I'd like to talk about Darkrai

[White symphoni]

I've never played with darkrai so i can not say anything useful.But i'm confused at the fact that Darkrai is getting opposed largely because of Dark Void.So why not ban only dark void?I think i'm missing something but i can't think of what it is.Darkrai without dark void would still be really fun to use and it won't be quite as OP.But i must be missing something.But what is that i'm missing?

[Matthew]

Originally Posted by Fat Taylor

Darkrai 2HKOs Uber stall teams, and that is without Chandelure picking off anything who can go toe-to-toe with said suspect. He can be checked but that goes for just about every Pokemon in the game bar Arceus.

I'd take a pure Dark type over something taking 50% damage for merely switching in.

Perfect coverage is what it is, perfect; "I can hit everything without being resisted, so the opponent plays out of the ordinary to remove him". This is where you start to gather momentum as you've already opened a gap in your opponent's team.

Basically you have Dark/Fighting coverage with the offensive stats and speed to make most of the tier unusable because why would you pass up on the advantage that is there for the taking.

Dark with STAB is resisted by Dark, Steel and Fighting; two of which are hit for super effective damage by Focus Blast.

How can Alakazam have better coverage when Darkrai can already hit everything for neutral damage? If anything, the sleep inducing move and speed outweigh the benefits of Magic Guard as far as competitive battles on our ladder are concerned.

and then you have to look at it more than just Fighting-typing beating down Steel-types. Jirachi is a prime example. It's bulky as hell, doesn't really care about non-super effective moves, and can go on to cause Darkrai the pressure of staying in or not (assuming a poke has already been put to sleep). The reason I'd say Volcarona has better typing is due to the nature of DW in which we play. Out of all the pokemon which can come in on Fire-type moves only Heatran can honestly counter Volcarona. That's just bulky Volcarona too, sweeper Volcarona has no qualms with Heatran with HP Ground. Regardless of that I just don't understand why anyone wouldn't agree to it? If a few players leave the tier because we've allowed Darkrai then they are not competitive. We should try to be as unrestricted as possible with our ban list.

[Taylor]

I don't see Jirachi recieving much Dream World usage given the Excadrill, Garchomp and Chandelures of the tier tend to derail any effort of checking certain threats.

I can't say players who warn the community of such a drastic change would ever flee in a fit of rage and anger. No one is dissaproving any nomination outright in DW because it was founded on the basis that if we can mold the metagame to our liking and said suspect is worth our attention, then experimenting with his assets in a lower tier is tempting to say the least.

Stealth Rock is commonly on the field in Dream World despite Excadrill's presense. Tyranitar is the most used Pokemon in the tier for a reason, and little fail to utilize Stealth Rock as its universially demanding when facing scary-looking teams.

Volcarona without Quiver Dance would be similiar to Darkrai minus the Dark Void, only worse. Strictly speaking on typing alone, Volcarona has little to boast about when he suffers significantly from residual damage.

[Matthew]

So far in the 5 matches I've played (both using, and facing Darkrai) I've been really super disappointed. Against my rain teams it's completely non-effective (thanks Manaphy!!) but even against my sun team it still wasn't the threat we've all made it out to be.

I mean maybe I'm alone on this but he's super underwhelming :(

[Nightmare]

I'm going to say, despite the fact it's one of my favorite Pokemon, is no. Darkrai belongs in an uber environment and pretty much is there to stay. It tears a hole in most teams, even with the simplest set of Dark Void/Nasty Plot/2 attacks. Unless you are packing some type of blatant counter, like a Scarf Fighting Type, a Lum Berry super-attacker, or in DW's case, Techniloom, it's going to take out multiple Pokemon. I used the Pokemon a lot in Gen 4 ubers, and I ended up like 100-2 in both Singles and Doubles. People at league and other places I went to personally requested I do not use it or they would not play me.

So, my answer is, until they change some things, absolutely not. It never has had a place in OU of any type and takes very specific things to take down in order to stop it.

If you tested it, it'd get the quick hook so fast it isn't funny, unless everyone on the ladder happened to run Scarf Terrakion and Heracross to no end.

-James

[ala]

I wouldn't mind the chance to test him out again, but back in round 1 BW OU Darkrai was the 2nd best sweeper in the game (Skymin was the best) and I can't see something with 125 speed, reliable sleep and super strong offenses complete with awesome coverage being OU material. Again, maybe the tier has changed to better accommodate him (I doubt it) so a chance to test would be cool. I'd be a lot more confident that Darkrai could fit into OU nicely if Chandy was banned, since that removes a lot of the fighting checks that Darkrai hates.

[jrrrrrrr]

So after reading through about 20 logs with a Darkrai metagame it's not looking that great. I'll post them in this thread gradually as people get eliminated (so I don't spoil their teams), but Darkrai has been a complete non-factor. I think I've only seen a small handful of KOs

It's defenses are pretty bad so it's 2hko'd by pretty much everything. I've only seen it put something to sleep then get immediately revenged by a Genesect or ScarfChomp. Or just outright destroyed by Keldeo.

Although there was one match where Scarfrai put an Adamant Excadrill to sleep, that was neat. And another surprised a Genesect with scarf HP Fire.

I'm starting to believe that Substitute is a must on Darkrai sets based on these battles I've seen. I also can't believe I haven't seen much of a Darkrai+Chandelure combo to destroy fighting types, probably because Chandelure can be such a liability since u-turn is so common

IMO, Darkrai isn't proving to be a huge factor in these matches at all. Although it's an admittedly small sample size.

[Tobes]

Additionally, I think you could also attribute overpreparation to this. Which would mean that Darkrai is still manageable in this metagame, but we would have to question if was too centralizing. This is also only the first round, so the skill level isn't at its highest yet.

I'm ambivalent on Darkrai so far (much to my surprise) but we'll see how long that lasts.

[Harsha]

From my Darkrai matches, the guy I was playing didn't even know we were using Darkrai for this tournament and it still wasn't that great. Sure, it can sleep something, but if you're not using Ice Beam, a bulky Dragon like Dragonite or Garchomp can absorb a hit and use a priority move in the former's case or a strong STAB in the latter's. While I'm not fully certain that it should be allowed back in the metagame, it really does not do that much. That being said, we already have very little support for stall in this metagame, and releasing Darkrai kinda just kills any hope for stall. While the pool of battles is admittedly shallow, I have to confess that I really don't mind Darkrai. In fact, I think that we could possibly test other unbanned suspects (Shaymin-S, and MAYBE Deoxys-N). I don't know, does this sound agreeable? I don't want to jump too far ahead though, so let's see what happens with Darkrai I guess :d

[Princess Bri]

Originally Posted by Fat Harsha

but if you're not using Hidden Power Ice,

it has ice beam

[Sewa]

Usually Darkrai plays DarkVoid, DarkPulse, FocusMiss and NP/Ice Beam so you not always carry ice beam

[Omicron]

Use Choice Scarf Darkrai guys

Dark Pulse / FB / Ice Beam / HP Fire or Dark Void

very useful set :)