np: ORAS OU Suspect Process, Round 6 - Purple Haze - Hoopa-U is now banned

[Albacore]

Guess I should probably make a proper post here

Honestly, pretty much all I would've said has been said already, I think Hoopa-U is able to make use of relatively minimal support far better than any Pokemon should, I think its ease of use, limited counterplay, low opportunity cost, and consistent effectiveness across multiple playstyles ranging from full stall to even bulky offense puts it leaps and bounds above any other wallbreaker, and I think having a Pokemon which can 2HKO the entire metagame with a single set is just not healthy. I don't think it's nearly as ridiculous as a lot of people are claiming it is, I don't think it's comparable to a single previous suspect this gen (nothing in Ubers is nearly as slow and physically frail as Hoopa-U, unless you count Shadow Tag Gothitelle which you shouldn't for pretty obvious reasons) and I certainly don't think banning it is a no-brainer or that it should have never been allowed in OU in the first place, but I do support a ban. Not much new here.


One thing I would like to touch upon is how it relates to skill. I've seen the argument that Hoopa-U does not punish, but rather, actively rewards skillful play. Which is true, I don't think anyone is seriously going to argue the opposite, no-one is saying Hoopa-U is uncompetetive. A good player will get more out of Hoopa-U than a bad player, and will be able to handle opposing Hoopa-U better as well. The problem with Hoopa-U in regards to skill it is that its risk/reward ratio is pretty unbalanced.

There are two ways you can play Hoopa-U. There's the "mindless spamming of dark STAB way" which is completely brainless to use skill, and which doesn't even take much skill in the teambuilder (building a halfway decent Hoopa-U team is just the easiest thing in the world). And yet, it's way more effective than it should be, certainly on the ladder, where, from my experience using it, Hoopa-U nets an average of 2-3 kills per battle without ever needing to click anything but it's Dark STAB. And yes, you can argue that it's because ladder teams are badly built, with players that don't know how to predict, etc. But still, I have never had as much success on the ladder with any team, or with so little effort, which is pretty distressing. You should at least have to try a little bit when you ladder, but that's not the case with Hoopa

Now, moving on to tour play, which is what's really important here, you obviously can't get away with just mindlessly using Hoopa-U's Dark STAB and expect it to pay off. You do need to predict a little. And yet, from the tour replays I've seen, Hoopa-U still doesn't seem to require much risk in order to use properly. You can point to TDK vs gingy, where TDK pulled a few good predictions with Hoopa-U and eventually broke through gingy's team, and argue that he didn't win because it is broken, but because he played well, and that in the hands of a worse player, Hoopa-U would not have been as successful, which is probably true to be honest. But skill also applies to the teambuilder, and between Clefable, SpD Heatran and Terrakion, gingy's team was already adequately prepared for Specs Hoopa-U (or at least, as well as one can expect on a balanced team like the one he was using). The fact that TDK dealt so much damage to it despite this shows how much Hoopa-U can devalue skill even in high-level play.

Essentially, Hoopa-U is either low-risk mid-reward or mid-risk high-reward, depending on how you play it. It negatively affects both ladder play and tour play by giving an unfair advantage to its user in both settings, and it does this to a much greater extent than any other OU Pokemon.
It may not be unbeatable, and it may be more weak to certain teams than others, but if you look at all playstyles and battling styles in general, it seems to me that preparing for and responding to Hoopa-U is a lot harder than it should be given how easy it is to use, that's what makes it overpowered to me.

 

[Get this Money]

ok so I decided to share my opinion on hoopa-u as well.
I think hoopa should be banned because of the sheer amount of power it has. Every time Hoopa gets a free turn to dish out an attack, its basically a gamble for almost any team, which is obviously a lot worse for defensive teams than offensive teams. Hoopa has the power and the movepool to OHKO anything that people will try to switch into it, I dont think that having something that is so powerful that its basically a guessing game every time it gets a free turn is healthy for the metagame. It adds randomness to the game because like I said, if it gets to attack something most likely dies, unless youre lucky and get the prediction right, and even then you might still lose your mon because you dont know its set in some cases, and it might end up having a move that fucks up your check, which is pretty likely considering how big hoopas movepool is.
It also restricts teambuilding in the way that basically every team that would be considered stall/semistall or even balance needs a tyranitar (or I guess a pursuit weavile) in order to prevent hoopa from just coming in and killing something over and over again, as its not possible to switch into it safely and youre basically at the risk of losing a mon every time hoopa gets to attack, which it can do quite often considering how many teams use stuff like slowbro, clef, hippo, heatran, skarm and other mons that are slower and quite passiv. And even though hoopa doesnt just switch into these mons and kill something every time, its really easy to force these mons in and either uturn/voltswitch out on them or double switch when they are forced in and I think everyone know that these type of mons are used to switch into voltswitch or u turn a lot.
Also since a lot of people are saying "hoopa isnt that good it dies to so many attacks" its not being suspected because of how well it takes hits, its being suspected because of its ability to kill something almost every time it gets a free switch.
On a final note: this kinda reminds me of the lando-i suspect, just with more power and less defensive capabilities, I think it would be silly to keep hoopa in the tier when we banned lando-i because of how hard it is to switch into it. Most people just dont want it banned because they refuse to use any breaker that cant just 2hko everything on switchin if you happen to click the right move.
I will expand this post/structure it a bit more later or tomorrow or whenever I find the time to do it

 

[Unknown Warrior]

The point of instituting a qualification requirement for public suspect testing is to ensure that those voting have some degree of skill and knowledge of the tier in question. A fully-open test is liable to having its results swayed by the uninformed, those who would be, for example, voting no-ban out of a reflexive hatred of Smogon bans in general, or those who assume the OU council is full of stall-lovers. By making voters actually earn their votes, the voters have the opportunity to experience the metagame under the conditions specified (without Unbound, in this case) and make a more informed decision. Sure, some people have their minds set from the beginning and will not be swayed--but at least they've had the exposure to potentially change their perspective.

As somebody who could scarcely dream of the skill level necessary to earn reqs, it bothers me too. But I can definitely see from my experience with previous suspect threads that there's a reason for things to be like this.

I know that but it feels like american politics where the rich decide how much the rich need to be taxed. I'd much rather have an appointed council decide the ban for this one than a pseudo-democratic vote.
Also this sounds way more serious than I thought it would.

 

[nLTk]

I know that but it feels like american politics where the rich decide how much the rich need to be taxed. I'd much rather have an appointed council decide the ban for this one than a pseudo-democratic vote.
Also this sounds way more serious than I thought it would.

Really not following you here. Why wouldn't you want the opportunity to earn reqs and opine on the situation yourself? I also don't follow your "rich decide how much the rich need to be taxed" analogy. Don't bans affect all players, experienced and inexperienced? Not trying to sound hostile, just trying to understand.

 

[Unknown Warrior]

Really not following you here. Why wouldn't you want the opportunity to earn reqs and opine on the situation yourself? I also don't follow your "rich decide how much the rich need to be taxed" analogy. Don't bans affect all players, experienced and inexperienced? Not trying to sound hostile, just trying to understand.

Again, I may not be too in the know for these things, but isn't a good deal of top OU players stall? The ones who most fear this set?
But I'm on the fence for this one anyway so my opinion isn't strong one way or the others. I both like and loathe Hoopa-U for its wallbreaking capabilities.

 

[toshimelonhead]

Again, I may not be too in the know for these things, but isn't a good deal of top OU players stall? The ones who most fear this set?
But I'm on the fence for this one anyway so my opinion isn't strong one way or the others. I both like and loathe Hoopa-U for its wallbreaking capabilities.

Top players are top players because they can play any playstyle effectively. They aren't just using Sableye stall or Hoopa-U offense.

 

[preserve]

Whether hoopa-u gets banned or not the metagame will become centralized. Banning hoopa will centralize the meta game to a more bulkier and balanced one while keeping hoopa-u will centralize it towards a more offensive one. Hoopa-U is a great wall breaker and in my opinion shouldn't be punished for it. There are other wall breakers like kyurem, terrak, mega cham, mega charizard x, and mega meta gross, but a made well team can work their way around them, which kind of negates the point of wall breakers. I'm not trying to say that teams can't find a way around hoopa, but hoopa just makes it a lot easier. It's a battle between which which play style is more likable and a defensive one usually ends up winning in smogon.

Also about the reqs. I do think that people should earn their right to vote, but I do think it's a bit strict. Just because you are unable to win 90 percent of your game's doesn't mean you don't know what you are doing, especially with hax having a decent influence in games.

 

[canadiane]

While Hoopa is a massive threat in the OU game today, I do not feel it is overcentralizing or “broken” enough to warrant a ban. I think everything about Hoopa’s potentials (especially the specs set) has been said already, so I won’t go too deep into that.

Hoopa’s piddling speed and paper-thin defense is what really holds it back. Many variations of Hoopa can pretty easily take out a Pokemon once it gets a switch-in, but it needs a free switch-in after a kill, a switch-in on something like a purely special mon, or a well-predicted Psychic move. Switching it in on any special move, white it has good SpDef, often puts it in range for common moves like Scarf Tar’s Pursuit and Offensive Mega Scizor’s BP.

Switching into Hoopa is extremely difficult especially for the specs set. But after Hoopa claims a victim, it gives the opposing player a switch to one of the many common checks to it like any reasonably fast Pokemon running U-turn (Scarf Lando, Torn-T, speedy or Scarf Jirachi, etc.). Any responsible player will switch out Hoopa but in turn lose momentum to the U-Turn which is a free click against Hoopa. Common Pursuit users such as Tyranitar and Weavile can remove Hoopa quickly while not being a liability on the team if the opposing player is not running Hoopa. Priority users (almost always physical) and faster physical mons can also easily check Hoopa. These types of mons are common, while Hoopa strongly influences teambuilding, I question whether or not it influences it more than mons like Keldeo, Azu, or Zard-X, which also have few switch-ins and are arguably harder to check (think +1/+1 Zard). I don’t want to get into a conversation about Hoopa’s similarities or differences to other mons (they obviously aren’t the same) but I think there are similarities in the effects they have on teambuilding.

I see the points made by GTM about how it isn't being suspected because it can take hits, but we need to consider a Pokemon's entire place in the metagame before deciding on a ban.

Hoopa has amazing offenses, but most common sets now are scarfed, specs, banded, etc. Being Choice-locked can be an issue, and requires skilled prediction on the part of the Hoopa user at higher levels of play. Mispredicting can put the Hoopa user in a bad position.

As of now, I think Hoopa is one of the premier offensive threats in the OU metagame. However its defense is ridiculously bad, and its speed leaves much to be desired. At this point I am leaning towards do not ban.

 

[Of Moose & Men]

Whether hoopa-u gets banned or not the metagame will become centralized. Banning hoopa will centralize the meta game to a more bulkier and balanced one while keeping hoopa-u will centralize it towards a more offensive one. Hoopa-U is a great wall breaker and in my opinion shouldn't be punished for it. There are other wall breakers like kyurem, terrak, mega cham, mega charizard x, and mega meta gross, but a made well team can work their way around them, which kind of negates the point of wall breakers. I'm not trying to say that teams can't find a way around hoopa, but hoopa just makes it a lot easier. It's a battle between which which play style is more likable and a defensive one usually ends up winning in smogon.

There's always got to be one of these kinds of posts in every suspect.
One suspect we're trying to make stall a useless playstyle, the next we're trying to make it super powerful.
It's never EVER that the suspect is just fucking broken or noncompetitive. . .
NEVER!
Let's not make this into a "Smogon prefers 'X' playstyle, that's the only reason this suspect is happening" thread.


BTW
"I'm not trying to say that teams can't find a way around hoopa"
Well, the rest of us are, since there is literally no "way around hoopa" outside of choose what dies then force it out. That's not a "way around" Hoopa U in case you were wondering.

 

[preserve]

BTW
"I'm not trying to say that teams can't find a way around hoopa"
Well, the rest of us are, since there is literally no "way around hoopa" outside of choose what dies then force it out. That's not a "way around" Hoopa U in case you were wondering.

They are plenty of CHECKS to hoopa-u. There was a thread not that long ago that made a list of all of hoopa-u's checks and there were like 20 listed.

 

[TerrorthornColt]

They are plenty of CHECKS to hoopa-u. There was a thread not that long ago that made a list of all of hoopa-u's checks and there were like 20 listed.

Again checks are much more different then counters. You can only carry so many checks to Hoopa-U and if you put 6 checks to Hoopa-U then it's obviously over centralizing.

 

[nLTk]

They are plenty of CHECKS to hoopa-u. There was a thread not that long ago that made a list of all of hoopa-u's checks and there were like 20 listed.

So list them. And while you're at it, list the calcs that show that it is a genuine check as opposed to a Pokemon that you can switch into Specs Hoopa-U ONCE only to lose its "check" status. Saying "there was a thread listing its checks" could not be less of an argument. I'm genuinely interested in hearing ways to check Hoopa-U.

 

[Norne]

They are plenty of CHECKS to hoopa-u. There was a thread not that long ago that made a list of all of hoopa-u's checks and there were like 20 listed.

You also forgot to say that only 2 overlap among those assuming no hp ice is used, it's a bit like M Lucario, you need to scout before you send your most likely to be destroyed 1 time check to the slaughterhouse.

 

[Vengeance417]

Whether hoopa-u gets banned or not the metagame will become centralized. Banning hoopa will centralize the meta game to a more bulkier and balanced one while keeping hoopa-u will centralize it towards a more offensive one. Hoopa-U is a great wall breaker and in my opinion shouldn't be punished for it. There are other wall breakers like kyurem, terrak, mega cham, mega charizard x, and mega meta gross, but a made well team can work their way around them, which kind of negates the point of wall breakers. I'm not trying to say that teams can't find a way around hoopa, but hoopa just makes it a lot easier. It's a battle between which which play style is more likable and a defensive one usually ends up winning in smogon.

There are still a bunch of decently powerful wallbreakers in the tier that give stall a good deal of trouble already. Specs Keldeo, Kyurem-B, Mega Zard Y, Banded Azu, Mega Gardevoir, Mega Medicham, Manaphy, BandTar, ect, so idk why people are making this assumption that stall will somehow get that much better with Hoopa-U out of the picture, because it simply won't be true.

Hoopa-U definitely needs the boot. While its Specs set is the reason for this suspect, it just adds on to this monster's many options such as LO, Scarf and Banded. It has coverage to hit just about everything in the tier for tremendous damage and when you bring something in on it, you're playing a game of Russian roulette. It's guaranteed to either get a kill or do serious damage whenever it gets a free turn, something that a lot of the wallbreakers I listed above can't do anywhere near as easily as Hoopa-U. Ban.

 

[preserve]

So list them. And while you're at it, list the calcs that show that it is a genuine check as opposed to a Pokemon that you can switch into Specs Hoopa-U ONCE only to lose its "check" status. Saying "there was a thread listing its checks" could not be less of an argument. I'm genuinely interested in hearing ways to check Hoopa-U.

For some reason, I can't find that thread(even though I saw it a day or two before the suspect began) and I can't remember all of them.

keldeo, t-ttar, mandibuzz, weaville, talonflame, clefable, klefki are all checks. Those are all that I can remember from the top of my head.

It's guaranteed to either get a kill or do serious damage whenever it gets a free turn, something that a lot of the wallbreakers I listed above can't do anywhere near as easily as Hoopa-U.

While this is true, I can argue it's not that easy to get this thing in for free, even with vol-turn.(I remember I got smacked using a vol-turn team with hoopa because my opponent would stay in on my volt-turns thus losing momentum) As I mentioned once before hoopa is really weak to priority users which are everywhere. I think some of these flaws that hoopa-u have are great enough to justify it's strength.

 

[Get this Money]

For some reason, I can't find that thread(even though I saw it a day or two before the suspect began) and I can't remember all of them.

keldeo, t-ttar, mandibuzz, weaville, talonflame, clefable, klefki are all checks. Those are all that I can remember from the top of my head.



While this is true, I can argue it's not that easy to get this thing in for free, even with vol-turn.(I remember I got smacked using a vol-turn team with hoopa because my opponent would stay in on my volt-turns thus losing momentum) As I mentioned once before hoopa is really weak to priority users which are everywhere. I think some of these flaws that hoopa-u have are great enough to justify it's strength.

weavile:
+1 252 Atk Hoopa Unbound Hyperspace Fury vs. 0 HP / 4 Def Weavile: 201-237 (71.5 - 84.3%) -- 75% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
great check, not even gonna start putting calcs for any of the fighting moves for this one lol

mandibuzz:
+1 252 SpA Hoopa Unbound Focus Blast vs. 248 HP / 108 SpD Mandibuzz: 224-264 (52.9 - 62.4%) -- 99.6% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
theres also trick which makes it completely useless and tbolt also could be used to 2hko after rocks w/o having to run specs

keld:
dies to any psychic attack and not really good considering this: +1 252 SpA Hoopa Unbound Dark Pulse vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Keldeo: 131-154 (40.5 - 47.6%) -- guaranteed 3HKO and the fact that every team has at least one solid counter to keld
+1 252 SpA Hoopa Unbound Focus Blast vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Keldeo: 262-309 (81.1 - 95.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

talon:
dies to anything with rocks up and gets ohkoed by every stab move if its offensive, and if its specially defensive, well:
+1 252 Atk Hoopa Unbound Hyperspace Fury vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Talonflame: 379-447 (105.5 - 124.5%) -- guaranteed OHKO
+1 252 SpA Hoopa Unbound Dark Pulse vs. 248 HP / 252+ SpD Talonflame: 219-258 (61 - 71.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
+1 252 SpA Hoopa Unbound Psyshock vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Talonflame: 318-375 (88.5 - 104.4%) -- 31.3% chance to OHKO
252 Atk Life Orb Hoopa Unbound Hyperspace Fury vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Talonflame: 329-387 (91.6 - 107.7%) -- 50% chance to OHKO
252 Atk Hoopa Unbound Hyperspace Fury vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Talonflame: 253-298 (70.4 - 83%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
while this is what its doing back to hoopa:
0 Atk Talonflame Acrobatics (110 BP) vs. 0 HP / 0- Def Hoopa Unbound: 168-198 (55.8 - 65.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
0 Atk Talonflame Brave Bird vs. 0 HP / 0- Def Hoopa Unbound: 183-216 (60.7 - 71.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

clef:
+1 252 SpA Hoopa Unbound Psyshock vs. 252 HP / 172 Def Clefable: 252-297 (63.9 - 75.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
+1 252 Atk Hoopa Unbound Gunk Shot vs. 252 HP / 172 Def Clefable: 480-566 (121.8 - 143.6%) -- guaranteed OHKO
252 Atk Life Orb Hoopa Unbound Gunk Shot vs. 252 HP / 172 Def Clefable: 416-491 (105.5 - 124.6%) -- guaranteed OHKO

klefki:
+1 252 SpA Hoopa Unbound Focus Blast vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Klefki: 189-223 (59.4 - 70.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
+1 252 Atk Hoopa Unbound Fire Punch vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Klefki: 308-364 (96.8 - 114.4%) -- 81.3% chance to OHKO
+1 252 Atk Hoopa Unbound Drain Punch vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Klefki: 154-182 (48.4 - 57.2%) -- 46.9% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

looking at your previous posts you really just wanna make up some excuses for how balanced hoopa is and how its needed in the tier because lazy teambuilding something with 160/170 attack stats and extremely spammable stabs+great coverage are great arent they? Hoopa is just the lazy way to beat any passiv team, because why would u use cores of mons that break for each other or a really good breaker with hw support or w/e if u can just throw hoopa on the team, right?
there are a lot of mons that are great at breaking holes in balance already, but hoopa seems to be the easiest way to do that, something like a m gard, m hera, lo chomp, thundi, kyurem or mmedi require a bit of team support and smart playing in order to break teams, while u can just click your stab and kill something most of the time if youre using hoopa instead, dont u think theres somethign wrong with that?

 

[toshimelonhead]

Hoopa has amazing offenses, but most common sets now are scarfed, specs, banded, etc. Being Choice-locked can be an issue, and requires skilled prediction on the part of the Hoopa user at higher levels of play. Mispredicting can put the Hoopa user in a bad position.

It's not that hard to predict with Hoopa-U.

Get Hoopa-U in on a U-Turn against something slow if the opponent does not have any pursuiters. When in doubt, spam dark moves, then switch out when the checks come in. Rinse and repeat until checks are gone. Then sweep with dark moves. Done. GG.

 

[Norne]

It's not that hard to predict with Hoopa-U.

Get Hoopa-U in on a U-Turn against something slow if the opponent does not have any pursuiters. When in doubt, spam dark moves, then switch out when the checks come in. Rinse and repeat until checks are gone. Then sweep with dark moves. Done. GG.

He doesn't really sweep, but the megagross, Mlopunny, Mmanectric and char X/Y really appreciate when their shared checks are gone or weakened enough after the other player sacks something to revenge kill Hoopa U, they really enjoy the free turn plus lack of checks at that stage of the game.

 

[BKC]

If metagame diversity is so important then why aren't we complaining about lack of HO in Adv - HO was really "invented" with set up sweepers in DPP. A question we need to ask and answer is at what point do we accept gamefreak's decisions in making tiering policy - they are the ones creating monsters regularly with 150+ base offenses and boosting moves, not smogon tiering policy.

there's plenty of hyper offense in advance, I recommend using a gen you understand to make your point instead

note I don't really care about hoopa, whether it stays or goes doesn't matter much to me. oras is great and fun to play but I think it's got bigger problems.

 

[Toxzn]

note I don't really care about hoopa, whether it stays or goes doesn't matter much to me. oras is great and fun to play but I think it's got bigger problems.

Kind of been thinking about this and I'm inclined to agree, also in reference to a point someone made early comparing hoopa to lando-i: I feel as though Lando-I had more things going for it, mainly speed, U-turn access and boosting moves such as rock polish which made it more difficult to stop.

Not to stray to far from the subject matter, while I agree Hoopa is strong I don't think it's as bad as people are making out. I think the argument of it being pursuit weak and having a crippling weakness to U-turn do make it pretty easy to lose momentum with hoopa and often result in it being lost early on.

The base speed of hoopa is kinda of an issue for me too, and choice locking into dark moves whilst being so weak to common pursuit users is definitely a huge problem.

Don't really have much more to say on the matter, I don't really care if Hoopa stays or goes, I think OU has bigger problems either way.

If I were to vote I would likely keep it.

Also the argument stall will dominate if hoopa leaves is dumb, plenty of other good stall breakers exist and using stall in ORAS OU comes with high risk because of this.

 

[Gengarino]

They are plenty of CHECKS to hoopa-u. There was a thread not that long ago that made a list of all of hoopa-u's checks and there were like 20 listed.

we aren't sayig hoopa can't be checked, the problem with those 20 pokemon is that some only work against certain playstyle of Hoopa ( im not saying variety is wrong, but that he can have a powerful set that can be mixed without spreading ev's and is not focused on one thing) and can be fooled by some changes, and can work with just 2 teamates

 

[squidlick]

The underlying problem with trying to check Hoopa-U is the inconsistency of the checks in question, which is only highlighted by Hoopa-U's high versatility.

Mandibuzz hard checks Hoopa pretty well...unless it's the Specs set with Thunderbolt. Even without Thunderbolt, Trick cripples Mandibuzz. Even Band and Life Orb can get past Mandibuzz with Gunk Shot and Focus Blast respectively after rocks.

A faster Pokemon is entering the field! Good luck switching it in if it doesn't carry an immunity to at least one coverage move. And even if you do, you have to guess whether the Hoopa is Scarfed or not. Crud. My Gengar just got outspeed.

Hooray, a Pursuit trapper! Better hope that Hoopa is Choice locked into something unfavorable(if at all). And if it's not Choice locked, Hoopa can turn the prediction argument against the trapper(it can eat at least one Pursuit if it doesn't switch out) and kill them off; any Fighting move kills off Tyranitar and Weavile. IN the case of the latter, Hoopa-U can 2HKO Weavile with Hyperspace Fury after rocks.

Hooray, priority! Pray Hoopa-U doesn't carry coverage specifically for Scizor or doesn't catch Bisharp on the switch! And Talonflame dies really easily to neutral hits.

And finally, Fairies. Gunk Shot is standard on all but Specs. Klefki's your best bet...pray Hoopa-U doesn't carry Fire Punch. Or Specs, Focus Blast can 2HKO without rocks.

And whatever Hoopa can't deal with, it's teammates handle. Unpredictable on its own, and has its shortcomings resolved by its other 5 buddies. This cannot be healthy for the meta game. And I like Hoopa-U a lot. To borrow a quote from Hoopa-U itself:

"Were you surprised? Why, Hoopa can do ANYTHING!...See? Hoopa is strong!"

Ban Hoopa-U

 

[Stathakis]

offense master stathakis is here...

first things first, stall was balanced in the wake of the goth ban before hoopa was released, and it was balanced when hoopa didn't really see use among top players. I don't know why taking away this tool that people haven't always had is going to make stall broken all of a sudden.

the reason I think hoopa should get the boot is that plain and simple it makes a lot of mons liabilities. like, if you run X mon and your opponent is running a hoopa, you're risking being put into a position where hoopa gets a kill or chunks 80% off something every time it comes in. things like spdef tran, slowbro, celebi, amoonguss--really any slow-ish defensive mon that uses special attacks to deal damage invites hoopa to come in and destroy. if you guys remember fighting against goth teams where you can't go to defensive mons because of fearing the double to goth, hoopa is similar in a lot of ways in my experience. so, bringing fat special attacking mons when the opponent has a hoopa puts the hoopa player at a massive advantage risk-reward wise, since every successful prediction by the hoopa player results in getting a kill or chunking half the health off the hoopa check, whereas every successful prediction by the hoopa opponent might result in him getting his rocks up or chunking 30% off the hoopa, or simply being able to go to his counter to some other mon at all without giving hoopa a turn. I think the reason the tour community finally gravitated towards specs is because it allows this sort of scenario to occur with the most efficiency for the hoopa player. with specs, the hoopa player doesn't have to worry TOO much about losing a 30% here and there, he can still use his hoopa the way he wants to and be getting guaranteed kills all the way until his hp hits 0 without life orb recoil influencing his predictions. the hoopa player also doesn't have to worry about getting scald or wisp burned, greatly increasing the number of things he can double on more safely without worrying about getting crippled if he mispredicts.

so like, a ton of OU mons become pretty unviable unless you're running pursuit alongside them, so that you can do the 1-for-1 thing where you sack your least important thing and then pursuit the hoopa. as long as you, like, predict correctly and don't lose your pursuiter and all that. and that's only if you're running pursuit. if you're not, you're kinda fucked. the most successful oras ou player this spl was one ABR, and I think he used a pursuit mon on his team in like 9/11 games or something like that? talk about the picture of a healthy meta. like, I don't think you can run anything in the metagame other than "spam 6 physical attacking mons faster than hoopa" without a pursuit trapper because it'll just lose to hoopa + any other kind of mon that can beat a half-crumbled defensive core. the fuck kind of meta is that.


anyway, I'm not going to address the set-guessing game stuff where u lose a mon if u get the set wrong or anything like that even though they're all true and all good arguments to ban, I just wanted to offer some thoughts that I didn't see expressed in the first few posts I read. namely, if you build a certain way you will be on the back foot risk-reward wise the entire time. some dude was pointing out SPL replays where "the player using hoopa predicted correctly and got rewarded." I fucking HATE this attitude on smogon, where every turn is a fucking 5050 in the eyes of the smogtours chat and there are no other factors at play other than "what is my opponent gonna predict me to do." what he didn't bother to tell you in his expert coin-flip analysis was that the risk being assumed by the hoopa player is much less, giving him a lot more flexibility to "make plays" since he can get one or two wrong and still be fine, whereas every wrong prediction by his opponent costs 1/6 of his team. the ease with which hoopa creates this lopsided risk-reward dynamic that I just outlined is what pushes it over the edge, in my opinion.

ban

again, these thoughts are coming from a player who loves offense and hates using bulky shit

 

[preserve]

weavile:
+1 252 Atk Hoopa Unbound Hyperspace Fury vs. 0 HP / 4 Def Weavile: 201-237 (71.5 - 84.3%) -- 75% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
great check, not even gonna start putting calcs for any of the fighting moves for this one lol

mandibuzz:
+1 252 SpA Hoopa Unbound Focus Blast vs. 248 HP / 108 SpD Mandibuzz: 224-264 (52.9 - 62.4%) -- 99.6% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
theres also trick which makes it completely useless and tbolt also could be used to 2hko after rocks w/o having to run specs

Hoopa has does have to hit 2 focus blasts, and while it does get wrecked by thunderbolt a choice locked move does require prediction. While prediction does go both ways this can be an argument for the choice locked pokemon. Also mandibuzz tanks any physical variant of hoopa.

keld:
dies to any psychic attack and not really good considering this: +1 252 SpA Hoopa Unbound Dark Pulse vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Keldeo: 131-154 (40.5 - 47.6%) -- guaranteed 3HKO and the fact that every team has at least one solid counter to keld
+1 252 SpA Hoopa Unbound Focus Blast vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Keldeo: 262-309 (81.1 - 95.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

If keldeo comes in for free it out speeds and kills it off with secret sword, it can also take a dark type move and KO it back.

talon:
dies to anything with rocks up and gets ohkoed by every stab move if its offensive, and if its specially defensive, well:
+1 252 Atk Hoopa Unbound Hyperspace Fury vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Talonflame: 379-447 (105.5 - 124.5%) -- guaranteed OHKO
+1 252 SpA Hoopa Unbound Dark Pulse vs. 248 HP / 252+ SpD Talonflame: 219-258 (61 - 71.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
+1 252 SpA Hoopa Unbound Psyshock vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Talonflame: 318-375 (88.5 - 104.4%) -- 31.3% chance to OHKO
252 Atk Life Orb Hoopa Unbound Hyperspace Fury vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Talonflame: 329-387 (91.6 - 107.7%) -- 50% chance to OHKO
252 Atk Hoopa Unbound Hyperspace Fury vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Talonflame: 253-298 (70.4 - 83%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
while this is what its doing back to hoopa:
0 Atk Talonflame Acrobatics (110 BP) vs. 0 HP / 0- Def Hoopa Unbound: 168-198 (55.8 - 65.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
0 Atk Talonflame Brave Bird vs. 0 HP / 0- Def Hoopa Unbound: 183-216 (60.7 - 71.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

Talonflame can revenge kill hoopa and OHKO's it back. Revenge killing something is considered a check.

clef:
+1 252 SpA Hoopa Unbound Psyshock vs. 252 HP / 172 Def Clefable: 252-297 (63.9 - 75.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
+1 252 Atk Hoopa Unbound Gunk Shot vs. 252 HP / 172 Def Clefable: 480-566 (121.8 - 143.6%) -- guaranteed OHKO
252 Atk Life Orb Hoopa Unbound Gunk Shot vs. 252 HP / 172 Def Clefable: 416-491 (105.5 - 124.6%) -- guaranteed OHKO

Can come in on a locked dark move and scare if off with moon blast.

klefki:
+1 252 SpA Hoopa Unbound Focus Blast vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Klefki: 189-223 (59.4 - 70.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
+1 252 Atk Hoopa Unbound Fire Punch vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Klefki: 308-364 (96.8 - 114.4%) -- 81.3% chance to OHKO
+1 252 Atk Hoopa Unbound Drain Punch vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Klefki: 154-182 (48.4 - 57.2%) -- 46.9% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

klefki can take a hit and priority status it and not that many people run fire punch anymore.

dont u think theres somethign wrong with that?

No, because the best play isn't always the most rewarding play. Not everyone will make the best play and play the way you'd expect.

 

[Of Moose & Men]

Yea, let's just remove the fact that in literally EVERY one of those scenarios, Hoopa had to have killed something the turn before. Otherwise you have balls of steel or just plain stupid. And then it just switches out and waits for its chance to do it all over again.
You can grasp at straws all day, you're only digging a bigger hole for yourself.

None of those "come in for free", since when is losing a Pokemon "coming in for free"?
I haven't been gone that long, yeesh.