(All Gens) Pokemon Through the Ages: Blissey

[Crystal_]

I think in rby if wrap moves are not allowed the best Moltres' set is Sky Attack/Hyper Beam/Fire Blast/Agility, a la Articuno. A Sky Attack crit can save the day, and although it's unreliable, SA is pretty much the only option Moltres has to actually bother Chansey and Starmie. SA+HB koes Chansey as well.

[Captain Evil]

Interestingly, the three legendary birds suffer from the same problem in RBY: in spite of being impressively powerful, they are easily walled by a large number of Pokémon.
Articuno is walled by most Water-types, and any Water/Ice, as well as Chansey.
Zapdos is walled by most Ground-types, and any Rock/Ground, as well as many Electric-types.
Moltres is walled by most Rock-types, and any Rock/Water, as well as many Water-types.
I do believe the legendaries would be quite a bit more threathening with an appropriate coverage option for each.

[.Maguss.]

Originally Posted by Fat Nyara

Entei's problem is its avarage offensive stats, with 90 of base for its special attack you'll not gonna break to much stuff, and without any STAB physical attack, you're not gonna deal too much damage with that. Entei is bad at Cursing as your opponent will almost always carry Surf and Earthquake, and something similar goes for RestTalk, Entei's edge is its lessen weakness to Rock Slide, SolarBeam, and maybe Psych Up, and its 101 HP substitutes; Entei's SolarBeam is just 20% more powerful than Moltres' Hidden Power Grass, so, you can't break stuff weak to that at all, but it's still a help, the lessen weakness to Rock Slide will rarely help (apart from a possible switch-in), and Psych Up can be useful, but it's niche, anyway. Moltres can at least break stuff with it's higher special attack.

Articuno at least do have an edge as a wall, as not too much stuff can break Articuno apart from Rock Slide and Fire pals under the sun, and you'll gonna freeze something soon or later with SleepTalking Ice Beam, and BoltBeaming with STAB on Ice Beam is nice, too; it can really break stuff with a Baton Passed Growth and wall at the same time, still, Articuno is not very good on GSC, but I find her better than Entei, who lacks of a real niche or use at all.

But well, that's just my opinion, lol.

Well, some mistakes here. Entei doesn't learn Substitute, and Articuno doesn't learn Thunderbolt.

Also, '20% more damage' means nothing. You need to know the actual damages it does on the Pokémon it is going to hit.

[Golden Gyarados]

Originally Posted by Fat .Maguss.

Articuno doesn't learn Thunderbolt.

"BoltBeam" colloquially means the combination of any ice and electric attacking move I thought? Smogon's recommended GSC sets both include HP Electric alongside Ice Beam, hence that satisfies "BoltBeam."

[Crystal_]

But tbh, HP Electric isn't doing anything useful anyway. It hits Suicune for just less than 20% after leftovers. I guess Articuno's best set would be Ice Beam | Toxic | Whirlwind | Rest, but give it some Spikes.

I really see no reason to use Entei over Houndoom though.

[Nyara]

Moltres' Hidden Power Grass Total BP: 24.360
Entei's SolarBeam Total BP: 33.360

Moltres does the 73% of damage than Entei does with it's coverage. How to calculate the final damage? Simple, divide that by the special defense of your target, add 2, later multiply that by 0,25/0,50/1/2/4 depending how it's resisted or super effective. End, you have the maximum damage, for the minium roll just multiply your result by 0,85.

Targets on OU/BL where Hidden Power Grass/Solar Beam does more damage under the Sun than Fire Blast:

Tyranitar (Entei: 56,3%-47,8% / Moltres: 41,4%-35,2%) 3HKO vs 90%+ 3HKO
Vaporeon (Entei: 50,7%-43,2% / Moltres: 37,3%-31,7%) 3HKO vs 10%+ 3HKO
Suicune (Entei: 51,3%-43,6% / Moltres: 37,7%-32,0%) 3HKO vs 15%+ 3HKO
Starmie (Entei: 78,0%-66,5% / Moltres: 57,2%-48,6%) 2HKO vs 10%+ 2HKO
Rhydon (Entei: 173,6%-147,7% / Moltres: 127,3%-108,2%)
Golem (Entei: 163,3%-138,8% / Moltres: 119,8%-101,9%)
Kingdra (Entei: 33,1%-29,3% / Moltres: 24,3%-20,6%)

Entei's SolarBeam does the same damage than it's Fire Blast under the sun to some foes like Marowak, so, it ease a bit the prediction, but Moltres' Fire Blast is still doing them a lot more of damage, but in exchange, it hard a bit the prediction with it's coverage. Entei can't use SolarBeam outside from the sun, while Moltres if needed can use it's coverage outside of it. I'm too lazy to calculate the exact chance of 2-3-4HKO, so, they are just aproximates at eye. The practical effect of SolarBeam? It can, with enough luck, timing, and luck (Suicune should not select Rest never while SleepTalking) break Suicune if you hit it on the switch (it will force Suicune to rest, otherwise, its Surf will still win), the same goes with Vaporeon, it can win against Starmie under the sun, and can severly damage a Tyranitar without Rest (I don't know how much damage do Tyranitar against Entei and Moltres). Taking in account Moltres' principal targets are Rhydon and Golem with Hidden Power Grass, it can choose other type of Hidden Power to cover other stuff, like Water or Rock.

Anyway, Entei's best target in comparison with Moltres is Starmie, so, it can be a reason to use Entei over Moltres, but that's pretty much all.

While Fire Blast...

Moltres' Fire Blast Total BP: 62.640 (83,520 under the sun)
Entei's Fire Blast Total BP: 50,040 (66,720 under the sun)

Well, it's not the exactly calc, as if I rebember OK, the STAB is calculated after the defense division and the 2+ add, but that's an aproximate, under the sun I'm not sure when it's calculated, so, it can be wrong. Entei's Fire Blast just does the 80% of the damage of Moltres one, and Moltres CAN break walls (even Snorlax under the sun) with that, and destroy offensive threats, but Entei just doesn't have enough power to do something at all... and Houndoom is still a better SunnyBeamer than Entei. Moltres is not great, but at least is not outclassed on it's job, and he does well it's job.

Flamethrower in Entei is a joke. I don't know how much hard hit Entei with Hidden Power Figthing, and I'm lazy to calculate that, but I guess it's better than Return for the slot most of the time, but I think Rest is better, anyway. Fire Blast's PP is really minimal, so, it's really a pity that Entei starts to run off of PP's really soon and without breaking or defeating something most of the time (unless your opponent is dumb and switch-in its Steelix or something like that), but Flamethrower will not do nothing more than burn stuff, poor Entei. Psych Up is an interesting niche in countering some cursers, it can work on Entei.

Ah, and yeah, with Articuno I mean with Hidden Power Electric, but, yeah, you can change that for Blizzard for more PP's to aim for a freeze and possible more damage if needed, or Toxic if you think they don't carry Heal Bell or Rest (but they do), and Whirlwind works with spikes as long you defeated the Rock Sliders over there, or you'll not gonna phaze too much (unless you're really lucky).

About the substitute, my error, I rebembered more the ADV's Entei. Entei does have a niche on GSC? It may, the same as Raikou and Suicune but with a worst defensive type, so, it's not really hard to break at all, but it can help depending of the team, I guess.

[Borat]

Entei should use counter, solarbeam, sday, fireblast. But no one should use entei anyway outside of mono-fire in which case always use entei, so idk why this debate exists.

[magic9mushroom]

Originally Posted by Fat Captain Evil

Interestingly, the three legendary birds suffer from the same problem in RBY: in spite of being impressively powerful, they are easily walled by a large number of Pokémon.
Articuno is walled by most Water-types, and any Water/Ice, as well as Chansey.

Chansey risks freeze or FP, as do the Waters.

Zapdos is walled by most Ground-types, and any Rock/Ground, as well as many Electric-types.

Ground-types don't wall Zapdos unless they're also Rock-types, because it has Drill Peck and immunity to Ground STAB.

Moltres is walled by most Rock-types, and any Rock/Water, as well as many Water-types.

Rock-types do risk a Fire Blast burn. But yeah, Moltres is garbage in OU where there's STAB Rock Slides and Recover users. Only thing it really does is AgiliSpin, and Dragonite's generally better.

[.Maguss.]

Entei does not learn Counter.

And Moltres DOESN'T BREAK WALLS. From where you got Moltres can? If Snorlax can't wall it, then why i'll try to wall it with Snorlax? It's like trying to wall Rhydon with Snorlax. Entei is harder to counter.

[Nyara]

The fact is you don't need to counter Entei as he can't deal enough damage at all.

Way to counter Entei:

- Have RestTalk whatever
- Rest only with a Heal Beller later also works
- Don't be weak to Fire Blast

And that is... the most common set ever on GSC, so, yeah, unless you're facing a sort of hyper offensive team or a lame opponent, Entei is just helpess to do something at all, any other sort of team will have 2-5 walls ready to wall Entei to the hell and back, and to add problems, Rock Slide, Earthquake, and Surf are really common attacks from almost any Mixed Sweeper, and actually, really common on any good attacker, so, Entei don't even had a easy switch-in or can really win too much 1vs1.

Moltres BREAK walls from the moment almost all the physical walls are weak to Hidden Power Grass or Fire Blast, and the second best special wall of the game; Snorlax, can't wall it because it's 2HKOed under the sun by Fire Blast, but, yeah, Moltres is not that great, either, as it's walled by Tyranitar/Suicune/Vaporeon/Starmie, but teams offen just carry one of them, so, it's up to you to defeat them, and wreak havoc with Moltres later, but, yeah, Hidden Power Grass is still helping him to overcome them if spikes are on the field and they do have some previous damage. Entei by other hand is just hard-walled by anything not weak to SolarBeam+Fire Blast (or actually, he's even with SolarBeam walled by Tyranitar/Suicune/Vaporeon, anyway), and he's not a good wall. Well, there are other Pokémon who also wall Moltres/Entei, but most of them are BL's, too, and Blissey.

Entei's edge is he can check Starmie, but that is the unique thing that Entei is checking that Moltres doesn't (and it can just check it on few turns, Starmie can switch when Sunny Day ends, and she will win there), and well, Tyranitar without rest.

[.Maguss.]

I never said Entei is not bad. I'm just saying it is better than Moltres. And, again, Moltres DOES NOT break walls. If you still think that, than I think you never played GSC competitively.

EDIT: HP Fight from Entei 2HKO Tyranitar and 3HKO Blissey.

[Hemp Man]

The GSC page for Moltres says "If it had Drill Peck and SolarBeam, it'd be a monster, despite its type."

How well do you guys think a Sunny Day/Fire Blast/SolarBeam/Drill Peck Moltres would work in GSC OU?

[Nyara]

Exactly the same stuff as Sunny Day / Fire Blast / Hidden Power Grass / Wing Attack, with just a bit more of raw power on Wing Attack (30+ BP with STAB already added, still not enough to being useful at all), and about SolarBeam, the same calcs adobe about Entei's Fire Blast, but with more raw power, being the most important stuff changing on 3HKO against Vaporeon, Suicune, Tyranitar, and Starmie into 2HKO, so, that could be a buff, but that's pretty much all, if you're really dying for those 2HKO, you can still use Miracle Seed, put Spikes on the field, and damage them just a bit before leaving (maybe with Pursuit).

But even if Moltres had SolarBeam, your opponent will just not switch-in them until it's the turn when Sunny Day ends, and when they do on that moment (not a hard task), Moltres will lost always (bar Critical-Hits). That should be rembered that SolarBeam DOESN'T do more damage even if it's SE in comparison to Fire Blast under the sun and with STAB, it just deals the same, and I already listed the unique OU/BL Pokémon were SolarBeam is more effective than Fire Blast (when Fire Blast is resisted and SolarBeam is SE, or Fire Blast is double resisted and SolarBeam is neutral).

And you're still OHKOing Golem/Rhydon with Hidden Power Grass, and you're still helpless against Kingdra.

Curiosly enough, Drill Peck doesn't deal more damage to anything at all, at least on type-wise and under the sun, Kingdra? SolarBeam deals the same damage. Dragonite? Fire Blast deals the same damage. Fire? Fire Blast deals the same damage. Water? SolarBeam deals more damage. So, Drill Peck doesn't have any use with Sunny Day, outside of the sun, it can be of some uses against Dragonite and Fire pals, but I could rather just use Hidden Power Rock against them, that deals more damage to both. It is not 2HKO against Blissey, and SunnyDay Fire Blast already 2HKO Snorlax (and Drill Peck is not 2HKO, either). Oh, yeah, my error, Moltres' attack stat is lower than it's special attack, so, Drill Peck will do just the 85% of damage than the other options (or just about the same against special walls, and less against physical walls).

[Jorgen]

In GSC, no SolarBeam means Moltres can NOT 3HKO bulky waters, and can NOT 2HKO Starmie. That is its biggest downfall. Well, that and the fact that Electrics murder it at LEAST 50% of the time. Still, it's the Sunny Day Fire with the best matchup against Lax, which is something. Tack on HP Fight and you can murder Ttar on the switch (which is better than HP Grass, which gets you the comparatively rare Rhydon and Quagsire).

Moltres ain't breaking its most dedicated walls, but it's got a good chance at sweeping/cleaning if it's against a team that doesn't have those walls. High-risk mid-reward, hence why it isn't OU and why it's considered a gimmick.

[Jellicent*]

Kabutops here was consistently UU from RBY to DPP. Despite a seemingly poor showing, he managed to carve out a few niches for himself. So, what kept Kabutops from ever hitting OU, and what were his best sets and roles throughout history?

[BKC]

in dpp uu, kabutops was one of the most terrifying rain sweepers, and one of the reasons why rain was one of the most dangerous playstyles in the tier. although rain teams are rarities in ou, kabutops is still very scary and although it's hard to pull off, it has the potential to run through teams.

[Lavos Spawn]

in addition to what bkc said about kabutops's role in dpp uu, the prehistoric menace also has a niche in adv ou as a flail sweeper, which is a really interesting little set. basically the idea is to sub down into salac berry range, but using an odd number of hp so that you go to 1 hp instead of 25%, meaning flail is at max power, nabbing a swords dance along the way if you can. then you start laying into your opponent with 200 base power flails. rock slide covers gengar (and dusclops), at +2 it's a straight ohko on gar and even at +0 it does a good bit more than half damage, meaning if you're behind a sub or get a flinch your sweep is still preserved. as you might have noticed, healthy bulky waters and skarmory shut this set down, so for it to be fully effective, you need to have spikes support and possibly a magneton as well. the set really sucks against stall, but against offense it can and will 6-0 teams.

[Jorgen]

In RBY he's crap. Not even good in UU, and I'm pretty sure he's not allowed in NU (not that I even play UU, let alone NU).

In GSC, he's still garbage in OU, but he's an interesting choice in UU, being a solid counter-offensive check to the #1 Physical threat in the tier, Dodrio. Problem is, he struggles to muscle past Slowbro even after a SD, which makes him less effective as a sweeper than, say, Pinsir, and there's plenty of other stuff, such as Slowbro and Magneton, that can also switch into Dodrio and are more useful in general.

[.Maguss.]

I remember when Slowbro was BL and I swept teams with Kabutops. Slowbro is a huge pain for it in GSC OU due to Thunder Wave, and Ancientpower failing at 3HKO it AFTER a Swords Dance most of the time. But it still one of my favourite UU mons, and still a pretty solid choice for a UU team, being one of the best Dodrio counters.

[magic9mushroom]

RBY Kabutops has no moves that can use its incredibly powerful Rock STAB, and the lack of an Electric immunity makes it harder to switch in than Rhydon or Golem. Its stats and typing are good, it just doesn't have a way to make use of them effectively.

[Crystal_]

In GSC UU, apart from what Jorgen said, Kabutops also has issues with bulky grass types such as Bellossom and Vileplume, but nonetheless it can be a very potent and dangerous sweeper as it is one of the fastest SDers available (is it the fastest in UU?), while being an effective Dodrio check if you are tired of Magneton. Not to mention, AncientPower luck can be game breaking!

In RBY UU Kabutops is unfortunately outclassed by Kingler in a metagame full of water-types with powerful STAB attacks and with some EQ users as well, not to mention the quadruple Mega Drain weakness. While Kabutops gains useful resistances to Explosion, Hyper Beam, Drill Peck, as well as a 4x resistance to fire-type attacks, these advantages don't really make up for the aforementioned disadvantages. Explosion and Hyper Beam aren't as big is UU as in OU at all.

[Awoken]

Kabutops in ADV is notable as it is the only viable Sub/Flail user that is immune to sandstorm.

[Jorgen]

Kabutops is not the fastest SDer in GSC UU. That title belongs to Scyther. 2nd fastest is Pinsir.

[Hipmonlee]

Kabutops in rby is way better than you guys are making out. Mostly because of how awesome slash is.

Slash rules.

[Dre89]

Kingler is still better than him in RBY though, which is why he's hardly ever used even in UU.