hard countering the clef. If Clef is a win button then greninja is the fuckin lord yeezus almighty, Clefable is a slow mon w/ a bunch of checks easily slapped on any team style, Greninja flexes 377 speed behemoth with coverage to start feastin on the whole metagame like kobayashi. Literally a poke that can specialize itself to kill large portions of the metagame and get a good matchup vs any playstyle, even puttin in work vs stalls [BTW i THiNK people vastly underrate how it is vs offense now since it became so good against balance, even with the presence of mc thundurus gren is still comin in on a trill amount of enemy pokes to revenge kill thanks to its crisp speed and coverage, not even counting double switch shenanigans here. Most offensive pokes are then too frail to take a hit, and no fuckin way you can scout it]. I think u arent thinking long term here honestly; clefable is the lesser of two evils, it's always been easy to play around with proper teambuilding and in battle decision making unless you just play passively and let it flamethrower ur gengar 12 times. Steel types, gengar, talons still vicious in ORAS as they were in XY ; i am fine w/ speed ties happening rather than everything switchin out and praying for correct prediction because greninja is terrorizing the metagame like a toddler at the beach

 

[Raikaria]

Honestly, to people saying 'If Greninja is banned Clefable will rise up and be broken'; remember these factors:

1: Mega Metagross is a thing. And that laughs at Clefable. It also laughs at Mega Garde for that matter.
2: Gunk Shot was distributed to more pokemon than just Greninja. Steel is also a better attacking type than it was in Gen 5. You might see the occasional Iron Head user, for example. Honestly; if Celfable becomes such an issue Iron Head has good enough distribution to be run as coverage. Not to mention you might actually see people running Steel STAB like Flash Cannon.

3: Metaphorical ideas about the effects of a broken people being banned is not a reason to avoid banning the current issue. Broken is not the answer to broken. The aim is a balanced, fun metagame. Greninja is stifleing that due to it's lack of counterplay, and if it being banned makes something else stick out, like Clefable, then we'll just ban that too. [Also it's laughable that you're argueing that Clefable will be broken without Greninja, since it got nothing from OR/AS and Greninja didn't have Gunk Shot in X/Y yet Clefable wasn't broken back then]

 

[chimpact]

I wasn't trolling this time.

Clefable has a whole fuckin station wagon of checks; talon, gengar, landorus-i, mega venu, scizor, bisharp, heatran, versace jirachi

Of these pokemon only talon, venu, scizor have direct recovery, and jirachi/gengar have wish protect if they want to go that way. If we're thinking "long term", talonflame can be pressured with rocks, scizor can't switch in and beat it 1v1 because flamethrower ohkos at + 1 while scizor's BP doesnt kill, venu only has 8 synthesis to go for. Heatran does hard wall it but it needs taunt or flash cannon to beat it. Some clefs run focus blast for heatran too but thats a story for another day. Roar only delays the inevitable. Bisharp can't ohko (neither can clef, but bisharp has to deal with prior damage just like every other pokemon).

now I know Clefable isn't going to always be at full, but with magic guard and softboiled with its resistances, it isnt hard to stay at a high percentage of HP.

That post was just me venting my frustrations on the ladder. I wasn't doing so well because of course ctc squads can't get past 1300 but im pretty amazing (lol) so i manage to outplay matchup but it can only take you so far when youre up against clef with ctc squads.

I'm really on the fence with Greninja, and I really don't think Clefable is broken. it's just a really dumb pokemon to use (that i am guilty of winning games with as well).

 

[megacrazyhand]

Mostly writing this as a sum up of my thoughts after reading through this thread and from my experience playing Pokemon competetively across a few different generations. Greninja is a Pokemon I hold dear to my heart and its especially hard for me to say that it needs to be banned. Greninja is a Pokemon who has now seemed to transcend a standard moveset and has the coverage to tailor its moveset to take on whatever your other five members require it to take on. Do you need a fast early game scout that can Uturn to a better answer in case you predict the lead wrong? Greninja can do that while getting STAB on its Uturn. Do you need a fast and powerful fire type to break through Ferrothorn with a STAB fire move but find OU lacking in fire types? Protean gives HP Fire base 90 power which is then multiplied by four, allowing you to break Ferrothorn and Scizor while also hitting things neutral to it decently hard. Do you need something to tear apart Fairies? Gunk Shot has 10 more base power than Hydro Pump and Greninja gets free STAB on it. How about just a strong Special Attacker in general? Greninja gets Hydro Pump, Ice Beam, Dark Pulse and Extrasensory all with boosts from Protean. Or how about a move to smack around AV Kyurem Black and Chansey? STAB Low Kick lets you do just that. The threat of Greninja is that until you've seen all four moves you will never know what can switch in and the stay in. All too often I've seen my opponent switch in a Ferrothorn expecting a Gunk Shot only to have it smacked by a HP Fire the next turn. Sure, Scarfers and Priority can help keep Greninja down, but try getting them in safely. Even if they only take chip damage you can just switch out to your answer for said Pokemon, force their switch and wear down their check with smart play (saying git gud works both ways). As much as I love Greninja, it should be banned because its too versatile and forces players to use dead weight checks that can easily lose to the other player's five other Pokemon.

 

[Miscellaneous]

Greninja usually forces to some easy predictions, thats right, but there are still many situations you can switch out against Greninja and survive and possibly Revenge kill it.

THE OTHER FACT is that you say "Greninja gets kill everytime it comes out" - thats not right, it might fail to kill if it fails to predict and those are not rare situations, imagine using Ice Beam while Scizor switch onto him... then you did not get the kill because of prediction. And you cannot forget that same as you cannot switch onto Greninja reliably he cannot switch onto anything as well... well actually to be honest, you may switch some Pokemon into majority of his attack, but with residual damage from SR and LO Greninja can basically switch into nothing. That means BEST CASE SCENARIO revenge killer that gets 1 for 1, worst case scenario 0 for 2 (Scizor situation if you dont switch - predicting for example roost, using HP Fire, wore down by Bullet Punch).
So I cannot see really point why it should be banned.

I don't understand why your scenario even validates your point here... there is no reason that in your situation the greninja player couldn't choose to HP fire predicting the switch, and suddenly bp isn't doing enough because of the resist, not that greninja needs to stay in anyway. True, in certain scenarios and with good prediction the Greninja player loses momentum, but it's not like the Scizor player isn't also taking a risk and possibly losing an important check to other threats.

I don't think any reasonably experienced player would argue that Greninja is the monster that singlehandedly comes in and gets guaranteed kills, but I think they would recognise that the lack of this problem doesn't mean the arguments for banning Greninja are no longer valid. Greninja forces a few mindgames and predictions, but these mindgames are going to almost always be in favour of the frog player (unless the opposing pokemon is scarfed and is threatening the KO - in which case they have momentum anyway). If the other player guesses my move/ my moveset right, then I take some LO damage and I lose momentum, but if they guess wrong then I can wreak their check. Of course, any offensive threat creates the same non-equal guessing game (if they didn't they would be a shit threat), the thing about Greninja is that it can quite literally 2HKO most of the relevant OU metagame unboosted, so whereas something like Gyarados/Tyrantiar has a few checks that can come in "safely", Greninja has pokemon that might be able to come in safely if X, not Y and if the other player does A and not B.

Maybe it's hard to understand what's so damn scary about that if you are looking at things too literally (and forgetting that singles is still a 6v6 game, and not 6 1v1s...), but if you are playing someone who's experienced and is executing the strategy of a well-built team, this essentially means that whatever sweepers they choose to have or whatever weaknesses they choose to accept, they can just slap Greninja on in the 6th slot and basically invalidate a significant part of any matchup, because in the match they only need to make one or two correct decisions (or heck, even sack the frog if it goes slightly wrong) to cripple or outright KO whatever threats or checks are preventing their direct win. This is why Greninja falls more under the support characteristic and not the offensive one (although, late-game or in a situation with a bad scarf-matchup - Greninja does pretty well for itself anyway).

Edit: been ninja'd, but my general point about Greninja still stands.

 

[naturalstupidity]

I personally feel that Greninja isn't broken per se, but it is definitely a Pokemon which has a negative impact on the metagame. I already gave my reasons for wanting to ban it a few pages back, but I'll elaborate a bit more on how Greninja makes balance very hard to use, and how that is more of a problem in comparison to the unviability of playstyles like TR, Sticky Web, etc.

bit of a rant

Balance teams revolve around a central defensive core to provide team synergy and hold the more offensive members of the team together. These cores typically have solid defensive synergy, and are used to cover a wide range of threats in the metagame. As such, the defensive core of a balance team needs to be preserved in order to maintain the ability to check various Pokemon. This means that balanced playstyles can be very unforgiving playstyles to use if you let your defensive core get unnecessarily weakened. Similar problems occur if you lose your offensive Pokemon too early on, as you will then lack the offensive presence to break through opposing teams. Each component of a balance team is crucial, and having dedicated checks for the majority of relevant threats is important. Undoubtedly, however, the core of a balance team is the most important part to preserve, as without it the team just falls apart.

This is the problem with Greninja. As it has a incredibly wide, diverse offensive movepool with solid power on nearly all of its attacks, Greninja has the tools to break through the majority of defensive cores with unparalleled efficiency. Take for example the popular balance core of Azumarill + Ferrothorn + Heatran. Greninja, with only two slots (Gunk Shot and Low Kick, although you can threaten it more with Gunk Shot+Hydro+HP Fire) can absolutely devastate that core. With the core of the team wrecked, the rest of the team falls apart to the offensive pressure of Greninja's teammates.

Now, the obvious solution to this problem would be to adapt the standard defensive cores to accommodate for Greninja's presence, right? That's easier said than done. There are remarkably few Pokemon that can effectively fit into balanced cores that are solid checks for Greninja. These are Pokemon like Alomomola, Chansey, Porygon2 and Empoleon. The problem is that the vast majority of Pokemon that can beat Greninja on balance are in turn beaten by one of its potential coverage moves. Slowbro loses to Dark Pulse, Empoleon to Low Kick, Alomomola to Grass Knot, and Tentacruel to Extrasensory. The remaining Pokemon that can technically "counter" Greninja are all quite passive and thus easy to break by Greninja's teammates. You can try fitting a situational Greninja check on your team that beats whatever set is most popular at the time, but Greninja users will catch on and change their set accordingly. The metagame fails to stabilize with Greninja forcing balance teams to run constantly changing checks to it on their teams, and even then you need to ensure that your check works.

And this is yet another layer of how Greninja devastates balance. Since no balance core can possibly handle every variant of Greninja while still holding up against its teammates, in every battle against Greninja you need to scout the Greninja's set to see if your dedicated check can even viably check it. This involves carefully planned switching between the members of your defensive core, letting them get unnecessarily weakened, significantly hurting the stability of the team. Balance teams, unlike offense, cannot afford to sacrifice something to revenge kill it; unlike stall, they cannot afford constantly switching to see what set Greninja is running. A well-played Greninja forces balance players to make high-risk decisions at almost no real cost to the Greninja user. If it breaks their core, it's done its job.

If we are to catalog Greninja under one of the three characteristics of an Uber, it would be the support characteristic:

A Pokémon is uber if, in common battle conditions, it can consistently set up a situation in which it makes it substantially easier for other pokemon to sweep.

Playing a balance team, as it is one of the three main spectra of playstyles, can be considered a common battle condition. Greninja is able to efficiently, effectively punch holes in basically any balance core imaginable, giving a teammate an extremely solid position to break through and sweep up the remains. As such, it consistently sets up situations in which other Pokemon can sweep, falling into the support characteristic of an Uber.

Now, some will argue that balance losing viability isn't unhealthy, but a metagame shift. That is a severe misconception of what a metagame shift is. Metagame shifts do not undermine entire playstyles. Even the metagame shift that occurred post-Aegis did not destroy stall. Stall teams were able to successfully adapt, with innovations arising that allowed them to hold their own against the powerful wallbreakers. As has been established, balance cannot permanently adapt to Greninja, because Greninja always adapts in return.

Another popular counterargument is that if we don't actively preserve other playstyles like Trick Room and Sticky Web, then why should we preserve balance? I alluded to this earlier when I described balance as a spectrum. There are so many different playstyles and subsets of balance that it can not truly be considered a singular playstyle. Things like BO, semi-stall, bulky Volt-Turn, hazard stacking balance, etc. are all contained within the spectrum of balance. Greninja invalidates that entire spectrum. As such, the fall of balance cannot be considered the fall of a playstyle, but that of an entire group of playstyles that serve to diversify the metagame and are not necessarily inherently flawed. The loss of all of these playstyles can be traced back to Greninja, and the suspect ladder has shown that this spectrum is able to flourish in Greninja's absence.

I hope that cleared things up for some people, although it is a bit of a tl;dr. While Greninja may not be truly broken, it has negative effects on the metagame and as such ought to go.

 

[Sanger Zonvolt]

Just wanted to pop in and say that's a garbage argument after you all have willingly killed a bunch of play styles and archetypes this gen alone. I actually liked BP thank you very much.

So you say we killed a "bunch of play styles and archetypes"? Last I checked the only play styles we ever nerfed or killed were Swagger teams and full BP. Swagger teams were teams that abused the RNG and were in no way a competitive play style, if you could even call it a play style since Swagger Teams basically just followed a formula to win and functioned completely independently of the meta and any choices the opponent made.

As for full BP teams, I stated this in an earlier post, but full BP was even less of a true play style in my mind than Swagger. Everyone who ever used full BP teams basically copied and pasted Denisss's team and changed one, maybe two of the team mate slots. That's not a playstyle; that's stealing a team and making the minimum changes needed to call it "your team". How can you call that a play style when they were all basically the same team? In addition, like Swagger teams, they functioned almost completely independently of the meta and the choices made by your opponent. Neither of these supposed "play styles" had any true interaction between 2 players, so I don't know how anyone can call them play styles.

If I've missed some "play style" that we supposedly destroyed, please inform us, because this claim that we "killed a bunch of play styles" seems like a lot of nonsense that has been brought up twice now for some reason, and until someone can bring legitimate evidence of Smogon actively killing a real play style this gen the "Greninja destroys balanced teams" argument is a perfectly legitimate reason to ban Greninja, and anyone against him getting banned had better argue how it doesn't destroy balance instead of wasting time telling nonsense about how we just randomly kill legitimate play styles.

 

[Norne]

Can someone neutral (like a mod) summarize a list of pros and cons discussed in this thread for the peanut gallery?

As much as that would be cool, no one reads the OPost. Every terrible poster just do 10 random post, add the git gud, priority, 4MS, never had a problem with it, unban the stuff and he will be balanced, he won't do well in Ubers, it's my favorite, or SMOGON nazis banning stuff they can't beat argument without reading a thing at all derailing this even further.

God I really have a newfound sense of respect on the poor souls that have to check this thread.

And again to keep this on topic I'm loving the suspect ladder, there is so much freedom and team are almost like a rainbow after a STAB ON EVERYTHING BASE 122 SPEED STORM, I mean once you get past the new toy kids pretending Greninja was the only bad thing happening to the fairies it gets really interesting, I mean I'm actually seeing non scarfs Landorus for a change. That's a huge improvement already.

 

[UBERPYRO]

Everyone who thinks about Greninja remembers the nightmares they had at the start of oras. Personally I thought it was the most broken thing in OU. However, I don’t think Greninja has the same “bang” to it that it had back then. The evolving meta has caused it to be less effective.

In essence, Pokémon like Tentacruel, Chansey, Rotom-w, Talonflame, Scarf Lando-t, and speedy megas have risen to take on Greninja. But wait, isn’t this the very definition of overcentralizing? No, it’s not because these Pokémon would be used anyway. According to WCAR, the primary reason for the rise in Tentacruel was because it formed an excellent anti-hazard core with Mega Sableye. Chansey is fricken Chansey. Rotom-W hit #1 on the usage stats in XY and I don’t think it plans to slow down. Talonflame, scarf Lando-t, and speedy megas have risen in usage due to the general increase in speed creep; in essence they exist to check each other.

So now can we agree that Greninja is not overcentralizing? I wouldn’t specifically blame Greninja for any usage shifts.

In the second paragraph I listed checks and counters. But I’m not just pointing out they exist, I’m saying they’re everywhere. In other words, Greninja is less effective versus (Hyper) offensive teams because they are loaded with checks. The meta resists it.

Onto a different argument, people say Greninja has no switch-ins as if he murders everything he touches. He’s not a stallbreaker on jets. Greninja is entirely reliant on coverage, with no basic strong spammable move. So, a Keldeo, for example, can switch in on a resisted ice beam or dark pulse and force it out. Similarly, Greninja could predict and try to force it out with a 2hko. This boils down to a mind game. Greninja may not be predictable, but as Jukain has said, it’s certainly not unpredictable either. So overall, bulky offense and balanced teams in the right hands have a chance to play around Greninja. By no means does Greninja invalidate balanced teams as a whole.

BTW, a commonly overlooked balance-team counter Edit: Check to Greninja is (physically defensive) Rotom-w. [HP] Grass is very rare, and if Greninja is forgoing dark pulse for grass knot or [HP] Fire then it can’t remotely touch it. Edit: it gets 2hkoed on the switch after rocks my bad.

Personally I see good arguments on both sides of this ban, but I’m leaning towards no ban after thinking it through. The most important thing is for you guys not to just bandwagon Greninja into oblivion. Keep an open mind. Consider the arguments, and then decide if Greninja is really broken or not.

 

[Celticpride]

BTW, a commonly overlooked balance-team counter to Greninja is (physically defensive) Rotom-w. [HP] Grass is very rare, and if Greninja is forgoing dark pulse for grass knot or [HP] Fire then it can’t remotely touch it.

Physically defensive Rotom-W (252 HP / 212+ Def) is 2HKOed by Dark Pulse or Extrasensory with Rocks, and also has a good chance to by 2HKOed by a combo Gunk Shot and Dark Pulse / Dark Pulse. That makes Rotom a check, and that's all assuming Rotom-W is at full health, which is much easier said then done with Rotom. I mean, in theory it works but in practice it falls below the required mark more often then one would like. Obviously every check can be worn down, but Rotom is particular gets worn down really easily.

 

[Holiday]

Anyways, I think one of the biggest arguments anti ban has right now is something that hasn't been said. ORAS meta has existed for what? A month and a half? (That's since release, tack on an extra month for the unofficial ladder thing where Mega Mence was everywhere.) As UBERPYRO said, Greninja isn't to blame for the rise of Tentacruel, scarf Keldeo, and others. They just have gotten better/more standard. Now stupid shit like P2 has to stop. It's not hard to see that Greninja is top tier, but there could be something new on the rise that could stop it? Idk I could very well be wrong, and I'm not going to list stupid arguments that have already been destroyed (read: get better scrub and: choice scarfs m8) But idk is voting not ban BC you're holding out hope a thing? Lol.

 

[Sanger Zonvolt]

Anyways, I think one of the biggest arguments anti ban has right now is something that hasn't been said. ORAS meta has existed for what? A month and a half? (That's since release, tack on an extra month for the unofficial ladder thing where Mega Mence was everywhere.) As UBERPYRO said, Greninja isn't to blame for the rise of Tentacruel, scarf Keldeo, and others. They just have gotten better/more standard. Now stupid shit like P2 has to stop. It's not hard to see that Greninja is top tier, but there could be something new on the rise that could stop it? Idk I could very well be wrong, and I'm not going to list stupid arguments that have already been destroyed (read: get better scrub and: choice scarfs m8) But idk is voting not ban BC you're holding out hope a thing? Lol.

How much time has to pass before we decide whether the solutions available to us are or aren't enough? I've seen the "we should keep waiting to see if it fixes itself" answer a couple of times now in this thread alone, but we've had all the time since Greninja's tutor moves were released to theorymon, and even if you don't count the month where Mega Mence was wrecking crap, you still had more than a month of in-ladder practice. We only needed a month of play to see Mega Mence was a monster, so why do we need more time to determine if Greninja is breaking the game? It's one thing to simply think at this point we have all the needed solutions to Greninja or to just not care either way, but it seems pointless to abstain or vote no ban because you think that after a month of theorymonning and a month of it being the MVP of the ladder there is some magic pool of solutions that the entirety of Smogon has somehow failed to find.

 

[HardlySaucy]

As a heavily pro-ban supporter, I don't want to say why Frogon should be banned and just end up regurgitating a bunch of other arguments, I will go over some of the anti-ban arguments and try to reason against them.

1. "Greninja will suck in Ubers"
No.

2. "Greninja has 4MSS"
While it's true that it can only use 4 of the moves it can learn, you need to remember that its moves remain unknown to the opponent until it's used all 4. The fact that it is a potential threat to anything other than Porygon2 and Chansey means it can get huge chunks of damage off on a team before you can find out how to deal with it, not to mention the Knock Off prevalence to deal with its checks.

3. "Greninja is a glass cannon"
Yes it's frail. So is Blaziken. So what? Outside of priority, very few things can hit it in the first place, and standard 4HP investment lets it survive Adamant Conkeldurr Mach Punch. It resists Pursuit, has no problem switching out and coming in as a revenge killer or a slow VoltTurn and once it's in, something just about dies every time if you predict correctly.

In conclusion, Greninja is by no means unbeatable, but it's able to at least seriously dent any team barring unusual circumstances, and puts a lot of pressure on team building with a ridiculous Speed Tier and a broken ability.

 

[MKL122788]

As a heavily pro-ban supporter, I don't want to say why Frogon should be banned and just end up regurgitating a bunch of other arguments, I will go over some of the anti-ban arguments and try to reason against them.

1. "Greninja will suck in Ubers"
No.

2. "Greninja has 4MSS"
While it's true that it can only use 4 of the moves it can learn, you need to remember that its moves remain unknown to the opponent until it's used all 4. The fact that it is a potential threat to anything other than Porygon2 and Chansey means it can get huge chunks of damage off on a team before you can find out how to deal with it, not to mention the Knock Off prevalence to deal with its checks.

3. "Greninja is a glass cannon"
Yes it's frail. So is Blaziken. So what? Outside of priority, very few things can hit it in the first place, and standard 4HP investment lets it survive Adamant Conkeldurr Mach Punch. It resists Pursuit, has no problem switching out and coming in as a revenge killer or a slow VoltTurn and once it's in, something just about dies every time if you predict correctly.

In conclusion, Greninja is by no means unbeatable, but it's able to at least seriously dent any team barring unusual circumstances, and puts a lot of pressure on team building with a ridiculous Speed Tier and a broken ability.

Not to nitpick your counter-arguments, but it is commonly known that #1 is not relevant to whether or not he should be banned from OU. By responding to this, you are fanning irrelevant flames and encouraging people to continue to use it as an argument.

Also, #2 is improper use of the term 4MSS, which has been rampant on this thread since the very beginning. Four Move Slot Syndrome is supposed to be reserved for pokemon who cannot function effectively in a tier with only 4 moves. We simply refer to this as a diverse move pool. When people cite it improperly, they are trying to twist a massive advantage into a weakness or simply don't understand the concept.

Lastly, standard ORAS Greninja does not have 4 HP investment. He tends to run 40/216/252 in attack, special attack, and speed respectively. This aside, I fail to see how surviving Conkeldurr's Mach Punch is a relevant calculation anyway. If you are bringing in Conkeldurr on Greninja, it is likely after a pokemon died and even more likely because Greninja killed it with either Ice Beam or Dark Pulse, meaning Mach Punch would be super effective. If that is the case, there is no chance Greninja would stay in, as even if it survived(it takes between 73 and 88% damage), it would kill itself on life orb(assuming it already took 1 round of recoil from orb killing the previous pokemon) while failing to kill Conkeldurr after. No one is willing to sacrifice Greninja to weaken a Conkeldurr. Even if it was a different type, I doubt Greninja would enjoy staying in and taking Knock Off to neuter him anyway. So, Greninja will most likely be switching here. Eventually, it will come back in and cause the exact same problems it was causing before switches.

If you want to make an argument against it being a glass cannon, you should really use Greninja's speed. He is not likely to be attacked with a super effective move without good prediction, which takes his bulk from awful to simply below average. Then again, his bulk is almost irrelevant when he is slaughtering people on the switch left and right anyway.

 

[Morningstar]

1. "Greninja will suck in Ubers"
No.

I agree with MKL's post. Whether or not it will be used in Ubers is irrelevant. The goal of the tiers is to make it not so that all the pokemon could be used (Something that is impossible outside of maybe AG and the BL tiers) but to make sure as many pokemon as possible could be used. On that front Greninja in OU makes this impossible since it could kill anything that isn't tailored to Stall, hence why all of these cries of "Muh Playstyles" are happening, because Greninja monopolized Hyper offensive by ensure only Stall teams have a shadow of a chance against it. And it's coverage moves ensure that those pokemon would be screwed over anyway.

Trying to appease everybody is also not the goal for the tiers for the same reason; it's impossible. The people divided on using Smogon vs. Nintendo rules are as polarized as the republicans and democrats (or as a closer analogue, the Sonic Fanbase) an there will always be some people that will see Smogon as the guys that prefers epeen over fun or think we will ban everything that is suspect because we don't know what counters are. Our reputation should not cloud our judgment on balance for keeping it balanced without pissing someone off is an exercise in futility.

 

[Punchshroom]

PS: If greninja really goes to Uber,i hope Smogon will make a New BorderLine because if Greninja goes to Uber,he will be useless...just like Deoxys-Normal who is useless in Uber (because Deoxys-attack form is better and -20 BS in the 2 defenses don't really matter) but too strong for the OU...

Lol this is not a reason to make a 'new tier' for Greninja specifically, because despite how obviously powerful the likes of Mega Lucario, Mega Mawile, and especially Mega Kangaskhan are in OU, I have not heard of literally any relevant mention of them in Ubers, simply because of how much competition for a teamslot they receive. At least Greninja is the only Pokemon with Toxic Spikes (which are stupid powerful in Ubers) + a Taunt fast enough to stop Defog Arceus so he is not actually totally useless, but regardless of how a Pokemon performs in Ubers, as long as it is too powerful for OU it will just be kicked off to Ubers like the rest of the OP Pokemon, simple as that.

 

[AlphaGiratina]

Subjective:

I think it's important to have a non-mega option that not only outspeeds the 108-110 tier but hits those pokemon extremely hard. After light hazard damage Greninja can kill off latios, latias, metagross, keldeo, diancie, terrakion, and other such popular pokemon in that realm. I think greninja's presence is a powerful downside to running those pokemon and acts as an (offensive) counterbalance to them.

You don't need to sacrifice your mega slot on something like beedrill or sceptile to outspeed and deter that tier -- you can use greninja as a catch-all revenge killer for those otherwise extremely bothersome pokemon that are difficult to outspeed and also bulky enough to be difficult to kill with something like raikou or starmie. With those threats somewhat covered meanwhile your mega slot is free for something more interesting and doesn't necessarily need to be fast.

I didn't notice any significant playstyle changes on the ladder. I used my old team that was designed around handling greninja (and the rest of OU) and it still functioned exactly as well.



Objective:

Greninja is under fire for fullfilling a few of the possibly-uber prerequisites; mainly being able to sweep a significant portion of OU without support, or, being able to support another 'mon to sweep by weakening things to a point. Furthermore he may be overcentralizing to an unhealthy extent.

All too often we've seen hazards rack up, our scarfer got cornered, and in the end greninja can cut like butter through whatever's left because he always hits first and hits weaknesses with STAB and even a neutral hydro pump can do the job if something got too weakened.

However: he only sweeps through teams like that if you build a team like that. There ARE pokemon that can switch in and slow-voltturn out to something that can kill ninja with a free turn. There ARE direct counters and moveset-dependent many, many checks. There ARE scarf or priority pokemon that can switch in a couple times and threaten it. There ARE bulky pokemon with strong Pursuit to really close the deal on it and remove it.

Whether he restricts teambuilding to an unhealthy extent strays out of objective territory but I am leaning towards "no" because there are enough answers to him that not only function as dealing with greninja but have plenty of good use otherwise -- building a team that can handle greninja in 2 different ways is not somehow super weak to any other team matchup, and there are a wide enough variety of possibilities that many pokemon and team types have a chance to see use.



Final:

I am not really decided at all on whether he is overcentralizing or not, but I don't think his ability to sweep the metagame is significant enough to ban it because making a team weak to it could be categorized as just plain a bad decision instead of thinking "my team and playstyle is good but greninja needs to be banned first". If he is putting a particular stranglehold on a certain playstyle, that's still not enough for a ban because that playstyle has more responsibility to evolve than the tier has responsibility to change to accomodate it. For the moment I see him just barely riding the line between what is broken and what is just plain oras ou effective by modern standards. He exists in a category alongside pokemon like azumarill, metagross, kyurem, gardevoir, and charizard that are honestly just too good at their jobs, are really annoying to switch into or worse give a setup turn to, and feel broken when you don't have the answer but honestly just represent the power level and intrinsic issues that pokemon as a game has and will always have.

This pretty much captures exactly how I feel about Greninja's ban at the moment, couldnt have said it better myself. I feel like through all my battles on the ladder I've never really felt like Greninja's was a monstrous threat like Mega Mence or Luke in that I had to definitely have an answer or five to on my team. Our froggy friend is so frail that pretty much any scarfer checks him and OHKOs, not to mention then speed creep with the ORAS mega shelling overall to solve the main issue I had in XY of Greninja's outspending damn near everything. LO recoil and hazards add up quickly, and there are a number of counters to Greninja that can function well in the meta (I.e Chansey, SpDef Tenta, Cresselia with investment). I personally also finds the suspect ladder to be extremely repetitive and dull with no creative teams standing out without Greninja, and no particular emergence of any team build. (Just the same old Lando-T Heatran bs...) Overall, although I've heard convincing arguments from the other side, I'm in favor of no ban.

This pretty much captures exactly how I feel about Greninja's ban at the moment, couldnt have said it better myself. I feel like through all my battles on the ladder I've never really felt like Greninja's was a monstrous threat like Mega Mence or Luke in that I had to definitely have an answer or five to on my team. Our froggy friend is so frail that pretty much any scarfer checks him and OHKOs, not to mention then speed creep with the ORAS mega shelling overall to solve the main issue I had in XY of Greninja's outspending damn near everything. LO recoil and hazards add up quickly, and there are a number of counters to Greninja that can function well in the meta (I.e Chansey, SpDef Tenta, Cresselia with investment). I personally also finds the suspect ladder to be extremely repetitive and dull with no creative teams standing out without Greninja, and no particular emergence of any team build. (Just the same old Lando-T Heatran bs...) Overall, although I've heard convincing arguments from the other side, I'm in favor of no ban.

forgot to add that Greninja cannot switch into anything for it's life so effectively the user has to sack a poke or gain switch initiative/momentum to bring in ninja, and this is assuming the foe doesn't predict the pivot and goe immediately out to their check/counter. I've watched matches play out where Greninja's was the last poke to come out, by which point the remainder of the opponents team simply gangbangs him merely because he cannot switch into anything.