Blissey

Great point, Supermath. If we remove Blissey, it will not be a sudden explosion in special sweepers and Nasty Plot set-ups. Scizor counters all of the frail sweepers just as well as Blissey. If you guys seriously think Jynx or some thing is going to skyrocket in useage if Blissey was tested, you are very wrong.

There's a reason people quit using NP Azelf and sweeper Alakazam fell to UU. This pokemon's name is Scizor, NOT Blissey. Even if you get +6 SpA to beat Blissey with Hidden Power fighting or whatever, you're still going to get 1 shotted by Bullet Punch.

supermarth64 said:

There's more than one reason why Nasty Plot is used so much less than Swords Dance.

1) 5 Pokemon in OU get Nasty Plot, while 13 Pokemon in OU get Swords Dance.
2) If we actually look at the Pokemon that use Nasty Plot:
Infernape: Actually beats Blissey, but gets countered by Latias.
Togekiss: Generally too slow to sweep, while it's most annoying and effective set is probably one that includes Air Slash and Thunder Wave. Togekiss can beat Blissey with a set of Air Slash / Heal Bell / Nasty Plot / Roost.
Azelf: Scizor handles it with Bullet Punch.
Weavile: lol
Porygon-z: Scizor still handles it.

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Yes, the likes of Sword Dance Celebi and Roserade threaten the very basis of the metagame as we know it. :/

Scizor surely keeps a lot of Nasty Plot, and Swords Dance Pokemon down in usage, but Scizor can only check Porygon-Z, Togekiss, and Azelf. If any of them throw up a Substitute, or happen to fire off the approriate attack, Scizor is no longer an issue.

Back to Blissey.. Infernape is one of the most used Nasty Plot users because he can annilhate Blissey in a single stroke with Close Combat. Of course he is neutral to Stealth Rocks, frequently carries Life Orb, is shut down by Latias and has paper defenses that make a resisted Bullet Punch able to revenge it. And on top of that he's still used, because he beats Blissey.

Blissey on the other hand keeps even more Pokemon from using Nasty Plot. Houndoom surely hates Tyranitar, and Scizor revenging him, but without Blissey, his goal is simplified, because Tyranitar, Heatran, and others simply can't afford to switch into HP Fighting, whereas Blissey can easily.

And let's not just look at Sword Dance, I think we'd agree Scizor has even a larger role in checking Dragon Dance Pokemon. Tyranitar, and Salamence, run Dragon Dance 30%~ and 50%~ of the time respectively, even though they are both revenge killed by Scizor. They're used though because there is no sure fired, all out, physical wall that shuts them down. There is no physical Blissey.

But let it be said, I think Blissey has a place in this metagame, unless there's going to be years of testing ahead again. This metagame is built, and testing. Everything will have to be redone, if one of the corner stones of the game is removed.

noob3 said:

Great point, Supermath. If we remove Blissey, it will not be a sudden explosion in special sweepers and Nasty Plot set-ups. Scizor counters all of the frail sweepers just as well as Blissey. If you guys seriously think Jynx or some thing is going to skyrocket in useage if Blissey was tested, you are very wrong.

There's a reason people quit using NP Azelf and sweeper Alakazam fell to UU. This pokemon's name is Scizor, NOT Blissey. Even if you get +6 SpA to beat Blissey with Hidden Power fighting or whatever, you're still going to get 1 shotted by Bullet Punch.

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Very easily avoided with Magnezone. If Blissey is removed, then the frail special sweepers may see an even BIGGER increase in usage; when a Scizor comes in on say, your +2 Azelf, then its obvious that it will use Bullet Punch, unless your opponent is an extraordinary idiot. Magnezone switches in, traps, laughs at Bullet Punches, and KOes with Thunderbolt or Hidden Power Fire. Anybody who uses special sweepers or Weavile is sure to have a Magnezone up their sleeve (I know I do). In fact, I use Nasty Plot Zelf, and with Scizor out of the way, its amazing. The fact that the special sweepers + Magnezone is all but guarenteed to take out the most popular Pokemon in OU might command a rise in usage. True it does take up two team slots, but Magnezone is very valuable no matter what kind of team it is placed on.

Snorlaxe said:

Very easily avoided with Magnezone. If Blissey is removed, then the frail special sweepers may see an even BIGGER increase in usage; when a Scizor comes in on say, your +2 Azelf, then its obvious that it will use Bullet Punch, unless your opponent is an extraordinary idiot.

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Or a genius. When someone brings Scizor in on Azelf, it's pretty obvious Azelf's going to switch out. Steel types in general are the predictable switch-in, so Scizor Superpowers, and it's bye bye Magnezone.

scizor has 4 options, 1 killing azelf, 1 killing azelf if it switches, 1 scouting the magnezone switch and 1 which will kill magnezone. having magnezone is not the end-all be all solution when it comes to team options for special sweepers. if it was, they would have a much bigger turnout in this metagame.

there's a reason NP sweepers arn't used and it's not blissey.

if you played pre-platinum, you'd know. when alakazam was the only legit special attacker with trick for a REAL choice set to combat blissey, and it wasn't very high in useage. you'd think people would run it more, since blissey is such a threat? i remember having a team comprised of azelf/gengar/roserade/jolteon/togekiss ect, it worked and blissey was in the metagame. youd just have to run explosion on azelf or gengar or BP on jolteon, and switch accordingly. after scizor got bullet punch teams like this became virtually obsolete..

Just going to give my 2c on Blissey. However, I haven't played in recent times really, this is what I noticed pre-Platinum when I played a lot.

A problem I find is that using it is not very skilful. Because it basically walls ANY special move, something which no other wall boasts, it's so easy to just say "special attacker, I'll switch Blissey" and you're safe. No prediction necessary.

Not saying that makes it broken, just that firstly it takes away some of the skill a user might otherwise need.

Then, as I assume many people have already said, (didn't read all 6 pages...) it makes a lot of Pokemon almost automatically unviable. Yeah, we have a physically biased metagame, but Blissey would definitely be one of the causes (among others, but still a factor). Besides special attackers, it also makes a lot of possible Special walls unviable because Blissey's simply better.

You talk about making the game more enjoyable. I see this as another way to restrict the game. You guys are going way too far on talk of banning stuff, and actually going through with it. It got too far with the first banning of Garchomp. Banning everything that is seen as a potential threat, very fun.

Last year when the Garchomp ban was being discussed, a concept called "the slippery slope" came up. Basically the theory was that banning Garchomp would open the doors for other Pokemon getting banned as well. I laughed at the thought, I figured such a thing was ridiculous and would never happen.

And now here I am looking at a Blissey ban thread with six fucking pages, started by KD24. I thought you were smarter than this to be honest. Let's take a look at your arguments here.



1.) Are more Pokemon viable in competitive play, but the metagame is not dominated by Pokemon following Blissey's removal?

Duh. Removing one of the biggest walls in the game obviously opens up the doors for more Pokemon to be viable in OU. Same if you removed Bronzong or Hippowdon. This is common sense, and isn't helping your argument.

Is adding more Pokemon to OU that a good thing? Not necessarily. Pokemon is already stretched to it's very limits. When making a team, there are several major Pokemon to keep in mind already, which strongly influence the Pokemon you are going to be using. If you do not take these threats into account, you will fail miserably. The game is already at the point where you're going to have holes, no matter what your team is like. There will always be some obscure Pokemon that will fuck you sideways, and hopefully, you'll never encounter it. You all know what I'm talking about. No matter how good your team is, there will be some hidden flaw that brings it all crashing down.

Removing Blissey puts Azelf, Porygon-Z, and Alakazam back on the threat list. Do you really need more things to worry about when you have Salamence, Scizor, Heatran, Gyarados, Lucario, and Latias breathing down your neck? I doubt it.

Speaking of Scizor, a lot of you seem to think he's the answer to most of these special sweeping threats. Great, MORE Scizor usage, just what the game needs. He's already beating out Garchomp's lead by a significant amount. The way this is going, he'll be a suspect next. You can quote me on that, because based on the average intelligence of this board, I'm willing to bet someone will propose it sooner or later.

2.) Is the metagame more enjoyable following Blissey's removal?

Huh, I didn't know enjoyment factored in to wether a Pokemon was a suspect or not.

Just because adding or removing a Pokemon would make the game more "fun" or "enjoyable" doesn't mean it is good for competition. I'm sure some people out there think Chess would be more enjoyable with spellcasting, or Starcraft more enjoyable without Carriers. This does not mean that it has a positive affect on the competitive nature of the game.


3.) Can we reconstruct the defensive characteristic of an Uber Pokemon? As it stands, the characteristic "could" apply to Blissey, who does wall a large portion of the metagame, enough that some Pokemon actually switch to physical attacks on all special movesets, just for her.

So fucking what? Tyranitar commonly runs Ice Beam exclusively for Hippowdon. Skarmory holds a Shed Shell exclusively for Magnezone. That's what you do when faced with a counter, you find a way around it. Just because you need physical attacks to beat Blissey doesn't mean a thing. Using a move, item, or even an EV spread to counter one Pokemon has been going on the entire game. This is not, and never will be and issue.

And about the defensive characteristic. I wouldn't call the Pokemon Blissey walls a "significant portion of the metagame". There are only a few Pokemon utterly and completely stopped dead by Blissey. Most of these have other problems already, so you can't be sure that Blissey is the reason they aren't used. Take Porygon-Z for example. It hits like a truck, but it's defenses are too poor and it's speed to mediocre to get anywhere with it.




What I got from your original post is that you're just tired of having to deal with opposing Blissey walling your favorite special sweeper. It is clear that you haven't thought out your argument much further than that, or you would have considered what Blissey is doing to help the metagame. We already have way too many dangerous Pokemon to deal with, and getting rid of Blissey compounds the problem.

There is already a slight "luck" factor of hoping your opponent doesn't have something that can exploit your team's weakness. Obi's stall team (I know this is old, but honestly I haven't seen a team that well built since) had a serious CM Clefable weakness. Problem is, if he addressed that weakness, he would open up holes somewhere else, so he was content with leaving his team as is. Because Clefable is relatively obscure, most matches he wouldn't have to deal with one.

Every time Obi entered a match, he had to hope that his opponent didn't have Clefable. Is this competitive, having a near guaranteed loss occur at random? Not at all. Any and all luck elements in a game go against the nature of competition. Adding more threats leads to more luck in gameplay because of the limits placed on team building. This, as I have already established, is bad for a competitive game.




I should conclude this post with a clear definition of what I believe is a competitive game.

A competitive game is an activity where two or more players are pitted against each other, both vying for the common goal of victory. The activity should be based on the skills of the players, not on luck or chance. A skilled player will always beat an unskilled player.

Pokemon is already flawed as a competitive game since many of the moves we use have chances of inflicting ill effects on their targets, or missing. As I have stated before, the sheer number of Pokemon present in the game adds a luck element in team building. You will have weaknesses, and your goal is to cover the popular threats in exchange for being weak to lesser ones. Banning Blissey will only make the game worse.

For the most part, Nasty Plot/Swords Dance pokes are never going to have an easy time of it, and in my opinion this as much or if not more the affect of Choice Scarf, rather than priority users. Nasty Plot Azelf or Infernape just seem kind of pointless with Scarf-Flygon or Latias around (or in Infernape's case, Latias in general). If they take any real damage, Jirachi can also take them out, not to mention Rotom, Heatran or even the aforementioned Magnezone. Aside from stall, there are very few teams without at least 1 scarfer because even bulky offense is likely to carry scarf heatran/rotom/magnezone/jirachi or something.

Since it's really impossible to have natural speed greater than a choice scarf poke, the only ways to succeed with Plot/Dance are:

a) Have a way to boost your speed also (generally the result of a baton pass chain)
b) Have awesome bulk in addition to speed (Think Garchomp)

Metagross getting passed stuff is just about the only OU pokemon who I can think of that can make consistent success of strategy a). There aren't any pokemon that I can think of that can pull of strategy b). Garchomp and Manaphy would though if they were OU.

cantab said:

Or a genius. When someone brings Scizor in on Azelf, it's pretty obvious Azelf's going to switch out. Steel types in general are the predictable switch-in, so Scizor Superpowers, and it's bye bye Magnezone.

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Or pursuits and kills Azelf. Or even predicts a switch and scouts with U-Turn if its not packing Pursuit. In other words you really don't know what Scizor is going to do.

Bourbon said:

Last year when the Garchomp ban was being discussed, a concept called "the slippery slope" came up. Basically the theory was that banning Garchomp would open the doors for other Pokemon getting banned as well. I laughed at the thought, I figured such a thing was ridiculous and would never happen.

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The same has occurred to me more recently actually, but for a different reason. I'll call it 'Uber drift'.
Basically, whenever we ban a Pokemon to Uber, the remaining metagame, by definition, becomes weaker. Thus, things that weren't suspects before may become suspects. More pertinent than Blissey at present would be the proposal for testing Salamence. Would Salamence have been tested if Garchomp was still OU?
Of course, we do test Ubers to check they're truly Uber. But when even considering them, we're then comparing them to the naturally weaker OU metagame.
Thus, the natural expectation is that over time we will see an increase in the number of Uber Pokemon, and a corresponding decrease in the strength of OU Pokemon.
The tendency is attenuated somewhat by the slowness of our testing processes, coupled with the fact that Game Freak shift things periodically. But I nonetheless think the tendency is probably there, and we should be aware of it. One way to 'break' it, if it's perceived to have become a major problem, would be to suspect test any all Uber with 600BST or less. If we ever end up banning Dragonite, I'd say that's when Uber drift starts to become a problem.

The metagame revolves around physical threats more than special threats. Blissey walls the lesser half of the attacking spectrum.

The Salamence ban would be retarded TBH. I wasn't around during the Garchomp era, so I do not know how powerful he was, but Salamence is very easily checked and hampered by rocks. Drop Salamence and we'll see Dragonite usage spike and Scizor usage drop.

Here we go, slippery slope!

I haven't paid a terrible amount of attention to this thread, so forgive me if someone has already addressed the wording of the characteristics and why it doesn't actually apply to Blissey.


Defensive Characteristic
A Pokémon is uber if, in common battle conditions, it is able to wall and stall out a significant portion of the metagame.


The operable word in the context of this issue is "metagame". The reason Blissey doesn't stall pokemon like Alakazam and Glaceon and Jynx and Raikou out of the metagame is because they are not actually a part of it. Remembering that we're talking about Standard here, and that we began Standard Gen 4 play with all of these pokemon, you get a better sense of what I'm getting at.

The metagame begins, ideally, with no bans. In actuality, it began, two summers ago, with Latios, Latias, Deoxys-S and Manaphy banned, in addition to more obviously "uber" pokemon like Rayquaza, Kyogre, and Mewtwo. Through testing of the actual Suspect pokemon (which includes Garchomp, Wobbuffet and the year-later Shaymin-S in Platinum), we have determined that Latios is too strong for the metagame, and that Latias almost certainly is not. We also determined that DXS is too strong for the metagame, and we are in the process of determining where Manaphy belongs. But besides Latias preemptively being added to the Standard Ladder (and, therefore, the metagame) after its Stage 2 OU tag, the one enduring constant is that all of these pokemon have been tested in the actual, standard metagame.

Alakazam and Glaceon and Jynx and Raikou have always been available for use in this metagame, as has Blissey. The would-be special threats have had every opportunity to show that they actually are special threats since the metagame started, in the middle of 2007, and began to take shape throughout the rest of the summer and year. If they failed to do so in this timeframe, they failed to become part of the true, Standard metagame, and it's as simple as that.

Oh wow. Now anything marginally strong is considered for a suspect test? I can find more reasons Scizor deserves a suspect test than Blissey and Mence, but I digress.

From what I understand, you don't want to remove/ban Blissey but you want to nominate it for a suspect test purely for your experimental gain.

Answering any of the questions in the OP is of course pure theorymon, but I might as well put in my two cents.

1.) Are more Pokemon viable in competitive play, but the metagame is not dominated by Pokemon following Blissey's removal?

I wouldn't know about the second part of the statement because in the current metagame we have pseudo-substitutes in the form of Tyranitar, Latias, Snorlax, and bulky waters that can wall what Blissey normally walls but no one can really tell unless said suspect test is in effect. But in relation to the first statement, absolutely. Even without a test, there is no doubt that people will spam special threats like offensive Heatran, CM _____, Jolteon..the list goes on. Not every special threat is incredibly fragile like Azelf and Gengar. Scarf Raikou anyone?

2.) Is the metagame more enjoyable following Blissey's removal?

It depends on what you mean by "enjoyable". I would anticipate that instead of worrying about a pink fat fuck, there are new factors you would have to consider when teambuilding. See above list.

3.) Can we reconstruct the defensive characteristic of an Uber Pokemon? As it stands, the characteristic "could" apply to Blissey, who does wall a large portion of the metagame, enough that some Pokemon actually switch to physical attacks on all special movesets, just for her.

I never liked the characteristics and I feel they are quite flawed in capturing what a true uber is so any reconstruction would be welcome. Jumpman was right on the money with my views on the second statement, though again with your suspect test one would argue that certain Pokemon aren't standard because of Blissey.

The only thing I can really think of that runs a physical move for Blissey is Gengar. The myriad of special oriented things that run Explosion (Magnezone, Heatran) use it for not just Blissey. I don't play nUU much but it seems that principle is much worse with Chansey than in standard with Blissey.



Ok so writing this out I do see the point in having a suspect test for Blissey, but I don't see what it would accomplish besides satisfying our own curiosity. I still think it's just an experiment, an experiment that time shouldn't be wasted on because there are more pressing matters.

TSPhoenix said:

Or pursuits and kills Azelf. Or even predicts a switch and scouts with U-Turn if its not packing Pursuit. In other words you really don't know what Scizor is going to do.

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How about: Scizor comes in on Azelf. Azelf selects flamethrower. That way, either Scizor dies to Azelf or Scizor dies to Magnezone.

Alakazam and Glaceon and Jynx and Raikou have always been available for use in this metagame, as has Blissey. The would-be special threats have had every opportunity to show that they actually are special threats since the metagame started, in the middle of 2007, and began to take shape throughout the rest of the summer and year. If they failed to do so in this timeframe, they failed to become part of the true, Standard metagame, and it's as simple as that.

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Jumpman, I'm going to have to interject here. The pokemon listed, especially Raikou are not in the standard metagame because of 2 reasons, and ONE of them IS Blissey. The other goes for their lack of being able to find other niches in the metagame other than special sweeping. For example, look at all of the OU pokemon that have viable special sweeping capabilities:

Salamence
Rotom-A
Latias
Heatran
Jirachi
Lucario
Infernape
Gengar
Azelf
Starmie
Magnezone
Celebi
Dragonite
Suicune
Zapdos
Kingdra
Togekiss
Empoleon
Jolteon
Electivre
Roserade
Porygon-Z

Now I can go down the list 1 by 1 and tell you why each of these Pokemon is OU, despite having viability as a Special Sweeper. There are two main reasons. A) They can BEAT blissey, or B) They have found another role through support. With Alakazam, Jynx, Raikou, and Glaceon, their is no other role. Let me go into detail.

Salamence - No Brainer.. SpecsMence is walled by Blissey and is one of the least common sets (wonder why?).. Has a myriad of physical options

Rotom-A - Can wall or Sweep. Beats Blissey with Sub/Charge

Latias - Calm Mind + Refresh

Heatran - Taunt + FireBlast, Explosion, or Flash Fire Choice Specs. Also makes good support.

Jirachi - Substitute + Calm Mind, can do other shit.

Lucario - Lol.

Infernape - Lol.

Gengar - Explosion.

Azelf - Explosion. Can lead also.

Starmie - OU because it Spins and counters two of the metagames biggest threats, Gyarados and Infernape

Magnezone - Explosion. Traps steels.

Celebi - Special Sweeper is never used because of how much other shit it can do.

Dragonite - see Salamence.

Suicune - Substitute + Calm Mind, Crocune, Pressure.

Zapdos - is relegated to support and tank because it CANT beat Blissey...

Kingdra - see Salamence

Togekiss - Can beat Blissey with Nasty Plot + Air Slash + Heal Bell / Aura Sphere

Empoleon - Beats Blissey with T-Spikes... makes good anti-lead

Jolteon - Baton Passer

Electivire - Cross Chop + Physical sets.

Roserade - lays Spikes / T-Spikes instead of Special Sweeping. In fact, it is never a special sweeper because it won't beat Blissey

Porygon-Z.. the LAST pokemon in the entire tier.. needs extreme lengths to beat Blissey, but it can. Offers nothing besides pure special sweeping.


So you see my point? Every pokemon that is a designated Special Sweeper with no other niches is out of OU BECAUSE of Blissey. You can't say that with Physical sweepers without any other niches because there is no physical equivalent of Blissey... For example, pokemon like Breloom and Machamp are limited in their roles as Hard-hitters and can be played defensively to help with Tyranitar. A physical equivalent of Blissey would restrict them to that role and their usage would drop dramatically...

So I wouldn't be so hard on the four you listed as "not being part of the metagame." They were never going to be part of the metagame solely because of Blissey. Personally, I stay away from special based pokemon as pure sweepers for that very reason. If you look on 98+% of successful OU teams, all the special based pokemon on the team are there for reasons OTHER than special sweeping, or they have a way to beat Blissey and its as simple as that.

RaikouLover said:

So I wouldn't be so hard on the four you listed as "not being part of the metagame." They were never going to be part of the metagame solely because of Blissey.

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I don't know about Raikou but the other three are solidly beaten by OUs other than Blissey. Scizor beats all three. Alakazam and Jynx fall to any priority move, nearly any scarfer, and Pursuit and Glaceon has limited effectiveness outside of Hail and has to contend with various Steels, Stealth Rock, bulky waters, and Fighters.

Your argument is based a little much in generalizations.

I am of the opinion that one-trick ponies have no place in the standard metagame, unless that "trick" is a damn good one. For the exact, well-thought reasons you mentioned, RL, there are no such Special ponies currently riding in the standard metagame—instead they're riding the short bus that is the BL Tier and below.

Raikou is probably the best example. It runs rampart in UU, and it cannot be stopped by scizor. BP is resisted, raikou has bulk, and a +1 thunderbolt destroys scizor. But it has absolutely zero way to get past blissey, so it's UU. Running as a mixed attacker with no way to boost, 85 attack, and crappy moves isn't really any option. How can you say raikou had it's chance when blissey has always existed?

What this thread is pointing out is that Blissey made special sweepers that couldn't beat her unviable, and arguably created the physical-over-special imbalance. The reason popular Pokemon mess up Blissey is because their sets were designed to, not because Blissey herself sucks. Focus Punch/Explosion Gengar, Trick Latias/Rotom-A, SubCM Mismagius, and "101 Subs" in general are just a few examples of how she centralizes. On the other hand, she's the only reason certain special attackers aren't Uber. If this sort of thing was bannable though, we'd have a lot fewer Pokemon in OU.

(Even if Blissey was removed, Tyranitar, Snorlax, Latias, Registeel, Chansey, etc etc could all step up to the plate, so don't expect a major metagame shift.)

As RaikouLover points out, we think about Blissey a lot when deciding if something is a good sweeper or not.

EDIT: No, I don't think she should be banned, I'm just looking at it from the other side.

I'm going to have to agree with Jumpman here. There's a difference between being broken and having a major impact on a metagame. I even come with a thought experiment:

Suppose we have a metagame, and call it "old OU". Now let's suppose that, through an Uber being demoted or a game making a few minor options available, a single new threat - let's call it "Nekrob" - arises that old OU cannot beat. Thus, the chaos of people trying to counter this beast ensues, and the resulting "new OU" metagame is vastly different from old OU. Many of the top threats in old OU are now in the lower regions of new OU, or have been phased out to UU entirely, while previously UU/low-OU Pokémon who were supposed to have been outclassed by the old OU top players now dominate new OU. Notably, new OU handles Nekrob incredibly well to the point of it becoming just enough of a threat to keep old OU's top threats out.

Is Nekrob broken? If we take RL's apparent interpretation of the term "metagame" in the Uber characteristics, Nekrob is clearly broken. It swept/walled a significant portion of old OU with little effort. However, it does not do this to new OU. New OU is about as stable as old OU was. In this case, I really don't see why Nekrob should be Uber.

I think that in order for a Pokémon A to be considered a part of the "metagame", for the purposes of determining the tier status of a given suspect B, Pokémon A should be able to function well in the metagame containing suspect B. When people are trying to adapt to suspect B, will they end up using Pokémon A despite it being countered by suspect B? If not, well, too bad? Even in the presence of Blissey, Heatran doesn't have to run Explosion to function well, and Latias doesn't have to employ TrickScarf to function well. Why should Porygon-Z or Raikou get to have an excuse?

FWIW, Blissey usage has been steadily dropping for the past year. I wonder if there will be a point where special sweepers (special HO teams?) will show up more frequently to reverse the trend. Even if it shows that Blissey is the main reason why fewer special sweepers see play, if a metagame cycle (similar to Shed Shell vs Magnezone) is the result, I can't see how it would be "bad" for the metagame. If Blissey usage continues to drop with no uptick in special sweeper usage, then the idea of Choice Scarf users nerfing special sweepers may have merit. Priority attacks affect sweepers on both sides of the spectrum so it's likely not the main issue.

cantab said:

Or a genius. When someone brings Scizor in on Azelf, it's pretty obvious Azelf's going to switch out. Steel types in general are the predictable switch-in, so Scizor Superpowers, and it's bye bye Magnezone.

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Pursuit will OHKO Azelf anyway.

I certainly do find Blissey annoying, and rarely use her myself, but that's just it. Annoying. The removal of Blissey would not make the metagame "more enjoyable" so to speak as it would unstable. Mean Special attackers (such as Heatran or Latias) would dominate the metagame. Why? With the absence of an awesome special wall would severely hurt much of OU. I'm not saying that its absence would be horrible, but i would be disheartened if blissey left. Blissey adds a little more stability to OU, and thus provides a very important part in the metagame that we know and love. Blissey can do more then just suck up special hits as well. It can provide keen team support with wish, and function as a cleric with aromatherapy. In conclusion, Blissey is a vital part of OU, and the rise of special attackers in OU would shoot up. I'm not saying special attackers would be broken without her, but they could do more damage without fearing her.

yea but blissey is OHKO'd by close combat so it should be ou for sure.