(Gen 1) Yo, when did we change RBY tiers?

[Mr.E]

<MrE> hey who changed the RBY tiers
<MrE> what sneaky mofo put Cloyster in OU and Dodrio in UU...
<MrE> and removed BL entirely for that matter
<MrE> and jolteon

what is this nonsense cloyster isn't better than dodrio or jolteon

and wrap still sux dragonite isn't good hip sorry mang

[Oglemi*]

http://www.smogon.com/forums/showthread.php?t=3455591

Also this more belongs in the Ruins of Alph so I'll be moving it there momentarily

[Crystal_]

Cloyster is better than Dodrio for sure, and better than Jolteon too although that's maybe more conflictive (but in any case Cloy > Jolt still). At the very least Cloyster has more usage that these two, which is the whole reason of why Cloy has been moved up. There's just no need to discuss about this.

[steviestar]

http://www.smogon.com/forums/showthread.php?t=3455591

Check this thread.

[evan]

just speaking from a usage point of view, Cloyster saw more use in this season of SPL than the following OU mons:

Gengar
Jynx
Zapdos
Lapras
Persian
Slowbro
Dragonite (but it moved up with Cloy)
(Probably Rhydon and Golem too)

Of the Smogon RBY OU tier Persian and Gengar both didn't see any use in SPL (the only running smogon RBY tournament) at all, iirc.

[Jorgen]

Gengar definitely saw SPL usage. Persian I'm not so sure about. Cloy definitely deserves OU status with Clamp. Dragonite... it's iffy, but the potential is there.

Anyway, this happened so long ago why are you just now noticing?

[Mr.E]

I don't check the pokémon forums regularly anymore, I just happened to notice because I'm making up teams for the all-gens tourney. ;[ Dragonite I don't necessarily agree with either but at least it's better than Cloyster. Dragonite is a strong borderline pokémon, it has high total stats and a great movepool (including T-Wave), and I can accept that Agiliwrap is, if not overpowering, at least good enough to push Dragonite to the strong side of the border if BL is going to not exist.

Originally Posted by Fat Crystal_

Cloyster is better than Dodrio for sure, and better than Jolteon too although that's maybe more conflictive (but in any case Cloy > Jolt still). At the very least Cloyster has more usage that these two, which is the whole reason of why Cloy has been moved up. There's just no need to discuss about this.

Dodrio is very Persian/Tauros-esque, certainly a viable alternative to the former if you don't want to overload on all three. Persian's probably better almost solely on the fact that it outspeeds Tauros but Dodrio hits harder than either and is one of the few things that actually scares Exeggutor. Jolteon is not much less dangerous than Zapdos with the perk of chipping Golem/Rhydon a bit harder, who pretty much exist solely to counter said Electric mons in the first place, and outspeeding absolutely everything. Cloyster is... pretty worthless outside of abusing Clamp against PAR targets, as it's almost completely outclassed by Lapras other than being marginally most resilient to Tauros. It can't even supply its own paralysis. None of them see any real use except I used to use Dodrio a lot and Hip has a hard-on for anything with a Wrap move.

From what orifice did you pull those stats, evan? It's not like we have a record of every team used every week in each generation... that'd be pretty god damn cool but whatever. Like ladder stats, except for SPL. I'm guessing you don't really know what anyone but yourself actually used from week to week, though. Myself, I know I've seen all the mentioned pokémon at least once in any RBY match I've played or spectated in SPL.

[Jorgen]

Cloyster walls the fuck out of Snorlax. Lapras can't Rest against Lax the same way Cloy can, since Bslam-Bslam-Hyper Beam and 4x Bslam can KO the former but not the latter. Surely that's a pretty big selling point.

[evan]

I pulled those stats from playing in RBY during SPL? And I know at least what I used and what my opponents used, as well as some other peoples battles, though Crystal_ and Jorgen also have their own experiences to draw upon.

Cloyster was everywhere during SPL and there were only a few weeks I didn't play one. Like I said, I saw all of them except for Gengar and Persian but I saw more Cloysters than those mons. Guarantee I can speak as more of an authority on this one than you, pal.

[Hipmonlee]

One of the main purposes of tiers is to warn people about what they can expect to face. You can expect to face trapping moves in rby ou, so IMO it's a better idea to err on the side of OU in those cases. Otherwise stuff around the borderline of borderline is pretty arbitrary anyway.. It doesnt need to be particularly accurate.

Trapping is better than you make it out to be.

And the RBY uu tier was crap. I got rid of it because it didnt deserve official recognition.

[420]

cloyster is amazing. I would say it's a top 10 pokemon as long as clamp is allowed just for being able to shut down paralized snorlax and force out tauros. Chansey-Cloyster-Psychic is like the skarmbliss of gen 1.

[Crystal_]

Cloyster is OU, Dodrio is BL/UU, and Jolteon could be both things depending on where you place the cut-off. Anyway, I think all the current OUs are more OU than Jolteon is, but probably Jolteon is also the most common UU in OU right now.

I'm surprised nobody has pointed out Cloyster's explosion yet. It's imo its main selling point over Lapras and to an extent, over Articuno. From my experience, at least 3/4 of the times Cloyster is effectively exploding into a recoverer or a Snorlax unwilling to switch out. Cloyster forces a lot of plays that his explosion is often very difficult to predict.

Clamp is not only useful when you are in a position to clearly sweep, it helps get good matchups and wear down stuff. And in any case, Cloyster only needs Starmie and Alakazam paralyzed to have a chance to sweep. Teams pack one of these two on average, and it's pretty likely that it takes early sleep, a paralysis, Exeggutor's explosion or something, especially in the case of Alakazam.

However, I don't like the idea of comparing Cloy to skarmbliss. The ability to rest loop a paralyzed Snorlax is great, and often slows down your opponent's offense but in RBY, its very predictable when doing this as a rule. Except for a few late-game scenarios, stalling for ever = losing in RBY. A sleeping Pokemon gives Tauros a free turn and that's gamebreaking in RBY. And not only Tauros, but other stuff can also capitalize on a free turn depending on your team and what you have left: Zapdos/Jolteon, Persian, Rhydon/Golem etc. Moreover, when Cloy uses rest, he generally finds unable to wake up healthy enough to make an impact offensively other than with explosion.

That Golem/Rhydon are used only for electrics is not true but I'm unwilling to discuss about it. This is kinda like saying Gengar only exists because Persian and Dragonite do.

Jolteon's advantage over Zapdos is not definitely being able to hit Golem/Rhydon for 10% more damage, which is hardly relevant. Their advantages are being faster than Tauros/Alakazam/Starmie (and thus having a higher %CH), being neutral to ice and resisting electric.

I never saw Gengar or Persian in SPL either, but my experience is only around 1/5 of the total RBY battles anyway. I'm pretty sure someone used Gengar as Jorgen said; 0 Gengars in +40 battles is hard to believe. Regarding Cloyster, I think I "only" saw two, but I used it many times myself. Overall, the usage stats of SPL were very standard, and, at least for me, not really surprising.

[Jorgen]

I used Gengar in SPL. That's how I'm so sure it saw usage.

[Omanyte]

Cloyster is lower OU, but still OU.
Over Lapras it gets Explosion, Clamp and significantly better physical defence. It loses Thunderbolt and Body Slam. It's a reasonable trade-off in my book.

Don't even try and argue that Dodrio is OU. The weakness to Ice and Electric hurt it massively when compared to Tauros or Persian. Jolteon is decent but suffers with Earthquake weakness compared to Zapdos.

[Yai-Inn]

Originally Posted by Fat Omanyte

Cloyster is lower OU, but still OU.
Over Lapras it gets Explosion, Clamp and significantly better physical defence. It loses Thunderbolt and Body Slam and HP. It's a reasonable trade-off in my book.

[Crystal_]

Lapras also learns Sing and CRay.

[Omanyte]

Yeh, I appreciate that extra HP, Sing and CRay are all small benefits of Lapras over Cloyster, but I didn't include them because Body Slam and Thunderbolt are much more significant.
Cloyster has the small benefits of a higher CH rate and the ability to outspeed Hypno. Lapras' small benefits are better, but then I think most would agree that Lapras is a better pokemon overall.

[133tSneasel]

can't lapras just use Growl or Reflect when cloyster uses explosion. or rest it away

[Omanyte]

Originally Posted by Fat 133tSneasel

can't lapras just use Growl or Reflect when cloyster uses explosion. or rest it away

Eh? Can't tell if you're joking or not.
1) We're not talking about a 1v1 situation.
2) How many Lapras sets know Growl!??

[Vineon]

Originally Posted by Fat Crystal_

Cloyster is OU, Dodrio is BL/UU, and Jolteon could be both things depending on where you place the cut-off. Anyway, I think all the current OUs are more OU than Jolteon is, but probably Jolteon is also the most common UU in OU right now.

I'm surprised nobody has pointed out Cloyster's explosion yet. It's imo its main selling point over Lapras and to an extent, over Articuno. From my experience, at least 3/4 of the times Cloyster is effectively exploding into a recoverer or a Snorlax unwilling to switch out. Cloyster forces a lot of plays that his explosion is often very difficult to predict.

Clamp is not only useful when you are in a position to clearly sweep, it helps get good matchups and wear down stuff. And in any case, Cloyster only needs Starmie and Alakazam paralyzed to have a chance to sweep. Teams pack one of these two on average, and it's pretty likely that it takes early sleep, a paralysis, Exeggutor's explosion or something, especially in the case of Alakazam.

However, I don't like the idea of comparing Cloy to skarmbliss. The ability to rest loop a paralyzed Snorlax is great, and often slows down your opponent's offense but in RBY, its very predictable when doing this as a rule. Except for a few late-game scenarios, stalling for ever = losing in RBY. A sleeping Pokemon gives Tauros a free turn and that's gamebreaking in RBY. And not only Tauros, but other stuff can also capitalize on a free turn depending on your team and what you have left: Zapdos/Jolteon, Persian, Rhydon/Golem etc. Moreover, when Cloy uses rest, he generally finds unable to wake up healthy enough to make an impact offensively other than with explosion.

That Golem/Rhydon are used only for electrics is not true but I'm unwilling to discuss about it. This is kinda like saying Gengar only exists because Persian and Dragonite do.

Jolteon's advantage over Zapdos is not definitely being able to hit Golem/Rhydon for 10% more damage, which is hardly relevant. Their advantages are being faster than Tauros/Alakazam/Starmie (and thus having a higher %CH), being neutral to ice and resisting electric.

I never saw Gengar or Persian in SPL either, but my experience is only around 1/5 of the total RBY battles anyway. I'm pretty sure someone used Gengar as Jorgen said; 0 Gengars in +40 battles is hard to believe. Regarding Cloyster, I think I "only" saw two, but I used it many times myself. Overall, the usage stats of SPL were very standard, and, at least for me, not really surprising.

Cloyster is not sweeping anything and the only thing it will kill will come from it's explosion.

Personally I find the thing to be nearly worthless. It's role seems to consist on taking a hit on the switch from a physical attacker and later explode on starmie.

I would love to face a resting one as it would give me a chance to CH it before it can even explode. Rest is overall a pretty poor move in RBY, I feel, and pretty much only belongs on the Amnesia pokémon.

Originally Posted by Fat 420

Chansey-Cloyster-Psychic is like the skarmbliss of gen 1.

Hell no. Cloyster does not counter tauros's offense. Nor does anything, for that matter.

[Floppy]

Originally Posted by Fat Crystal_

Cloyster is better than Dodrio for sure, and better than Jolteon too

How is Cloyster better than Jolteon again? Believe it or not i agree with what MrE says here after extracting a few things and making additions in bold:

Jolteon is not much less dangerous than Zapdos with the perk of chipping Golem/Rhydon a bit harder, and outspeeding absolutely everything. Cloyster is... pretty worthless outside of abusing Clamp, as it's completely outclassed by Lapras other than being able to take Snorlax/Tauros hits easier.

[Hipmonlee]

Well the reason it is ou is inside of abusing clamp. That's about as far as it goes..

[Mr.E]

The reason it is OU is because user Hipmonlee said so. ;[

[Hipmonlee]

Of course.. Who else?

[d.hgss]

Originally Posted by Fat Vineon

Hell no. Cloyster does not counter tauros's offense. Nor does anything, for that matter.

i think it's better than rhydon and golem agains tauros, cause it doesn't take like 60% damage from tauros' blizzard as the rock types do