np: UU Stage 10 - Suspect Test Round 1 - Let it Snow

[kokoloko*]

It's a very exciting time here in UU, as we're doing our first suspect retest in BW, and what better way to start than with one of the most hated things this tier has ever witnessed? Yep, that's right. We're retesting Hail. Since this is bound to be a very polarizing subject, I'm opening up a new megathread, as to isloate the discussion of the resulting metagame from the previous one. The UU Suspect Ladder is up now, so get playing!

Remember, we have a new UU Senate system, so if you do well during this testing period, you might earn yourself a vote when the time comes! Information on this can be found on this post.

Now, Let it Snow!

That is all.

[Metric]

Any time frame on the duration of this suspect test?

[kokoloko*]

I'll be making a new thread about the actual vote on the 24th, and from there it will take about a week or two to organize everything, so about a month total.

[Bent1ey]

Well, considering the amount of discussion Hail was getting and the banning of Snow Cloak -which I don't contest, but it's forcing me to train a new Snorunt :p -, I think this ladder will be quite interesting. I bet we'll see some Walreins in the format :p

Mmmh... I suppose it would be too much to ask to have Abomasnow dropping from OU at the same time, too erase the achylles heel that is Snover. Still, pretty exciting!

[exotic]

Whitequeen will enjoy this, js.

I don't think it will be broken, it will be good for the metagame. Checking rain-teams is awesome, because these were really good. Without Snow Cloak these teams won't be as hard to take down, I think. Blizzardspam is annoying but can be played around. Insert bulky water and your set for checking hail. Haven't been around here when hail was still unbanned but I think hail is totally different without snow cloak.

[TPO3]

WhiteQueen was high enough on ladder without hail lol. Also we're complaining about how Blastoise is 3rd, and then we re-introduce a team that pretty much requires spin support. seems legit.

Anyways, I'm unsure about how this will go. We don't have Kyurem anymore. We're forced to use Snover if we want to use perma-hail. And we don't have Snow Cloak anymore. This, in addition to the fact that Fire-types and Fighting-types basically control the meta right now. It would SEEM like hail wouldn't be as good as it was before. On the other hand, hail will be the ONLY weather in this meta. It won't have to compete with Drought Vulpix and Sand Stream Hippopotas like it did before, so it will be easy to take control off the field. (theoretically.) It also turns many pokemon like Walrein that normally suck into very usable pokemon. I'm definitely looking forward to the suspect testing, it will be a very interesting round.

[AJC]

it's so much different now without snow cloak to allow froslass to avoid bullet punch or some scarf SE move to just set up spikes with impunity or able to try to get d-bond in without dying first.

without the thing that would make the former holders of snow cloak take the 20% miss gamble no longer can and it cuts down on the bullshit that made facing them much more manageable.

also snover is a very shitty pokemon even with evolite even worse than little hippo was due to having a worse typing and worse stats (hippopotas at least had a reasonable base attack to EQ from) and no 50% recovery (it does get Synthesis but due to bringing hail it only heals 25%).

[Pocket]

Noice, definitely getting in on this. I personally doubt Snover's Snow having a drastic negative influence in UU, but let's see what the suspect ladder shows me :d

[superbadd]

Oh so there's a senate... It's not gonna be like ou then. Kokoloko, are you considering a certain ranking for non senate members to vote?

[hobo bob]

So I have been playing on the suspect ladder for over an hour, and I have yet to see a single hail team. Hmmm...

[Ace Emerald]

Originally Posted by Fat kokoloko

Since this is bound to be a very polarizing subject

But seriously, this will be fun. My main complaint with hail was Snow Cloak, it'll be interesting to see if it's still broken almost a year later (man it's been a while).

[Oiawesome]

This ...is...AWESOME thank you for posting this kokoloko.Hail is in no way broken ,and it's recent and past nerfs show this Kyurem getting banned was one step in the right direction, and the recent nerf (Snow Cloak ban) REALLY helped since those two things are really the broken things of hail. The recent drop of Tornadus(Priority RD) and the hype of the powr of rain dance team just to say F*ck you helps,IMO Hail is no way broken.

Have fun with the testing.Cheers.^_^.

[superbadd]

Honestly, uu is different... very different, but enjoyable. The pace dramatically slowed down. Hail stall is really fun and so is hail bulky offense. All hail did was give defensive teams a good nudge and slowed down HO, enough to even things out positively.

[Oiawesome]

Hail stall Is broken by a LOT of 'mons in the UU meta currently ,The Best hail FULL Stop is Tornadus kills Snover with hurricane(Even if you switch Another pokemon usualy risks taking a heavy chunk and getting 2HKOD) ,Deletes Hail with Priority RD,And rapes hail stall with priority taunt.AND all of this is on the most standerd set (The rain dance offensive support as I like to call it).And when I first think about hail I think about Blizzard Spam,I mean a 120 BP STAB move coming of a +2 Jynx WILL dent or OHKO(OR 2HKO) A Lot of things and even Sub Roost LO articuno is greater than usual my freind "+6Metapod" on PS has been testing a Snover/Articuno/Jynx/Suicune/Snorlax/Darmantan Team on PS and his reports came good Obviously hail is weak to the monsters such as Victini and Darmanitan so cricune and snorlax dispatch of them and Darmantian as stated before wreks hail CBFlareblitz is monstres and SubRoost articuno has subpringly(lolpun) done well outstalling many threats and raping with free use of life orb (roost) and 120/120 STABS jynx lol like I said DENTS TEAMS and punchs holes with CBDarm for SRcuno and the rest to clean snover sucks DROP DOWN OBAMA!

The last part of the post is to educate about what a sucessfull hail team kind of should be: Snover,Two blizzard spammers,Countrers to counters of hail teams(bulky waters) and a hole puncher that helps agianst other hail.

[Santuga]

If Hail ever comes back to UU, I really hope people start using Escavalier again, that thing needs moar love <3

[Steamroll]

Not even Thanksgiving and we're listening to Christmas Carols. So pathetic. At least this metagame is going to get some life.

[rlyn99]

Originally Posted by Fat Santuga

If Hail ever comes back to UU, I really hope people start using Escavalier again, that thing needs moar love <3

This.

Also, Poliwrath seems to be another pokemon that could deal with hail decently.

A simple BU/Sleep Talk/Rest/Circle Throw set could do a lot.

[FrostFireBolt]

One thing I've found pretty cool (no pun intended) about hail is that if you run the Event Raikou with Weather Ball you get a 100 base power ice move as an alternative to HP Ice. You can also use Aura Sphere on that set to give you good Fighting/Ice coverage along with your Electric STAB. The obvious downside is that you have to use a Rash nature as opposed to Timid, though your speed is still decent. You could use scarf to alleviate this but then Hail+ Hazards hitting you every time you come in will wear you down quite quickly. I hope hail does stay, as it gives a lot of lower tier Pokemon reliant on weather, but not quite good enough to use in OU, a shot at viability (Rotom-F for example). There are some downsides though, as recovery moves such as Synthesis and Morning Sun get nerfed in Hail but on the whole it's a refreshing change for the tier.

[Ghostbone]

Weather ball Roserade is also pretty amazing for offensive sets, flying types that were previously reasonably safe switch ins get wrecked by a 100 base power ice move...
I've found mienshao working really well in hail, all its counters get worn down by hail (especially gligar), and it can regen off the hail damage itself, plus it doesn't have a weakness to entry hazards which can be annoying for most hail teams.

Obviously a bunch of mons that would normally run ice beam can now run the more powerful blizzard, like Slowbro/Suicune (bulky waters are generally a necessity on hail).
So yea, imo hail adds a bunch of variety to the tier, but has its weaknesses, being a rather limited pool of pokemon that work well in it (ice typing is also terrible in general), and having to use snover (to be fair he's a decent subseeder because of Ice STAB to hit opposing grass types, but it's still rather lackluster)

Cresselia cries when it sees hail teams though now xD

[Dallasboi1992]

YES! Love seeing hail getting retested. Time to run Weather Ball Raikou in hail again on the suspect ladder.

[SHUCKLE MAN]

Originally Posted by Fat Bent1ey

Mmmh... I suppose it would be too much to ask to have Abomasnow dropping from OU at the same time, too erase the achylles heel that is Snover. Still, pretty exciting!

I think it's good this way. In the scenario that Snow Warning turns out to be fine now, and then Abomasnow drops and it becomes over-powered, we'll know it'd probably be because of Abomasnow rather than because the ability itself, saving the usual debate we always have of "We have a problem, what do we ban, the whole ability or the main Pokemon that uses it?"

Snover is quite awful though. The best you can do with it is hope that it can throw a Leech Seed or Toxic around, or scout with Protect. It's a nice option for death fodder, but you just need to make sure you've taken out all the likely Rain Dance users (Bronzong, Tornadus, Kingdra, Uxie, Volbeat, etc.) from the opponent's team, before you can be comfortable you can sacrifice it.

[Jobriq]

The lack of snow cloak on froslass hurts as she's was a big part of UU hail.
Hail won't be broken as long as Abomasnow stay OU, as Snover is almost a dead team slot. The best it can do is possibly toxic things, or revenge almost dead flying/ground types with ice shard, but even with max attack Snover's ice shard is underwhelming.

Nidoking makes a good Blizzard spammer as it gets a sheer force boost. Hail damage shouldn't matter too much since sheer force cancels out LO damage.
Also Mandibuzz with overcoat makes a good special wall in hail....although in UU mixed or physical sets seem more viable. Also Rotom-F can be a Blizz spammer

[cim]

so forgive my ignorance before i jump on the ladder. what do hail teams do? why would a team want to run hail? is it just all stall with a varying number of ice types doing shit?

i get that back in the day you'd run a few ice types with snow cloak and powerful blizzards and run a more defensive team, but without snow cloak i guess i'm kind of at a loss with regards to what hail teams actually do

honestly the best thing I can think of for snover to do would be a choice band set. it's only staying in one turn, ever, so why not load up on wood hammer and ice shard "damage"?

[TPO3]

Originally Posted by Fat cim

so forgive my ignorance before i jump on the ladder. what do hail teams do? why would a team want to run hail? is it just all stall with a varying number of ice types doing shit?

i get that back in the day you'd run a few ice types with snow cloak and powerful blizzards and run a more defensive team, but without snow cloak i guess i'm kind of at a loss with regards to what hail teams actually do

honestly the best thing I can think of for snover to do would be a choice band set. it's only staying in one turn, ever, so why not load up on wood hammer and ice shard "damage"?

Without Snow Cloak, hail's only plusses are the passive damage, Blizzard, and Ice Body. I would expect a team would want to run hail just to add stall damage between turns, the extra 6% will nuke leftovers, or just add damage onto common Choice pokemon, like Flygon or Raikou. You're definitely right in questioning it though, hail is definitely less powerful than it used to be.

Also, Snover can run a passable (read as: mediocre, not great, meh) Leech Seed set. With max SpDef, Calm nature, and Eviolite, it reaches what would be base 115 SpDef on a fully evolved pkmn. Its typing gives it a few cool resistances (notably Water and Electric), so it gets a few chances to come in and set up Leech Seed. Leech Seed + Hail will add up pretty quickly, and you heal yourself at the same turn.

[Ace Emerald]

Originally Posted by Fat cim

so forgive my ignorance before i jump on the ladder. what do hail teams do? why would a team want to run hail? is it just all stall with a varying number of ice types doing shit?

i get that back in the day you'd run a few ice types with snow cloak and powerful blizzards and run a more defensive team, but without snow cloak i guess i'm kind of at a loss with regards to what hail teams actually do

honestly the best thing I can think of for snover to do would be a choice band set. it's only staying in one turn, ever, so why not load up on wood hammer and ice shard "damage"?

My current hail team is pointing towards semi-stall/balance as the most effective, as a mix of everything hail has to offer. It's got blizzspam offensive power, as well as teammates and a team style that takes full advantage of the extra hail damage, which can really put a damper on hyper offensive teams. I've got a few shifting spots, and I'm trying to work out the kinks, but I've got some preliminary ideas.

My two favorite team members right now are Subsplit Rotom-F and Stallbreaker Crobat, and they happen to illustrate exactly what I'm talking about. Rotom-F can be pretty hard to handle, especially behind a Sub. LO Blizzard is just plain hard to take, and that STAB Thunderbolt backs it up very nicely. Crobat has such great synergy with hail (outside that unforutate SR weakness, but if you're using hail you already have to have that covered) thanks to it's ability to check fighting, as well as heal off hail damage. He provides a more defensive element to the team. So in short, it looks like hail balance is the most effective right now, but I won't hold the point as I haven't fully tested hyper offense or full stall.

Another point, my favorite Snover is eviolite bulky. I actually use it for a little more than death fodder sometimes, it can actually take a hit. Leech Seed and Substitute actually can help against some walls that hail has to deal with.