Matthew
I love weather; Sun for days
Whether we like it or not weather is here in the metagame for as long as we can tell. The suspect test as we know it is over; there might be something to balance out the metagame later, but for now we have what we call a balanced metagame. I don't care who says what at this point, but what really irks me beyond all belief is when people say, “there's no creativity anymore! It's the same X amount of pokemon on every team!” I hope to God that the people who say this are fucking high on crystal meth, because that's a pretty damn bold statement to make. It's even more bold because it's wrong; proclaiming a wrong statement as truth takes some balls to do, I'll give it that.
Look around the metagame. I'm filled in a world where Toxicroak and Gastrodon are solid pokemon to put on a team. I'm in a land where there are two different play styles, stall and offensive, and they branch off into five separate categories of their own (sand, sun, rain, hail, weatherless). Fuck, I couldn't be happier with how diverse we can make this metagame if we actually tried to give a damn. Take a look at Salamence. He's the perfect example of a pokemon that can fit in three different offensive teams. Sun, rain, and weatherless. In the sun Salamence can fire off super powered Fire Blasts that complement his Dragon STAB excellently. In the rain Salamence has a super powered Hydro Pump, which pared with Dragon (yet again) are wonderful in unison. Weatherless Salamence has even more options. Bulky sets, Wish, Mixed, the list goes on.
But not every pokemon has to use weather to their advantage. The causes of the weather metagame are simply opportunities for other pokemon to rise in the ranks. Despite never being used, Weavile is actually very wonderful in the current metagame. Outpacing Starmie, OHKOing Tyranitar with Low Kick, and with Swords Dance and LO Weavile dealing a good amount of damage to Ferrothorn. The issues Weavile honestly faces in standard OU? Conkeldurr and Scizor. That's honestly about it bar the random scarf users and Jirachi. But Jirachi is now investing more and more in SpDef over Def itself. Jirachi hates taking a +2 LO Night Slash. Another example of a pokemon who has benefited from weather even though it doesn't abuse it is Gastrodon. Being the pinnacle counter to rain and sand teams has made this pokemon go from zero to hero in no time flat. Also I'm going to throw Sharpedo out there, because without Drizzle it wouldn't be anywhere near as good as it is today.
The creativity doesn't just stop with using odd pokemon like Weavile and Sharpedo, however. Sets on pokemon are just as important as using pokemon themselves. I recently read an RMT where Grimm(correct me if I'm wrong) used Sunny Day Ninetales. Ninetales, being the fast summoner, and having a super effective no charge move (Solarbeam) against both Tyranitar and Politoed is amazing.
Overall I do like weather's input on the metagame. It has given time for creativity to happen if people try to break free of the standard team. I guess people don't realize that no matter how the metagame is structured there will be a standard team.
What I want from you, the posters in this thread, is to post about weather teams and about creative sets and pokemon that you use, and for what purpose do you use them. This isn't the same as I use fucking Raichu because I hate Jolteon. This is I use Salamence as the main Dragon-type on my sun team because x y z. This is because Tyranitar, Latios, and Ferrothorn are so high in the stats I use Weavile because it cleans them all up with the SD set. Things like that – but more in depth of course.
Look around the metagame. I'm filled in a world where Toxicroak and Gastrodon are solid pokemon to put on a team. I'm in a land where there are two different play styles, stall and offensive, and they branch off into five separate categories of their own (sand, sun, rain, hail, weatherless). Fuck, I couldn't be happier with how diverse we can make this metagame if we actually tried to give a damn. Take a look at Salamence. He's the perfect example of a pokemon that can fit in three different offensive teams. Sun, rain, and weatherless. In the sun Salamence can fire off super powered Fire Blasts that complement his Dragon STAB excellently. In the rain Salamence has a super powered Hydro Pump, which pared with Dragon (yet again) are wonderful in unison. Weatherless Salamence has even more options. Bulky sets, Wish, Mixed, the list goes on.
But not every pokemon has to use weather to their advantage. The causes of the weather metagame are simply opportunities for other pokemon to rise in the ranks. Despite never being used, Weavile is actually very wonderful in the current metagame. Outpacing Starmie, OHKOing Tyranitar with Low Kick, and with Swords Dance and LO Weavile dealing a good amount of damage to Ferrothorn. The issues Weavile honestly faces in standard OU? Conkeldurr and Scizor. That's honestly about it bar the random scarf users and Jirachi. But Jirachi is now investing more and more in SpDef over Def itself. Jirachi hates taking a +2 LO Night Slash. Another example of a pokemon who has benefited from weather even though it doesn't abuse it is Gastrodon. Being the pinnacle counter to rain and sand teams has made this pokemon go from zero to hero in no time flat. Also I'm going to throw Sharpedo out there, because without Drizzle it wouldn't be anywhere near as good as it is today.
The creativity doesn't just stop with using odd pokemon like Weavile and Sharpedo, however. Sets on pokemon are just as important as using pokemon themselves. I recently read an RMT where Grimm(correct me if I'm wrong) used Sunny Day Ninetales. Ninetales, being the fast summoner, and having a super effective no charge move (Solarbeam) against both Tyranitar and Politoed is amazing.
Overall I do like weather's input on the metagame. It has given time for creativity to happen if people try to break free of the standard team. I guess people don't realize that no matter how the metagame is structured there will be a standard team.
What I want from you, the posters in this thread, is to post about weather teams and about creative sets and pokemon that you use, and for what purpose do you use them. This isn't the same as I use fucking Raichu because I hate Jolteon. This is I use Salamence as the main Dragon-type on my sun team because x y z. This is because Tyranitar, Latios, and Ferrothorn are so high in the stats I use Weavile because it cleans them all up with the SD set. Things like that – but more in depth of course.