VGC 2015 Viability Rankings - Mark 2

[Ksh13]

Rotom (especially H), thundurus and zapdos will always check pretty easily salamence and then proceed to OHKO or cripple it then there are the others you mentioned. Tbh i don't really think salamence deserves to be S, imho people are just too paranoid when facing him.
Kang on the other hand is surpringly random. You can't never know if he has fake out or protect, low kick or PuP, return or DE (sometimes even ice punch instead of sucker punch). Every move she can have forces you to play differently (if she has PuP and setup you basically won/lost the game). Basically only ghost with WoW are a good way to stop Kanga

Okay, so imo Salamence deserves S. Since my explanation in the previous post maybe was kind of lackluster, I will explain why properly now, and why some of your arguments for why Kang is surperior compared to Mence are lackluster. First of, yes, Mence has solid checks that deal with all its sets. So is the deal with Kangaskhan, and every other Pokemon in existense. Ghosts with WoW are not the only things that beat Kangaskhan. Other things with WoW, Arcanine, Rotom-whatever beat it. Aegislash (sub more easily, but Wide Guard can in a 1v1 go for PP stalling out Sucker Punches with Wide Guard. Terrakion is a surefire way to beat Kang, and Lando-T with Superpower OHKO's most of the time, with Band you got it every time. You can't ignore the fact that there are many ways to beat Kang. Bulky waters are not reliable, but when the Scald burn comes, it stinks for Kang. Altough it has PuP, Intimidate is still not straight up ignored. Landorus-T is the most common Pokemon after Kang, and more popular on Showdown iirc, and is the best way to shuffle Intimidate. It can come in, Intimidate, U-Turn out, and come back to Intimidate once more, and not really fear the hit it switches into. My point here is that Ghosts with WoW are not the only ways to beat Kang, and there are several ways to beat Mence, and many ways to beat all Pokemon.

Now more about Mega Salamence. Earlier on I was kind of on the fence about it for S, but now I do feel like it deserves it. First of, although Japan Sand has made everyone use special or mixed Mence, physical is still highly viable. Mence+Clefairy was the original reason for why it was put in S. Clefairy's redirection combined with Friend Guardd letting Mence tank Rock Slide's like it is nothing, gives Mence an excellent opportunity to set up a D-Dance. When it has set up, Mence will kill something. It just will, okay, deal with it. Mence suffers from Hyper Voice spam, but Jolly 252 Atk OHKO's 252 HP 0 Def Sylveon with Double-Edge. In a situation where you have Clef+Mence and the opponent has Sylveon+something else, Mence can OHKO Sylveon and Clef redirects whatever comes form the other foe. Bulky waters like Suicune with Ice Beam is a big problem, that Mence needs like 3 D-Dances to deal with. However, as said everything has its checks. and something else on your team can deal with that. If you don't have a teammate that deals with bulky waters you have a bad team. Mence has the special set also, which is very good for Hyper Voice spam, and is indeed best paired up with Japan Sand. I honestly think that looking at the description of S rank, Mega Salamence fits the bill. It can perform multiple roles with tremendous effect (can Kang even do this?), has few flaws (weaknesses is a bummer though), its flaws can be taken care of with little to no team support (Clefairy is not a lot of team support, although special Mence needs a bit).

I will admit that Kang also has a surprise factor with Protect, PuP, Ice Punch and what not, it's type coverage is mostly the same (except Ice Punch). The thing is that almost no matter what what Kang runs, the same stuff walls it (unless you go to the level of Crunch and other elemental punches). As Synral said, different types of Mence has different checks and counters, but some Pokemon do wall all sets. The thing is that if you run some kind of mixed set, you might be able to lure in what would normally be a counter against either physical or special, and proceed to knock it out. Kang has a surprise factor to it, but so has Mence, having many different combos for coverage to mix up with on a mixed set, and also for pure physical or special as well.

What i meant with ghosts with WoW mean that they are the only one that will totally wall kanga, the others you mentioned will still take a beating.
Salamence is always walled by something (usually very common), depending on what he runs. Kangaskhan has almost always ways to beat her counters.

And don't forget the neat fact of breaking sashes, an incredibly good thing that few pokemons have.

(So this just popped up while I wrote my long ass post, lets make it longer) Tell me, how does Kangakshan beat Terrakion? Terrakion will always outspeed and OHKO with Close Combat. Other WoW users like Arcanine and Rotom formes do get knocked out by Double-Edge after first tanking a hit and Wisping it. Then they have done their job. Kang has taken a ton of recoil from Double-Edge, and is crippled and useless for the rest of the match. Aegislash is only beaten by Crunch Mega Kangaskhan. Mega Kangaskhan is also always walled by something very common.

 

[Hero_Inpace]

Hi everyone, I'm very new to posting on the smogon forums, though I've been lurking for quite a while.
I'd like to nominate Gourgeist-Super to B-, or even B ranking.

The first reason for this is because of the three S-tier mons (at time of writing, Mega-Kangaskhan, Landorus-T, and Mega Salamence), two are completely countered by Gourgeist-S.

The calcs below are taken from my own specially defensive Gourgeist, which has been working wonders:

252 Atk Landorus-T Stone Edge vs. 252 HP / 36 Def Gourgeist-Super: 51-60 (26.5 - 31.2%) -- 10.9% chance to 4HKO after Leftovers recovery
252 Atk Landorus-T U-turn vs. 252 HP / 36 Def Gourgeist-Super: 36-43 (18.7 - 22.3%) -- possible 6HKO after Leftovers recovery

If Kangaskhan doesn't mega-evolve to preserve scrappy:
252+ Atk Kangaskhan Double-Edge vs. 252 HP / 36 Def Gourgeist-Super: 75-88 (39 - 45.8%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery

After mega-evolution, most Kangaskhan will only have sucker punch to hit it:

252 Atk Parental Bond Mega Kangaskhan Sucker Punch vs. 252 HP / 36 Def Gourgeist-Super: 111-132 (57.8 - 68.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

factor in burn and/or leech seed, and these two will never break gourgeist-s.

It also works as a great counter to rain teams, and between leech seed recovery and protect, can often stall out the rain pretty effectively:

252 SpA Politoed Ice Beam vs. 252 HP / 220+ SpD Gourgeist-Super: 72-86 (37.5 - 44.7%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ Atk Mega Swampert Ice Punch vs. 252 HP / 36 Def Gourgeist-Super: 86-102 (44.7 - 53.1%) -- 0.4% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ SpA Life Orb Ludicolo Ice Beam vs. 252 HP / 220+ SpD Gourgeist-Super: 101-122 (52.6 - 63.5%) -- 99.6% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery (OK, LO Ludicolo is still quite threatening)

It can also survive and take hits from mega tyranitar in sand, and potentially cripple it with a will-o-wisp, while taking negligible damage from Excadrill

252 Atk Mega Tyranitar Crunch vs. 252 HP / 36 Def Gourgeist-Super: 134-158 (69.7 - 82.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after sandstorm damage and Leftovers recovery
252+ Atk Life Orb Excadrill Iron Head vs. 252 HP / 36 Def Gourgeist-Super: 83-99 (43.2 - 51.5%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery

That's not to say it's perfect by any means, it's offensive presence is pretty meagre, and it pretty much always gets destroyed by mega-Mence, Mega-Zard Y, or Heatran, and doesn't fare too well against Specs Hydreigon either. It also relies quite heavily on inaccurate moves like will-o-miss and leech seed. Interestingly though, it always survives specs Sylveon hyper voice, and can actually beat Aegislash 1v1

252+ SpA Aegislash-Blade Shadow Ball vs. 252 HP / 220+ SpD Gourgeist-Super: 150-176 (78.1 - 91.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
0 Atk Gourgeist-Super Phantom Force vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Aegislash-Blade: 174-206 (104.1 - 123.3%) -- guaranteed OHKO (Phantom force breaks Kings Shield)

Below is a replay of a VGC match where I was testing out a mega-sceptile/feraligatr combo (spoiler warning: not that great), where Gourgeist took me from 3-1 down to a win.

http://pokemonshowdown.com/replay/battlespotdoublesvgc2015-244059710

And another replay where Gourgeist beats Mega-Venusaur: http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/battlespotdoublesvgc2015-244089542


TL;DR version: Gourgeist-Super is a great stop to physical attackers and can counter most weather players. While it struggles against one or two common pokes, it counters many others as well. Think of it as a mini mega-venusaur, since they play quite similarly. Gourgeist-S for B-

 

[Xanda]

Okay, so imo Salamence deserves S. Since my explanation in the previous post maybe was kind of lackluster, I will explain why properly now, and why some of your arguments for why Kang is surperior compared to Mence are lackluster. First of, yes, Mence has solid checks that deal with all its sets. So is the deal with Kangaskhan, and every other Pokemon in existense. Ghosts with WoW are not the only things that beat Kangaskhan. Other things with WoW, Arcanine, Rotom-whatever beat it. Aegislash (sub more easily, but Wide Guard can in a 1v1 go for PP stalling out Sucker Punches with Wide Guard. Terrakion is a surefire way to beat Kang, and Lando-T with Superpower OHKO's most of the time, with Band you got it every time. You can't ignore the fact that there are many ways to beat Kang. Bulky waters are not reliable, but when the Scald burn comes, it stinks for Kang. Altough it has PuP, Intimidate is still not straight up ignored. Landorus-T is the most common Pokemon after Kang, and more popular on Showdown iirc, and is the best way to shuffle Intimidate. It can come in, Intimidate, U-Turn out, and come back to Intimidate once more, and not really fear the hit it switches into. My point here is that Ghosts with WoW are not the only ways to beat Kang, and there are several ways to beat Mence, and many ways to beat all Pokemon.

Now more about Mega Salamence. Earlier on I was kind of on the fence about it for S, but now I do feel like it deserves it. First of, although Japan Sand has made everyone use special or mixed Mence, physical is still highly viable. Mence+Clefairy was the original reason for why it was put in S. Clefairy's redirection combined with Friend Guardd letting Mence tank Rock Slide's like it is nothing, gives Mence an excellent opportunity to set up a D-Dance. When it has set up, Mence will kill something. It just will, okay, deal with it. Mence suffers from Hyper Voice spam, but Jolly 252 Atk OHKO's 252 HP 0 Def Sylveon with Double-Edge. In a situation where you have Clef+Mence and the opponent has Sylveon+something else, Mence can OHKO Sylveon and Clef redirects whatever comes form the other foe. Bulky waters like Suicune with Ice Beam is a big problem, that Mence needs like 3 D-Dances to deal with. However, as said everything has its checks. and something else on your team can deal with that. If you don't have a teammate that deals with bulky waters you have a bad team. Mence has the special set also, which is very good for Hyper Voice spam, and is indeed best paired up with Japan Sand. I honestly think that looking at the description of S rank, Mega Salamence fits the bill. It can perform multiple roles with tremendous effect (can Kang even do this?), has few flaws (weaknesses is a bummer though), its flaws can be taken care of with little to no team support (Clefairy is not a lot of team support, although special Mence needs a bit).

I will admit that Kang also has a surprise factor with Protect, PuP, Ice Punch and what not, it's type coverage is mostly the same (except Ice Punch). The thing is that almost no matter what what Kang runs, the same stuff walls it (unless you go to the level of Crunch and other elemental punches). As Synral said, different types of Mence has different checks and counters, but some Pokemon do wall all sets. The thing is that if you run some kind of mixed set, you might be able to lure in what would normally be a counter against either physical or special, and proceed to knock it out. Kang has a surprise factor to it, but so has Mence, having many different combos for coverage to mix up with on a mixed set, and also for pure physical or special as well.


(So this just popped up while I wrote my long ass post, lets make it longer) Tell me, how does Kangakshan beat Terrakion? Terrakion will always outspeed and OHKO with Close Combat. Other WoW users like Arcanine and Rotom formes do get knocked out by Double-Edge after first tanking a hit and Wisping it. Then they have done their job. Kang has taken a ton of recoil from Double-Edge, and is crippled and useless for the rest of the match. Aegislash is only beaten by Crunch Mega Kangaskhan. Mega Kangaskhan is also always walled by something very common.

First of all, the whole argument clefairy + salamence lead is not so solid because its an unreliable lead that can't be done so often because competitive/defiant users are always a threat, and usually even the majority of steel type pokemon can take care of them pretty easily (no stabbed/boosted EQ are pissfully weak). Second, you understimate the fact that using clefairy is in itself a big support strain because you are basically fighting with 3 pokemon given its no offensive pressure; this means that Koing even one of your pokemon will destroy the offense of your team. Special mence in sand is (probably was) a good meta call but that doesn't mean that's strong and the fact that in Japan, where it's born, only one made it to top 32 says a lot.
So for you conclusions,"It can perform multiple roles with tremendous effect", no, because special mence is weak and needs a entire team to support it, "has few flaws" I'm pretty sure Kanga has less, for example a no 4x weakness to ice (if your team doesn't have at least 3 ice moves you are doing it wrong), one weakness easily covered (lando-T, amoonguss etc.), no weakness to ubercommon spread moves, no acces to priority "its flaws can be taken care of with little to no team support" as i said before, clefairy is a lot of team support by itself.

For your question of terrakion and kang: exactly like you said for clefairy and mence, kang has a redirectioner that does other things (compared to clefairy) and can win matches by itself.

 

[Ksh13]

First of all, the whole argument clefairy + salamence lead is not so solid because its an unreliable lead that can't be done so often because competitive/defiant users are always a threat, and usually even the majority of steel type pokemon can take care of them pretty easily (no stabbed/boosted EQ are pissfully weak). Second, you understimate the fact that using clefairy is in itself a big support strain because you are basically fighting with 3 pokemon given its no offensive pressure; this means that Koing even one of your pokemon will destroy the offense of your team. Special mence in sand is (probably was) a good meta call but that doesn't mean that's strong and the fact that in Japan, where it's born, only one made it to top 32 says a lot.
So for you conclusions,"It can perform multiple roles with tremendous effect", no, because special mence is weak and needs a entire team to support it, "has few flaws" I'm pretty sure Kanga has less, for example a no 4x weakness to ice (if your team doesn't have at least 3 ice moves you are doing it wrong), one weakness easily covered (lando-T, amoonguss etc.), no weakness to ubercommon spread moves, no acces to priority "its flaws can be taken care of with little to no team support" as i said before, clefairy is a lot of team support by itself.

For your question of terrakion and kang: exactly like you said for clefairy and mence, kang has a redirectioner that does other things (compared to clefairy) and can win matches by itself.

Okay, after reading your post I quickly whipped up a teambased around Mega Salamence+Clefairy. I must say, I was impressed of how good it was. When using this, you will get up a D-Dance, no matter what. I am serious. If your opponent has a Fake Out user, then okay, just double Protect. Clefairy takes one hit from anything:

252+ Atk Life Orb Bisharp Iron Head vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Eviolite Clefairy: 140-166 (79 - 93.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 Atk Tough Claws Mega Metagross Iron Head vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Eviolite Clefairy: 144-170 (81.3 - 96%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

Clefairy will also most times live to the next round, so you can just redirect things when Mence attacks as well, or give a Helping Hand boost, or just Protect to survive for longer and give Mence the Friend Guard boost. I must say that Bisharp gives this lead a bit of trouble, but I had things that could easily switch into Bisharp and beat it (Entei). Milotic is actually not the biggest problem. Just D-Dance up without bothering about what it goes for because redirection, and proceed to possibly knock it out, and there is always the chance that the redirection support will still be there to secure Mence's safety.

+1 252 Atk Aerilate Mega Salamence Double-Edge vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Milotic: 180-213 (89.1 - 105.4%) -- 31.3% chance to OHKO (Okay, it's a roll, but against something that is supposed to beat Mence that is good, and some people run a bit of offense on their Milotic as well)

WoW users like Rotom-W are not too much of a problem either, once again because it hits Clefairy and not Salamence. When Clefairy is gone, it does come some problems. Mence will probably have taken some damage from spread attacks, so it will be knocked out without too much of a problem. It will still have a KO in it, as +1 Double-Edge kills too many things to count. It even 2HKO's Rotom-W:

+1 252 Atk Aerilate Mega Salamence Double-Edge vs. 252 HP / 44 Def Rotom-W: 97-115 (61.7 - 73.2%) -- 99.6% chance to 2HKO after Sitrus Berry recovery (Basically 100%)

Mega Salamence with Dragon Dance only needs redirection support. Honestly all types of redirection work good enough, but Clefairy is easily the best. If you feel like it is too passive, then go ahead and use Togekiss or Clefable, or even Amoonguss which can deal better with Water-types (although weakness to Ice sucks). I will admit that Mence sucks without redirection support. Not like it is a big problem to include redirection support, you can just start off with Mence and the Pokemon with redirection as a core and build around it, and smack, you got a solid team.

Special Mence is not the best, but it does pull its weight even without Japan Sand. I am currently using it in a team that is mainly based around Trick Room (more spoilers about my team), and sometimes it is excellent for leading off with my TR setter and dishing out as much damage as possible before it falls, and on the turn it dies I set TR and sweep with my Sylveon. Special Mence does not need an entire team dedicated to it, it is just most popular and slightly better in Japan Sand. I think it is correct to say that Special Mence is a role it can play with tremendous effect. It might not be the Pokemon that sweeps everything, but it dishes out a lot of solid spread damage which can be really useful for its teammates. Special Mence is good, but on a team it is not necessarily the star of the show every match (although sometimes it is).

Also, Salamence's weaknesses are easily covered by teammates too. A Steel-type covers for all of them (Aegislash works wonders, and Heatran covers three). With a speed boost from Dragon Dance, Mence does not really need priority because it goes faster than everything else.

 

[ProjectTitan313]

Hi everyone, I'm very new to posting on the smogon forums, though I've been lurking for quite a while.
I'd like to nominate Gourgeist-Super to B-, or even B ranking.

The first reason for this is because of the three S-tier mons (at time of writing, Mega-Kangaskhan, Landorus-T, and Mega Salamence), two are completely countered by Gourgeist-S.

The calcs below are taken from my own specially defensive Gourgeist, which has been working wonders:

252 Atk Landorus-T Stone Edge vs. 252 HP / 36 Def Gourgeist-Super: 51-60 (26.5 - 31.2%) -- 10.9% chance to 4HKO after Leftovers recovery
252 Atk Landorus-T U-turn vs. 252 HP / 36 Def Gourgeist-Super: 36-43 (18.7 - 22.3%) -- possible 6HKO after Leftovers recovery

If Kangaskhan doesn't mega-evolve to preserve scrappy:
252+ Atk Kangaskhan Double-Edge vs. 252 HP / 36 Def Gourgeist-Super: 75-88 (39 - 45.8%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery

After mega-evolution, most Kangaskhan will only have sucker punch to hit it:

252 Atk Parental Bond Mega Kangaskhan Sucker Punch vs. 252 HP / 36 Def Gourgeist-Super: 111-132 (57.8 - 68.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

factor in burn and/or leech seed, and these two will never break gourgeist-s.

It also works as a great counter to rain teams, and between leech seed recovery and protect, can often stall out the rain pretty effectively:

252 SpA Politoed Ice Beam vs. 252 HP / 220+ SpD Gourgeist-Super: 72-86 (37.5 - 44.7%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ Atk Mega Swampert Ice Punch vs. 252 HP / 36 Def Gourgeist-Super: 86-102 (44.7 - 53.1%) -- 0.4% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ SpA Life Orb Ludicolo Ice Beam vs. 252 HP / 220+ SpD Gourgeist-Super: 101-122 (52.6 - 63.5%) -- 99.6% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery (OK, LO Ludicolo is still quite threatening)

It can also survive and take hits from mega tyranitar in sand, and potentially cripple it with a will-o-wisp, while taking negligible damage from Excadrill

252 Atk Mega Tyranitar Crunch vs. 252 HP / 36 Def Gourgeist-Super: 134-158 (69.7 - 82.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after sandstorm damage and Leftovers recovery
252+ Atk Life Orb Excadrill Iron Head vs. 252 HP / 36 Def Gourgeist-Super: 83-99 (43.2 - 51.5%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery

That's not to say it's perfect by any means, it's offensive presence is pretty meagre, and it pretty much always gets destroyed by mega-Mence, Mega-Zard Y, or Heatran, and doesn't fare too well against Specs Hydreigon either. It also relies quite heavily on inaccurate moves like will-o-miss and leech seed. Interestingly though, it always survives specs Sylveon hyper voice, and can actually beat Aegislash 1v1

252+ SpA Aegislash-Blade Shadow Ball vs. 252 HP / 220+ SpD Gourgeist-Super: 150-176 (78.1 - 91.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
0 Atk Gourgeist-Super Phantom Force vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Aegislash-Blade: 174-206 (104.1 - 123.3%) -- guaranteed OHKO (Phantom force breaks Kings Shield)

Below is a replay of a VGC match where I was testing out a mega-sceptile/feraligatr combo (spoiler warning: not that great), where Gourgeist took me from 3-1 down to a win.

http://pokemonshowdown.com/replay/battlespotdoublesvgc2015-244059710

And another replay where Gourgeist beats Mega-Venusaur: http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/battlespotdoublesvgc2015-244089542


TL;DR version: Gourgeist-Super is a great stop to physical attackers and can counter most weather players. While it struggles against one or two common pokes, it counters many others as well. Think of it as a mini mega-venusaur, since they play quite similarly. Gourgeist-S for B-

Ah here we go, something more enjoyable to read than the Khan / Mence thing.
Gourgeist is a sad case of a Pokémon I find interesting, but haven't gotten around to using much outside minor Maison trolling. But damn is Leech Seed + WoW fun.
I can see it tackling Khan, Landog, Clefable, Cress, Suicune, Rotom-W, Terrakion, Toed, Scrafty, Breloom, Conkelderp, Garchomp, etc but Ice / Fire / Flying / Dark are a bitch to be weak to. I do adore its movepool though, even if Trick-or-Treat is tragically shitty. TR, WoW, Leech Seed, Skill Swap, Worry Seed, Phantom Force, Trick+Disable, etc. Plus, Ghost being the best offensive typing in the game means it's not all that concerned about coverage.
I can't really back a ranking though, haven't dicked around with Pumpking (against humans) enough to really thumb up or thumb down. Will put on my to do list however.

 

[Demantoid]

Ah here we go, something more enjoyable to read than the Khan / Mence thing.
Gourgeist is a sad case of a Pokémon I find interesting, but haven't gotten around to using much outside minor Maison trolling. But damn is Leech Seed + WoW fun.
I can see it tackling Khan, Landog, Clefable, Cress, Suicune, Rotom-W, Terrakion, Toed, Scrafty, Breloom, Conkelderp, Garchomp, etc but Ice / Fire / Flying / Dark are a bitch to be weak to. I do adore its movepool though, even if Trick-or-Treat is tragically shitty. TR, WoW, Leech Seed, Skill Swap, Worry Seed, Phantom Force, Trick+Disable, etc. Plus, Ghost being the best offensive typing in the game means it's not all that concerned about coverage.
I can't really back a ranking though, haven't dicked around with Pumpking (against humans) enough to really thumb up or thumb down. Will put on my to do list however.

Trick or Treat is a tragic move; Scarfed/Sashed Gourgeists use it on Minimize Chanseys ;( Save us all.

 

[tofucocoa]

making a few changes.

terrakion: A+ -> A
suicune: A+ -> A
talonflame: A- -> B
rotom-h: A- -> A
ludicolo: A -> A-
gardevoir-mega: B -> B+
raichu: B- -> C+
manectric-mega: B- -> C+
raikou: B- -> C
altaria-mega: C+ -> C
lucario-mega: C+ -> C-
swampert-mega: C- -> C+
tyranitar-mega: B -> C+
tornadus: C+ -> C
chandelure: B -> C+

 

[Ksh13]

So, guess it's time for opinions on the new changes:
Terrakion A+ to A = Agreed, don't really see it anywhere, and that for a reason.
Suicune A+ to A = I nommed this down, so I'm happy with the drop. If you want a reasoning from me, check the previous page
Talonflame A- to B = Nearly no one uses it, once again for a reason. It is weak and suffers from Rock Slide and basically everything else. Only has Gale Wings going for it.
Rotom-H A- to A = I am not too sure about this one, but i have not used it so what do I know.
Ludicolo A to A- = Yeah, rain is not popular atm. It is still awesome in rain, but rain is not as awesome.
Gardevoir Mega B to B+ = Nice, Garde is seeing quite a lot of usage and I really like it myself. Was too good for B, and TR variants are also all over the place.
Raichu B- to C+ = Encore is gimmicky and better from Whismsicott, and overall it is just very niche
Manectric Mega B- to C+ = No one uses it, change from VGC 14 to 15 just killed it
Raikou B- to C+ = Do we like really hate Electric-types or something? Seriously though, I don't really mind it moving down
Altaria Mega C+ to C = Although it is bulkier than Mega Garde and Sylveon, it does not have damage output near them
Lucario Mega C+ to C- = Don't see any reaason to use it, don't really care too much for it either
Swampert Mega C- to C+ = Although it is not the best rain sweeper, it is still viable and C- was too low
Tyranitar Mega B to C+ = Not really worth the mega slot, just stick with regular T-Tar. Only niche over regular is better bulk, but mega slot is a problem
Tornadus C+ to C = It is decent for rain, but not really that good. It is not really something that shines no matter how you use it, but Hurricane in rain gives it a small niche
Chandelure B to C+ = Nommed this down earlier, happy that it went through. Not really going to just repeat what I said on the previous page, if oyu want a reason for why i think this, just go back a page


Edit: Talonflame is listed in B and A-, should be fixed.

 

[Mishimono]

I think we can all agree and put Crobat at least on C Rank. His good natural speed, Super Fang, Tailwind, Taunt and Quick Guard make it amazing as supportive mon in VGC, and i'm seeing plenty of those on Battle Spot recently (around 1600+).

I've seen so many Crobats on Battle Spot ya around 1600-1650. It's support Super Fang, Tailwind set is amazing. It needs to be C rank

 

[emperior09]

MY PERSONAL OPINION:

I think Terrakion is still a top VGC 15 Pokemon, and we'll see plenty of them in nationals and worlds as it is a popular choice and a good counter to Char-Y and Mega-Kangaskhan. I don't see why it was moved down.

Suicune is like the best Tailwind setter in the entire metagame, so I don't see why it was dropped.

Thundurus should move from A+ to S. It is really great and can shut down many tactics ALONE.

As for Arcanine, I think he is on the same level as Entei, and I don't see both higher than A- there's a reason why Arcanine is not a popular choice in tournaments.

Tyranitar and Excadrill could surely move up to A- considering Japan Sand is a really viable playstyle.

Whimsicott is the fastest prankster user and it could be at least B+ in my opinion.

 

[Synral]

after this weekend:
Kangaskhan: S -> A+
Gardevoir: A -> A+
Thundurus A+ -> S
Tyranitar B+ -> A-
Landorus-I B- -> B
Clefable A+ -> A
Metagross A+ -> A

I'll post reasons when I get home but I have some hot opinions about these pokes

 

[Xanda]

after this weekend:
Kangaskhan: S -> A+
Gardevoir: A -> A+
Thundurus A+ -> S
Tyranitar B+ -> A-
Landorus-I B- -> B
Clefable A+ -> A
Metagross A+ -> A

I'll post reasons when I get home but I have some hot opinions about these pokes

I don't think we should do sweeping changes based solely on the results of a single tournament (Kanga had totally dominated both japan and italian nationalsand it's still the most popular pokemon on BS).

 

[Synral]

you're arguing not to be results-oriented and then in the same breath tell me to look at other national tournaments and usage stats

like come on throw me a cubone

 

[Xanda]

you're arguing not to be results-oriented and then in the same breath tell me to look at other national tournaments and usage stats

like come on throw me a cubone

I was pointing that that if you want to change something based solely on results you should consider more than a single tournament (i still think it's not a so great idea tbh).

 

[nightwolf]

you're arguing not to be results-oriented and then in the same breath tell me to look at other national tournaments and usage stats

like come on throw me a cubone

To be fair though, he's telling you to look at TWO tournaments instead of the ONE that you seem keen on having everything changed based off of. While either way its not the best idea to do, it's better to look at things from a broad perspective than just looking at the US regionals and going "Aha! See all these pokemon that we have so highly regarded? Players had them on their teams and they didn't do that well with them so clearly we overestimate them and they all need to be dropped while others be raised up because other players had them and did really well with them."

 

[Synral]

the one player who did well at US nationals with mega kangaskhan was wolfe glick, who got top 8 with it, being the only mega kangaskhan in the top 8. wolfe is ranked #1 in CP in the country, and among the highest in the world. kangaskhan is the most represented yet least successful mega of those who made it into top cut. that alone should tell you a bit about it. but here, let me talk about each of the shifts in greater detail

Kangaskhan S -> A+

khan is still very good, nobody's arguing that it sucks. what makes kangaskhan worse this metagame is that no matter what set or off the wall move it chooses to run, you're still losing so much momentum vs intimidate, and you're almost just down a slot vs any ghost type, which is a really hard disadvantage to just ignore. the other downfall kangaskhan has is that 100 is a very crowded speed tier to be in; you risk getting outsped by charizard, gardevoir post-mega and salamence pre-mega just to name a few. not only that, but when pokemon are defensively EV'd, the benchmark a lot of people start at is surviving 252+ Atk khan's double edge. let me put this into perspective; in the top 12, kangaskhan lives its own double edges with just 4/0 investment, and can live low kick with some defensive investment, landorus-t lives it after intimidate with no investment, almost every build of thundurus that runs sitrus berry lives it, sylveon can be built to live it, standard amoonguss lives it, heatran can live adamant low kick with significant investment or chople, aegislash in shield lives any unboosted sucker punch, charizard can live it, m-salamence can live it after intimidate with 4/0 investment, talonflame and bisharp will die to it, and pretty much any variant of cresselia can live it.

and most pokemon after a single intimidate can survive kangaskhan's attacks and be pretty well off. the reason kangaskhan is so good is because the metagame respects it, to the point where nearly every team is packing a way to survive its attacks on multiple pokemon or intimidate/wow (or both) to neuter its offensive presence. i still think kang is really good, but it is a one-trick pony, and when an entire metagame has had the better part of two years to adapt to that trick, it's only bound to get worse as time goes on.

Thundurus A+ -> S

for a pokemon with such frail looking defenses, thundurus has a lot of staying power when purely invested into bulk and imo stands as the biggest check to mega-salamence, oftentimes resisting its whole moveset. thundurus can disrupt just about everything in the metagame. there really isn't too much to be said about thundurus, but it really does benefit from landorus-t scaring away all the terrakion because without quick guard to block twave/taunt and the like, thundurus will leave its mark in nearly every game. and if the finals of masters was any indication, thundurus' ability to turn an otherwise unwinnable game into a potential coinflip is extremely underestimated. you can hate on swagger all you want, but when it wins you games you have no business winning otherwise, you have to concede to how ridiculous that move is

Gardevoir A -> A+

gardevoir is a pokemon that is capable of fulfilling several roles. in japan, it's preferred as the trick room setter to be paired alongside amoonguss and scrafty, whereas in the US, it's there to spam hyper voice and survive hits with its incredible special bulk and palatable physical bulk (after intimidate from scrafty and landorus-t) gardevoir has a number of nifty support options in will o wisp, taunt, and ally switch, but the standard seems to be psychic/hyper voice/protect with the last slot typically going to hidden power ground or trick room. even without investment, gardevoir has a gargantuan 165 sp. atk and a pixilate boost to spam hyper voice with. trace copying intimidate and things like swift swim and sand rush also come into play quite often, or it can opt for telepathy so that it can switch into things like landorus' earthquake. it's not the easiest mega to play, but it's probably one of the most rewarding so long as the team is built around it.

Tyranitar B+ -> A-

tyranitar is a huge part of what makes japan sand what it is. there's a number of approaches to it; most opt for choice scarf, as it makes tyranitar reasonably fast, giving it the niche of having a fast STAB rock slide. tyranitar does have its fair share of problems, though, the big one being the relatively low BP of its stab moves. the other is preserving tyranitar, which can be a difficult task no matter how you go about it. the choice scarf version doesn't have the luxury of protecting or additional bulk, but the chople and mega versions are quite slow and have the obvious flaw of having to take hits because of its low speed tier.

Landorus-I B- -> B

landorus-i is the alternative to excadrill and it trades having an unreachable speed tier for a much better intimidate matchup (expert belt HP Ice ohkos landorus-t and earth power in sand 2kos almost everything) 101 is a pretty unique speed tier to be in, it means you outrun all variants of kangaskhan and charizard, the latter being exceptionally useful because even with a timid nature, you can OHKO most variants with stone edge. the problem with landorus is that he still doesn't want to be staring at things he should be ohkoing like m-salamence and just gets hardwalled by a lot of bulky water types. life orb and expert belt are necessities to pick up OHKOs, so missing out on the focus sash that excadrill would typically be running in that slot kind of hurts too

Clefable A+ -> A

clefairy offers superior bulk and redirection and basically all the same moves, amoonguss has redirection, which, although weaker, moon has spore access which is a huge plus, and togekiss offers redirection + tailwind. at the end of the day, clefable tries to find a niche to separate itself from the pack, the biggest being its ability to ohko landorus-t with ice beam, something most other redirectors cannot do.

Metagross A+ -> A

metagross' home is on rain. rain beats its checks and counters and neutralizes its fire weakness. rain is very good. why is metagross not as good? because no matter what moves metagross runs it still gets beaten by a lot of common threats just by virtue of being unable to damage them. to make matters worse, metagross isn't even the best mega in rain. just as landorus-t and heatran threaten most variants of gross, they also threaten most variants of salamence, who supports rain better with intimidate and a higher speed tier and kill potential with double edge/return. metagross is a very matchup dependent pokemon and while very strong, it's almost a guarantee that it will struggle with one or more things in preview very much

 

[Pyritie]

I completely disagree with Kanga being moved down to A+. Regardless of its usage at the top cut, the metagame is still ridiculously warped around it and it's undeniable that if you don't have several checks to it, your team will be destroyed by one.

The top players might feel that it's over-prepared for, but that just speaks volumes about the size of its influence.

Kang for S.

 

[JBC]

Can I point out that Talonflame is listed under both A- and B?

 

[nightwolf]

the one player who did well at US nationals with mega kangaskhan was wolfe glick, who got top 8 with it, being the only mega kangaskhan in the top 8. wolfe is ranked #1 in CP in the country, and among the highest in the world. kangaskhan is the most represented yet least successful mega of those who made it into top cut. that alone should tell you a bit about it. but here, let me talk about each of the shifts in greater detail

Uh did you ever think that maybe there wasn't so many khan's in top cut was because khan didn't fit what their team needed or what they wanted to build their team around instead of whatever crusade you seem to be on against it? And as Pyritie said, it could also have been people felt that it would be too well prepared for to run against, which again is not a negative against khan.

Kangaskhan S -> A+

khan is still very good, nobody's arguing that it sucks. what makes kangaskhan worse this metagame is that no matter what set or off the wall move it chooses to run, you're still losing so much momentum vs intimidate, and you're almost just down a slot vs any ghost type, which is a really hard disadvantage to just ignore. the other downfall kangaskhan has is that 100 is a very crowded speed tier to be in; you risk getting outsped by charizard, gardevoir post-mega and salamence pre-mega just to name a few. not only that, but when pokemon are defensively EV'd, the benchmark a lot of people start at is surviving 252+ Atk khan's double edge. let me put this into perspective; in the top 12, kangaskhan lives its own double edges with just 4/0 investment, and can live low kick with some defensive investment, landorus-t lives it after intimidate with no investment, almost every build of thundurus that runs sitrus berry lives it, sylveon can be built to live it, standard amoonguss lives it, heatran can live adamant low kick with significant investment or chople, aegislash in shield lives any unboosted sucker punch, charizard can live it, m-salamence can live it after intimidate with 4/0 investment, talonflame and bisharp will die to it, and pretty much any variant of cresselia can live it.

and most pokemon after a single intimidate can survive kangaskhan's attacks and be pretty well off. the reason kangaskhan is so good is because the metagame respects it, to the point where nearly every team is packing a way to survive its attacks on multiple pokemon or intimidate/wow (or both) to neuter its offensive presence. i still think kang is really good, but it is a one-trick pony, and when an entire metagame has had the better part of two years to adapt to that trick, it's only bound to get worse as time goes on.

While intimidate is annoying, if you run something with competitive or defiant in your team along with khan, it'll deter players from bringing out an intimdate user at the start. And other than the occasional gengar/jellicent, how many ghosts do you think are around in VGC? The way you're wording this portion, it sounds like everyone and their grandmothers uncle runs at least 2 ghosts on their team. Just because players have to use a limited resource to train their pokemon to outlive something, it shouldn't be held as a negative to the attacking pokemon. The fact that all of those pokemon either need intimidate or need a decent amount of investment in defensive stats should bring praise too it.

I personally don't like khan and think it's overrated, but your reasoning for demoting it is just bad.

 

[Ksh13]

Uh did you ever think that maybe there wasn't so many khan's in top cut was because khan didn't fit what their team needed or what they wanted to build their team around instead of whatever crusade you seem to be on against it? And as Pyritie said, it could also have been people felt that it would be too well prepared for to run against, which again is not a negative against khan.


While intimidate is annoying, if you run something with competitive or defiant in your team along with khan, it'll deter players from bringing out an intimdate user at the start. And other than the occasional gengar/jellicent, how many ghosts do you think are around in VGC? The way you're wording this portion, it sounds like everyone and their grandmothers uncle runs at least 2 ghosts on their team. Just because players have to use a limited resource to train their pokemon to outlive something, it shouldn't be held as a negative to the attacking pokemon. The fact that all of those pokemon either need intimidate or need a decent amount of investment in defensive stats should bring praise too it.

I personally don't like khan and think it's overrated, but your reasoning for demoting it is just bad.

In terms of ghosts, there is Gengar, Jellicent, aaaaaand Aegislash, who was on 6/8 teams in top 8 masters iirc

 

[Synral]

i mean no, kangaskhan isn't a mega evolution that requires a team built around it, that's one of its biggest selling points. and yes, it being overly prepared for is a negative against kangaskhan. why would you go into a tournament playing kangaskhan when everyone and their mother has multiple answers to it? that's just asking for more work

i'm not sure how you got "everyone is running two ghosts" from what i said:

"and you're almost just down a slot vs any ghost type, which is a really hard disadvantage to just ignore."

aegislash is #7 in usage, and most teams were packing a ghost in top cut of some variety.

here's the short version of my argument: kangaskhan is very good. good to the point where the entire metagame has been forced to adapt to it. this is a hallmark of what makes an S-rank pokemon. however, the metagame has spent two years doing this and every single competent team packs multiple ways to check and counter it. this again, is with respect to kangaskhan, a testament to its strengths, but it also means that kangaskhan is going to have a harder time beating its opponents by a significant margin.

you argue that to deter intimidate you can just pack a bisharp or a milotic on the same team, and while reasonably true, that fits pretty well with the A-rank definition:
Reserved for Pokemon that function very well within the current VGC15 metagame. The Pokemon in this tier are either able to perform multiple roles to great effect, or execute one extremely well. Support Pokemon in this tier can create free turns, but not as easily as those in the S Rank.The flaws that the Pokemon in this tier may have are usually mitigated by their positive traits, or with minimal team support.

if kangaskhan needs intimidate deterrents or redirection to block will o wisp, or multiple answers to aegislash, that's more than "minimal" team support

 

[Pyritie]

if kangaskhan needs intimidate deterrents or redirection to block will o wisp, or multiple answers to aegislash, that's more than "minimal" team support

I wouldn't say adding a defiant/competitive mon to a kang team is a form of support, rather, that it's a way to take advantage of one of the common ways a lot of people try to weaken kang.

 

[nightwolf]

In terms of ghosts, there is Gengar, Jellicent, aaaaaand Aegislash, who was on 6/8 teams in top 8 masters iirc

I forgot aegislash *facepalm*

you argue that to deter intimidate you can just pack a bisharp or a milotic on the same team, and while reasonably true, that fits pretty well with the A-rank definition:
Reserved for Pokemon that function very well within the current VGC15 metagame. The Pokemon in this tier are either able to perform multiple roles to great effect, or execute one extremely well. Support Pokemon in this tier can create free turns, but not as easily as those in the S Rank.The flaws that the Pokemon in this tier may have are usually mitigated by their positive traits, or with minimal team support.

if kangaskhan needs intimidate deterrents or redirection to block will o wisp, or multiple answers to aegislash, that's more than "minimal" team support

Uh that's not really team support... That's just taking advantage of someone that could potentially want to intimidate your khan and boosting the partner so they can be threatening with it. If I was saying that it needed support, I would've said that it absolutely has to have a competitive/defiant partner with it or something with redirection to really make it shine. Did I say that? No. What I said was that there are ways to deter people from throwing out intimidaters all willy nilly to weaken khan. I don't know what you're reading but it is certainly not what I'm saying.

 

[Demantoid]

the one player who did well at US nationals with mega kangaskhan was wolfe glick, who got top 8 with it, being the only mega kangaskhan in the top 8. wolfe is ranked #1 in CP in the country, and among the highest in the world. kangaskhan is the most represented yet least successful mega of those who made it into top cut. that alone should tell you a bit about it. but here, let me talk about each of the shifts in greater detail

Kangaskhan S -> A+

khan is still very good, nobody's arguing that it sucks. what makes kangaskhan worse this metagame is that no matter what set or off the wall move it chooses to run, you're still losing so much momentum vs intimidate, and you're almost just down a slot vs any ghost type, which is a really hard disadvantage to just ignore. the other downfall kangaskhan has is that 100 is a very crowded speed tier to be in; you risk getting outsped by charizard, gardevoir post-mega and salamence pre-mega just to name a few. not only that, but when pokemon are defensively EV'd, the benchmark a lot of people start at is surviving 252+ Atk khan's double edge. let me put this into perspective; in the top 12, kangaskhan lives its own double edges with just 4/0 investment, and can live low kick with some defensive investment, landorus-t lives it after intimidate with no investment, almost every build of thundurus that runs sitrus berry lives it, sylveon can be built to live it, standard amoonguss lives it, heatran can live adamant low kick with significant investment or chople, aegislash in shield lives any unboosted sucker punch, charizard can live it, m-salamence can live it after intimidate with 4/0 investment, talonflame and bisharp will die to it, and pretty much any variant of cresselia can live it.

and most pokemon after a single intimidate can survive kangaskhan's attacks and be pretty well off. the reason kangaskhan is so good is because the metagame respects it, to the point where nearly every team is packing a way to survive its attacks on multiple pokemon or intimidate/wow (or both) to neuter its offensive presence. i still think kang is really good, but it is a one-trick pony, and when an entire metagame has had the better part of two years to adapt to that trick, it's only bound to get worse as time goes on.

Thundurus A+ -> S

for a pokemon with such frail looking defenses, thundurus has a lot of staying power when purely invested into bulk and imo stands as the biggest check to mega-salamence, oftentimes resisting its whole moveset. thundurus can disrupt just about everything in the metagame. there really isn't too much to be said about thundurus, but it really does benefit from landorus-t scaring away all the terrakion because without quick guard to block twave/taunt and the like, thundurus will leave its mark in nearly every game. and if the finals of masters was any indication, thundurus' ability to turn an otherwise unwinnable game into a potential coinflip is extremely underestimated. you can hate on swagger all you want, but when it wins you games you have no business winning otherwise, you have to concede to how ridiculous that move is

Gardevoir A -> A+

gardevoir is a pokemon that is capable of fulfilling several roles. in japan, it's preferred as the trick room setter to be paired alongside amoonguss and scrafty, whereas in the US, it's there to spam hyper voice and survive hits with its incredible special bulk and palatable physical bulk (after intimidate from scrafty and landorus-t) gardevoir has a number of nifty support options in will o wisp, taunt, and ally switch, but the standard seems to be psychic/hyper voice/protect with the last slot typically going to hidden power ground or trick room. even without investment, gardevoir has a gargantuan 165 sp. atk and a pixilate boost to spam hyper voice with. trace copying intimidate and things like swift swim and sand rush also come into play quite often, or it can opt for telepathy so that it can switch into things like landorus' earthquake. it's not the easiest mega to play, but it's probably one of the most rewarding so long as the team is built around it.

Tyranitar B+ -> A-

tyranitar is a huge part of what makes japan sand what it is. there's a number of approaches to it; most opt for choice scarf, as it makes tyranitar reasonably fast, giving it the niche of having a fast STAB rock slide. tyranitar does have its fair share of problems, though, the big one being the relatively low BP of its stab moves. the other is preserving tyranitar, which can be a difficult task no matter how you go about it. the choice scarf version doesn't have the luxury of protecting or additional bulk, but the chople and mega versions are quite slow and have the obvious flaw of having to take hits because of its low speed tier.

Landorus-I B- -> B

landorus-i is the alternative to excadrill and it trades having an unreachable speed tier for a much better intimidate matchup (expert belt HP Ice ohkos landorus-t and earth power in sand 2kos almost everything) 101 is a pretty unique speed tier to be in, it means you outrun all variants of kangaskhan and charizard, the latter being exceptionally useful because even with a timid nature, you can OHKO most variants with stone edge. the problem with landorus is that he still doesn't want to be staring at things he should be ohkoing like m-salamence and just gets hardwalled by a lot of bulky water types. life orb and expert belt are necessities to pick up OHKOs, so missing out on the focus sash that excadrill would typically be running in that slot kind of hurts too

Clefable A+ -> A

clefairy offers superior bulk and redirection and basically all the same moves, amoonguss has redirection, which, although weaker, moon has spore access which is a huge plus, and togekiss offers redirection + tailwind. at the end of the day, clefable tries to find a niche to separate itself from the pack, the biggest being its ability to ohko landorus-t with ice beam, something most other redirectors cannot do.

Metagross A+ -> A

metagross' home is on rain. rain beats its checks and counters and neutralizes its fire weakness. rain is very good. why is metagross not as good? because no matter what moves metagross runs it still gets beaten by a lot of common threats just by virtue of being unable to damage them. to make matters worse, metagross isn't even the best mega in rain. just as landorus-t and heatran threaten most variants of gross, they also threaten most variants of salamence, who supports rain better with intimidate and a higher speed tier and kill potential with double edge/return. metagross is a very matchup dependent pokemon and while very strong, it's almost a guarantee that it will struggle with one or more things in preview very much

First of all Mega Kangaskhan won japan nationals where Mega Salamence had a very poor showing. You can't just look at US nationals to base the best mega on. My opinions on these changes:

Kangaskhan S -> A+ why are you nominating regular Kangaskhan to S

I completely disagree with this. Almost all the pokemon you listed it speed tying it against barely ever run max speed besides pre-mega Salamence. Nobody is going to be running 252/244 defensive investment on a Charizard to survive adamant Double Edge or 252/168 with a bold nature on Heatran to survive adamant Low Kick. Most of the top 12 shows just how warped around Kangaskhan the metagame is. Intimidate can be overcome with Power Up Punch (which is what you should be running at this point). Kangaskhan also should run Return if everything will survive Double Edge anyway so it doesn't kill itself. Kangaskhan doesn't require any support (besides Aegislash maybe but Salamence struggles with Aegi more); it just becomes so much better with it whereas Salamence almost needs redirection.

Thundurus A+ -> S

I don't really care which way this one goes. I personally like Zapdos more since it is bulkier but Thundurus is still good.

Gardevoir B+ -> A+ (it wasn't A before)

Mega Gardevoir has shown that it is not just the faster Sylveon that can change moves with the recent showings at 2 nationals. With more Sylveon now being Pixie Plate or Life Orb Gardevoir also stronger than Sylveon. Its physical fraility is bad even with Intimidate support but can invest a lot in bulk and still hit hard. I think Gardevoir deserves A rank but not A+ because of how much support it needs. It basically requires redirection and Intimidate and needs an Aegislash check (starting to see a pattern there). Trace is a nice ability but I can't tell you how many times I've traced Intimidate with a Bisharp on the field ;(

Tyranitar B+ -> A-

I find Tyranitar extremely easy to play around. It either locks itself into a move with Choice Scarf or is extremely easy to outspeed and KO if it is not scarfed. The only reason people use Tyranitar is to set sand which imo isn't enough for A-

Landorus-I B- -> B

I agree with this just because it is one of the only Pokemon that can use a special ground type attack well. It also has pretty good coverage and does well against a lot of popular Pokemon in the meta.

Clefable A+ -> A

Clefable is basically outclassed by Clefairy. It's amazing abilities for singles are near useless in VGC. All it has over Clefairy is Sitrus Berry and more offense, but Clefable won't be picking up many ko's anyway.

Metagross A+ -> A

Metagross doesn't really hit hard enough compared to the other megas. Substitute is expected and isn't much of a surprise. Metagross will never beat Aegislash Aegislash for S and struggles against Heatran which are two of the best and most common Pokemon. It also doesn't check Kangaskhan as well as it should and doesn't take hits very well in general. Metagross is underwhelming compared to other megas in general. The only common Pokemon it has good matchups against are Sylveon Amoonguss Terrakion and Gardevoir.

 

[tofucocoa]

made changes.

tyranitar: B+ -> A- :: ttar has high stats, amazing movepool, and great ability. i guess it isn't something to underestimate after all.
gardevoir-mega: B+ -> A :: i've been looking at gardevoir just for fun before nats and japan nats, and i've been loving it. its builds are kinda like zardy where you dump a bunch of EVs into defenses, run a modest nature, outspeed something important (20 speed outspeeds bisharp outside of TR... try holding off on evolving to outspeed it under TR!), and let its ability and naturally high attack do most of the heavy lifting. you do have to keep it away from other megas, but you have like 5 team slots to help you with that. not to mention it does better than sylveon against amoonguss/venusaur and has a better matchup with zard than sylv thanks to STAB psychic. i could move it up to A+, but i would like to see more discussion on it, especially since i still see talk of stuff like ally switch, which is complete garbage and you shouldn't waste your time with ally switch mega gardevoir. encore and trick room are frankly the only support options gardevoir should be concerned with, or at the very least, shit that isn't fucking ally switch (using taunt and wow on garde is like running wow zard-y... it just doesn't work)
milotic: B+ -> A :: fits in with suicune in terms of landorus hate and bulky water stuff. it's more offensive if your opponent feeds it.
ludicolo: A- -> B+ :: rain with ludicolo needs to die or use protect ludicolo. ludi's naturally low stats means you need rain for it to have good speed and therefore a good pokemon, but then you're sacrificing two team slots for one good pokemon basically. its low base power moves relies on it getting super effective hits, and against kang... hope for a burn or you're getting double edged or sucker punched. ttar being more popular doesn't help it too much, even if it has a good matchup with ttar itself.
terrakion: A -> A- :: terrakion gets walled easily by aegislash like mega metagross and has a huge problem with redirection and intimidate. not to mention it gets creamed by the #1 mon, landorus-t, but it does create positive matchups with fire types, kang, and sand to an extent.
metagross-mega: A+ -> A- :: hard walled by aegislash, heatran, and bisharp (kinda). doesn't have an amazing matchup with stuff it should beat either (kangaskhan, mawile, salamence, even cress). still a powerhouse that checks problem pokemon.
garchomp: B+ -> B :: chomper is outclassed badly by landorus-t. that's about it, really.
Clefable A+ -> A :: outclassed slightly by clefairy. it could move back up though.

i will also ask you all to consider moving regular metagross up to C+. it's pretty good right now (well, better) with everyone's attention starting to shift towards gardevoir and megamence, and beats amoonguss/mega venusaur, cresselia, does well as a fighting check, and helps with fairy-types in general. that's mostly theorymon though, and of course it kinda struggles with a lot of the meta, but its niche seems a little stronger, much like the other stuff in C+.

also here's the garde spread i've been running!

gardevoir @ mega stone
trace/telepathy
modest nature
252 HP / 164 def / 68 spa / 4 spd / 20 spe

evs are for general physical bulk, outspeeds bisharp after mega, and ohkos bisharp after amoonguss rocky helmet damage.