Metagame np: DOU Stage 1 - Safe and Sound | Jirachi Banned! (Read New Suspect System Thoroughly)

[Idyll]

I could lift you up
I could show you what you want to see
And take you where you want to be

You could be my luck
Even if the sky is falling down
I know that we'll be safe and sound
We're safe and sound
​

Welcome to the first ever Suspect Test of SM Doubles OU! In about two weeks, we'll be putting Jirachi under the microscope. Jirachi is a longstanding member of the Doubles OU metagame, and the only one as of now to be suspected not for its offensive prowess but rather for its ability to support teammates. With access to Follow Me, high bulk, and stellar defensive typing in Steel / Psychic that gives it numerous resistances, Jirachi is capable of supporting teammates for extended periods by redirecting hits. It also has access to numerous speed control options such as Icy Wind (the most common one), Trick Room, and Thunder Wave. Jirachi also boasts Iron Head, which, with its ability Serene Grace, allows it to stun slower, bulkier checks that can otherwise it and its partner. The valuable support Jirachi can provide has always been a controversial part of Doubles OU even in the older generations; with its ability to support teammates possibly a game-breaker and unhealthy to have in the metagame, Jirachi is now being up for suspect.

As usual, the only requirements to vote for the suspect are the ladder points required further below on the post. There are NO posting requirements; still, we advise everyone to actually read the arguments others present for and against Jirachi's brokenness (or lack thereof) and still attempt to participate in discussion on this thread. A sheer volume of people saying one thing or another will change nobody's opinion so make sure you're actually doing something to make people think.

Important NEW THING!: The ladder will only be open for six days. Yes, you read that right! The suspect ladder will now only be open for three days on the weekend period only and there will be two laddering periods. This will hopefully concentrate competitive players into a tigher time period as they now can't play games on weekdays against less (high level) competition, alleviating concerns about the competitiveness of the suspect ladder.

The way we're going to do this is as follows:

1. The Doubles Suspect Ladder will be up for 3 days. Saturday, Sunday, Monday (Start time 12:01am GMT -5 Saturday [3/4 to 3/6])
2. Players who achieve the reqs during that timeframe will be able to post in the reqs thread
3. The Doubles Suspect Ladder will be taken down at 12:01am Tuesday GMT -5 and the old Doubles Ladder will return
4. The Doubles Suspect Ladder will return at 12:01am Friday GMT -5 and stay up for 3 days (Friday, Saturday, Sunday [3/10 to 3/12])
5. The Suspect Ladder should go down at 12:01am GMT -5 Monday

Note: The ladder rankings from the first laddering period will carry over to the second. Also, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday should be the standard for the plan moving forward, but we decided to use Monday for now for the first session to give room for the conclusion of the Doubles Laddering Tour laddering stage.

Jirachi will be allowed on the suspect ladder.

The B value for this suspect is 14.5. One will need to achieve a COIL of 2600 to qualify. In addition, one will also be required to have a minimum of 77 GXE with a game limit of 60 maximum.
N=14.5/log2(40*GXE/2600)

These numbers were crunched by our local Doubles Magician kamikaze and not me because I suck at math lol!

Remember to keep an open mind in this suspect! Please respect the opinions of others; remember, just because you believe in your side doesn't mean the other is wrong!

Have fun

 

[miltankmilk]

My feelings on Jirachi haven't really been hidden since the middle/end of ORAS and they really haven't changed. Since the last Jirachi suspect this pokemon has only gotten better and has found more pokemon to support to the point where counterplay is extremely limited. While Jirachi + Azumarill has seen a decline in usage and perhaps a bit in viability, its still super strong but with terrains there's more counterplay, pokemon like Mega Salamence and Zygarde take advantage of Jirachi just as effectively if not more so than threats that existed in SM. Jirachi has become perhaps even better defensively as well as its one of the best checks to Mega Salamence and the "Psychic-spam" teams that were initially very popular and are still quite potent.

Now you could argue that "Jirachi is passive, why ban that when you could ban the pokemon abusing Jirachi and then sweeping teams?" I wholeheartedly believe that if Jirachi were banned Zygarde, Azumarill (probably not mence because its pretty busted with or without rachi) and other pokemon that abuse Jirachi's Follow Me become much more manageable threats and would most likely create a healthier, more stable metagame.

I dont like long posts because I wouldn't read it anyway but I hope this suspect actually generates discussion. Jirachi is about as polarizing a topic as it gets in DOU and even I have tried to see the other side on this. I'm hopeful this new suspect system will ensure that voters are actually knowledgable on doubles and that we can Make Doubles Great Again, but if you are new to doubles and reading my post then please try and read up on what does or doesn't make rachi banworthy.

 

[Bughouse]

assuming I can even get reqs within the hilariously short time frame that punishes people who have lives, I will be voting no ban.

Jirachi is not performing the kind of team support that could sometimes break the meta in XY or ORAS. The meta is much less favorable to it and Z-Moves enable many Pokemon to break through that might not have before.

Kanga is running a set that takes it on better.
Zapdos is better than ever.
Heatran is better than ever.
Hoopa-U is better than ever.
Zygarde is better than ever.
Milotic is better than ever (oh and totally takes advantage of those Icy Winds kek)
Aegislash (still) beats it.
Celesteela beats it.
Tapu Koko beats it.

Yes, Jirachi still offers good team support to most any team because Follow Me is a good move and 100/100/100 bulk and very good neutrally defensive typing pairs well with it. But as long as you're not running psychic spam, you'll do fine against it. Every other top mon in the meta is doing fine against Rachi.

The only differences to the meta that are AT ALL favorable to Jirachi are 1) Tapu Lele + Mega Metagross and/or Deo-A teams are totally cockblocked and 2) a few good set up mons especially Mence and Zygarde. The first suspect's focus should have been on one of these two factors, which would have left Jirachi less useful in a metagame already not super great for it.

 

[nadando]

I'm going to try my best to clearly articulate my thoughts about the suspect, although I've been feeling a bit out of touch with the meta as of late. Bear with me here.

I'd first like to call attention to the grounds on which the suspect has been called. Jirachi certainly isn't broken, like Zygarde-C, and neither is it uncompetitive, like Eevee pass. This leaves "unhealthy." This term is quite subjective, and I think that's rather worrisome in itself. When dealing with suspects for "unhealthy" Pokemon, it's pretty hard to objectively prove anything (whether you're pro ban or against). Thus many voter decisions end up boiling down to personal preference, that is, whether they find the Pokemon annoying or not. If the community doesn't take a good look at what the consequences of banning said Pokemon might be, we could end up with a far worse metagame than we anticipated.

This leads me to my second point. Currently, Jirachi serves the role as one of the best checks to Mega Salamence and Tapu Lele (+ Deoxys or Metagross), arguably two of the biggest threats right now. Mega Salamence, especially, would thrive in a metagame without Jirachi. Although these Pokemon certainly have other checks, by removing Jirachi it could quite easily be the "tipping point" and lead to a slurry of other suspects.

On the flip side of the argument, Jirachi's access to Follow Me and great defensive typing allow it to support such a large variety of attackers that it often exasperates problems of team match up. If your team is a bit weak to an opposing Pokemon, you have to constantly apply pressure in order to prevent both Jirachi and said attacker from coming in, which may force you to make some suboptimal plays. This, combined with Jirachi's other great supportive options, make Jirachi a massive threat (albeit a situational one), even at team preview.

While I certainly can see why some may deem Jirachi as unhealthy, and there's no easy solution to this problem, I'm currently leaning towards a no ban vote. Since multiple subsequent bans will be a necessity after Jirachi goes, it's going to cause more problems than it solves. Ultimately, the goal of any Smogon metagame is to stay as true to the original game as possible. The fewer the bans, the better.

In closing, I'd like to say that I hope everyone keeps an open mind about this. Jirachi is quite a controversial subject, and many people may be biased from the previous ORAS suspect test and council vote. Like the OP says, "remember, just because you believe in your side doesn't mean the other is wrong!"

 

[GenOne]

I'm on the fence about how I feel, and I'm probably going to keep a close pulse on this discussion to help guide which direction I want to vote.

That said, let's hone in on what everyone seems to think is the problem with Jirachi: it makes it too easy for setup sweeper wincons to get up their stat boosts.

The prominent setup sweepers rn that benefit from Jirachi include:

• Azumarill: Tries to get off a free Belly Drum while Jirachi eats hits, giving it +6 Atk which is more than enough to OHKO targets that don't resist Aqua Jet. Once Azumarill gets its +6, it's just gonna bop things every turn until it's stopped, and stopping it is tough af especially if Jirachi is still on the field. Psychic Terrain negates priority and nerfs Aqua Jet, but AzuRachi teams have opposing Tapus in the back -- AV Bulu in particular is adept at switching into hits without giving a fuck. Also, Jirachi commonly packs Trick Room, which allows Azumarill to sweep without the need for a priority move. Sun Teams nerf Azu's Aqua Jet down to a managable 20 BP attack, but most good Azu teams I've seen have strong sun checks like Lando-T or Tapu Koko. The best counterplay to AzuRachi is not letting them get onto the field together, and tbh this works a lot of the time. As OP as AzuRachi is once the BD goes off, it's far from mindless cheese; in a highly competitive match, I almost feel like the AzuRachi user deserves to win if they have the wit to get off the BD in the face of pressure to the contrary. Alas, there are some otherwise viable teams that simply have lackluster matchups against AzuRachi, so if there's an arguement for AzuRachi to be broken, it's that it forces you to bring an ironclad counter to it.
  
  
• Zygarde: Zygarde is threatening af after it gets off a few DDs, but tbh I've never lost to Zygarde and thought that Jirachi was the problem. The thing with Zygarde is that it hits like a wet noodle before it sets up, and all you have to do to counterplay it is keep switching in Intimidate supporters like Lando-T or Salamence. At -1 Zygarde is actually kind of pathetic. If anything, Zygarde + Milotic is the core to be worried about. But with all that said, Jirachi does a fantastic job of redirecting ice beams, ice punches and hp ices and that matters a lot. It also redirects Moonblasts from Fini and Lele, but imo people just need to see the value of running Dazzling Gleam -- especially on Fini. Scald hits Aegi which Wide Guards the Muddy Waters, while Dazzling Gleam bypasses the Rachis that eat Moonblasts...but I digress. But real talk, Zygarde is kind of easy to wear down with spread attacks as long as you keep its attack below +1.
  
  
• Mega Salamence: Most of what I said about Zygarde also applies to Mega Salamence, except that it actually hits hard even before the boosts. But on the other hand, bulky steels pretty much wall Mega Salamence even after a DD unless they are running Earthquake, and if they're running EQ Rachi isn't staying in for long, so Jirachi isn't the problem imo. If anything, Jirachi is better at checking Salamence than it is at supporting it, even if it excels at both roles.
  
  
• Tapu Fini: Tapu Fini can set up fine without Jirachi, especially in the end game. It has the typing and bulk to pull it off without support. Next!
  
  
• Snorlax: This is more of a niche thing, but Rachi does a fantastic job of supporting Belly Drum Snorlax because it can redirect attacks AND set up Trick Room. This is easy to counter if you can snipe out Jirachi early on, though.

I guess the tl;dr of this all is that I'm really undecided on what I think about Jirachi, but if it's broken it's mainly because of AzuRachi imo. Zygarde, Mence and Fini aren't really broke because of Jirachi. They can adapt to a rachi-less meta and do the same things imo. I'm torn because there isn't really a setup sweeper that *needs* Jirachi that can be pulled off without a lot of skill and sick predictions, but...but...I just need someone to convince me either way :I

Also on another note: I think the concept of having the suspect being limited to 6 days across two weekends is a great concept, but it would've been nice to have a bit more advance notice on this...rip anyone that already made plans for this weekend or even next weekend :/

 

[Derivatives]

entering this discussion with limited experience i would like to bring up the point that a lot of this meta's top mons are crazy weak to mega diancie and would struggle immensely when diancie is sitting next to a jirachi, and perhaps the opposing team would feel incredibly exposed, possibly needing a jirachi of their own... and no i'm not suggesting that we look into mega diancie upon its release as we have several alternatives to jirachi in terms of diancie checks, such as celesteela, lando-t, aegislash, megagross, the return of skymin, deo-a, scarf lele, bronzong, genesect, milotic, amoonguss, azumarill, fini, koko, bulu, sylveon, rotom-w, and the rest of them. it's just that most of those mons are rendered utterly useless against jirachi just like last gen. amoonguss would at least be weak to lots of the things that would cause problems for diancie and can be ignored through the simple act of putting on goggles or using a grass type. i say we should ban it now, this meta with mega diancie will not be good imo and the wrong thing will be banned again just like i think happened during the mence suspects in oras.

 

[Yellow Paint]

entering this discussion with limited experience i would like to bring up the point that a lot of this meta's top mons are crazy weak to mega diancie and would struggle immensely when diancie is sitting next to a jirachi, and perhaps the opposing team would feel incredibly exposed, possibly needing a jirachi of their own... and no i'm not suggesting that we look into mega diancie upon its release as we have several alternatives to jirachi in terms of diancie checks, such as celesteela, lando-t, aegislash, megagross, the return of skymin, deo-a, scarf lele, bronzong, genesect, milotic, amoonguss, azumarill, fini, koko, bulu, sylveon, rotom-w, and the rest of them. it's just that most of those mons are rendered utterly useless against jirachi just like last gen. amoonguss would at least be weak to lots of the things that would cause problems for diancie and can be ignored through the simple act of putting on goggles or using a grass type. i say we should ban it now, this meta with mega diancie will not be good imo and the wrong thing will be banned again just like i think happened during the mence suspects in oras.

Smogon tiers for the current meta, not hypotheticals. We can't even begin to guess what the meta will look like when/if garde and diancie are freed. If the meta changes, we can always do a retest.

That said, I'm a bit undecided on jirachi. On one hand, figy berry is really, really annoying. Even though it's standard, it's still absolutely infuriating to suddenly have another 50% more of jirachi to deal with. It almost feels like rachi has inherited something equivalent to amoong's regenerator recovery in terms of longevity.

On the other hand, most mons rn either dent it with powerful stab neutral hits, or they run ep or some other coverage or spread moves. This general preparedness may be a consequence of the meta adapting to rachi or simply overlap from an offensive meta. Either way, even psychic spam doesn't truly "click x" to rachi because of the many options available for the rest of the team to check it.

 

[Sylveon.]

Well, I am not gonna stress on what rachi does in general, as most of the above posts have explained that pretty well. While it does have plenty of positive aspects, but I feel like the meta-game to support various stuff that rachi "walls" like mence, psychic spam is much better prepared for it. Umm, for an example running a fire type along with your psychic spam team, isn't because of jirachi, it's to take care of steels in general.
I have personally been using a lot of azu-rachi(probably one of the main reasons for the suspect) this gen, and in most matchups against somewhat decent players, I've never felt like that because of jirachi I could belly drum my azu whenever i wanted, as with terrains and stuff, there are lots of other factors which have to be kept in mind, rather than just clicking aqua jet 100% of time.
Coming back to my point of meta being prepared for it, it actually relatively easy to get past rachi for mons this gen, courtesy the introduction of z-moves and change in various standard sets like seismic toss set for mega-kang. Also, though steel/psychic is stellar defensively, but still it has to suffer from a weakness from common fire and ground attacks which are prominent like ever.
So, right now though I am biased towards a NO Ban if I get time to ladder, but yeah I hope a healthy discussion continues on this thread.

 

[Big_Danny_Mason]

Does this mean that after the ladder goes down over the weekend people's ladder rankings will reset for the next weekend?

 

[kamikaze]

Does this mean that after the ladder goes down over the weekend people's ladder rankings will reset for the next weekend?

Important NEW THING!: The ladder will only be open for six days. Yes, you read that right! The suspect ladder will now only be open for three days on the weekend period only and there will be two laddering periods. This will hopefully concentrate competitive players into a tigher time period as they now can't play games on weekdays against less (high level) competition, alleviating concerns about the competitiveness of the suspect ladder.

The way we're going to do this is as follows:

1. The Doubles Suspect Ladder will be up for 3 days. Saturday, Sunday, Monday (Start time 12:01am GMT -5 Saturday [3/4 to 3/6])
2. Players who achieve the reqs during that timeframe will be able to post in the reqs thread
3. The Doubles Suspect Ladder will be taken down at 12:01am Tuesday GMT -5 and the old Doubles Ladder will return
4. The Doubles Suspect Ladder will return at 12:01am Friday GMT -5 and stay up for 3 days (Friday, Saturday, Sunday [3/10 to 3/12])
5. The Suspect Ladder should go down at 12:01am GMT -5 Monday

Note: The ladder rankings from the first laddering period will carry over to the second. Also, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday should be the standard for the plan moving forward, but we decided to use Monday for now for the first session to give room for the conclusion of the Doubles Laddering Tour laddering stage.

 

[OrangeFluffy Sheep]

Nearly every discussion of some potentially broken thing seems to include the caveat of Jirachi support. The thing is just way too good at redirecting and there's no good way to punish it. It can barely survive Aegislash's Shadow Ball and Hoopa-U's Hyperspace Fury. With max HP and 275 special defense or more, it always survives Heatran's Fire Blast. While a lot of the big offensive guys can 2HKO it, that's still two hits it is ensuring it's partner does not have to take. More than that, if a Pokemon is not using one of its four weaknesses, it can be extremely hard to break. LO Tapu Koko barely 2HKOs on 404/283 special defense, and anything less than that - which is a lot - is taking way too long to get in. Things without spread moves have to be able to hit Jirachi extremely hard to be useful, and that's a very narrow list.

It can do so much more than just Follow Me. Jirachi has Helping Hand and Icy Wind to help its partner deal damage and control speed. It also has Trick Room, Gravity, dual screens, and more. It is a one-stop support option. If it had Heal Pulse it could do every utility function. Though it is more often than not redirecting, there is no guarantee how exactly Jirachi is helping out. It can just do so much.

Offensively, its Iron Head is respectable on things that don't resist Steel even without flinch, providing decent chip damage with a likely chance of robbing turns at complete random. It can run other offensive moves if need be, most notably Thunderbolt/Thunder to hit waters that resist steel and to provide a fair paralysis chance.

Between its bulk and its utility, it catapults too many strong options even further with its varied and powerful support options, and represses too many things not blessed with the right offensive types, just because they can't hit Jirachi and just Jirachi correctly. I am Pro-Ban because of how hard it forces the metagame to contort around these facts.

 

[Matame]

assuming I can even get reqs within the hilariously short time frame that punishes people who have lives, I will be voting no ban.

Jirachi is not performing the kind of team support that could sometimes break the meta in XY or ORAS. The meta is much less favorable to it and Z-Moves enable many Pokemon to break through that might not have before.

Kanga is running a set that takes it on better.
Zapdos is better than ever.
Heatran is better than ever.
Hoopa-U is better than ever.
Zygarde is better than ever.
Milotic is better than ever (oh and totally takes advantage of those Icy Winds kek)
Aegislash (still) beats it.
Celesteela beats it.
Tapu Koko beats it.

Yes, Jirachi still offers good team support to most any team because Follow Me is a good move and 100/100/100 bulk and very good neutrally defensive typing pairs well with it. But as long as you're not running psychic spam, you'll do fine against it. Every other top mon in the meta is doing fine against Rachi.

The only differences to the meta that are AT ALL favorable to Jirachi are 1) Tapu Lele + Mega Metagross and/or Deo-A teams are totally cockblocked and 2) a few good set up mons especially Mence and Zygarde. The first suspect's focus should have been on one of these two factors, which would have left Jirachi less useful in a metagame already not super great for it.

Problem is half of the pokemon you listed barely 2hk0 if (in most cases a 3hko after sitrus). Pair it with a set up mon like azu and you've got the reason why i'd implore people to vote ban. Jirachi is insanely bulky and forces you to consistently pressure it to prevent it's partner from setting up/koing something ect. It forces you to not have too many pokemon on your team that can't deal good enough damage at it to prevent it being a problem late game when paired with a threat. All the jirachi user needs to do is orchestrate their board position well enough so that the 2 opposing pokemon aren't an insane direct threat to rachi so it lets its partner get free set up. Spread moves aren't rly that good of a check since said jirachi partner usually has a fairly good matchup vs spread attacks that would threaten rachi, e.g Zygarde vs heat wave, azu vs muddy water/rain. Well built rachi teams focus on piloting the innate advantage rachi gets from merely being in team preview as the opponent must prevent letting rachi get in for free vs mons that don't have the ability to 0hko or 2hko; unless your team is like 6 straight steel checks you're going to have mons that simply can't do much to rachi. Its influence on dictating how your opponent plays and limitations in terms of building that require you to consistently pressure it lead me to believe this mon is busted.

 

[FloristtheBudew]

Yeah I'm actually screwed for this now lol. Didn't have enough time this weekend to do the reqs and Melbourne IC next weekend :( Definitely if possible let us know more in advance next time if you're going to do the two weekend thing as I really wanted to participate in the rachi suspect.

 

[Braverius]

Man you have Tapu Lele, Hoopa-U, and Zygarde in the tier running over peoples' faces and you want to suspect test Jirachi? I'd love to write four paragraphs about how ridiculous this is but I think you're putting the cart before the horse here, Jirachi being good is the result of the other stupid Pokemon, not the other way around. It helps teams get around Lele + Psychics (which would be even more busted without it), it helps support Zygarde which would still be more obnoxious to play against than Azumarill ever was in previous years, and it keeps Hoopa from being even more stupidly broken than it already is by providing the only decent redirection in the format.

Okay fine, I'll go two paragraphs. It's also a Pokemon that's exceptionally versatile. It can Icy Wind, Trick Room, set up rocks, and really do whatever your heart desires. It gets Thunder Wave, Skill Swap, all sorts of neat tricks that aren't literally destroying battles, rather making them more interesting. It's kind of like Cresselia used to be. That's not really a bad thing. The format also desperately needs good redirection or this is basically a nuclear battle zone of a metagame. I honestly think the format sucks with each week I have to play in it and I'm not sure why people think this has anything to do with Jirachi. It's being enabled by the stupid shit like Lele and Zygarde that god only knows why weren't instabanned when the format was announced.

 

[Hashtag]

the song is a 7/10 choice, good work memoric.
However, I don't really understand what you're saying with this sentence:

The valuable support Jirachi can provide has always been a controversial part of Doubles OU even in the older generations; with its ability to support teammates possibly a game-breaker and unhealthy to have in the metagame, Jirachi is now being up for suspect.

The English just doesn't really make sense for me there... which stinks because thats one of the most important sentences in the OP. On what grounds is this pokemon actually being suspected? Does anyone think this mon is broken? is it "unhealthy"? regardless, this seems like a pretty biased statement (i think?) which shouldnt rly be in the OP of a suspect thread imo.

I'm not really sure the word "unhealthy" actually means anything, lol. I'm not really seeing many good arguments itt as to why this pokemon is actually banworthy. I'm seeing plenty of posts like "this is why I'm voting ban" and none of "this is why you should vote ban" So with that, I'm just gonna touch on a few things people have said here.

I wholeheartedly believe that if Jirachi were banned Zygarde, Azumarill (probably not mence because its pretty busted with or without rachi) and other pokemon that abuse Jirachi's Follow Me become much more manageable threats and would most likely create a healthier, more stable metagame.

-milk

I understand you have spoken before on this, but I think it'd be nice if you went more into depth itt other than saying what boils down to "setup sweepers are less powerful without redirection" followed by your opinion that that is a bad thing.

All the jirachi user needs to do is orchestrate their board position well enough so that the 2 opposing pokemon aren't an insane direct threat to rachi so it lets its partner get free set up. All the jirachi user needs to do is orchestrate their board position well enough so that the 2 opposing pokemon aren't an insane direct threat to rachi so it lets its partner get free set up.

-matame

this is true, but this is just positional play. The opponent also has some control over the situation because he should avoid killing two pokemon at the same time if there's a jirachi and an azu in the back of your team.

i really think people are overrating setup sweepers in this thread. the "2 pokemon on the field at the same time" meme hurts the setup sweeper user just as much if not more than it hurts the guy that has to fight a jirachi next to a setup sweeper, because the azu/mence etc has to attack one thing every turn, and clicking follow me every turn means that your jirachi isnt attacking, giving your opponent time to respond

I honestly think the format sucks with each week I have to play in it and I'm not sure why people think this has anything to do with Jirachi.

-Braverius

fr*g off m8 this format is great

I'm interested in seeing better posts as to why this pokemon should actually be banned, I think some points of discusion should be:
-on what grounds is this pokemon being suspected?
-what mons or archetypes is jirachi forcing out?

 

[finally]

Some beginning questions to provoke thoughts while you read my points:
is there counterplay to jirachi?
what pokemon can I not use because of jirachi?
is jirachi overcentralizing?
what are the good things jirachi does for the metagame?
what are the bad things jirachi does for the metagame?

My 6 points on why jirachi should stay: 1) there is counterplay to jirachi, 2) jirachi checks strong attackers, 3) jirachi makes tr viable, 4) jirachi makes set up viable, 5) you do not have to overly prepare for jirachi, 6) jirachi promotes advanced playmaking

1) there is counterplay to jirachi and the metagame has been adapting (as a healthy metagame should) in order to beat it even more handily.
jirachi is weak to spread moves (fire and ground) and you get to hit both jirachi and its partner
charizard, heatran, landorus-t (eq version and groundium z version), zygarde
there are single attackers who beat jirachi and are normally good pokemon (i.e. they are not weird pokemon you have to fit onto your team).
aegislash, hoopa-unbound, mega gengar

2) jirachi contributes to a healthy metagame because it checks strong attackers
mega salamence
tapu lele + deo-a
we are already at a healthy spot where hyper offense is not too strong. if we change the metagame to make hyper offense potentially too strong, then we create another problem that did not need to be created.

3) if you take jirachi away, you hurt the archetype trick room because jirachi is one of its best setters. With this, you make a lot of pokemon unviable and hurt the metagame’s diversity.

4) jirachi makes the archetype of set up viable. whether it is dragon dance or belly drum, this archetype would be oppressed if jirachi were banned. to ban an archetype just because you personally don't like it isn't fair. a lot of people think trick room is gimmicky and want to ban it, but a lot of people also love trick room. in order to promote a wide array of archetypes, in this case the setup archetype, jirachi should stay

5) a lot of arguments here are stating that you have to overly prepare for jirachi to beat it (i.e. not have more than 2 pokemon that can’t touch jirachi), but i think that a lot of teams naturally have multiple pressure mons. going through the spl team compendium (http://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/teams-and-replays-from-spl-8-doubles.3592118/) most teams have around 4 pokemon which can dent jirachi. from my personal experience building teams, i do not build my team thinking "i can't have too many jirachi-prone" pokemon. i build my team for offensive threats like kanga and char, and a lot of these ways to beat offensive threats overlap with ways to beat jirachi. so what i'm saying is jirachi is not something you have to overly prepare for, it is something that you naturally prepare for while preparing against other threats.

6) arguments state how you have to constantly apply pressure to the jirachi team in order to prevent jirachi and a teammate from setting up. i think this is a good thing because it forces the person fighting against jirachi to think about their switches and which pokemon they kill. you might not go for the easy double kill because they get a free switch into azumarill and jirachi, and instead you kill off units one by one so that they are stuck with bad momentum- this is an example of high level play/thinking which should be promoted. On the other side of the field, developing a long term gameplan in order to guarantee a safe belly drum setup is another example of high level play. You have to prepare the battlefield in a way where the opponent has things that cannot touch jirachi.

To answer my questions at the beginning:
There is counterplay to jirachi.
There are a couple of pokemon that are weakened by jirachi (tapu bulu, rotom-w, diancie), but for the most part you can use the pokemon you want because there are many super effective attacks you can have to hit jirachi.
Jirachi is not overcentralizing because there is not a need to overprepare for it.
Jirachi is good for the metagame because it: checks hyper offense, makes trick room viable, and makes set up viable.
The bad thing Jirachi does for the metagame is make setting up your pokemon easy, but I disagree with this idea and I think Jirachi setups require forethought and that there is also advanced counterplay to set up which should be promoted.

I hope Jirachi stays because it has a good influence on the metagame, not a bad one.
Tl;dr: Jirachi is beatable, serves as a promoter of archetypes, and uniquely affects battle patterns in a good way

 

[finally]

Braverius
From the beginning of the generation until now, there have been metagame shifts to deal with the pokemon that you have listed. Heatran and aegislash which were previously good, have ascended to great because of their ability to check tapu lele. Celesteela which would normally crack under the pressure of the prevalence of fire and electric attacks remains a relevant threat (that you have to prepare for with around 2 mons a team) because of it's ability to beat tapu lele. Tyranitar, a pokemon laughed at last generation, has risen to the forefront of many spl teams as a way to check hoopa and to an extent tapu lele. Tapu fini, which was initially thought of as worse than tapu bulu, is now the premier bulky water type to add to your team, one of the primary reasons being is it checks and sets up on hoopa. Hidden power ice (landorus-t, charizard, tapu koko, heatran, tapu lele) is on so many random pokemon now as an adaption to zygarde. Ninetales-alola has even begun to see more and more usage because it can beat zygarde behind a jirachi. Yes, the 3 pokemon you listed are strong but counterplay exists in multiple forms to these pokemon.

In discord you mentioned how you have little experience with the metagame in 2 forms: lack of sheer number of battles and lack of knowledge of damage calcs.
I acknowledge you are a strong player mechanically, but I think that if you played the metagame more you would see that the metagame is in a good position because you would get to practice using these metagame adaptions. Currently because of your lack of number of games, you may witness the power of a zygarde sweep, but you have not practiced enough games with shuca hp ice heatran or ninetales-alola to know how to beat zygarde consistently in this metagame.
I enjoy the current metagame very much, and I do not appreciate you calling my format/tier shitty after you self-admittedly only have limited experience with the tier. Calling a tier shitty should be reserved for after playing the metagame for many games. I think if you were to practice more games, you would enjoy the metagame more because you would be able to more consistently stop these strong pokemon and their sweeps. Please do not take this as me calling you a bad player, I am repeating what you said about your lack of number of games and explaining why more games is important for metagame analysis.

 

[miltankmilk]

Sick double post flan (but really these are good posts even though I disagree with them)

Hashies brought up that I didn't elaborate very well on my views and I guess I will do that a bit. My basic belief here is that redirection is the culprit in making set-up sweepers too strong, specifically follow me. Now I don't think that Follow Me is broken/unhealthy/(other buzzword about pokemon suspects) on every single user, simply that using Jirachi as a redirector has almost no drawbacks. One of these reasons is that common set-up sweepers and Jirachi share very few weaknesses to spread moves or even shared neutrality to them. The most common set-up partners to Jirachi are Salamence, Zygarde, and Azumarill (in no particular order) and what weaknesses are these sharing? As Finally brought up you can hit Jirachi with moves like Heat Wave or Earthquake and also damage its partner, but for Mence and Zygarde they both set up on these moves. More often then not when facing Jirachi + Dragon Dancer you are forced to KO the Jirachi with single target attacks and watch Mence or Zygarde get to +1 or +2. Other spread move options to hit these pokemon (ignoring Azumarill here) super effectively are also problematic. Dazzling Gleam is probably the most common, (and ignoring how much spdef DD mence and zygarde actually run), to do this you need to bring in a Fairy-type on Jirachi which is obviously problematic as it can either KO you with Iron head or chip you into range of dying to the sweepers attacks. You can use Blizzard but unless you're using Ninetails this isn't a very reliable option and I certainly wouldn't bank on hitting blizzard in a tournament game.

I agree that Jirachi doesn't put an undue burden on teambuilding but I do think that it inhibits play in many matchups and disallows the opponent to actually address the pokemon that is going to KO the rest of his team. While positioning yourself into a situation in which you can win with Jirachi + sweeper would fall under my definition of skillful play, I personally think that Jirachi makes too many pokemon unmanageable with incredibly low opportunity cost. I also don't really agree that Jirachi is keeping Trick Room viable, Hoopa-U is one of the best pokemon in the format now and fullroom teams really don't use Jirachi as a setter. I haven't seen nearly as much Jirachi 'semi-room' this gen as there was in ORAS, probably because of the lack of garde, but while Jirachi is a tool for trick room its really not as much of a staple as flan makes it out to be.

TLDR: Jirachi makes set-up (specifically dragon dancers) far too easy as the ways to circumvent redirection are not viable methods of addressing Jirachi's set-up partners.

 

[Braverius]

Braverius
From the beginning of the generation until now, there have been metagame shifts to deal with the pokemon that you have listed. Heatran and aegislash which were previously good, have ascended to great because of their ability to check tapu lele. Celesteela which would normally crack under the pressure of the prevalence of fire and electric attacks remains a relevant threat (that you have to prepare for with around 2 mons a team) because of it's ability to beat tapu lele. Tyranitar, a pokemon laughed at last generation, has risen to the forefront of many spl teams as a way to check hoopa and to an extent tapu lele. Tapu fini, which was initially thought of as worse than tapu bulu, is now the premier bulky water type to add to your team, one of the primary reasons being is it checks and sets up on hoopa. Hidden power ice (landorus-t, charizard, tapu koko, heatran, tapu lele) is on so many random pokemon now as an adaption to zygarde. Ninetales-alola has even begun to see more and more usage because it can beat zygarde behind a jirachi. Yes, the 3 pokemon you listed are strong but counterplay exists in multiple forms to these pokemon.

In discord you mentioned how you have little experience with the metagame in 2 forms: lack of sheer number of battles and lack of knowledge of damage calcs.
I acknowledge you are a strong player mechanically, but I think that if you played the metagame more you would see that the metagame is in a good position because you would get to practice using these metagame adaptions. Currently because of your lack of number of games, you may witness the power of a zygarde sweep, but you have not practiced enough games with shuca hp ice heatran or ninetales-alola to know how to beat zygarde consistently in this metagame.
I enjoy the current metagame very much, and I do not appreciate you calling my format/tier shitty after you self-admittedly only have limited experience with the tier. Calling a tier shitty should be reserved for after playing the metagame for many games. I think if you were to practice more games, you would enjoy the metagame more because you would be able to more consistently stop these strong pokemon and their sweeps. Please do not take this as me calling you a bad player, I am repeating what you said about your lack of number of games and explaining why more games is important for metagame analysis.

Fair criticism, I think you're mostly correct with how I perceive it and what I said should be taken with a grain of salt *but* shouldn't be completely discounted. Thank you for actually stepping up to the plate here and saying something, I appreciate the response and want to create discussion, not push it away.

To the points though -- I'm truly not sure why Celesteela is listed as a Lele "check", I don't think I've ever considered the move outside of on one team in DOU and maybe it's lack of experience but it seems like it has way better options (I ran random HP Ice on it one week and think Seeds / Sub / Protect / WG / Flamethrower / HP Ice are generally better moves and EQ / Toxic are just as useful -- does depend on the team but take this in a general sense from theorying with it a lot this season). I would use it to switch in on Lele but definitely not to "beat" it. Celesteela is arguably better as a Jirachi and Zygarde check and is maybe more comparable to Hoopa, where it's a tenable option but not a shutdown. If Lele carries Tbolt and you don't carry HSlam it's not in your favor, and honestly that's a situation I don't care about losing since I'm using Celesteela to beat Salamence, Landorus-T, Zygarde (with WG), Jirachi, Aegislash, and Deoxys, things I don't think you'd disagree are threats right now. Enough things actually take out Lele quickly enough, and that isn't the issue I have with it.

The issue I have with Lele is it prevents things in teambuilding - I explained it to Ablast last night:
[7:43 PM] Zach: fake out, priority, and other things that a team can use in a wide variety of ways against a lot of pokemon are elbow-dropped in a matchup vs lele
[7:43 PM] Zach: it creates this sort of works-if-they-have-lele-doesnt-if-they-do thing, but you're not checking lele or a combo like lele + deoxys, you're checking all of the mons on the team with said priority move
[7:44 PM] Zach: especially things like fake out and feint that are support moves and not even attacking moves, it makes them nearly useless
[7:44 PM] Zach: so the format naturally has less of those and naturally moves faster, big damage becomes more prominent
[7:44 PM] Zach: because you can't fake out pressure deoxys anymore
[7:44 PM] Zach: you can't fake out pressure the heavy hitters
[7:44 PM] Zach: you can't ice shard the landorus-t for the ko, you can't espeed to break sashes
[7:44 PM] Zach: can't sucker punch anything
(I also was made / am well aware that you can Ice Shard the Lando, a perfect example of my issues - I understand things but they're not something I've assimilated yet, so while I can pick things apart slowly I can't hash out those problems on the fly. Probably why I was surprised by things in so many SPL games this year.)

Basically this metagame creates a scenario where you can't justify building teams with heavy priority because of how common Lele is. If you put a lot of priority on and run into Lele it makes the matchup difficult if not impossible because of what you've sacrificed in that matchup Pokemon-wise, strategy-wise, and moveslot-wise for other matchups, and it's too prominent right now to bank on not hitting the Lele matchup. This creates a situation where the metagame is based heavily around big damage, most of it single-target, and this is why Jirachi is so good - it is a byproduct of Lele's influence on the metagame. Remove Lele and Jirachi is less of a problem because Fake Out and other priority moves (pick off the Deoxys instead of needing to redirect it, etc) can easily replace what it does on many teams. This is why I'm skeptical of removing Jirachi. Removing it makes things more ridiculous than better, which I don't think I've ever felt about a suspect test and why I think this one is really questionable to even test. Hoopa would probably be a better step if you don't want to suspect Lele, but then you further enable Jirachi and it actually becomes a problem. It all starts with Lele, even if you can "check it" with things like Fini, you still aren't enabling priority enough to make it worthwhile to use.

So I definitely do think that this suspect test was done in haste and my criticism, although brash, was meant to provoke a strong response. Probably went too far and didn't have ground to stand on here but hopefully this clarifies it in a less intrusive and demeaning way. I think the tier is alright overall but if Jirachi's removed before Lele is I'm actually quite concerned that things could break loose and go right down the drain and turn into some weird form of VGC 2011 (basically Terrakion, Thundurus, Amoonguss, and Tornadus, the metagame. Yes, it was about as bad as it sounds.) Offense is fine but what you'd open up is a can of worms that no one's really experienced before, and I'd argue it isn't for the better here.

 

[n10siT]

WHats up fuckers, I'm gonna share some thoughts on jirachi since my opinions usually differ from a lot of top players

Jirachi is a Pokémon that has terrorized dou for a long time. We (we being half the community) wanted to ban it last gen, and it's been the source of debate for a long time in this tier. That being said, I personally think that it needs to stay in dou FOR NOW. I think it checks a lot of the new stuff in this gen, while still providing the great support it always has. I think if we someday end up in a meta without hoopa and zygarde, we should suspect jirachi again. I don't want to talk too much about those two mons, as this thread is about jirachi, but I think we're all in agreement that we will, or should, be taking a look at hoopa and zygarde after this current test.

To be concise, I think jirachi still has a place in the current meta game. Keeping stuff like mence and lele in place is a good thing, and I think jirachi is currently easy enough to deal with to not warrant a ban. It's a really, really good redirector and our next best redirector is amoonguss, which got worse this gen. I will be voting do not ban, but I would like to see another suspect if the metagame shifts.

Sorry if this hasn't been the clearest post, just wanted to share my thoughts. Enjoy this picture of me and my jirachi plush!

Hide

 

[BlueSkiddo]

Reason N10sits posts should absolutely never be brought into consideration when talking about anything ever

Are we really supposed to take the opinion of a man who OPENLY STATES THAT HE SUCKS AT POKEMON????

I personally will be voting no ban on the sole reason that it may keep (you know who) from fully returning to this game.

 

[shaian]

Can't believe y'all are seriously gonna fuck up a chance to get this broken ass mon out of the tier again.

Posts that say Rachi helps keep Mence in check: it's ridiculous to me that people actually believe Rachi hurts Mence more than it helps it. Seriously, I don't see how people legitimately think guaranteed free turns for dangerous attackers is less of a help to them than one more check on their pile of checks is a hindrance. Sure Rachi is a good mence check, but here is a non-exhaustive list of things that would be much better Mence checks if Rachi couldn't redirect their shit:

HP Ice Lando-T
Celesteela
Tapu Lele
Deoxys-A
Mega Gengar
Mega Metagross
Shaymin-Sky
Tapu Fini
Bronzong
Genesect
Kingdra
Kyurem-B
Rotom-W
Zapdos
Ferrothorn

ALL of these Pokemon become much better Mence checks if Jirachi is banned, it is absolutely unfathomable that a Jirachi ban would help Mence overall. Mence is the most ridiculous one but you could go down the list for any other dangerous attacker in this tier: Azumarill, Zygarde, Volcarona, Mega Gengar, etc. They're all made broken by the ridiculousness that is Jirachi. The only dangerous attacker that isn't helped by Jirachi is Deo-A and frankly I wouldn't be surprised at all if triple psychics with Lele/Deo/Rachi is also fucking great, just nobody's made it yet.

Posts that say Jirachi keeps hyper offense in check: Yes, you're right, but more than in check, hyper offense is basically entirely unviable right now. There is exactly one HO build that has seen any kind of success, which is Lele Deo sun, and even that is falling out of favor with the meta. Hyper offense relies on maintaining pressure on the opponent every turn and Jirachi just completely shits on this playstyle because of how good it is at granting free turns; after a Mence or Volcarona or Zygarde gets +1, the game is usually close to lost for HO. Jirachi is why we've been seeing Sam defense be so successful: Fini + Zap + Intimidate doesn't need to always exert offensive pressure because of its ability to tank hits, so it's a pretty Jirachi-proof playstyle. If you want to play a meta where the only builds are boosting, Sam defense, and Hoopa TR, then by all means vote no ban. There's absolutely 0 chance that HO becomes broken if we ban Jirachi in any variant except Lele Deo, which will not be a hard fix if push comes to shove.

Posts that say banning Jirachi is equivalent to banning setup: This just isn't true at all. Sam used DD Mence without any redirection week 6 (and would have probably won without a heat wave burn). Chase used Linoone and Zygarde with Clefairy week 3 and won. kamikaze, Zach, and Chase have all used that one team with QD Volc and DD Zygarde that has no redirection in SPL. Kyle won week 4 with DD Mence that had no redirection. There are probably more examples I just don't feel like checking. Setup is perfectly viable, healthy, and fun to use without Rachi. Jirachi just makes it stupid.

(It hasn't happened yet but it will) Posts that say teams will just move to another redirector if Rachi is banned: Just look at the users. Every other redirector is like half a fuckin Pokemon. Of course some teams that need redirection will use another redirector if Jirachi is banned, but the very fact that the redirector isnt Jirachi is gonna make those teams a lot more manageable.

The only argument for keeping Rachi that actually makes sense is that Psychic spam might be overwhelming if it doesn't have to build in a way that takes Jirachi into account. But there's nothing stopping us from banning a Psychic mon (Lele or Deo or whatever) if that ends up being true, which is far from guaranteed in the first place. We shouldn't tolerate this broken ass Pokemon just because it might be stopping another thing from being a broken ass Pokemon. We can ban two things if we need to.

This is completely off topic but I'm going to tackle Zach's post about Lele here, keep reading if you give a shit:

Yeah Lele fucks priority users but if you think priority will make a comeback after a Lele ban I'm sorry to say you're wrong. Look at the priority users from last gen that have fallen off:
Talonflame - RIP. Never coming back. Gale Wings nerf is the dumbest nerf GF has ever done
Kangaskhan - After PBond nerf, it's running 0 Atk investment 9 times out of 10. Its fake outs are weaker (and it doesn't run sucker anymore) but it still almost always uses fake out so Lele has nothing to do with this mon's priority situation.
Thundurus-I - Lele definitely sucks for Thund-I, but so does Misty Terrain, the two T-wave nerfs, the Swagger nerf, and the fact that it now has to compete with the Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger Electric-type Tapu Koko. I think Thund-I has a place in the metagame and is underappreciated atm but I'm willing to grant that it would rise in usage with a Lele ban, though definitely not to where it was last gen.
Breloom - Two new sleep-preventing terrains and a bunch of new threats to Fighting types (mence, skymin, koko, etc), banning Lele would actually nerf Loom (if theres anything left to nerf) because you have no other way to remove Electric/Misty terrain.
Conkeldurr - Maybe less rekt than breloom but rekt by basically the same things. Unlike Loom, doesn't even beat Fini. Also quite terrible and not likely to significantly improve with a Lele ban, but it could maybe get a little more usage.
Scrafty - See above, mostly, though if my matches with Chase are any indication, Scrafty is actually still good in this metagame. Being held back by a variety of factors but I'm actually willing to grant in this case that it would see more usage if Lele were banned (probably).
Mega Metagross - Bullet Punch is actually the best third move on it with Lele in the meta because you don't need coverage with Psychic Terrain boosting your zen headbutts. Would ironically probably use priority less often after a Lele ban because it would need to run Ice Punch. If you want to see more of this guy, >>ban Jirachi<<

So in the end banning Lele would likely see an appreciable rise in exactly two priority users, Scrafty and Thund-I. The unfortunate fact of the matter is GameFreak shit all over priority this gen with or without Psychic terrain. Lele might be broken, but if it is, it's not because it's keeping priority users down. But again let me reiterate, there's absolutely a 0% chance that any style of offense other than Psychic spam becomes broken with a Jirachi ban (defense, trick room, boosting, balance, etc definitely have all the tools they need to deal with other forms of HO), and we can just ban Lele after that if we need to. That in no fucking way means we shouldn't ban Rachi right now.

 

[Pocket]

i'm still conflicted about Jirachi's effect on our metagame.

Keeping Jirachi would be great for offensive teams and TR teams, both of which are limited in slots for a glue Pokemon; Jirachi can offer the all-purpose shield for the team, thanks to redirection, speed control, and amazing resists all bundled into one mon. Trick Room teams are already limited in teamslots, and being able to have a both redirection and TR is an amazing 2-in-1 deal. Losing Jirachi would most likely make setting up with Salamence, Zygarde, and Azumarill slightly harder, but even moreso it would affect the TR archetype the most. Weakening TR can be a good thing or a bad thing, depending on your stance on TR in the current metagame. I think TR is really dangerous rn with all the Tailwind Zapdos archetype running around.

Losing Jirachi would most likely benefit bulkier teams that pack weak shit like Rotom-W, Celesteela, Ferrothorn, Milotic, etc that struggle to break past Jirachi. However, Jirachi was also one of the bulky weak shit that kept Psychic spam, Mence, and Kanga in check. It would be interesting to see how the removal of Jirachi would affect their viability.

We also cannot deny how Follow Me is a ridiculously good move, and maybe this move on a Pokemon with exceptional bulk and defensive typing is not desirable for a balanced metagame? When I need a redirector I always find myself reaching for Jirachi. There were teams where I had Amoonguss or Togekiss, but then ended up replacing them with Jirachi. I don't think such monopoly of this big role is desirable. If Jirachi had any other support move, such as Wide Guard, it would have been perfectly fine, but Follow Me might be "too good" of a support from Jirachi.

 

[kamikaze]

Suspect Ladder Thoughts
So I finished laddering and I definitely feel this new suspect system idea that we piloted definitely improved the ladder quality.

The quality of the suspect ladders has always been a complaint from the community. All too often we hear that the ladder isnt properly able to educate people on the suspect at hand, due to low suspect pokemon encounters, as well as running into low quality teams which often lead to breezing to meeting reqs.

I was initially skeptical when Memoric posed this idea of the weekend ladder system but figured it was worth a shot to see if it would help improve the ladder quality. While there will obviously always be the few bad apples such as Dusclops Cradily TR but overall the percentage of games with decent looking teams as well as known people was a lot more than usual suspects which made them more of a fight to getting reqs and definitely getting a lot more exposure to the suspect pokemon.

The downside that some people who arent free on the weekend may be unable to ladder was something we always knew could be a potential issue, but something had to give to create a ladder like this one.

This system is a test and we will keep trying to improve it if possible so feedback is encouraged. Feel free to post below.
1. If you laddered for the suspect what did you think about the quality of the ladder? (quality of team compositions, # of jirachis seen)
2. If you didnt ladder or found difficulty to do so let us know about what could be done to accommodate others while also trying to keep in mind our goal on keeping the ladder more competitive


Jirachi Thoughts
I figured I would post some thoughts on Jirachi after laddering as well. It really helped to be playing so many games both with Jirachi and fighting against it. shaian hit pretty much most of what I think about it but I definitely want to focus on the setup portion.

I voted no Ban on Jirachi last gen and I stick to that. This gen however it definitely feels a lot stronger because of how many more threats it enables.
- In regards to setup, last gen we mainly really had Azumarill, Kangaskhan, and misc sub users.
- This gen we have Azumarill, Zygarde, Volcarona, Tapu Fini, Salamence.
- There are also even extremely powerful pokemon this gen that dont use setup but can sometimes clean up or properly dent holes in teams when Jirachi comes in at the proper moment such as Hoopa-U, Tapu Lele, Tapu Koko, Kangaskhan. Particularly Kangaskhan who isnt setting up with Power Up Punch this gen, is still an absolute menace alongside Jirachi. Seismic Toss Kang is able to go very bulky this gen, allowing you to be very reckless as you blow holes by 2hko'ing almost anything in the metagame, making there be almost no switchins when a Kangaskhan gets in at the right time. Jirachi enables this pokemon to get off more Seismic Tosses or redirect to heal up with Wish making it even harder to KO.

The amount of pressure that the above mons can exert just with a turn or 2 of aided setup can be a massive payout and tear massive holes through teams, making it extremely overbearing for the opponent to come back from. There were too many games where I use a setup mon and then cycle turns of fake out or follow me by either protect + hard switching into kang or rachi, or protect + sacking a pokemon so that my kang + jirachi can come in and extend the cycle even further.

Many times when this happens my opponent simply doesnt have a good response and becomes locked down.
- Being forced sometimes to not take a KO when a setup mon is front of you just to prevent Jirachi from coming in and enabling more and instead taking a big blow is not how I think we should be playing the game as its very easy for a Jirachi user to make both options highly negative for their opponent.
- Because of how much respect Jirachi demands it can also force the opponent to send in their check to try to deal with it, but then the Jirachi user switches it out either out to their counter and makes a good sack to get a safe switch out to another big threat, main one being Kangaskhan. And now the Jirachi check that was forced in is in another lock down situation where their Jirachi check is inside so they should switch out to preserve it but now they dont have any good switchins that can come in safely. I have both done and have also been on the receiving end of this plenty of times as well.

As shaian said, setup is not going to leave with Jirachi as people have made teams using setup mons with Jirachi because of how good the setup mons naturally are this gen. However the issue is that Jirachi enables the setup even further and with much ease. We may have to address the Pokemon that Jirachi aids in the future but it may be better to evaluate their strength in a metagame without Jirachi boosting them so easily.

Like shaian addressed at the end of this post, some people are fearful of some things like Psyspam being too overbearing with a Jirachi ban because they believe it prevents it from being fully broken. And also like he said, I am gonna stress that just because a Pokemon is stopping another from getting out of hand that doesnt mean that we should ignore it. If Psyspam actually ends up being issue then we will address Lele or Deo, and if anything else is an issue we will address it. Simple as that. We have a lot of threats in the current metagame so I dont think we should be worrying about tipping any sort of balancing factor this early on when there is room for things to change. If we can improve the state of the metagame, even if it takes a few steps, it needs to begin with a first step.

In Summary:
Personally I feel Jirachi is preventing the metagame from moving forward because of how it demands an extremely high level of respect throughout the game and with how easily it enables them further than they would alone, made even easier by its fantastic natural bulk to take hits easily and in turn create more turns for its partner. A lot of games boil down to choices which can often be in the favor of the Jirachi user through pinning forcing their opponent to either suffer heavy damage or take a KO to allow jirachi to come in. Yes there are things like powerful Z moves this gen that can dent Jirachi absurdly hard and yes people listed some pokemon that threathen it 1v1, but its been apparent through the many battles I have seen that this isnt enough. Jirachi often either accomplishes its job by staying in and providing support it needs to until it faints or it forces their opponent to send their checks in out of respect and waste opposing resources to handle Jirachi by switching out and creating pinch situations so that Jirachi may come back in later and run wild again.

 

[talkingtree]

There are very few thoughts that I have on Jirachi that have not already been adressed in shaian and kamikaze's posts so if you're reading mine and ignoring theirs because mine's short stop being lazy and just read them to be an informed voter. Jirachi is restrictive, too bulky with too good of support moves, and something that I believe this metagame will be better off without.

I may have had a rough go of things laddering between my WiFi cutting out and my own poor playing/building decisions cutting it pretty close to the point where I only had 2 games to go when I made reqs, but this was actually one of the most enjoyable laddering experiences I've had. The overall ladder quality was noticeably higher, I saw at least double the number of Jirachis that I saw last suspect, and there was a much stronger community feel to the experience because of the restricted time frame. I'm aware that it may be difficult for some people to get reqs and so this system is not flawless, but the old system had flaws too and I believe with a bit more of a heads up so that people can plan their weekends, this should continue to be the suspect system.