CAP 16 CAP 5 - Part 2 - Typing Discussion

[capefeather]

tbh I'm leaning more towards Dark / Grass right now. The Ground weakness of Electric / not-Grass is increasingly worrisome, and considering this, the Ice weakness doesn't sound so bad by comparison. Nonetheless, if the slate looks like that, I'm going to have a hard time deciding. This is going to be a good poll series :)

 

[jas61292]

I know I talked a lot about it in my first post, but I want to go into a bit more detail on Dragon/Grass. I remain thoroughly unconvinced it has much, if any real positives for this concept, and comes along with a large amount of negatives.

Now, looking at the posts trying to sell this typing, the most important thing that sticks out to me is that they try and sell it as a defensive pivot vs rain, but at the same time try and write off the Ice weakness as unimportant. Sure, the typing resists water. But that means nothing when every water type still kills it. This is not a type that generally checks water except for those few unique sets that can beat it. This is a typing that straight up loses to every Pokemon that it wants to pivot on if they choose the right move. The fact that the rest of your team resists Ice (which Venusaur and Dugtrio and the like would like to remind you they don't), does nothing to circumvent the fact that you cannot even risk doing you job without dying.

The other hugely worrying thing is that being Dragon in general simply causes the propogation of more dragons. Dragons are always good, and a Dragon that beats Dragon will just see a lot of use. It won't decrease the use of others. Now, some say that beating dragons is not the goal of this type. Even so, you still propogate dragon use. Add a good dragon to OU but have it unable to beat other dragons. What do you get? A huge amount of dragons. Even if we are successful in lowing the usage of water, if we do so with a dragon, a significant amount of the Pokemon usage that comes in to take itse place will be dragon, either in the form of CAP5, or in the form of dragons that beat it.

Finally, I feel that most of the arguments in favor of Grass/Dragon are simply generic things that almost any type could fill, or is not specific to sun. Arguments about spinning or trapping or the like that have nothing to do with the typing, and most suggested types do just as good, if not a better job of theses things. Additionaly statements that the typing itself would be nice for sun are offset by the fact that the typing itself would be wonderful for rain or sand or weatherless as well. Claims to the contrary are either ignoring the fact that Pokemon like this are used all over, or only work if we assume that we will be genally inferior to existing similar Pokemon that thrive in the other weathers, and yet somehow are sucessful in sun.

Overall, there is really little Grass/Dragon actually does right for this concept, and what it does do is done just as well, if not better by the other part Grass typings, which lack the major downsides that Dragon provides.

 

[Stratos]

I'm going to make one last plea for the type i really do find necessary somewhere on the slate: FIGHTING/ELECTRIC. This is a typing intended to seize momentum vs sand (only stopping defensive momentum, not creating it) and keep momentum vs rain (not able to switch in to tank hits, but able to dish them well)

What does this bring to the plate?

1) Tyranitar Pivot. Yes, yes, i know that "we're trying to counter Rain here," but Sand is the more problematic weather for Sun teams simply because Ninetales has such a damn hard time switching in. If you honestly think that we can make sun good just by letting it beat rain, uh, go play some more OU. Nothing on your standard sun team can consistently, reliably force tyranitar out and let tales in, which really is a problem. A fighting type would resist both of Tyranitar's STABs while being neutral to its coverage moves and let Tales come in to regain favorable weather
2) Stealth Rock Resistance. Sun has such a problem with being unable to function defensively because of SR-weak cores. Having a staple member with an SR resistance would take a lot of defensive pressure off of this archetype.
3) Beats Heatran. A strong fighting STAB has the not-insubstantial purpose of being able to take on Heatran and win, which is something none of the other types currently on the slate can do.
4) Threatens Waters. Self-explanatory really, but a strong Electric type attack would press the offense against Rain, and a fighting type backup stab would make any switch sans Rachi incredibly unsafe.
5) Strong VolTurn core with Scizor. Scizor is a really fucking helpful pokemon for Sun teams: It kills most dragons (which we all know sun hates), it provides a secondary win condition if Venu falls, and it provides a dragon resist and good physical bulk, two things sun teams usually lack. Also, it has coverage issues with mostly steels, which its sun partners bust down. It's unfortunately held back because sun teams are strapped for options: scizor just doesn't fit with all the slots we need, it can only pivot vs Tyranitar and others once, and furthermore since sun struggles with hazards, a Volturn core doesnt help with that. With an elec/fight on the team, hazards hold scizor back less, Heatran holds scizor back less, Tyranitar can be taken by a different pokemon, and Scizor can apply the offensive pressure it needs to. Basically, the fighting STAB would take the place of rotom's water STAB where water is neutered so hard. This also removes the problem of the Latis, as this CAP could simply pop out and let Scizor take its place, so no need to worry about that.

As for why this typing won't be used on rain teams: It likes to play defensively vs Sand; rain teams prefer to play offensively vs sand. It's not helpful vs sun. And as reach already expressed, being good in a mirror match is always a net neutral at best for a playstyle.

As for why this typing won't be used on Sand teams: It likes to play offensively vs rain; sand likes to play defensively vs rain. It's not helpful vs sun. And as reach already expressed, being good in a mirror match is always a net neutral at best for a playstyle.

 

[alexwolf]

I don't get your reasoning at all pwnemon... In the part where you explain why the Electric/Fighting mon would not benefit rain and sand teams more than sun teams you say that rain likes to play offensively against sand, where this Pokemon likes to play defensive vs sand and other similar stuff. Where did you get this? Electric / Fighting has very good offensive STABs and can keep momentum too with Volt Switch. Does this suggest a defensive role? If it will prefer to play more offensive or defensive will be determined later, but its typing favors offense.

tl;dr I just don't get why this Pokemon will only work in sun's favor and not in everyone's favor, so if you mind explaining it would be nice...!

So far Electric/Grass and and Electric/Dark seem to be the best typings. Grass/Dark is great offensively against rain teams but it sucks defensively and cannot make an effective pivot; not in this meta at least.

EDIT: One more thing that i want to remind to everyone is that if we make a Grass-type, we have to make sure that it will be able to work well with Venusuar, sun's mvp. If it doesn't work so well with Venusaur then it will be a failure, because sun teams will pick Venusaur over it and therefore all our efforts will be in vain.

 

[DetroitLolcat]

The Fighting type is a great addition to this Pokemon in that giving Sun a boost against Sand may not do much to help out Sun if it only forces Rain users to switch to Sand. The type I would like to see discussed is Grass/Fighting.

Grass/Fighting has a few bonuses to it that help it dump Rain, help itself against Sand, and most importantly, benefit Sun. The qualities I see in Grass/Fighting are as follows (pwnemon I like your list idea so I will use it for my own purposes!):

1. Stealth Rock Resistance

Making this Pokemon resistant to Stealth Rock is going to strengthen this Pokemon's role as a defensive pivot if we choose to go that direction and give Sun something that both Sand and Rain have: a Stealth rock resistant tank. Sun teams naturally have plenty of Pokemon weak or neutral to Stealth Rock, so giving this Pokemon Grass/Fighting as a typing would ease the hazard burden that most Sun teams have.

2. Resistance to Water and Electric

Water and Electric are two types commonly used by Rain teams, specifically high-powered Special attack by Pokemon such as Thundurus-T, Keldeo, etc. Giving this Pokemon resistances to Water and Electric (and enough bulk to handle coverage moves) will let it better handle Rain teams. Pokemon like Keldeo can rip through Pokemon without Water Absorb, Dry Skin, Storm Drain, or a resisting type, so unless we stick on an ability that defeats Water-type Pokemon we will not be able to adequately handle the high-powered Water moves commonly seen on Rain teams. The Electric resistance provided by the Grass type allows our Pokemon to handle Thundurus-T, Jolteon, and Politoed's various Thunder buddies, strengthening this Pokemon's role as a Rain counter.

3. Can attack Water-type Pokemon right off the bat

Grass typing means Grass STAB. Being able to sponge a hit from something like Keldeo or Politoed doesn't mean much it we can't hit back with Giga Drain, Power Whip, Horn Leech (notice how many Grass STAB moves give this Pokemon semi-reliable recovery!), or whatever STAB Grass moves we decide to give this Pokemon. Furthermore, we would not need to bloat this Pokemon's attacking stats if we can just hit Water types super-effectively, so we can focus on giving this Pokemon the defensive stats to weather the rainstorm of OU. Though Jellicent isn't the spinblocking titan of OU, beating OU's bulkiest Ghost will clear the way for this Pokemon or a teammate to Spin away the hazards that hamper Sun's usefulness.

4. Increased potential for a Sun-benefiting ability

This is more of a flavor argument, but Grass types commonly have abilities like Chlorophyll, so giving this Pokemon a Grass typing will bring Chlorophyll into serious consideration for later. Excuse the minor polljump, but giving this Pokemon Chlorophyll creates the incentive to use this Pokemon on a Sun team.

5. Can beat Heatran if paired with Rotom-W

Though this typing fails to switch into Heatran at will, if we pair this Pokemon with Rotom-W or another slow U-Turner or Volt Switcher, we can take Heatran's attack and then retaliate with a Fighting-type attack to theoretically OHKO the Sun counter.

6. Beats Dugtrio barring the rare Aerial Ace

Resists Earthquake, resists Stone Edge, and has ways around Reversal (Leech Seed anyone?). Instead of living in fear of Dugtrio, Grass/Fighting would let CAP5 switch into Duggy with impunity unless Duggy decides to use Aerial Ace, which is a pretty rare move for Dugtrio since it kind of needs all four of its moveslots for Stealth Rock, Earthquake, Stone Edge, and Reversal.

7. Is not demolished by Sand.

The Fighting type gives this Pokemon a resistance to Stone Edge, Crunch, Pursuit, and Earthquake, the four most common moves on Tyranitar and Hippowdon. Super-effective coverage on those Pokemon and Terrakion (plus a neutral hit on Landorus) gives this Pokemon the ability to grapple with Sand just as well as it grapples with Rain. Common Sand abusers will not be able to break this Pokemon and thanks to the neutrality to U-Turn and resistance to Volt Switch, VoltTurn Sand teams will have just as much trouble.

8. Weaknesses are all covered by natural teammates or good defensive stats.

The most critical weaknesses of this type are Flying and Ice, but in reality, this is not a significant issue. The only common spammer of Flying moves outside of the rare Acrobatics Gliscor is Tornadus, who is both an uncommon presence in OU and is not a 100% counter to a Grass/Fighting CAP5. In Sun, Tornadus will only be able to hit CAP5 with Hurricane 50% of the time, so a Tornadus user will have to risk a 50/50 chance to kill this Pokemon with Hurricane or else switch out. Meanwhile, an Ice weakness is not the end of the world because most Ice moves in OU are coverage moves on Pokemon such as Starmie, Politoed, Landorus, Thundurus-Therian, etc. Giving this Pokemon adequate Special Defense would offset this Pokemon's Ice weakness. Look at Specially Defensive Celebi for example: Specially Defensive Celebi can take plenty of Hidden Power Ices or weak Ice Beams despite its weakness, so we are not necessarily screwed against Ice. The only common Ice Pokemon in OU, Mamoswine, is weak to both of this Pokemon's STAB types, so even the strongest Ice types in OU cannot defeat CAP5. Fire is another salient weakness on a Grass/Fighting CAP, but that's where this Pokemon's teammates come in. Sun teams commonly use three or four Fire resists per team, so it's not critical to resist Fire. Even if this Pokemon was neutral to Fire, the power of Sun would boost Fire moves to a point where it wouldn't really matter whether or not this Pokemon was weak to Fire.

9. Theoretically counters Ferrothorn

Leech Seed immunity, Grass resistance, and Fighting STAB. Knocking out Rain's best defensive pivot and half of its sweepers make this Pokemon Rain's bane. In conclusion, Grass/Fighting provides this Pokemon the tools necessary to boost Sun as a playstyle and severely hamper both of Sun's rival weathers.

 

[Scorpio]

I would like to make a suggestion: This CAP should not be of any of the types we are trying to lower. This means no Dragon, no Steel, no Water, and no whatever else the other overused types are (let's say Fighting).

Why am I saying this? Simple: by making CAP5 any of these types, we've already failed in our objective to lower these types, since we're using them. In my view at least, using these types to lower overused types is hypocritical.

tl;dr sometimes fighting fire with fire (purely metaphorical in this case, since Fire is one of the types we're trying to RAISE) isn't the solution.

Also, can someone tell me which overused types we agreed on other that Dragon, Steel, or Water?

 

[Bughouse]

I think the main reasons I have remained in support of Dark/Electric over Dark/Grass are the following:

1)Competition with Venusaur as a Grass type is a possibility
2)Inferior coverage against Rain-mons, namely Tentacruel and Gyarados
3)In the case that CAP5 gets Volt Switch, it won't have STAB anymore. This move is kinda good for a pivot, particularly one against water types.
4)Becomes weak to Hurricane
5)Becomes weak to Ice Beam
6)Stops resisting Bullet Punch (and can't touch Scizor with a STAB move at all either)

Dark/Electric is still superior to the late addition, Dark/Grass.

 

[Stratos]

I don't get your reasoning at all pwnemon... In the part where you explain why the Electric/Fighting mon would not benefit rain and sand teams more than sun teams you say that rain likes to play offensively against sand, where this Pokemon likes to play defensive vs sand and other similar stuff. Where did you get this? Electric / Fighting has very good offensive STABs and can keep momentum too with Volt Switch. Does this suggest a defensive role? If it will prefer to play more offensive or defensive will be determined later, but its typing favors offense.

tl;dr I just don't get why this Pokemon will only work in sun's favor and not in everyone's favor, so if you mind explaining it would be nice...!

Sure thing, alex

Basically, it's what Theorymon said in the concept thread about heatran. When you're using a fight/electric against a sand team, you can never press the advantage with your typing, because landorus is just waiting to come in and go to town on your butthole. As such, even though its typing is ideal for /scaring out/ many sand staples—jelli, ferro, ttar, terrak—it can never actually net any KOes because it leaves sun wide open. It's thus forced to act as a pivot, gaining momentum, but never applying pressure. Playing defensively.

Vs rain there is no such impediment. A fight/elec has many good type matchups again—toed, tenta, keld, torn. The difference being if you look at the sand matchups, they're things that elec/fight can switch in on and force out. With rain, it's things elec/fight canNOT switch in on, but CAN kill without repurcussion (applying pressure). Playing offensively.

As for why rain would not use cap5 against sand? Rain typically tries to hammer sand with tons of strong stab moves, keeping the pressure on, so sand sweepers can't switch in. A fight/elec is like handing over all that offensive pressure on a silver platter. It may not be unrecoverable, but it's not worth it either.

As for why sand wouldn't use cap5 against rain? I take it back, can't think of a good reason not to. Honestly though is that that bad? Sand beating rain? We'd still be increasing the usage of sun more, since cap5 sucks against sun. And giving rain such a beatdown, to boot, would really accomplish the concept.

 

[alexwolf]

Sure thing, alex

Basically, it's what Theorymon said in the concept thread about heatran. When you're using a fight/electric against a sand team, you can never press the advantage with your typing, because landorus is just waiting to come in and go to town on your butthole. As such, even though its typing is ideal for /scaring out/ many sand staples—jelli, ferro, ttar, terrak—it can never actually net any KOes because it leaves sun wide open. It's thus forced to act as a pivot, gaining momentum, but never applying pressure. Playing defensively.

Just because Pokemon that are commonly used in sand teams can revenge kill you doesn't mean that a Pokemon can't take an offensive role. By the same logic, Terrakion is forced to play defensively on sun teams when against sand teams, because after it kills something it will be forced out by Scarf Lando. But this is not true in the slightest as we all know. Having a way to deal with Landorus is one of Sun's duties, and if left unchecked it will be a problem no matter what the sun team does. The Electric/Fighting mon will be able to force a ton of sand members out, by typing alone, while also preserving momentum with Volt Switch, and possibly trapping with Pursuit. If this sounds defensive to you then i don't know what else to say.

Vs rain there is no such impediment. A fight/elec has many good type matchups again—toed, tenta, keld, torn. The difference being if you look at the sand matchups, they're things that elec/fight can switch in on and force out. With rain, it's things elec/fight canNOT switch in on, but CAN kill without repurcussion (applying pressure). Playing offensively.

It is true that it will be harder to switch in against rain teams, but this doesn't instantly translate to playing offensively. There are a ton of factors that will decide how easily this Pokemon will switch-in, and many useful abilities and stats that will allow for easier switch-ins.

As for why rain would not use cap5 against sand? Rain typically tries to hammer sand with tons of strong stab moves, keeping the pressure on, so sand sweepers can't switch in. A fight/elec is like handing over all that offensive pressure on a silver platter. It may not be unrecoverable, but it's not worth it either.

I agree with you one this one!

As for why sand wouldn't use cap5 against rain? I take it back, can't think of a good reason not to. Honestly though is that that bad? Sand beating rain? We'd still be increasing the usage of sun more, since cap5 sucks against sun. And giving rain such a beatdown, to boot, would really accomplish the concept.

I agree with this too.

Finally, everything you say is based on the concept that rain teams play offensively against sand teams, and that sand teams play defensively against rain teams. This is very generic and not always true, and therefore not very reliable to base your arguments on. There are many rain teams that play defensively against sand teams (rain stall vs sand offense or balance) and many sand teams that play offensively against rain teams (any fast offensive sand team).

 

[Nyktos]

A few thoughts on several things that have been proposed:

Dragon/Grass - Simply put, I worry that this is limited in that I think it essentially requires Chlorophyll to adequately fulfill our requirements (good against other dragons, but only better than them on a sun team). This isn't the thread for abilities so I won't go into the arguments on whether or not we should give CAP 5 Chlorophyll, but I'm certainly not 100% convinced that we should and if we decide not to, this typing is going to be extremely difficult to work with. Also, the Ice weak really does suck.

On the other hand, though, I really don't buy the arguments that we can't make a Dragon because we don't want to boost Dragons. The fact is, Dragons are good on sun teams, thanks to their ability to hit hard in any weather while appreciating the boost to their Fire-type coverage moves that sun provides. Dragons aren't universal on sun teams mainly because they're non-essential and, as mentioned many times in this thread, sun is strapped for slots. Since freeing up some slots is clearly a major goal, we're likely to see more Dragons on sun teams. It simply comes down to whether CAP 5 itself will be that Dragon of choice.

Water/something - I think this is an interesting idea, and similarly to Dragon I don't think the argument that we shouldn't make a Water-type because "we want to weaken Water-types" really holds...uh, water. If we weaken rain, the overall usage of Water-types will fall, even if we add another good Water-type to the meta. (Even if every sun team uses CAP 5, rain teams often have three Water-types, so anyone who switches from rain to sun is likely running fewer Waters than before.) There are some solid points in favour here: Water can obviously switch in reasonably well against other Water-types, and does well offensively against several common sand Pokémon. If we can find a way to make it bad in rain and good in sun, I think this is a perfectly reasonable avenue. (And I do believe that is possible.)

Anything weak to Rock - Yeah this is just a terrible idea. More Stealth Rock-weak Pokémon is the last thing sun needs.

 

[MCBarrett]

I'm still having trouble seeing the merits in grass/dragon, even after reading most of Korski's insanely long post othe subject. One thing I do like that he mentioned was that it would be mostly a defensive pivot, since grass/dragon offensively is insanely redundant and ineffective against rain. Think of yourself playing with a rain team against a dragon type, what do you bring in? Definitely not something weak to grass, you bring in ferrothorn or jirachi, both of which resist grass. And since nothing else wants to take a powerful dragon stab anyways grass coverage finds itself being pretty useless, especially on a sun team that is filled with it.

Now, Korski's post did mention the 4x resist of water which will definitely help but think of how easy this is to play around with a 4x ice weakness. Again, you're playing with a rain team against a sun team with a dragon/grass mon. Everything is ohko'd or out sped and 2hko'd in the rain by your specs keldeo except our grass/dragon friend. What do you think your opponent is going to do? Gee that's a tough one, he's bringing in the 4x resist and you're gonna go for hp ice and destroy the only defensive presence on his team. You could even be e-belt and bluff choice to ko next turn, it's just too easy to play around with every offensive rain threat having ice coverage. I think if you want a defensive pivot with a 4x water resist water/grass outclasses grass/dragon by miles. And, even though this lends itself to rain at first sight it is possible that we can use its ability and move pool to make it more beneficial to sun teams. I'm not saying I fully support this typing but I think it does the job of 4x water resist pivot much better than grass/dragon could ever hope to do.

 

[Yllnath]

The problem I have with Electric/Fighting is that it's EQ weak. (Same for all other Electric/..) When you mention Electric/Fighting as a way to deal with Ttar and his cronies because said mons are problems to sun, I'd actually think Grass/Fighting makes more sense. Grass/Fighting has the added benefit of taking resisted hits from Water, helping it out to do well against both opposing weathers by virtue of it's typing alone.

Also, the idea of a core of Grass/Fighting-CAP5/Scizor/Heatran (the latter is already common on sun teams and is there to take the fire attacks) is actually pretty amazing. This core would work out much less efficient with Electric being the type over Grass. Water would hit all neutrally or worse. EQ would hit two of them SE and the other neutral. And EQ is already a major issue, with Ninetales dying to it, and Venusaur's secondary poison typing neutering it's ability to tank EQ's.

Like many others here, I think that Grass/x is the way to go here. A 2x Ice weak when fired off through non-stabbed HP-Ice's or Ice Beam 90% of the time is still pretty manageable. Especially when you can't look at CAP5 in a vacuum. There's always team mates to tank Ice Beams. On Sun teams, Ice Beams are free switch-in oppertunity's actually.

From Grass/x, I'd be most in favor of a typing that doesn't make it lose it water resistance or EQ resistance. Grass/Fighting even adds a SR resistance, something also lacking on sun teams. As a defensive pivot, being able to switching in and out often without dying from SR is a huge boon to a team that can't take switching lightly, because of common SR weaknesses.

 

[CiteAndPrune]

Regarding Grass/Dragon, jas already said pretty much everything I'd reply with. I'll only add that I'd definitely prefer Celebi over a Grass/Dragon, settling for x1/2 Water resist but only a x2 Ice weakness, really solid all around stats, plenty offensive options (including Earth Power for Heatran if need be) and a huge support movepoll. Celebi could be Venusaur's Grass partner and core Grass type for sun teams - if sun teams could afford the moveslot.

That's why I think Grass/anything is redundant for our purposes, especially Grass/Dragon. So I'll be supporting the part-Electric typings, and just as Deck said, the weakness can be addressed at later stages, via ability or even item (or Electric can always use Magnet Rise, right?).

The one exception to this I'd consider is Grass/Fighting. If that gets slated, it has a chance to beat both Rain AND Sand and be Stealth Rock resistant, which is a boon. However, what srk said before still holds. There's a Grass/Fighting type named Virizion with awesomely tailored stats and strong moves that could stop Rain. Where does Virizion sit? UU. So yeah, I'm skeptical in regard to actually pulling this off.

 

[Yllnath]

Virizion is awesome in stats, but we're likely going beyond just tailoring a few good stats. This is somewhat poll-jumping, but everyone so far has been making this exact same assumption. If we get something like Rapid Spin, we have a niche that let's us act as both a defensive pivot and as the team spinner, saving up two team spots. Like you said, on paper, Virizion has everything that would've made it the most awesome rain stopper. I don't see any reason why that should stop us from making a CAP with the same typing. If anything, it should encourage us, as from theorymonning and looking at Virizion as an example, there's definitely potential in the Grass/Fighting typing. It's just that Sun teams are strapped for team spots. So where this CAP will have to differ from Virizion, is that it's capable of fulfilling a few roles for sun teams, finally freeing up some spots on sun teams to get down to it's core business. Abusing sun to sweep opposing teams.

 

[DetroitLolcat]

Virizion does have some noticeable flaws that prevent it from being a Rain counter. For starters, it's not a Sun abuser and has absolutely no way to abuse the Sun or carve itself a niche on a Sun team. We will be building this Pokemon so that it can use the Sun as a weapon. Furthermore, Virizion is lacking in power. It loses to Heatran 1v1, loses to Tornadus 1v1, loses to Ferrothorn 1v1 if it's packing Gyro Ball, loses to Starmie 1v1 thanks to Psyshock, etc. Virizion has neither the movepool nor the attacking capability to adequately deal with Rain. Compound those failures with no way to deal with status (Burn, Toxic, or Paralysis immediately destroy Virizion) and Virizion loses its niche in the world.

My typing idea, to an extent, entails building a better Virizion: one that doesn't lose to half of the average Rain team and fits onto a Sun team. Throwing some examples out there, what if Virizion had Leaf Guard? What if it had Stealth Rock? What if its Special Attack and Physical Defense stats were swapped? What if we gave it Fire coverage to better function in Sun? What if it had Bulk Up? Horn Leech?

Though I digress in the above paragraph, you have to wonder what we could do with a Grass/Fighting Pokemon? We could make it so it doesn't take 50% from resisted Earthquakes and instead has the ability to contend with the Pokemon it's designed to counter.

The one flaw with a Grass/Fighting CAP5 is that it should not function well in Rain. However, that's where the stats and ability come in: we can tailor stats to where it cannot just be a Rain staple or give it an ability that makes it irresistible to Sun teams. One word of caution that I would like to extend to everyone is don't worry about making Sun 'too good'. We're probably never going to be able to have Sun outclass Rain by creating just one Pokemon. I've heard on IRC that we need to limit this Pokemon in ways to make Sun not a broken playstyle, yet there is little evidence that one Pokemon could turn Sun into the new Rain pre-Aldaron's Proposal.

 

[DFrog]

I think some posts and typings are neglecting the fact that Ninetails its outclassed and outmatched by many things in OU and thats its saving grace is its ability, Drought. Sun teams are essentially planing with five pokemon due to Ninetails uselessness. To rectify this CAP-5 needs to have typing that pairs well with the weakness of the fire type–specifically rock and water as presented by the most commonly used weather starters in Tyranitar and Politoed.

To effectively check Tyranitar CAP-5 should be a Fighting type. This type could easily switch into Tyranitar's dual STAB with little consequence, playing offensively forcing the Tyranitar to switch thus applying pressure on the sand team lest it wants to loose the weather war. Offensively and defensively I feel that fighting types provide the best check against sand, specifically where Tyranitar is the sand starter. The fighting type also adds a stealth rock resistance which is valuable to a sun team, reducing the penalty of switching CAP-5 in and out.

As for dealing with rain there are two types that should be taken into consideration when pairing them with the fighting type. These types being Electric and Grass, the former being an offensive check to rain team while the latter is a more defensive check.

The Electric type although makes it harder for CAP-5 to switch into water moves it can effectively check common pokemon found on rain teams with its strong Electric STAB. Its similar to the fighting type when checking sand on this regard. The electric typing also gives CAP-5 a neutrality to Hurricane, though uncommon this neutrality should enable to the pokemon to take a hit (if necessary) and damage (if not, knock out) the threat at present. The electric type however give CAP-5 a weakness to Earthquake/Earth Power, moves commonly found on sand teams forcing out CAP-5, forfeiting offensive momentum something the electric typing aims to gain. This also compounds the weakness of ground moves that sun teams usually have.

The Grass type is very much an opposite to the electric type despite their common purpose, defeating water types. Grass typing allows CAP-5 to switch into water moves and immediately threaten the opponent out for previously stated reasons. The grass typing is also more useful when confronting sand teams, allowing CAP-5 to check Tyranitar and Hippowdon (something the fighting type cannot do). A virtue of being a grass type is the innate resistance of ground moves–this fact is especially important on a sun team where that weakness may be common between team members. The weaknesses brought by the grass type are many, specifically to Ice Beam and Hurricane. The former being on present on all water types and the latter being present on niche but powerful pokemon (i.e Tornadus-I)–there is little CAP-5 could do against Hurricane, however on a sun team the switch-in to an ice move should be plentiful.

I support both dual typings of Grass/Fight and Electric/Fight, my preference is for the Grass/Fight type as it checks rain and sand better defensively. This typing also promotes superior synergy between CAP-5 and Ninetails, its weather starter. CAP-5's resistance to Rock, Ground and Water and in turn Ninetails resistance to Ice proves this to some extent. If CAP-5 were to have Rapid Spin (or support moves of similar merit) the support CAP-5 would give to a Sun team would be invaluable.

I am hesitant to support anything weak to fighting due to the ubiquitous presence of powerful fighting types, Terrakion and Keldo being stand outs among them due to their affiliation with weather and/or outright strength. Their strong STAB moves often spell out disaster for sun teams and a CAP-5 that is weak to fighting would not help this problem.

tl;dr

Grass/Fight & Electric/Fight for CAP-5

 

[Meru]

What's wrong with the concept of a defensive Pokemon?

I feel like Cresselia is one of those pokes that is perfectly tailored to this CAP. It singlehandedly defines any remote viability behind the term "Sun Stall" while countering pretty much every dragon and encouraging the use of Bug-Type and Dark-Type moves as well as Toxic to take it down. The only thing that Cress doesn't do that this challenge might want is discourage Water-types. This is pretty much only because of its reliance on Moonlight, so we know to avoid that much. I think Electric-Type is a good place to start. Maybe even a Mono-Electric defensive pokemon could work.

But I think this concept delves into what people are saying. In order to dissuade the usage of dragons, this CAP is either going to be ridiculously bulky or ridiculously fast.

 

[Yilx]

I'm still in full support of the typings Dark/Electric and Grass/Electric myself. To the people worried about buffing one unfavorable weather or another, we could just avoid giving it elements that allows it to thrive or do something it normally can't in one weather; a good example is Volcarona being able to function in both Rain and Sun due to the inclusion of Hurricane in It's movepool and rounding up a FWG core with ferro and any water. I shan't expand on this to avoid poll jumping, but I strongly feel that some people are overthinking the impact of weather. I can easily argue that by virtue of typing, anything grass typed would benefit from rain as it douses their fire-type weakness. I can argue that anything weak to water is buffed by sun because it dries up water-type attacks.

What dark-type does is allow us to hit psychics and ghosts like Latias and Jellicent hard and give us a handy immunity to switch-in with. Some might argue it will increase fighting-type usage, but I would like to reinstate the same thing I've been repeating through this CAP; making a mon weak to a type does not increase it's usage. This is also aimed at the people arguing for Grass/Dragon on ther basis that it'll increase ice usage; I bring up the examples of Hp fire latias and flamethrower blissey again.

But I digress. If we really feel like taking on water-type usage, we can go grass/electric. Although it leaves us open to Hurricanes unlike Dark/Elec, it also lets us counter most of rain and it's "abusers". It also lets us switch in on some earthquakes and maybe survive Landorus' boosted Earth Powers, something not every mon can claim to do.

Am making this post with my phone, so some of it might be quite incoherent; I apologize for that and the lack of the man with the seven scars.

 

[Juicy]

I'm in complete agreement with the grass/electric pivot that is needed to make a successful CAP able to tackle rain and sandstorm, making holes for that under used grass type to exploit.
Momentum is a critical issue in weather and the ability to turn that momentum around by defending and threatening common water types and ground types will make for a reliable 'check'/pivot. It is not weak to earthquake either, but neutral, being a grass type. Useful when in a team that has a lot of ground weaknesses.

Dragon/Grass is still extremely susceptible to ice, no matter how you spin it. It is not just a momoswine with ice shard we need to worry about but with rain having the ability to hold defensive cores it can reliable harbour and use choice scarfers with ice beams/etc that waters do enjoy for coverage. It will simply increase the importance of ice coverage in rain teams.

 

[Deglas]

I require more convincing with Electric/Dark that the Latis are the primary threat we should concern ourselves with,. Rain hates the Latis just as much and introducing a Pokemon that can take those out is just going to perpetuate that cycle. Electric/Dark is a fairly neutral typing to weather, and not really specifically useful to sun over the others. Remember, this concept is about raising the usage of a type, not just this CAP. My fear with Electric/Dark is that it just gives Rain another tool, and will increase the popularity of Electric and Water types by giving Rain a more solid answer to the Latis.

I have an answer to this (I'll have to poll-jump a bit and assume Pursuit though). An Electric/Dark type doesn't give it any characteristics that make it less viable on Rain (or Sand), but it is outclassed on them. Rain can use Scizor or weavile as a Pursuit trapper, and Sand has Tyranitar and Scizor. The Electric typing also is out classed on Rain, because Rain already has Pokemon like Rotom-W and Thundurus-T, who lack a Ground weakness (less relevant if we give this CAP Levitate). As for beating the Lati@s, I'll link my earlier post, where I explained how Sun has a hard time using any of the common Lati@s counters, quite a few of which fit better on Rain. And this type also has the advantage of not compounding the common type weaknesses of Sun, other than Ground. Basically, an Electric/Dark type would be mainly used in Sun, because it will face strong competition under other weathers from Pokemon that do not fit well on Sun teams.

 

[Homeslice]

I see a HUGE problem with some of these types being brought up. Some people are forgetting we've decided we want to reduce not just Water and Dragon, but also Fighting and Steel. While Steel suggestions are not as common, there's too many suggestions going around about Fighting and Dragon types. I just want to post all my thoughts on these along with Grass, so it may be poorly organized but I'm just spitting out everything I can think of.

Dragon-

I'm going to start off by just reiterating what jas originally said. Trying to stop Dragons on the other team using your own Dragon just raises the usage of Dragons. One Dragon doesn't all of the sudden make every Dragon ever hide away in UU. It's like if (for example) Mewtwo got moved down to OU. Everyone would use him, and he'd still get usage in Ubers also, which just boosts the usage of a type. Using Dragon for a counter to Dragons is extremely situational- you'd essentially need to be scarfed with full investment in speed to be guaranteed to pull it off. With the way everyone seems to be posting, this could go either way, Offensive or Defensive, so in the end we could make a Defensive Dragon that was made to counter Dragons. Doesn't sound that logical, now does it? It seems like the only Dragon posting is of Grass/Dragon, which just brings up more problems. We're trying to find a way of stopping Water, Ice, and Electric all at once. Giving a pokemon a 4x weakness to one of them isn't helping. More on Grass types later.

Fighting-

I have some extreme reservations about this type. You could argue for days about how Fighting is the best type behind Dragon, if not the best type. While it may have some potential towards rain teams because of an SR resistance, I still generally don't like the idea of using a Fighting type to stop common types, seeing as it is one of them. It's like a lesser version of the Dragon situation, but most fighting types hit so hard with STAB moves that other Fighting types not named Gallade, Toxicroak, or Heracross can't reliably come in on without being threatened to get 1-2HKO'd. And honestly, the only thing you're getting out of a fighting type besides an SR weakness is the ability to stop Ferrothorn and Hydreigon only if it is for some reason chosen over Lati@s. Other than that, you're destroyed by STAB Psychic moves Lati@s might have, most likely crippled by a Scald to the face from Politoed or whatever Bulky Water they're probably running, and really only have something going for you if you're grass typed also, which again will be talked about later. I could MAYBE deal with dragons only because they usually get great coverage and resist Water and Electric, but Fighting doesn't do that. Fighting does have the Rock resistance for Stone Edge from Sandstorm teams, but it doesn't resist Ground anyways and once again is really relying on it's dual typing to give it some backbone.

Water-

While I've only seen a few suggestions of these, it kind of concerns me that we're using a water type on a sun team to counter rain teams. Honestly, if it's good enough, rain teams are also going to use it anyways just because it's Water typed. The only suggestions I saw for water we're Water/Grass and Water/Fire, both of which could operate on Rain teams just as well as sun teams. I don't have much more to say on Water, pretty sure it's not getting anywhere anyways.

Steel-

Steel is probably the "Big 4" type I mind the least. It's not being brought up much anyways, but I just want to say it's neutral to Water and Electric attacks and resists Ice. Somebody could probably come up with something good here.

Grass-

I have the most concerns when it comes to this type. Adding another Grass type to a Sun team is not going to help. It's just going to compete with Venusaur for a team spot, and if Venusaur beats it out the project is lost and a complete waste of time. The only way anything Grass typed is going to get a team spot along side Venusaur is if it has so much pumped into its Defensive stats and has Leaf Guard or some defensive ability, or is so amazing at utility to the point it can set every hazard, spin them, have heal bell, and roar/whirlwind at its use. We know all these most likely won't happen. Grass typing is taking a HUGE risk with the project. It could become a worse Venusaur. Everyone might use it anyways just because it's a CAP Pokemon, and it could just open up some other problems in slot syndrome where you're losing valuable coverage or resists just because you wanted to throw another Grass type on the team. I would prefer if we stay away from Grass completely and fully.

As of right now, I'm giving all my support to Dark/Electric. It's got the ability to threaten Water types, trap Lati@s, hit Scizor neutrally, still somewhat threaten Sandstorm teams outside of Ground types, and is not weak to SR.
EDIT: Like what Deglas said about Dark/Electric too.

 

[Stratos]

much of homeslice's post is completely incoherent, but i will attempt to dissect it anyway. my points will specifically be about the two typings suggested, fight/grass and fight/elec

Fighting-

I have some extreme reservations about this type. You could argue for days about how Fighting is the best type behind Dragon, if not the best type.While it may have some potential towards rain teams because of an SR resistance, I still generally don't like the idea of using a Fighting type to stop common types, seeing as it is one of them.

Fighting is the seventh most common type in OU, behind water, dragon, steel, ground, psychic, and flying. Three of the OU Fighters, Conkeldurr, Toxicroak, and Lucario, are hanging on by their fingernails. This leaves three good OU Fight Types in Keldeo, Breloom, and Terrakion. Frankly i'm not entirely sure why it was listed in the concept. w/e

It's like a lesser version of the Dragon situation, but most fighting types hit so hard with STAB moves that other Fighting types not named Gallade, Toxicroak, or Heracross can't reliably come in on without being threatened to get 1-2HKO'd.

let me get this straight. you are arguing that strong STAB moves which dissuade frail pokemon with neutral typings from coming in is a /weakness/ of the fighting type? or is this lumped in with the previous quote, in which case ^

And honestly, the only thing you're getting out of a fighting type besides an SR weakness

and a tyranitar pivot, and a Heatran counter, and a threat to rain

is the ability to stop Ferrothorn and Hydreigon only if it is for some reason chosen over Lati@s. Other than that, you're destroyed by STAB Psychic moves Lati@s might have,

you can't win em all. on the bright side, you can volt-switch out when lati@s comes in to whichever pokemon is appropriate for the situation. worth noting that the only truly threatening lati set—subcm—doesn't run psychic moves

most likely crippled by a Scald to the face from Politoed or whatever Bulky Water they're probably running,

i find it amusing that despite the presence of two strong special fighting moves (aura sphere and focus blast) you polljump to the assumption that this CAP will necessarily be physical if it is fighting type, and use it as an argument against the type. Furthermore i am amused by the fact that you support Elec/Dark, a typing that is getting so much traction largely for its ability to pursuit trap bulky waters—an ability that is completely neutered by a scald burn.

and really only have something going for you if you're grass typed also, which again will be talked about later.

let's talk about that now. you are convinced that it's either cap5 or venusaur unless cap5 is the god of all things support. need i remind you that many successful sand teams run both landorus and gliscor—which have the exact same typing. Both terrakion and tyranitar are Rock typed. Lots of rain teams use Tenta, Keldeo, AND toed, also Ferro AND Rachi. Just because two pokemon share the same type doesn't mean they have the same role. Venusaur is a sweeper, Grass/Fight is a defensive pivot and rain counter.

I could MAYBE deal with dragons only because they usually get great coverage

this deserves its own response. "traditionally, dragons do x and fights dont" is a completely flavor argument that has no place in a competitive discussion like this.

and resist Water and Electric, but Fighting doesn't do that.

Fighting/Grass does. Fighting/Elec resists half of that. Sun provides a water resistance.

Fighting does have the Rock resistance for Stone Edge from Sandstorm teams, but it doesn't resist Ground anyways and once again is really relying on it's dual typing to give it some backbone.

I find it amusing that "a neutral switch-in is no switch-in at all" is your argument here, and yet you support electric/dark, which is a neutral switch in on almost all of the pokemon it is intended to beat (latios, latias, politoed)

 

[Harle]

Water-

While I've only seen a few suggestions of these, it kind of concerns me that we're using a water type on a sun team to counter rain teams. Honestly, if it's good enough, rain teams are also going to use it anyways just because it's Water typed. The only suggestions I saw for water we're Water/Grass and Water/Fire, both of which could operate on Rain teams just as well as sun teams. I don't have much more to say on Water, pretty sure it's not getting anywhere anyways.

That is obviously the biggest challenge for taking this path, how to ensure it doesn't help rain teams... But there are many ways around this road block. Water being one of the most versatile types, what better way to counter it than with its own adaptability? Water already resists fire, so it gets no defensive boost from rain without a rain-related ability. So, if we were to take some useful thing the water type can do other than rain boosted STAB attacks and abilities that function in the rain, then rely on the cap's primary typing (fire, grass, bug for all I care etc...) for its attacks. Water becomes its defensive/utility type, while generally assuming the role of a different type. It would use moves that don't do what rain teams need, fill a role that rain teams don't want, etc... Eh, it's just a thought. As you said, its been suggested a few times, but it doesn't look like one of the more popular typings for this cap. While I support Water for this cap, I also think it might not be as practical as other types and might just be a more stylistic/mind-screwing choice.

 

[Yllnath]

I'm starting to get really annoyed by arguments about not being able to use one of the popular typings for this mon because then inherently that typing itself must become even more used and we will not have accomplished something.

Seriously misguided logic. The OU metagame usage statistics is nothing more than a pie chart.
X% is rain, Y% is HO and Z% is Sun offense. (There being a few more playstyles, but ok.) X is split amongst a few Waters, a few Steels, a bit Fighting, Electric, etc. Y Has a few Dragons, Steels, Fighting, etc. Z is split amongst mostly Grass, Fire, Ground and Steel.
CAP5 Fighting-type enters the metagame.
A month later, the metagame has settled, new statistics come in. The only group composition to have drastically changed is Z, it now has a Fighting type in almost all the matches that the Sun playstyle was used. For every percentage that Sun has been played more in comparison to last month, percentage-wise, other playstyles must have diminished. (100% being absolute and all) That means that Rain has been played less relatively, HO has been played less. One fighting on one team has indirectly increased the usage of 5 other pokemon on the Sun team, and decreased the usage of all the common pokemon on opposing playstyles.

That is what we are trying to accomplish here. No matter what the type of CAP5 itself is, if it somehow manages to make Sun a more used playstyle, with that playstyle gaining more usage relatively to all other playstyles, the usage of 5 other pokemon with underused typings will get boosted too. And the usage of the commonly found pokemon on other playstyles will have gone down, for the usage of the playstyle that allows them to be on a team in the first place will have gone down.


Please remember that usage has nothing at all to do with pokemon. In any game, there's usage statistics. Ken and Ryu have always been leading usage polls in Street Fighter for example. Usage is nothing more than a statistic in the competitive metagame OU. That's what we're trying to impact. One pokemon's typing will never ever impact it to the point that it alone can bring up one typing and leave it at that, even if it's Arceus-like strong. Even if CAP5 ends up being the solitary #1 most used pokemon.
Why? Because you have to build a team of 6 pokemon. If we build CAP5 to really always have a best fit with Sun teams, the 5 pokemon in his team will also get a ride to the OU top. As simple as that. And usage statistics are always relative to the amount of battles played monthly. Ff 2000 battles were played last month, of which 100 used sun teams, and 2000 battles this month, of which now 750 sun teams, all other teams now have their usage percentage spread in the remaining 1250 battles used. In other words, usage goes down for Water/Dragons/Steel/Fightings/etc. that are commonly found on those teams.


I'm sorry the post is longer than has to be, but this is really important to realize for everyone. For this discussion and for all discussions to come in further stages. Even if you see CAP5 more on a day to day basis, and even if it's a Dragon. It's still bloody likely that overall, in metagame usage statistics, the Dragon typing will have declined in usage. Period.

Pwnemon, I understand the points you make for Elec/Fighting, I do. It's what got me inspired to think about and back Grass/Fighting. But since writing down the benefits of Grass/Fighting, I have no idea how I can back Elec/Anything anymore. Sun is weak to Rock and Ground quite some bit. You've brought up how Sand is actually just a great a nemesis to Sun as Rain is, if not bigger. You attempt to resist Stone attacks from default sand most with Fighting and most notably SR too. Yet all these guys love EQ to death too. And just seeing a Sun team in team preview, aside from Heatran possibly having balloon, EQ is perfectly spammable as it often does neutral or better damage to the lot of them. That weakness is just compounded upon with Elec/Fighting.

I don't feel Grass/Fighting is necessary for the water resistance, that's just nice. Like you said, the fact that we aim to get Sun up more as the weather condition gives everything neutral to water a pseudo-resist all of the sudden. However, that ground resist is amazing for Sunteams, with just one member being able to take care of the popular QuakeEdge combo.

 

[Bughouse]

Everyone currently freaking out about Sand, thinking it's more threatening to Sun than Rain....

y'all crazy

Solid Sand players have lost many a match to SunTrio teams. It's a much more even match up than Sun v Rain at the moment.

That is all.