np: Intro to Ubers Testing: It's the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)

[Mr.lol]

Set: Accuracy Abuse Item:Sash/Petaya/??? Ev's: 252HP 252 Speed 4 Defense
Smeargle (M)
Trait:Moody
Nature:Timid (+Spd -Atk)
- Gravity/Coil
- Substitute/Baton Pass
- Spore
- Sheer Cold

Sheer Cold's accuracy is unaffected by accuracy boosts and evasion drops. Evidence for this claim was / can be found in the research thread (yes this does include telekinesis as well).

EDIT: I completely missed Jibaku's post on this :(, sorry if this is repetetive.

Also that set gives me an idea.

Set: U Mad bro?
Smeargle (M)
Item:Sash / Leftovers / Lum Berry (if you wanna troll Darkrai's)
EV's: 252HP / 252 Speed / 4 Defense <- I'll leave it as that for now BUT I AM CERTAIN GreatSage knows a more efficient spread (he posted it in the analysis or something )__))
Trait:Moody
Nature:Timid (+Spd -Atk)
- Substitute / Ingrain / Taunt
- Baton Pass
- Spore
- Minimize

Combine this with Wobbufett support and its possible for you to accumulate +6 Evasion in no time 0_0, the broken part is using Evasion to get more boosts DX. Spore actually lets you secure a +3 Evasion for sure, and that should be able to get you another minimize up your belt. You can actually free up the slot to run Ingrain now which is sad in its own right, alternatively, Substitute with Leftovers and Minimize is also an extremely helpful way of abusing moody, and you aren't screwed if something already used Perish Song ((Smeargle used Ingrain! Arceus used Perish Song! Smeargle panicked!)you CAN get out of this scenario though by firing a +6 U-turn). Taunt allows you to stop all Support Arceus from using Perish Song if you manage to grab a +1 boost to speed. When your done, pass it to something like a Mewtwo or Kyogre and enjoy. The sad part is its weak to Aura Sphere but that move is actually ridiculously uncommon compared to Thunder. You don't even have to worry too much about Aura Sphere if you have a Substitute up...

I also think the above supports a Smeargle ban, Smeagle's verstality is supposed to be "checked" with its extremely low base stats, Moody allows it to gain those base stats, which strictly speaking endangers the whole metagame and makes it a lot less "balanced". I'm not saying I favor a Moody ban just yet but Smeargle is scaring me, and I think it freaked people out too when it wasn't banned :(.

[ace combat]

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Originally Posted by Fat Poppy

Gliscor
move 1: Fissure
move 2: Toxic
move 3: Substitute
move 4: Taunt
item: Toxic Orb
ability: Poison Heal
nature: Impish
evs: 252 HP / 184 Def / 72 Spe

Your traditional stallbreaker Gliscor just got a whole lot more scary. This set is notorious for the ridiculous amount of free turns it gets by people trying to switch around and avoid their important Pokemon getting Toxic'd and at the same time breaking Gliscor's Substitute. Now, rather than doing pathetic chip damage with Earthquake, Gliscor now threatens almost every potential switch in with a 30% chance to instantly die, Sturdy and Ground-immune Pokemon excluded. This set obviously has some workarounds, like Skarmory or Forretress with HP Ice, or even switching back and forth between a combination of Sturdy, Ground-immune and Toxic-immune Pokemon until Fissure's measly PP is burned out.

Unfortunately Gliscor does not learn Fissure; instead he learns something better: Guillotine. This means that Gliscor can poison Pokemon and threaten non-ghosts that would otherwise be threats. Fortunately most of the common Ghost Pokemon are weak to toxic with the exception of Giratina, which you can easily taunt and out-stall his Dragon Tail PP. I think that he would be better with a Jolly 252 HP / 40 Def / 216 Spe spread though. This makes him much more threatening in Ubers.

[Theorymon]

I'll make a bigger post with more of my thoughts later, but so far I want to say that in a OHKO metagame, Gliscor, Exadrill, and Kyogre are probably the new biggest threats around. There ARE a few more OHKO Pokemon I'm interested in testing atm (them being: Suicune, Groudon, Gastrodon, and Lapras), but they don't have the unique advantages Gliscor and Excadrill have.

On its own, I think Gliscor will be the most threatening abuser of OHKO moves. Having all those free turns that Sub and Toxic Orb give it is HUGE, and I have a feeling its going to lead to a lot more Pokemon fitting Ice moves in their movesets! While I don't think Excadrill is as threatening on its own persay, Fissure and Mold Breaker gives it the potential to be THE nastiest rapid spinner in Ubers. So much so that I'm honestly almost tempted to test out Excadrill with Ho-Oh, despite Excadrill being bleh in sun and Ho-Oh not being as fearsome in the rain. Finally, while Kyogre doesn't have the awesome advantages Excadrill and Gliscor have, that massive Special Defense has the possibility of going a loong ways to fix that!

Oh one last thing I want to mention. In the past, I've seen people claim that Articuno would be great in a OHKO metagame. I really doubt this for one reason: Mind Reader loses its effectiveness if the target switches out. Since obviously the person is gonna switch out, its only really going to work on the last Pokemon. So in other words, Articuno is just using a worse Perish Song. Combine that with its craptastic typing, and I feel that its not going to be viable at all.

[VaporeonIce]

Originally Posted by Fat Mr.lol

I also think the above supports a Smeargle ban, Smeagle's verstality is supposed to be "checked" with its extremely low base stats, Moody allows it to gain those base stats, which strictly speaking endangers the whole metagame and makes it a lot less "balanced". I'm not saying I favor a Moody ban just yet but Smeargle is scaring me, and I think it freaked people out too when it wasn't banned :(.

"The above"? All you did was post a set and said how good you think it is; you've provided no logs, no calcs, and no reasonable consideration that it could actually be anything other than the god you say it is.

I don't doubt that Smeargle can be annoying as hell, but don't pretend it can actually take a hit; Thunder from anything in Ubers will generally kill it if it's not already. You need Taunt or Ingrain to avoid phazing (because otherwise anything can just come in and spam phazing moves until they eventually hit you), so without Substitute, you have literally no defense against Thunder.

Choice Scarf 252 SpAtk Modest Kyogre Thunder vs. 252/0 +0 Smeargle: 95.22-112.1%

So that's a likely KO from a move that never misses...on the most common Pokemon in the game.

That said, Spore would definitely be annoying, but I don't think "ban Smeargle" is a fair assessment of the situation without even testing it out.

Also, you didn't give Smeargle any way of getting out of Perish Song, because you didn't put U-Turn on the set. But, just for kicks:

0 Atk +6 Smeargle U-Turn vs. 0/0 +0 Arceus (type neutral to Bug): 14.65 - 17.27%

Smeargle's offenses are hilarious.

Theorymon, I won't say Articuno is good, but Lock On + Sheer Cold still has a 30% chance to KO the switch-in (unless it has Sturdy, so you'd probably want to run HP Fire to help preserve Articuno's only niche). If you can manage to keep Articuno alive (which I'd imagine would be very hard, given its Stealth Rock weakness), that could get very annoying very quickly, especially if it decided to forgo Lock On and just start spamming Sheer Cold on whatever Pokemon you switch in to try to kill it. That said, you can never know how well it works until you test it.

[tehy]

Originally Posted by Fat Theorymon

I'll make a bigger post with more of my thoughts later, but so far I want to say that in a OHKO metagame, Gliscor, Exadrill, and Kyogre are probably the new biggest threats around. There ARE a few more OHKO Pokemon I'm interested in testing atm (them being: Suicune, Groudon, Gastrodon, Regice and Lapras), but they don't have the unique advantages Gliscor and Excadrill have.

On its own, I think Gliscor will be the most threatening abuser of OHKO moves. Having all those free turns that Sub and Toxic Orb give it is HUGE, and I have a feeling its going to lead to a lot more Pokemon fitting Ice moves in their movesets! While I don't think Excadrill is as threatening on its own persay, Fissure and Mold Breaker gives it the potential to be THE nastiest rapid spinner in Ubers. So much so that I'm honestly almost tempted to test out Excadrill with Ho-Oh, despite Excadrill being bleh in sun and Ho-Oh not being as fearsome in the rain. Finally, while Kyogre doesn't have the awesome advantages Excadrill and Gliscor have, that massive Special Defense has the possibility of going a loong ways to fix that!

Oh one last thing I want to mention. In the past, I've seen people claim that Articuno would be great in a OHKO metagame. I really doubt this for one reason: Mind Reader loses its effectiveness if the target switches out. Since obviously the person is gonna switch out, its only really going to work on the last Pokemon. So in other words, Articuno is just using a worse Perish Song. Combine that with its craptastic typing, and I feel that its not going to be viable at all.

On the other hand, that sort of in and of itself forces switches, based on prediction. Like perish song, but you don't have to wait 3 turns. That on a stall team would be a nice stallbreaker. I mean, it's not a super-win strategy, but with hazards up, in ubers, you can't afford to just spam switches willy-nilly.

[Theorymon]

Originally Posted by Fat Mr.lol

Sheer Cold's accuracy is unaffected by accuracy boosts and evasion drops. Evidence for this claim was / can be found in the research thread (yes this does include telekinesis as well).

EDIT: I completely missed Jibaku's post on this :(, sorry if this is repetetive.

Also that set gives me an idea.

Set: U Mad bro?
Smeargle (M)
Item:Sash / Leftovers / Lum Berry (if you wanna troll Darkrai's)
EV's: 252HP / 252 Speed / 4 Defense <- I'll leave it as that for now BUT I AM CERTAIN GreatSage knows a more efficient spread (he posted it in the analysis or something )__))
Trait:Moody
Nature:Timid (+Spd -Atk)
- Substitute / Ingrain / Taunt
- Baton Pass
- Spore
- Minimize

Combine this with Wobbufett support and its possible for you to accumulate +6 Evasion in no time 0_0, the broken part is using Evasion to get more boosts DX. Spore actually lets you secure a +3 Evasion for sure, and that should be able to get you another minimize up your belt. You can actually free up the slot to run Ingrain now which is sad in its own right, alternatively, Substitute with Leftovers and Minimize is also an extremely helpful way of abusing moody, and you aren't screwed if something already used Perish Song ((Smeargle used Ingrain! Arceus used Perish Song! Smeargle panicked!)you CAN get out of this scenario though by firing a +6 U-turn). Taunt allows you to stop all Support Arceus from using Perish Song if you manage to grab a +1 boost to speed. When your done, pass it to something like a Mewtwo or Kyogre and enjoy. The sad part is its weak to Aura Sphere but that move is actually ridiculously uncommon compared to Thunder. You don't even have to worry too much about Aura Sphere if you have a Substitute up...

I also think the above supports a Smeargle ban, Smeagle's verstality is supposed to be "checked" with its extremely low base stats, Moody allows it to gain those base stats, which strictly speaking endangers the whole metagame and makes it a lot less "balanced". I'm not saying I favor a Moody ban just yet but Smeargle is scaring me, and I think it freaked people out too when it wasn't banned :(.

Originally Posted by Fat VaporeonIce

"The above"? All you did was post a set and said how good you think it is; you've provided no logs, no calcs, and no reasonable consideration that it could actually be anything other than the god you say it is.

I don't doubt that Smeargle can be annoying as hell, but don't pretend it can actually take a hit; Thunder from anything in Ubers will generally kill it if it's not already. You need Taunt or Ingrain to avoid phazing (because otherwise anything can just come in and spam phazing moves until they eventually hit you), so without Substitute, you have literally no defense against Thunder.

Choice Scarf 252 SpAtk Modest Kyogre Thunder vs. 252/0 +0 Smeargle: 95.22-112.1%

So that's a likely KO from a move that never misses...on the most common Pokemon in the game.

That said, Spore would definitely be annoying, but I don't think "ban Smeargle" is a fair assessment of the situation without even testing it out.

Also, you didn't give Smeargle any way of getting out of Perish Song, because you didn't put U-Turn on the set. But, just for kicks:

0 Atk +6 Smeargle U-Turn vs. 0/0 +0 Arceus (type neutral to Bug): 14.65 - 17.27%

Smeargle's offenses are hilarious.

Theorymon, I won't say Articuno is good, but Lock On + Sheer Cold still has a 30% chance to KO the switch-in (unless it has Sturdy, so you'd probably want to run HP Fire to help preserve Articuno's only niche). If you can manage to keep Articuno alive (which I'd imagine would be very hard, given its Stealth Rock weakness), that could get very annoying very quickly, especially if it decided to forgo Lock On and just start spamming Sheer Cold on whatever Pokemon you switch in to try to kill it. That said, you can never know how well it works until you test it.

As someone who used moody Smeargle when it was allowed, I'm not sure if you two really ever used it to its fullest potential (or used it at all), let me explain me and Great Sage's personal experiences with moody Smeargle.

When it was just Octillery and Bibarel, I thought Moody was fine, if a bit overpowered. Both were pretty good Pokemon in my experience (I preferred Bibarel because it was less weather dependent), and while EXTREMELY annoying, both had ways to deal with them (mostly roar and Thunder and Aura Sphere, especially Thunder giving its big distribution). In Dreamworld, I also had sucuess with Glalie, because Ice is a pretty good offensive typing. Smeargle however... ooooh boy, that thing is on a totally new level!

Now, I'm not sure if Moody Smeargle was broken... I'm still extremely undecided about that, but what I can say is that Smeargle was the straw that broke the camel's back in many's eyes, and for good reason: Smeargle was a HUGE game changer. This was because of 3 amazing moves Smeargle had that no other moody Pokemon had: Spore, Baton Pass, and Stored Power. Now since you can't have 5 moves at once, Smeargle did suffer from 4 moveslot syndrome, but the two Baton Pass combinations I tried were VERY effective!

Baton Pass is a major part of what made Smeargle far more fearsome than the other Moody Pokemon. Substitute + Protect isn't THAT risky of a strategy in most cases, and best part was that Smeargle had an excellent teammate to Baton Pass to: Magic Bounce Espeon. Yeah right now, Espeon is extremely mediocre, but Smeargle made it into one hell of a fearsome Pokemon. Even if you didnt get SpA boost, Espeon had access to Stored Power, which meant that unless you got REALLY unlucky with SpA boosts, Espeon was gonna SMASH through stuff. For example, lets say you have gotten... +2 in 3 stats. even without an SpA boost, Espeon now had a move that was as powerful as Draco Meteor with NO consequences. And thats being conservative, most of the time I had enough boosts to easily do stuff like 2HKO Dialga o_O. And of course, Espeon itself got Baton Pass, so if you just needed to Magic Bounce away a Roar so you could pass Attack boosts to something else, Espeon was still extremely useful. And of course, a crap ton of Pokemon in Ubers could rampage through stuff the moment they got Smeargle's boosts.

I didn't have experience with this part myself, but Great Sage also used this strategy with Baton Pass Scizor with impressive results. He'd generally Baton Pass to Scizor if he had low SpA, and while Scizor doesn't have Magic Bounce, it having access to Baton Pass itself was still extremely useful. And since he still used Espeon, he had an extremely effective and deadly Baton Passing core! Also, one last teammate that I found extremely effective with Smeargle was my good old friend Wobbuffet, since letting Wobbuffet get Smeargle a free turn was usually an Encore well spent in my experience! Edit: Oh man I forgot one teammate that was REALLY useful: Poison Arceus. Quite a few people used Toxic Spikes to try and beat Smeargle, and I found that Poison Arceus was an extremely useful deterrent for that. Also, Poison Arceus loved the baton pass! Maybe Tentacruel and Roserade and Qwilfish could work out okay too, but I never felt the need to use any other Poisonmon with Smeargle besides Arceus.

In the last slot, you had a choice between Spore and Stored Power. Now Spore is mighty attractive obviously, since it gives Smeargle even MORE chances of setting up its Baton Pass. While I won't deny that was pretty good, its also extremely reliant on other Pokemon on your team. What I (and I think Great Sage but my memory is foggy) found to be EXTREMELY deadly was Stored Power. Yeah, laugh at Smeargle's punny SpA, but with Substitute and Protect, Smeargle usually had enough time to become insanely powerful. Sure, it requires more support than the Spore varient, but oh god this thing ripped a lot stuff a new asshole! I will NEVER forget the many times where Smeargle went on brutal rampages, murdering freaking Dialgas at 70% after enough boosts and making even many Arceus beg for mercy! I'm dead serious, Smeargle really was an extremely dangerous sweeper in Ubers!

Smeargle wasn't unstopable though. Like VaporeonIce mentioned, Smeargle wasn't exactly fond of stuff like fast Kyogre Thunders. In those kind of situations, Smeargle relied on getting that speed boost, or else it wasn't setting up. And of course, the biggest stop to Smeargle overall was Perish Song Arceus, who was a godsend against Smeargle's empire. While all of what I said makes Smeargle sound really scary (and thats because it is pretty scary in Ubers!), I am totally open to retesting moody (I never even made up my mind about the moody ban in the first place!). I also will admit that the set Mr.lol posted wasn't a very good use of Smeargle's capabilities, but dismissing Smeargle's offenses as "hilarious" does show inexperience to me at least! Finally, I really dislike the idea of banning Smeargle in ANY circumstance. Pokemon shouldn't be banned in Ubers this gen as far as I'm concerned, so assuming that Moody Smeargle is once again the thing that makes people cry for a reban, I think it's just best to reban Moody instead of banning Smeargle. The only other option I'd consider is just banning Moody on Smeargle via a Complex ban, and while I admit I dislike complex bans, I still vastly prefer this option to outright banning Smeargle.

Oh yeah, oooone last thing since VaporenIce and tehy brought this up: Yeah, I didn't really consider the whole "Sheer Cold has a 30% chance to kill something" as a part of Articuno's benefits and that is indeed a pretty nice advantage over other formes of phazing! However, I think the combonation of an awful typing and meh defensive stats are going to screw it over in the end. Maybe I'll still test it because I'm crazy and test almost everything, and hey maybe I'm totally wrong about this, but I feel that its unlikely that Articuno will be a major player in the hypothetical OHKO metagame.

[StarmieLazer]

Originally Posted by Fat Mr.lol

Sheer Cold's accuracy is unaffected by accuracy boosts and evasion drops. Evidence for this claim was / can be found in the research thread (yes this does include telekinesis as well).

EDIT: I completely missed Jibaku's post on this :(, sorry if this is repetetive.

Also that set gives me an idea.

Set: U Mad bro?
Smeargle (M)
Item:Sash / Leftovers / Lum Berry (if you wanna troll Darkrai's)
EV's: 252HP / 252 Speed / 4 Defense <- I'll leave it as that for now BUT I AM CERTAIN GreatSage knows a more efficient spread (he posted it in the analysis or something )__))
Trait:Moody
Nature:Timid (+Spd -Atk)
- Substitute / Ingrain / Taunt
- Baton Pass
- Spore
- Minimize

Combine this with Wobbufett support and its possible for you to accumulate +6 Evasion in no time 0_0, the broken part is using Evasion to get more boosts DX. Spore actually lets you secure a +3 Evasion for sure, and that should be able to get you another minimize up your belt. You can actually free up the slot to run Ingrain now which is sad in its own right, alternatively, Substitute with Leftovers and Minimize is also an extremely helpful way of abusing moody, and you aren't screwed if something already used Perish Song ((Smeargle used Ingrain! Arceus used Perish Song! Smeargle panicked!)you CAN get out of this scenario though by firing a +6 U-turn). Taunt allows you to stop all Support Arceus from using Perish Song if you manage to grab a +1 boost to speed. When your done, pass it to something like a Mewtwo or Kyogre and enjoy. The sad part is its weak to Aura Sphere but that move is actually ridiculously uncommon compared to Thunder. You don't even have to worry too much about Aura Sphere if you have a Substitute up...

I also think the above supports a Smeargle ban, Smeagle's verstality is supposed to be "checked" with its extremely low base stats, Moody allows it to gain those base stats, which strictly speaking endangers the whole metagame and makes it a lot less "balanced". I'm not saying I favor a Moody ban just yet but Smeargle is scaring me, and I think it freaked people out too when it wasn't banned :(.

Hmm.. now that you mentioned it... Wouldn't ScarfTwo Be a Nuisance? Forcing you to Switch, or pass early (If you do have a Speed Boost that is).


Again, Lum Haxorus will also force you to switch out early, Since even Adamant Outspeeds Timid Smeargle. Lum Berry Smeargle cannot troll Rai if T-spikes are up, yet if it gets poisoned by it, HP Draining, But Rai Can't troll.

Basically, that set has counters, ingrain lets you stay in Shufflers ,but Gira-O unless Slept, will basically troll with Parahax then deal loads of damage with Dragon Tail (And its other Moves), That is where Sash Comes in Handy to sleep it, but due to the Iffy Hazards, spin Support is always recommended not to mention Sandstorm, since Mr.4x weak to Fighting Types (Tyranitar) helps Excadrill to be faster with Sand Rush.

Sand Veil Garchomp is also Notorious for the 20% Miss Hax. If it gets a Sub, well, Pass for your life!

You will also need spin Support if you want to keep Sash, but then again... Don't run sash with Substitute, because Sash would never Activate. Protect can allow you to Get a Moody Boost w/o the risk of priority/something faster than you.


And Finally, Trick Users will screw with you big time, especially [read:Scarfed] choiced Pokemon. Protect locks the user into trick, Allowing you to set up some more (Rack Moody Boosts), That is were Ingrain vs Substitute comes in, use a move to get recovery and not be phazed by moves [read:Whirlwind/Roar] Or Substitute to further help the receiver and let him/her take a D-Tail. With Roar's -6 Priority you will usually put something to sleep.

[Poppy]

Originally Posted by Fat StarmieLazer

Hmm.. now that you mentioned it... Wouldn't ScarfTwo Be a Nuisance? Forcing you to Switch, or pass early (If you do have a Speed Boost that is).


Again, Lum Haxorus will also force you to switch out early, Since even Adamant Outspeeds Timid Smeargle. Lum Berry Smeargle cannot troll Rai if T-spikes are up, yet if it gets poisoned by it, HP Draining, But Rai Can't troll.

Basically, that set has counters, ingrain lets you stay in Shufflers ,but Gira-O unless Slept, will basically troll with Parahax then deal loads of damage with Dragon Tail (And its other Moves), That is where Sash Comes in Handy to sleep it, but due to the Iffy Hazards, spin Support is always recommended not to mention Sandstorm, since Mr.4x weak to Fighting Types (Tyranitar) helps Excadrill to be faster with Sand Rush.

Sand Veil Garchomp is also Notorious for the 20% Miss Hax. If it gets a Sub, well, Pass for your life!

You will also need spin Support if you want to keep Sash, but then again... Don't run sash with Substitute, because Sash would never Activate. Protect can allow you to Get a Moody Boost w/o the risk of priority/something faster than you.


And Finally, Trick Users will screw with you big time, especially [read:Scarfed] choiced Pokemon. Protect locks the user into trick, Allowing you to set up some more (Rack Moody Boosts), That is were Ingrain vs Substitute comes in, use a move to get recovery and not be phazed by moves [read:Whirlwind/Roar] Or Substitute to further help the receiver and let him/her take a D-Tail. With Roar's -6 Priority you will usually put something to sleep.

Right, so please refer to Theorymon's post in regards to mr. lol's set. As someone who has actually used Moody Smeargle Theorymon's authority over it is relatively greater.

The rest of your post is borderline nonsensical, but Haxorus is not viable in Ubers, Moody should always be used with Leftovers to make the most out of it with Leftovers + Protect.

Please take the time to read others' posts in the thread before responding.

[Mr.lol]

I don't doubt that Smeargle can be annoying as hell, but don't pretend it can actually take a hit; Thunder from anything in Ubers will generally kill it if it's not already. You need Taunt or Ingrain to avoid phazing (because otherwise anything can just come in and spam phazing moves until they eventually hit you), so without Substitute, you have literally no defense against Thunder.

Choice Scarf 252 SpAtk Modest Kyogre Thunder vs. 252/0 +0 Smeargle: 95.22-112.1%

So that's a likely KO from a move that never misses...on the most common Pokemon in the game.

That said, Spore would definitely be annoying, but I don't think "ban Smeargle" is a fair assessment of the situation without even testing it out.

Also, you didn't give Smeargle any way of getting out of Perish Song, because you didn't put U-Turn on the set. But, just for kicks:

0 Atk +6 Smeargle U-Turn vs. 0/0 +0 Arceus (type neutral to Bug): 14.65 - 17.27%

Smeargle's offenses are hilarious.

Theorymon, I won't say Articuno is good, but Lock On + Sheer Cold still has a 30% chance to KO the switch-in (unless it has Sturdy, so you'd probably want to run HP Fire to help preserve Articuno's only niche). If you can manage to keep Articuno alive (which I'd imagine would be very hard, given its Stealth Rock weakness), that could get very annoying very quickly, especially if it decided to forgo Lock On and just start spamming Sheer Cold on whatever Pokemon you switch in to try to kill it. That said, you can never know how well it works until you test it.

I was referring to something else coming in from Baton Pass and using U-turn -_- (ex: what Great Sage did with Scizor (I think)). Also the sets just an idea, since Smeargle was obnoxious in the moody era for at least (in my opinion) accumulating Evasion boosts, and using that to prevent you from phazing it, this set speeds up the process of getting boosts immensely, and since moves like Roar, Whirlwind, Mind Reader, and Dragon Tail can all miss if the user has evasion moves, and that was what Smeargle was stalling for, hasn't it already done its job?

While all of what I said makes Smeargle sound really scary, I am totally open to retesting moody (I never even made up my mind about the moody ban in the first place!). I also will admit that the set Mr.lol posted wasn't a very good use of Smeargle's capabilities, but dismissing Smeargle's offenses as "hilarious" does show inexperience to me at least! Finally, I really dislike the idea of banning Smeargle in ANY circumstance. Pokemon shouldn't be banned in Ubers this gen as far as I'm concerned, so assuming that Moody Smeargle is once again the thing that makes people cry for a reban, I think it's just best to reban Moody instead of banning Smeargle. The only other option I'd consider is just banning Moody on Smeargle via a Complex ban, and while I admit I dislike complex bans, I still vastly prefer this option to outright banning Smeargle.

Wait what reread through my post -_-, I never at once talked about Smeargle's offensive capabilities, neither insulting them or praising them.

Also yes the set is mostly theory, Theorymon. The idea was that it is the only Pokemon that can pass Minimizes and ironically it gets moody which helps accumulate even more boosts. It was supposed to bring up a discussion on Evasion Clause, Sleep Clause and Moody Clause, and whether Smeargle would break the meta if all of these clauses were removed, but I can see that the former 2 of which it was supposed to bring up has failed. I actually will admit my bias (if it wasn't obvious already) against Moody but all the rest of the mons can't baton pass their boosts to something insane, which means they are much more vulnerable to being stalled / set up on trying to get their boosts (I remember one time when I was using Octillery (with Sub / Protect / Ice Beam / Surf, and I got setup on by a Cro Kyogre (who then proceeded to win the pp stall war, that and the fact moody mons are basically a huge sitting duck for offense setup sweepers is pretty big too (well unless Evasion boost), Smeargle gets Baton Pass so that it can immediately establish a more Offensive Presence, and if Sleep Clause is out, basically Spore everything to death). Smeargle IMO, can break the meta a bit if we do get rid of the other clauses a bit more then other sweepers, if not because of the fact Spore @ +2 Speed is frightening, but because even if you do run Scarfed Sleep talk or Lum Berry your move might just miss the turn after.

The original Moody set that terrorized Ubers back in the days is listed here for preference should anyone want it.

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Set: U Mad bro?
Smeargle (M)
Item:Leftovers
EV's: 252 HP / 252 Speed / 4 Defense <- I'll leave it as that for now BUT I AM CERTAIN GreatSage knows a more efficient spread (he posted it in the analysis or something )__))
Trait:Moody
Nature:Timid (+Spd -Atk)
- Substitute
- Protect
- Baton Pass
- Spore / Shell Smash / Stored Power
Shell Smash was just there iirc to insure you got the speed boost. The other stat drops were pretty much assuaged if you ran something like a recipient with White Herb. Spore becomes a LOT more appealing though when you take into consideration the fact Sleep Clause may be lifted.

[Theorymon]

Originally Posted by Fat Mr.lol

I was referring to something else coming in from Baton Pass and using U-turn -_- (ex: what Great Sage did with Scizor (I think)). Also the sets just an idea, since Smeargle was obnoxious in the moody era for at least (in my opinion) accumulating Evasion boosts, and using that to prevent you from phazing it, this set speeds up the process of getting boosts immensely, and since moves like Roar, Whirlwind, Mind Reader, and Dragon Tail can all miss if the user has evasion moves, and that was what Smeargle was stalling for, hasn't it already done its job?



Wait what reread through my post -_-, I never at once talked about Smeargle's offensive capabilities, neither insulting them or praising them.

Also yes the set is mostly theory, Theorymon. The idea was that it is the only Pokemon that can pass Minimizes and ironically it gets moody which helps accumulate even more boosts. It was supposed to bring up a discussion on Evasion Clause, Sleep Clause and Moody Clause, and whether Smeargle would break the meta if all of these clauses were removed, but I can see that the former 2 of which it was supposed to bring up has failed. I actually will admit my bias (if it wasn't obvious already) against Moody but all the rest of the mons can't baton pass their boosts to something insane, which means they are much more vulnerable to being stalled / set up on trying to get their boosts (I remember one time when I was using Octillery (with Sub / Protect / Ice Beam / Surf, and I got setup on by a Cro Kyogre (who then proceeded to win the pp stall war, that and the fact moody mons are basically a huge sitting duck for offense setup sweepers is pretty big too (well unless Evasion boost), Smeargle gets Baton Pass so that it can immediately establish a more Offensive Presence, and if Sleep Clause is out, basically Spore everything to death). Smeargle IMO, can break the meta a bit if we do get rid of the other clauses a bit more then other sweepers, if not because of the fact Spore @ +2 Speed is frightening, but because even if you do run Scarfed Sleep talk or Lum Berry your move might just miss the turn after.

The original Moody set that terrorized Ubers back in the days is listed here for preference should anyone want it.

...

---

Set: U Mad bro?
Smeargle (M)
Item:Leftovers
EV's: 252 HP / 252 Speed / 4 Defense <- I'll leave it as that for now BUT I AM CERTAIN GreatSage knows a more efficient spread (he posted it in the analysis or something )__))
Trait:Moody
Nature:Timid (+Spd -Atk)
- Substitute
- Protect
- Baton Pass
- Spore / Shell Smash / Stored Power
Shell Smash was just there iirc to insure you got the speed boost. The other stat drops were pretty much assuaged if you ran something like a recipient with White Herb. Spore becomes a LOT more appealing though when you take into consideration the fact Sleep Clause may be lifted.

Maybe I wasn't clear enough, but first of all, I was referring to VaporeonIce in that part, since he claimed that Smeargle's offenses were "hilarious". Anyways, While I appreciate your intentions when it came to posting that untested set, I think assuming "everything is unbanned" is putting the cart before the horse here. We are in fact testing moody before sleep clause so far, so in you're doomsday senario, if Moody is allowed and we start testing sleep clause, we could always just say that sleep clause gets banned instead of moody if Moody Smeargle really does end up screwing Ubers with no sleep clause! And even if something gets deemed uncompetitive and we do that whole "test everything unbanned at once stuff", I think that's far away enough that we should worry about that problem when we're close to it! I think that until we get this clause test stuff rolling, its best to just assume all the clauses in a vacuum, we can worry about stuff like "How will Moody clause effect Sleep clause" after we come to a decision on that stuff.

I won't deny that Baton Pass doesn't make Smeargle powerful though, I know from firsthand experience that moody Smeargle was one hell of a Pokemon that should NEVER be underestimated, but honestly I never really came to a conclusion or not if it was worth banning moody, while it looks like you have. While I'm not going to try and persuade you now, I still think its a good idea to remain cautious about saying "I NEVER WANT THIS UNBANNED" until testing actually starts!

I might as well mention my current opinion of testing Sleep clause here too! If this had been brought up a while ago I would have been like "rofl no", but my opinion has changed quite a bit on that. After playing Glitchmons (YES THE METAGAME WITH SHEER COLD MACHOKE DON'T CRUCIFY ME), and seeing a metagame with over 400 users of Spore and no sleep clause STILL managing to deal with it, I now question my previous opinion on sleep clause. Granted, Ubers doesn't have crazy off the wall shit like priority Ursaring that can laugh at Spore (though it also doesnt have crazy spore abusers like Dugtrio and Skarmory)... but as controversial as this opinion is, I'm no longer 100% sure how Ubers is going to react to the lack of sleep clause. Maybe Darkrai and Smeargle will take over and make things unplayable, or maybe using more lum berries, sleep talk, and magic coat can make it manageable, I'm really unsure until we test this now!

[Tank178]

I'm a bit late to see this, but alright. Can't wait to see what is soon to come. Time for me to ladder!

[ssbbm]

yeah, moody smeargle is pretty terrifying, and the worst thing is that it barely has any viable counters / checks

it has: ps arceus, scarf ogre (has to use thunder), scarf pokemon w/ thunder under rain, and fast pokemon w/ aura sphere (and gimmicky stuff like haze and heart swap manaphy)

what makes this terrifying is that all thsoe pokemon MUST switch in on smeargle immediately: whenever you switch in smeargle, you immediately force your opponent to act to you. smeargle, then, acts as the best lure in the game, since it can run any move. is your team weak to ps arceus? no big deal, you can take it out of the equation by sporing it. is your team weak to scarfogre? no big deal, run dugtrio along smeargle and punish it for using thunder. your team is weak to mewtwo or scarf dialga? run thunder-wave on smeargle to cripple them!

[SteelCurtain]

Having read all of the posts I return with more insights.
Most of the discussion seems to be focused on OHKO moves and moody.

OHKO moves still only have 30% accuracy, which is, quite frankly terrible. People tend not to use Thunder outside of rain because of its 70% accuracy. Though there is the chance that you could sweep a team using gliscor's guillotine, it is more likely that you'll miss and spend the rest of gliscor's life trying to set up substitutes before being murdered by some ice move.
Though gliscor is probably the best user of guillotine because of its ability to stall. It also could use double team to help last longer against other pokemon. One downside of guillotine though is giratina cause ghost type. Though a toxic would hamper a stall giratina and annoy an offensive one.

I don't see excadrill being useful with fissure. Its bulk isn't good enough to take more than two super effective hits from most offensive uber pokes, that and most flying pokemon will counter it (assuming it doesn’t have rock slide) and get a free substitute or boosting move.
Kyogre could make some use of it though relying on it would be foolish.

Moody seems annoying. I never experienced it personally though most pokemon seem like they could be phased out pretty easily. And then there’s smeargle. I can see why Ingrain smeargle with spore would be awful. Though darkrai does get haze for those inclined to use it. Given the lack of experience with moody I won’t say anything else on the topic.

Sleep clause still sounds bad.

[naagza]

I feel that most of the clauses are there for a good reason and probably do not need to be changed. However, there are some which I think can be removed.

• Removal of Sleep Clause is something where Choice Scarf Darkrai may be viable. However, the fact that Dark Void has only 10 uses (16 max) and the fact it would likely be locked on that move make it limited. The one thing I see "fixing" that "issue" with Scarf Darkrai would be removal of Species Clause as well. With Species clause, one could decide to have more than one Darkrai to abuse the "Bad Dreams" ability...maybe even have the new Darkrai set up a Substitute and Dream Eater the opponent if desired. With Sleep Clause removed, it is possible that some will get paranoid and have Magic Bounce Pokemon that they can switch to as soon as they see Darkrai, so maybe its removal will not cause too many issues. Overall, I think Sleep Clause could be removed but not at the same time as Species Clause.

• Removal of Moody Clause would cause a lot of hax in the metagame. I don't think it would be a good idea to get rid of it. Smeargle will be a common sight in ubers with Moody Clause removed, and one Spore could easily cause a bunch of issues once Moody activates. Too much hax involved and Moody Smeargle could even Baton Pass all its gained stats. I don't think it's a good idea to unban Moody.....luck plays too much of a role in this.

• Removal of Evasion Clause would be a bad idea because, as charlord stated, there are Prankster users that could abuse the opportunity to Double team with priority while not being able to be countered by No Guard because of Machamp and other No Guard pokemon not being good for ubers.

• As for the OHKO Clause, I feel that the metagame won't be affected much by removing this clause. OHKO moves are gimmicky on their own, with only a 30% chance to hit. Compare 30% to the well-known 70% chance of "Focus-miss" hitting. Given the difference, I think it is clear that OHKO moves are more than likely going to miss their target almost every time. OHKO moves are extremely gimmicky, and I doubt anyone in their right mind would try to put a OHKO move to fill a slot (in other words, only a player newly introduced to competitive play would do this). The only Pokemon that could potentially do well with OHKO moves (Articuno) as it can learn Mind Reader and Sheer Cold, is NU, due to the fact it loses 50% health from Stealth Rock........The only potential good OHKOer is NU. Removal of this clause will not be an issue.

• If we do decide to get rid of Species Clause, it would be a bad idea to combine it with removal of the other clauses.....Scarf Darkrai would be annoying as you could have more than one Darkrai to abuse Bad Dreams with, as stated earlier. But even with this being removed on its own, it would have bad consequences. Many teams made up of overused uber pokemon would be common, such as Extremespeed Arceus.

[StarmieLazer]

@Poppy: I overlooked the users of Dual Chop, and I found Garchomp, but since Dragon Claw would be more efficient overall... Dual Chop is just not that used, but i'll give a set.
Ev's: 4 HP/ 252 Atk/ 252 Spe
-Substitute
-Swords Dance/Hone Claws
- Dual Chop
-Earthquake

Well.... This is old Standard Sub Dance Chomp with some added stuff, Hone Claws gives Accuracy if you're paranoid about that 90% Accuracy, but its usually Swords Dance.
Dual Chop Gives the same power as Dragon Claw but with more variable damage, (it hits twice so both hits vary in power) And both hits can be a critical hit. The 40 Less power (Before STAB) from Outrage gives no drawback at all.

Sand Veil of course is the used Ability Here.

Well There you have it, an Uber Viable Pokemon that can actually use Dual Chop.



So a counter to smeargle... would be a Hazer/Phazer? I Also think Specially Defensive Giratina Deserves a mention, but if you're paranoid with substitutes, go for Roar.

Ev's: 248 HP/ 8 Def / 252 Sp.def
~ Rest
~ Sleep Talk
~ Will-O-Wisp / Roar
~ Dragon Tail / Outrage

Hmm.. What move should I remove to use Roar you ask?

Dragon Tail:Would leave you open to taunters, but roar has better accuracy


WoW:How do I Counter Extremekiller again? Not that good of an idea.


Rest:No.

Sleep Talk:Main Counter here.

[Iceydude168]

Originally Posted by Fat Poppy

Kyogre
move 1: Sheer Cold
move 2: Scald
move 3: Rest
move 4: Sleep Talk
item: Leftovers
ability: Drizzle
nature: Bold
evs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD

I used this set back on PO server during the time that OHKO moves weren't banned and it was a monster. Playing against this thing is a huge fucking gamble - The 2 Pokemon with Sturdy actually viable in Ubers (Forretress and Skarmory), are both easily 2HKO'd with Scald after Stealth Rock damage is factored in. You thought Scald burns were a reason not to switch Zekrom into Kyogre - try the same chance of instantly dying. Traditional Kyogre counters/checks such as Gastrodon, Ferrothorn, Specially Defensive Giratina, and Chansey are fearing much more than a Scald burn from Kyogre now. Even worse - none of these Pokemon can viably run Substitute. Basically, this set breaks the metagame.
If anything, keep the move Sheer Cold banned and let the rest of the moves be unbanned - what sets Sheer Cold apart from other OHKO moves is that it is stupidly broken on the most common Pokemon on the metagame, both common Sturdy users are weak to said Pokemon, and nothing is immune to the move - PP stalling it is a big luckbag.

[Pokémon Trainer R]

I did initially intend to make a huge post expressing my thoughts in regards to this test, but upon further consideration, I realized that the message I initially wanted to post would be pointless, as what defines an "enjoyable metagame" is entirely subjective anyway, and from my own personal experience with this site, the people don't seem to like to listen to the ideas of a single person either, even when discussing matters that are far more objective than that which this thread pertains to.

But in any case, I'll post just to say that I am in support of the removal of the OHKO Clause, the Evasion Clause and the Moody Clause for two very simple reasons:

1. Innumerable laddering experiences tell me that even with the aforementioned clauses, the game of Pokémon is still, in a nutshell, nothing more than a gambling game anyway. We all know that critical hits, freezes, paralysis, and other things that people commonly refer to as "hax" contributes to luck's impact on the outcome of any battle. But little do many people realize that even if "hax" does not occur in a battle, its outcome could still have been influenced by two more subtle forms of luck: Namely, team matchups and predictions. Even in this current metagame, there is no such thing as a single team that can have at least a 50-50 matchup against every single other team in existence, and unless both trainers in a battle are using the exact same team, it is probably extremely rare, if even possible at all, to find a battle in which the two trainers' teams have exactly a 50-50 matchup with each other. Though the trainer with the team advantage obviously isn't guaranteed to win the battle (as the other trainer could make up for their team's disadvantage through skill, "hax" or predictions), it is undeniable that as soon as a Pokémon battle begins, luck has already had its impact on the game by giving an advantage to the trainer with the team advantage, regardless of how slight it may be. And while the process of an experienced trainer completely reading and outpredicting the moves of a less competent battler is undeniably a show of skill, the concept of "predictions" becomes nothing more than a game of guessing in a battle between two trainers of similar skill. For example, in a battle between two experienced trainers, someone with a Zekrom out against a Kyurem-W, as well as an Arceus-Steel in their team, may leave their Zekrom in to launch a Dragon-type attack at the Boundary Pokémon, due to predicting that the opponent will predict a switch to Arceus-Steel and therefore use Fusion Flare. But Kyurem-W's trainer may use Ice Beam or a Dragon-type move, predicting that the opponent will predict a Fusion Flare and therefore stay in. Since there is no way to be absolutely sure of what the opponent may do in this situation, what both trainers are ultimately doing is just guessing the opponent's move, and therefore depending on luck to win. So since luck in Pokémon is not just exclusively observed in the phenomenom people commonly refer to as "hax," but is also an inextricable part of both team matchups and predictions (both of which, especially the latter, are extremely central to what "competitive" Pokémon even is in the first place), I see nothing wrong at all with the luck that one-hit KO moves, Evasion-enhancing techniques, as well as the Moody Ability introduce to the game, as luck is absolutely nothing new to the metagame anyway. And while one may argue that pointing out the fact that luck already exists in the game is not a justification for adding even more luck into it, such an argument assumes that the metagame was "competitive" in the first place with the OHKO Clause, the Evasion Clause and the Moody Clause, but would lose said "competitiveness" upon the lifting of the aforementioned clauses. But the way I see it, as much as anyone would want to deny it, there is already so much luck in the game that even now it is very uncompetitive, with events like this, this and this (note: the Groudon lead in that last log had Jolly and maximum Speed, so it was far from unreasonable to assume that my opponent's Ho-Oh had a Choice Scarf, as not only did it have just a 50% chance of attacking first, but very few Ho-Oh actually have Jolly and maximum Speed) easily occurring, and costing a huge number of points on the ladder, or even worse, eliminating one from a tournament. I realize that the creation, promotion, and study of a competitive Pokémon metagame is the heart of Smogon itself, but my laddering experiences tell me that this was a futile pursuit to begin with, and that it would be far better if people would accept that Pokémon is largely a luck-based and uncompetitive game, with or without the OHKO, Evasion and Moody Clauses.

2. The vast majority of people seem to be absolutely fine with the existence of a Pokémon with a base stat total of 720, the Ability to be any of the 17 types (and not even Team Preview provides any information about that type), and by far most importantly, the access to Swords Dance + Same Type Attack Bonus ExtremeSpeed with 120 base Attack and absolutely insane bulk as well as only one weakness, in a metagame where the most reliable method of burning fails 25% of the time (to put this into perspective, this is even more than the chances of a move with 100% accuracy missing against Garchomp in the sand. Why people constantly complained about Sand Veil Garchomp in OU, and yet have no problem with Will-O-Wisp missing Arceus remains a complete mystery, especially since Will-O-Wisp's failure rate against Arceus-Normal is increased to a whopping 44% if it just carries the very common Lum Berry), and overcentralizing it and dominating it left and right. Given the premise that a Pokémon like Arceus is considered to be "OK", then by that logic, as far as I'm concerned, Sheer Cold Kyogre, Guillotine Gliscor, Fissure/Horn Drill Excadrill, and Moody Smeargle would be absolutely fine and not overpowered either. So what if Fissure Excadrill's ability to easily get past Spin-blockers, as well as Sheer Cold Kyogre's ability to easily eliminate Ferrothorn on the switch seriously hamper the viability of stall? None of this is even anything at all compared to the way Arceus-Normal has singlehandedly almost completely crushed the viability of hyper-offense in Übers, and people are completely cool with that, yet for some reasons, even the slightest prospect of something threatening stall makes many people unhappy, and I don't know why that is the case.

As for Sleep Clause and Species Clause, I am personally against their removal for two basic reasons:

1. I just do not think that a metagame without them would be very fun for some reasons, but this is completely subjective. I personally would not mind the removal of the Species Clause in any metagame barring Übers though, ironically, because no other metagame has a Pokémon as overpowered relative to every other Pokémon in its tier as Arceus is to the Übers tier, and no other metagame has a Pokémon which can be of any of the 17 types. The fact that Arceus is clearly a cut above every other Über in the game, combined with the possibility of being able to make completely viable teams where at least half of its members are Arceus Formes is why I think that the removal of the Species Clause would be undesirable in Übers, but not in any other tier.

2. Unlike the OHKO, Evasion and Moody Clauses, both the Sleep Clause and the Species Clause have actually been official clauses in some Pokémon games, such as Pokémon Stadium and Pokémon Stadium 2.

[SteelCurtain]

Dear Pokemon Trainer R,

I’ve read your post and I recognize many of your concerns. Hax is a pain. I’ve lost games because one of my pokemon was frozen, or a wild crit removed one of pokemon that would have destroyed the rest of the opposing team. However calling the entire metagame uncompetitive and entirely based on luck is untrue. Your comment about choosing a move or choosing to switch is entirely based luck because you don't know what the opponent will do is quite frankly false. That is akin to saying that chess is not a competitive game because you don’t know what the opponent will do so each move is non-consequential and the winner is just luckier than the loser. Pokemon takes planning and prediction. Yes some of it is decided by luck. However using moves with a slightly lower accuracy is your call. Recognize that it can, and probably will, miss. If you don’t like this use more accurate moves at the price of lower base power. And yes some moves will freeze, paralyze, burn, and poison. However the chance of this happening is low.

About arceus. It is overpowered. 720 stat base is ludicrous, but ubers isn’t about that. It’s a place where pokemon that are too powerful or broken for OU play go. Garchomp was too powerful for OU with its 130 attack, 102 base speed, and decent bulk. As such it was moved to ubers. Speaking of garchomp, The reason that people whined about sandviel, but don’t complain about will-o-wisp is because they choose to use the 75% accuracy move. Having your 100% accuracy move miss against the land shark, and not being able to do anything about it is kinda broken.
That is also the reason that evasion was banned. If you can’t hit the opponent, whether to phase, haze, or simply damage, that removes the competitive aspect of the game. In my old Gameboy color Gold version I found Falkner to be annoying as heck because of mud slap. Evasion is only worse because it sticks around after the pokemon kills you. This is just my opinion though.

As for the OHKO clause, I agree with you. The fact that it has 30% accuracy all the time keeps it from being totally broken, and it makes some other pokemon have a neat move that can help it remove previous checks from the game. The only risk with this is a pokemon sweeping a team using a OHKO move, but this is unlikely.

I don’t know enough about moody to speak on it, though everybody else seems to hate it. Sleep clause is great, keep it forever, species could be modified to allow only 2 of the same pokemon… maybe.

Pokemon Trainer R, I’m not trying to shut out your opinion, nor am I trying to insult you; but coming to a competitive pokemon site and calling it uncompetitive and claiming that everything is luck is pretty rude. If you don’t think pokemon should be competitive then stick to the games. Otherwise don’t complain.

Thank you.

[Furai]

Alright, I think it's finally time for me to chime into this thread. I've been too late with that too. Since I have to go soon, I'll only post a few comments, and my thoughts will be up tomorrow.

@Pokémon Trainer R

SteelCurtain said most of it. Predicting and planning ahead is not luck based; it's pure skill. If you predicted Kyurem-W to Draco Meteor your Ho-Oh, and you went to Steel Arceus as he Focus Blast'd it, too bad, your plan didn't work. The opponent predicted your move, and played accordingly.

Again, SteelCurtain hit it dead-on; on Will-O-Wisp you're perfectly aware of its chances to miss, and you went ahead with it (mainly because there are no other alternatives). Sand Veil can cause any move that will hit the user to miss, thus making it really frustrating sometimes; all of that without having to waste a moveslot on Double Team or something. Arceus is not overpowered; if you were swept by Arceus, it's because you either didn't play correctly or didn't prepare for it. In either case, you deserve to be swept by it. There are many Arceus counters out there: Terrakion, Giratina, Wallceus... I can go on and on. Calm Mind Arceus is defeated by Ho-Oh, the pink blobs, and Calm Mind Kyogre, unless they pack super effetive moves, of course. Comparing Arceus to an instant kill is not a good thing to do, as Arceus can be dealt with as I just mentioned. Sheer Cold may not work on Skarmory or Forretress, but Scald 2HKOes both, leaving everything to Sheer Cold's Accuracy mercy.

@StarmieLazer

Roar > Dragon Tail; both are mainly used to phaze. Dragon Tail may land some damage, but Roar is much more accurate and can phaze Subsitute Pokemon as well. And again, what if Smeargle got an Evasion boost from Moody, or used ingrain? That set is useless.

@naagza

Prankster users have other things to do than setup a Double Team. The Pokemon that have Prankster and can actually do something in Ubers are Thundurus, Tornadus, and Whimsicott (barely). Thundurus is not bulky enough to utilize the move, as on the turn it sets it up it risks being KOed, and even if he already has a few boosts up, a simple hit can cause a ton of damage. Thundurus should also use its ability to slowen fast things like weather abusers with Thunder Wave, and stop faster Pokemon, such as Mewtwo and CM Arceus, from setting up. Why would you use Double Team on Tornadus, another fairly frail Pokemon, when you can fire off a Hurricane that turn or aid your entire team with Tailwind? Whimsicott can make it work, but what will you give up on? Subsitute? No, you need it to recover more health from Leech Seed. Encore? No, it grants you setup oppurtunities. Taunt? You're being a setup fodder, and Ferrothorn would just love switching on you as you do literally nothing to it.

[Acritter]

I'm having trouble seeing right now why anyone would run Sheer Cold on Kyogre. Water Spout is so strong that it's very close to an OHKO move as-is, and it has 100% accuracy. Kyogre is good enough that OHKO moves are more liability than strength.

What OHKO moves seem like they'd be good on are Pokemon that lack offensive presence but can force enemy Pokemon out through their defensive potential. The way it goes is: switch in on a Pokemon you counter, use an OHKO move. If they switch, you have a 30% chance of killing the Pokemon they brought in to try and deal with your 'mon. If they stay in, the odds heavily favor you landing the kill before you burn through all your PP. In this context, I think OHKO moves are quite balanced in Ubers, as there are so few Pokemon that can really counter other Pokemon in this sense without already having access to superior offensive options or more reliable ways to cripple enemy Pokemon, such as Toxic or Will o' Wisp.

Regarding the other clauses, I imagine that nobody will ever actually USE Evasion moves and the test will fall through. Moody will get banned again instantly because it is the most teeth-grindingly infuriating strategy ever conceived. Sleep Clause is most likely going to be reinstated, because not everyone LIKES using Primeape on their team, and Lum Berries just aren't enough all of the time.

What I'm really excited for, though, is Species Clause. Chances are it will be found to be uncompetitive, because even if it doesn't create a metagame where skill is undervalued it will shake things up so much that people just aren't comfortable with it. But there's no way that I won't find it fun to mess around with teams having 2 or more of the same Pokemon.

[ThisMysteriousGuy]

About time I give my own two cents on all the clauses. I wouldn't be surprised if people hate on everything I say.

• Keep the OHKO Clause: I'm honestly pretty confused as to why people want to remove this. In my personal opinion, removing this would have some serious consequences, especially to stall teams. While some may argue that you shouldn't be relying on it since it's so luck, maybe this is just me, but a 30% of instantly being rid of your foe's Pokemon is STILL 30%. Think about this way, would you gamble on a 30% chance of instantly KOing a Giratina-A or Lugia that has been stalling the hell out of you the entire match and you just have no other way to kill? Yeah Giratina-A and, sometimes, Lugia have Pressure, but still the fact that Pokemon that could completely stall you out can instantly be killed by spamming a OHKO move makes it broken in my eyes.
• Keep the Species Clause: This one is pretty simple. Arceus spam isn't cool
• Complex Ban the Moody Clause: Don't honestly know about this one. I've never seriously used Moody in any way, even in-game, but from theorymoning, having it used against me, and what I've heard from others I think a complex ban should do the trick, like ban Sub+Moody, Protect+Moody, or even Smeargle+Moody. Plus, there's a good deal of ways to phaze in Ubers, which help keep it in balance.
• Keep or Complex Ban the Sleep Clause: The only legit Sleep inducer in Ubers, to my recollection, is Darkrai. Still, Darkrai spamming Dark Void will make it a serious threat. If they do a complex ban involving Darkrai in some way then I'd see the Sleep Cluase being something we could remove but other than that no.
• Remove the Evasion Clause: I'm really torn on this one. I have tried Double Team spamming, if you can get more than like 3 boosts you'll probably be good to go but seriously, phazing is rather common in Ubers, it's fairly easy to stop if you can land a hit early on, and don't you have better things to do other than spam Double Team? On the other hand, there are a good deal of walls who can get free turns without too much of an issue during the time they stall you, at which point they can spam Double Team and potentially stall out your team. However, since walls like Lugia are cramped for moveslots and have much better things they should be doing, I say we should remove it.

[Furai]

Originally Posted by Fat Acritter

I'm having trouble seeing right now why anyone would run Sheer Cold on Kyogre. Water Spout is so strong that it's very close to an OHKO move as-is, and it has 100% accuracy. Kyogre is good enough that OHKO moves are more liability than strength.

The thing is, that everyone is prepared for Water Spout. Be it Latias, Palkia, or a niche Pokemon like Gastrodon, everyone has its protection from Kyogre's STAB. However, you cannot do the same with Sheer Cold. The 30% of killing your Pokemon makes it a gamble on who do you want to lose. But what makes this set so deadly is the combination of Sheer Cold and Scald. Since the only viable Sturdy users in Ubers are Skarmory or Forretress, they are the only ones that are able to switch into Sheer Cold. But that's where Scald takes place, by 2HKOing both Sturdy users, and that's what makes Sheer Cold Kyogre so deadly.

[Great Sage**]

Please stay on topic and focus discussion on the clauses. Arguments about Arceus's power or lack thereof are not relevant.

[puregenius]

u could play some serious mind games with species clause gone
specs/band and scarf seems like the main problem
-kyogre will be a huge thorn
adding specs halves the counters and u may not be able to revenge it if it is carrying scarf
-darkrai can void revengers with scarf, as almost nothing outspeeds it and then sweep with a nasty plot set
-reshi is in the same boat as kyogre
-arceus can effectively stop all of its counters trick, overheat, chople berry, lum berry, recover, eq, brick break and ice beam and u can never tell which one it is because they all look the same :\
-palkia can feign a scarf set with lustrous orb, haban berry or expert belt
-kyu w is in the same boat as reshi and kyogre

[Acritter]

Originally Posted by Fat Furry

The thing is, that everyone is prepared for Water Spout. Be it Latias, Palkia, or a niche Pokemon like Gastrodon, everyone has its protection from Kyogre's STAB. However, you cannot do the same with Sheer Cold. The 30% of killing your Pokemon makes it a gamble on who do you want to lose. But what makes this set so deadly is the combination of Sheer Cold and Scald. Since the only viable Sturdy users in Ubers are Skarmory or Forretress, they are the only ones that are able to switch into Sheer Cold. But that's where Scald takes place, by 2HKOing both Sturdy users, and that's what makes Sheer Cold Kyogre so deadly.

There's also the very real danger of Sheer Cold failing entirely, and your opponent getting a Pokemon in completely for free. My guess is that the set will either completely fall through due to people allowing free setup with no drawbacks, or be a success and end up with OHKO banned because games involving Sheer Cold Kyogre will come down to "did my Sheer Cold hit", and that is practically the definition of non-competitive.

Regarding Species, I'd like to do something like Dual Rayquaza. One runs DD, one runs SD. Your opponent can't tell which is which until it's too late. Rest of the team is Specs Kyogre because why not. yes this is mostly a joke