np: UU Stage 9 - Welcome Home

[cim]

I wasn't around when you guys banned permaweather - was there even an option to ban just the evasion abilities and not the weather in the previous Suspect Test?

And if Sand is broken because of just Stoutland, we should probably just BL Stoutland, no?

[mrb]

I believe there were four options:
1. Ban sand entirely
2. Just ban Sand Veil
3. Complex ban of sand and Sand Veil
4. Ban just Stoutland

The first option was chosen because Stoutland and Sand Veil Gligar weren't the only "problems" with sand. The passive damage was hindering to Life Orb sweepers; Arcanine, Umbreon, Roserade, and Shaymin couldn't abuse their instant recovery moves. Sand was not broken at all, nor was it claimed to be. It was banned because, in short, it would make a more fun metagame.

Sure, Stoutland had to be accounted for in teambuilding, but that wasn't the central reason as to why sand was banned. Making Stoutland BL would not change those reasons.

[/B/utterfree]

Originally Posted by Fat cim

I wasn't around when you guys banned permaweather - was there even an option to ban just the evasion abilities and not the weather in the previous Suspect Test?

No, there wasn't. There was, but people chose to just ban the Sand Stream ability and that was that apparently.

Thankfully, the weather ability bans led to two-three NFEs going to LC where they belonged and everything was okay. I'm fine with a retest of the abilities, but I despise NFEs being in tiers higher than NU, bar Scyther and Porygon2 who are both still-really-good-Pokemon.

And if Sand is broken because of just Stoutland, we should probably just BL Stoutland, no?

Many people such as myself proposed this before B2W2, before being told of Stoutland's alleged "counters" (in which people just named lists of every Ghost, Rock, and Steel type without offering any discussion at all as to how all of them were effective against Stoutland).

[mrb]

/B/utterfree, you're wrong.

Look at this post to see that there was a vote, and that there were different options in the vote.

[cim]

Originally Posted by Fat mrb

Sand was not broken at all, nor was it claimed to be. It was banned because, in short, it would make a more fun metagame.

So "I don't like it" is the criteria needed to ban something now? The idea that a group of people would ban something they all agree isn't broken just because it pisses them off really bothers me.

I feel the link to the vote you provided helps me to argue a stronger case for retesting weather. Half of the votes were in favor of banning Sand Veil in some form or another, and now that they are banned the votes would presumably change to "No ban"... I'm just saying.

[kokoloko*]

We're not doing this again. My use of the word "fun" to describe the metagame has caused enough shit-slinging as it is, and I'm not going to allow this to go any further. If it makes you feel any better, replace all instances of the word "fun" with "more competitive and diverse" in all my arguments--it's the same shit.

Anyway, feel free to debate your little hearts out about whether we should re-test Sand Steream and Snow Warning, but don't bring up the old votes to justify your arguments--use current data instead. Also just to let you guys know, I have spoken to a few other Senators, and they feel weather doesn't need a re-test (as do I).

I am open to asking for a suspect ladder to be set up if people manage to sway enough of the Senate and other prominent players in that direction, though. Just saying.

[Reaver12]

It makes sense to give them a new test IMO given OU's banning of Sand Veil. It was the most sound reason to ban Sand from a purely competitive standpoint, and now that it's gone a re-test as Sand on a whole seems viable. The banning of Sand Veil may not make this any less true, but I believe that it warrants one, final, test of the weathers without their evasion raising abilities. Especially given how heavily offensive this current metagame is (I personally find this metagame to be the most enjoyable one I can remember, but that doesn't change the fact that it's not near as balanced as it could be)

If you look at the usage statistics thread, kokoloko laughingly notices that only 6% of teams are Stall. I'm no fan of Stall, have actually personally hated it since I started playing competitively, but that doesn't seem balanced to me. Perhaps perma-weather, with it's ability to really rack up damage on LO Pokemon, might actually give us a much more balanced metagame.

I haven't voted in a suspect test since Gen IV, so I'm obviously no expert, but IMO a final test of weather couldn't do us any harm. It might actually do us some good.

[RT.]

Even with the ban on Sand Veil, nothing fundamental has changed that would justify a retest; of the four votes that were in favor of banning Sandstream, only one even mentioned Sand Veil. The strain that Sandstream put on team building and the metagame as a whole was the main reason behind its ban, and that part hasn't changed. If anything, those effects would be even more profound now that Stoutland received Superpower and we have our very own Excadrill.

[Pokemazter]

If senate is smart, they leave UU the way it is for now. Why ruin a tier tip-toeing the line of perfection?

[/B/utterfree]

Originally Posted by Fat Pokemazter

If senate is smart, they leave UU the way it is for now. Why ruin a tier tip-toeing the line of perfection?

Because it isn't really perfect? You still have stuff like Tornadus-I who can completely wreck teams at the blink of an eye, forcing you to use *shudder* Ambipom to check it, albeit Torn-I has a few (emphasis on few) other checks who are less stupefying for me, such as Zapdos.

Don't even get me started on other Pokes such as Meloetta, Raikou, Mew or Yanmega, who are actually very lethal in this tier. If at least one of those four is Suspect Tested, then one could say the line of perfection is being tip-toed.

[Silvershadow234]

lol you don't have to run Ambipom to check tornadus. Pretty much every top tier attacker has solid counters, and if Stoutland is introduced it will have virtually none, as now Rhyperior has to face the threat of Superpower, and Sandslash can quite easily get to +2 thanks to it's decent bulk and force offensive teams to run something like Weavile on every team just to have a check to it. If sand comes back, then it will ruin UU like pokemazter said. I feel that the tier is very balanced at the moment, and sand/hail would completely ruin that.

On another subject has anyone tried out SubBU Braviary? It is one of the very best wallbreakers in the tier at the moment, being able to set-up on Slowbro, Blastoise, Roserade and even Bronzong, and because most of these are the first things you would switch in on Braviary, Braviary can quickly set-up an almost unstoppable sweep. With Brave Bird as the attacking option, his only real counter is Zapdos, and I have to say that I prefer Braviary over Tornadus as a bulk up sweeper, as Braviary has that surprise factor and better bulk, and although Tornadus probably fits better onto heavily offensive teams because of that speed, Braviary has been working wonders on my balanced team at the moment.

[Machi]

Originally Posted by Fat Pokemazter

If senate is smart, they leave UU the way it is for now. Why ruin a tier tip-toeing the line of perfection?

I'm with this guy... Sand Veil was never particularly the issue of sand, snow cloak and hail on the otherhand was. As UU did not particularly attempt nor have abusers barring Cacturne, but he still never made the cut for UU, probably Gligar to an extent but he's not that unmanageable and at best would only lay on SR (as compared to hail and froslass' layers of spike + TW). The votes against Sand Veil sentiment was just that evasion was uncompetitive but really from my experience I never particularly cried for uncompetitiveness from say Sandslash, Cacturne, or Gligar it was such a far cry from what real evasion abuse looked like from the previous round with hail... Rather you had far more reliable mons that could take advantage of sand, albeit quite limited, in that what you had was Rhyperior/Stoutland/Nidoking/Flygon + Roserade (to deal with bulky waters) that could fit much better in a team than say Sandslash or Cacturne (again Cacturne wasn't a bad choice on Sand just that between those three especially Stoutland the enemy teams were nicely cleaned off with hazards+toxic spikes+sand stream). Still overall the cries against sand weren't so much about evasion as how it limited team building as the general mons you'd be playing around with were the aforementioned.

Edit: Heck if anything you've just gained two additional advantages to sand in the form of Superpower Stoutland (which probably would go in favor of suspect testing him), limiting the common Rocks/Steels usually sent to check it, and Sand Rush Sandslash being released. Third if you consider the option of adding Virizion on your sand team as a water check if Roserade doesn't fit your fancy. Fourth if you add Golurk who received his DW ability as well as some good move tutor additions, most notably Drain Punch. Last one that may have slipped under the radars would be Sand Force Gigalith being released. What has the meta since the banning of sand actually gained to deal with it we have Bronzong but as argued before one mon is not particularly enough of an argument, especially when you're advocating it is the go to answer for sand alone (meaning once its picked off then what?). The introduction of new fighting types + returnees (Mew + Nadus) aren't particularly geared toward countering the regular sand members. Frankly, Sand does have a pretty good buff from when it was banned, again its not like losing Sand Veil was particularly damning to it, so I'm not for re-testing sand.

[SHUCKLE MAN]

Originally Posted by Fat RT.

Even with the ban on Sand Veil, nothing fundamental has changed that would justify a retest; of the four votes that were in favor of banning Sandstream, only one even mentioned Sand Veil. The strain that Sandstream put on team building and the metagame as a whole was the main reason behind its ban, and that part hasn't changed. If anything, those effects would be even more profound now that Stoutland received Superpower and we have our very own Excadrill.

Bearing this in mind:

Originally Posted by Fat kokoloko

don't bring up the old votes to justify your arguments--use current data instead.

I think it's worth a test.

The fact that we're even discussing this, and that people have different points of view, shows that we're not sure (as a community) what the outcome of the event would be. That's where a test would come in.

[breh]

Ok, so

Why is the conversation solely about sand and not about hail? Although sand is clearly controversial, the same cannot be said about hail. Yes, we do have the same Blizzspammers as before, but everything about hail bar residual damage is gone and a bunch of new threats for hail Pokemon are on the loose. I don't see why Snover can't be allowed back in.

Is there any fundamental reason why we can't test hail first in a suspect ladder and worry about sand later?

[superbadd]

Adding on to weather discussion, I'd like to see sun make a comeback. It was short lived imo and it's been a VERY long time since it was banned and the metagame changed drastically. Maybe diglett would be uu viable to get rid of the weather abusers? Lawl It would be really cute to see all the little babies cause so much destruction.

[kokoloko*]

Sun is out of the question.

[RT.]

Don't mind him, he's against anything that will see Diglett rise to power >_>

[/B/utterfree]

Originally Posted by Fat kokoloko

Sun is out of the question.

I'm going to agree with this. As much as I want all permanent weathers to return to UU, I get the feeling people would just whine about them and everything would be a colossal mess, moreso than I already view UU to be.

I'm working hard to spam teams in order to get mediocre stuff to drop to RU and be forgotten in UU practically, having indirectly learned the ways of TAONU. In return, some things from the tiers lower than UU are, for me, expected to rise in their place. Meloetta being in one of my spam teams was a thing, so now I might try Mew and Virizion out; I haven't made spam teams to endorse those Pokemon and five respective others yet.

[Pokemazter]

Originally Posted by Fat RT.

Don't mind him, he's against anything that will see Diglett rise to power >_>

And other things too.

Again, to be frank about this, UU is simply at its best right now. It's got a wide variety of abusable sweepers, its fair share of defensive tanks, and enough of the other elements to keep each individual match interesting. Going back on past bans, such as unbanning Hail, Sun, and Sand, will lead to a rapid centralization of the metagame, much like what happened in OverUsed when Black and White initially came out. Those weather effects absolutely require you build your team to beat them, which leaves some teambuilding aspects, such as the more frail sweepers - Weavile, Honchkrow, Azelf, and others like them - off the table as they cannot afford to be taking the passive damage brought by Hail or Sand.

Sun on its own is extremely unhealthy without a permanent way of setting Rain up in the lower tiers, as the number of Chlorophyll users and overpowered Fire-types this side of BL gives it way too much to work with. The likes of Shiftry, Sawsbuck, Victini, Darmanitan, and Victreebel would quickly snap the metagame in half, which really isn't worth it. Hail, I'll admit, isn't to be as feared as it once was. Mamoswine and Kyurem were what made it so dangerous, and with them out of the picture, won't be as much of a problem. However, unbanning hail will lead to an onslaught of "you banned Snover, so why not ban Hippopotas or Vulpix" discussions and other false sympathies towards the weather starters. Sand, we all know will be a bugger to handle, as things like Sandslash, Stoutland, Cacturne, Gligar, and Rhyperior all of a sudden become extraordinarily difficult to handle while retaining momentum for your team.

Weather is unhealthy in this tier, no matter how you look at it. My question to those asking for weather to be retested, is why do you want to disrupt the tier so badly? If you want to play an organised tier, play OU, but don't come around asking for the same styles of play in a completely different tier. There's a reason as to why BW2 UU is so comparable to DPP OU, and I'd like to see it stay that way.

[RT.]

I wouldn't be opposed to taking a closer look at Hail, actually. I wasn't here when it was banned, but it seems pretty clear by looking at the votes that the playstyle has lost most of its power players since then, leaving Blizzspam as its only remaining viable strategy. Its nice that we have a decent metagame right now, but we should also aim to minimize the banlist if there's anything on there that is no longer detrimental to the metagame. That being said, I'm still firmly behind Sand and Sun not getting re-tested.

[/B/utterfree]

Originally Posted by Fat Pokemazter

Again, to be frank about this, UU is simply at its best right now. It's got a wide variety of abusable sweepers, its fair share of defensive tanks, and enough of the other elements to keep each individual match interesting.

The reason UU is interesting is because Gen V OU is so broken people are only willing to use some Pokes and let others drop all too willingly. And UU's "balancedness" is starting to corrode as a result.

Going back on past bans, such as unbanning Hail, Sun, and Sand, will lead to a rapid centralization of the metagame, much like what happened in OverUsed when Black and White initially came out.

It would also lead to the metagame being more dynamic, in a way. Whether these dynamics actually help the tier any is what would be debated, and I agree that releasing the permanent weather will just wind up being a mixed bag again.

Those weather effects absolutely require you build your team to beat them, which leaves some teambuilding aspects, such as the more frail sweepers - Weavile, Honchkrow, Azelf, and others like them - off the table as they cannot afford to be taking the passive damage brought by Hail or Sand.

This I can agree with. Some sweepers despise residual damage from Hail or Sand, thereby making those weathers somewhat annoying. However, balanced metagames in the past have had permanent sand before. Two previous generations' worth of it, to be exact.

Sun on its own is extremely unhealthy without a permanent way of setting Rain up in the lower tiers, as the number of Chlorophyll users and overpowered Fire-types this side of BL gives it way too much to work with. The likes of Shiftry, Sawsbuck, Victini, Darmanitan, and Victreebel would quickly snap the metagame in half, which really isn't worth it.

While this is agreed upon, you also forget some tanks, such as Cresselia and Umbreon, have their reliable recovery being stronger in the Sun on top of all that. I might have to make a defensive Sun team as part of my next Dark Horse Project in OU to destroy this perception of "it only benefits hyper offense" using Hope.

Hail, I'll admit, isn't to be as feared as it once was. Mamoswine and Kyurem were what made it so dangerous, and with them out of the picture, won't be as much of a problem. However, unbanning hail will lead to an onslaught of "you banned Snover, so why not ban Hippopotas or Vulpix" discussions and other false sympathies towards the weather starters.

As much as I want eternal winter to cover all the Gen V tiers, I'm going to agree that releasing Hail would set a garbage precedent; in the case, it would deliver chicanery in the other weather NFEs being released.

Sand, we all know will be a bugger to handle, as things like Sandslash, Stoutland, Cacturne, Gligar, and Rhyperior all of a sudden become extraordinarily difficult to handle while retaining momentum for your team.

Gligar is no longer a problem, neither is Cacturne. Unless you mean Immunity Gligar and Water Absorb Cacturne making teambuilding still more difficult to counter stuff reliably, then of course. As for Sandslash, Stoutland, and Rhyperior, though - you'd be right in that regard.

Weather is unhealthy in this tier, no matter how you look at it. My question to those asking for weather to be retested, is why do you want to disrupt the tier so badly? If you want to play an organised tier, play OU, but don't come around asking for the same styles of play in a completely different tier.

While I don't agree with the attitude, I can agree that UU is slightly better without permanent weather in it.

There's a reason as to why BW2 UU is so comparable to DPP OU, and I'd like to see it stay that way.

The irony in this statement is that permanent Sand and permanent Hail were allowed in DPP OU. There are also several contrasts, mainly in part to how a majority of the DPP OU Pokemon aren't actually in B2W2 UU. I'd like to see something like Infernape drop to UU before the comparisons start, for example.

However, UU is a much more comfortable tier for me to play in compared to the likes of OU and RU. Please don't free anything, as there is still some banning to do before the tier is perfect.

Arguments in bold, just making sure a reality check is in place while otherwise agreeing for the most part with what is being said by Pokemazter.

[Machi]

I can't help but want to punch a baby whenever I hear someone advocate for a re-testing of sun, clearly it will never happen because the Senate has sanity, because it just falls under the category of "you've got to be shitting me". I understand some guys were never here during the 1st round to see just how bad sun is but you know its not hard to read through the previous votes and discussions, it was pretty unanimous anyways, to see that sun was never particularly healthy to the metagame (even when there were other permanent weathers available). Or just a quick glance of Pokemon with sun based weather abilities will immediately tell you just how different the level of sun abusers are from hail/sand (along with stats and coverage to boot).

Hail I'd actually be more in support of re-testing than sand, not that I'm a fan of permanent weather either, but with the snow cloak ban as well as the drop downs (fighters) being such great threats to the team mates I can see justification for re-testing it. I don't think it would set such a precedence with those who understand the key difference between how drop downs and bans have affected hail and sand, you'd just be jumping the gun equating hail = sand therefore sand should also be valid for retesting. Hail undoubtedly has not gained anything only lost and with the current meta its clear that there is a nerf sand on the other hand has only gained from the current metagame and has not lost its potency from when it was around. Fact is one weather received the shorter end of the stick so in no way are the two weathers necessarily equal in this metagame and its that difference that would make me support re-testing hail but not sand.

[superbadd]

I get that sun may be too powerful but do you think we could have something like ou were have a chlorophyll +drought ban? The only thing that might be too strong is victini or darmanitan, but both are SR weak and can be played around. That would probably even things out a bit. Just a thought... Hail seems okay imo, we have bronzong now, and no good hail abuser is set to come back, then there's the SC ban. In regards to sand, how was sand like in DP uu?

With sun not being so offensive we can try sun stall. With how offensive uu is atm a, a new type of stall team is just what we need. UU sun stall would look something like this, vulpix/cresselia/arcanine/Swampert/hitmontop/cofagrigus).
It's a pretty interesting team archetype imo, and it would bring a lot more diversity in the metagame. So would do you guys think about banning chlorophyll+drought?

[Pokemazter]

Originally Posted by Fat Masara Damage Calculator

Detailed Result:
252 Atk Choice Band Victini V-create vs 248 HP/0 Def Rhyperior: 50.58% - 59.58%

Thats what unbanning sun and imposing a Chlorophyll+Drought ban does. Rhyperior gets 2HKOd by Jolly Victini in the Sun, by a Fire-type move. One of the bulkiest of all Rock-types should never be 2HKOd by a Fire-type move, especially when Rhyperior would be switching into that V-Create. We really don't need that in this metagame, which would go to show that there would be no safe switch-ins to Choice Band Victini, which was one of the biggest issues surrounding Drought Vulpix during its last stint in UU. Life Orb Darmanitan would play a lot the same;

Originally Posted by Fat Masara Damage Calculator

Detailed Result:
252 Atk Life Orb Sheer Force Darmanitan Flare Blitz vs 248 HP/0 Def Rhyperior: 48.04% - 56.58%

However, Darmanitan is free to use Earthquake after Flare Blitz, decimating whatever remains of Rhyperior's HP stat. Then there's Chandelure, who'd finally have a way to get past any Snorlax unfortunate enough to take enough prior damage;

Originally Posted by Fat Masara Damage Calculator

Detailed Result:
252 SpAtk Choice Specs Chandelure (+SpAtk) Fire Blast vs 144 HP/176 SpDef Thick Fat Snorlax (+SpDef) : 37.42% - 44.27%

Either way we look at this, Sun is too unhealthy for the metagame. It makes some of the most powerful attackers in the tier all the more dangerous, literally leaving no checks to things such as Victini or Darmanitan.

[superbadd]

Let's be real, who would slap on three different fire types on one team(counting vulpix that would be 4), that team would be incredibly SR weak. Are you also forgetting that things like rain dance kingdra and tornadus exist? It's not like sun is gonna be up all the time. Victini is also very close to hitting ou usage and chandelure is going to get its dw ability sometime within the next year or so, which means it'll be banned pretty quickly. That means if you're thinking of a long term period, the only threat you have to watch out for is darm. And he's weak to SR, has under 95 base speed, is frail, and is susceptible to all forms of priority. Intimidate bulky arcanine counters darm, while being able to recover 66% health each turn.