CAP 8 CAP 8 - Part 3 - Secondary Type Discussion

[Shade of Elysia]

Dragon for secondary typing, hands down.

What do we get from it?
Half damage from: Fire/Water/Grass/Flying/Steel
Quarter damage from: Electric
Neutral Type coverage against every type and almost every pokemon.
Neutral Stealth Rock/Pursuit damage.

Downsides:
Double damage from: Ground/Ice/Dragon
Quadruple damage from: None

In CAP so far, we've covered all types but ELECTRIC, DRAGON, Flying, Psychic, Dark and Normal. We're using types that are neglected so far in CAP as well! It has great resistances though it's weaknesses are fairly common. As either an offensive or defensive pokemon it could work well, especially as Physical Offensive.
The most beneficial types I can see are Bug/Dragon/Fight. We've covered Bug and Fight already, let's go with a so far unused and popular type, Dragon. Bug has a SR weakness which could limit it's offensive and defensive abilities, and Fight, while effective against most steels, doesn't hit the most common pokemon Metagross for enough damage. Neither does Dragon, but that lends itself to possible Fire moves.

 

[Tint]

Water/Electric

Defenses:

Weakness: Grass Ground

Resistances: Fire Ice Water Flying Steel (x4)

Offenses:

Super Effective:Flying, Water, Fire, Ground, Rock

Not Very Effective: Grass, Dragon

Does anyone see this?

 

[m190049]

Electric/Water

Defenses:

Weakness: Grass Ground

Resistances: Fire Ice Water Flying Steel (x4)

Offenses:

Super Effective:Flying, Water, Fire, Ground, Rock

Not Very Effective: Grass, Dragon

Does anyone see this?

The Ground weakness is still offputting. While with water, it can still counter this, it still seems like there are better options.

 

[Naxte]

Bug.
Neglected ability, meet neglected typing.

Granted, we've done a part Bug before, but that doesn't matter so much. There aren't many usable bugs (Sorta limited to Syclant, Forry, and Scizor), and it would accomplish the thing people want to see; Neutralize electric's ground weakness. Ground is more common than Fire and Rock (though both are fairly common), and a 2x SR weakness isn't so killer. Also, STAB electric covers it's flying weak pretty well.

It's typing doesn't really restrict making this an offensive, defensive, or support pokemon. At least one good STAB typing gives it the ability to potentially be offensive, decent resistances allows it to potentially a good guy on defense, and both electric and bug allow for plentiful support moves. It's a very flexible combination, where we don't have to work around any too glaring weaknesses (I'm looking at you 4x ground, and you as well Syclant being given mountaneering).

For a open concept, lets keep the typing flexible enough to work through potential roles it can play.

However, I'm not seeing what good bug really offers; most of the Pokemon that bug would hit super-effective have a secondary typing which cancels which it out. It helps against Latias and Celebi (and Alakazam, but it's on the frail side anyway), but not much else. On the defensive side, it does cancel out the ground weakness, but it adds two more in, fire and rock, in its place. And that SR weakness really isn't great for it no matter which way we go, with frail offensive Pokemon naturally not liking it as it makes it even trickier for them to get in, and makes defensive Pokemon need to heal right off the bat much more often, which also isn't good. Bug just doesn't offer too much either way, so I'm not sure it's worth it.

Electric/Water does sound interesting, despite Lanturn already existing. It does add a grass weakness, but grass isn't the most comon attacking type and it adds several nice resistances to make up for it, such as ice and water. It also lets it hit Fire and Ground for super-effective, which is nice. All and all, it's a decent typing, which I've a bit tempted to go with over Electric/Poison. The only real concern I have with it is the Ground weakness, which likely isn't going to end up going away anyway, and the "Laturn remake!" thing, but since we already made Arghonaut, who is essentially a better Poliwrath, I'm not too concerned with that either.

Electric/Ground has also grown on me a bit, but the water and ice weaknesses still have me being unsure about it.

I'm not really keen on Electric/Dragon either. Yes, it's a nice typing. But it will centralize the metagame more around Dragons and Steels even more, which really isn't needed. True, being electric and thus weak to ground won't really help that problem much anyway, but this definitely isn't the best way to go about it, especially since with nothing resisting its STAB moves, it's very easy to get carried away with such a typing.

 

[dorkknight23]

The big selling type for both Grass and Bug could mitigate the big Ground weakness.

Fighting, Dragon, and Poison are all compelling and interesting options as well (although Poison has some advantages, 4x weakness to Ground is a bit scary.)

I'm not entirely sold on No Secondary Type or Water yet.

As of right now, I'd put my support for Electric/Grass. But any of the five I mentioned would be interesting.

 

[Dr. Duck]

I'm liking the Electric/Bug pairing. I'm not one to enjoy another fighting CAP, since we've done two fighting CAPs so far. Grass's tremendous weakness to Ice will call out many a special sweepers, and I think with the other pairings (Electric/Poison and Electric/Ground) the 4x Ground weakness will severely limit this CAPs effect on the battlefield, seeing how many physical sweepers carry a ground move.

 

[m190049]

The biggest offputting I've seen for Electric/Bug is the SR weakness, mainly.

It has a Fire Weakness, but Fire isn't exactly the most use type either, due to it's own SR weakness. Electric beats out Flying Types.
It's great offensively and defensively, and can go either way perfectly. Electi

I don't see SR being TOO much of a problem if we go the right way with it. It's only a 2x weakness. Not too centralizing.
And certainly not big enough a problem to completely dismiss the type.

 

[SEO]

Electric/Ground has also grown on me a bit, but the water and ice weaknesses still have me being unsure about it.

These weaknesses though open the possibilities for synergy between other members of the team. Off the bat pretty much any bulky water can work pretty nicely with so long as the opponent isn't carrying a Grass type move. Celebi and the Dragons also fit the role quite well but are weak against Ice. I don't like to think of weaknesses as too much of a hinderance, but rather an opportunity to switch to a resist to the predicted attack. I'm not saying that having lots of weaknesses is good but a balanced amount of them could easily work in your favor. The perfect synergy though comes with Gyarados, resisting all but one of it's weaknesses and being neutral to the least common of them, Grass. It is also immune to the dreaded 4x weak Ground type weakness.

Another point I'd like to make is that you cannot expect to cover all of Electrics weaknesses. Making it Ground neutral is not that big a deal, did we forget the fact that there are so many opportunities to switch in Flyers or Levitators and take advantage of the situation? Heatran is four times weak to Ground, does that stop people from using him, no. How about Magnezone? These are good examples of pokemon that despite this weakness work nicely in the metagame by providing free switches on the predicted Ground type attack. In such an offensive metagame, a free switch could mean that a Salamence sweep, or a Gyarados sweep. Instead of thinking about convering this weakness think about how you could exploit it.

 

[darkie]

Seriously, guys. This is a discussion thread. Do you not know how to read?

It's great that you think x/y is a great typing. It doesn't matter. Back up your posts with solid reasoning or else they WILL be infracted.

 

[41victory]

I support Electric/Grass.

Its typing counter each others weaknesses and it seems pretty solid.

Grass covers its first weakness to ground, and Electricity gets rid of those pesky flying types that get in the way of its grass typing.

Dragons and Grass get a 1/2 weakness from both electic and grass attacks, making them counters.

Fire and Ice are super effective to this typing but the movepool later might help.

 

[billymills]

Rock or Dragon seem like the best options.

Rock would leave a ton of dangerous weaknesses, but it would bring STAB Head Smash and Volt tackle into play. Obviously for a glass cannon Reckless/Hustle attacker. (Trying to relate this back to the concept here)

Dragon on the other hand would be very defensive. Leaving Static, Filter, and other such defensive abilities.

 

[Jimbo]

Dragon seems to be popular, and for good reason. It provides nice resistances, and is a great Offensive type. Dragon/Electric hits everything neutral too afaik. (There isn't a steel ground I can't think of right.... ok Steelix ... and Magnezone who cares)

Water is also a cool idea. Lanturn is an awesome Pokemon, and Water/Elec is pretty good in terms of offense.

I kind of wanted Ground for a main type, but it would work as a secondary type too. I've been hard pressed to find a good Electric + Rock resist since Garchomp went to ubers :(

 

[-Tsunami-]

Bug
It's gets rid of the earthquake weakness and adds a fighting resist too
In exchange for fire and rock
Which are not as common as fighting moves and earthquake

 

[m190049]

Dragon seems to be popular, and for good reason. It provides nice resistances, and is a great Offensive type. Dragon/Electric hits everything neutral too afaik. (There isn't a steel ground I can't think of right....)

Steelix.


To me, I think Electric/Dragon seems kind of overpowered. Again, the extremely great coverage, and Electric and Dragon are both great offensive types. In addition to that, it's also great defensively. Would centralize steels a bit as well.

 

[Fuzznip]

Firstly, I'm completely against typings that grant a Stealth Rock weakness. With this being said, Flying, Fire, and Bug types are out of the question, for me that is. It would be nice if we can get a typing that resists SR, but keeping it neutral is just as fine. A couple of types I think can be decent:

Grass: Grants neutrality to Ground moves and the Electric-type pairing allows to get rid of the Flyers, as 41victory stated. It's also a quite unique typing.

Dragon: Yes, Dragon. I think we're ready to take a step on making this CAP based on a Electric/Dragon type. It does not at all have to be sweeper based, so things like Draco Meteor and/or Outrage don't have to be used to their full potential. It has many resistances, and it allows a nice change.

Fighting: This would be a nice type combo that would be interesting to use. It resists SR which is great, and it's neutral to Flying thanks to the Electric pair up. Psychic is the only added weakness, but Psychic-type moves aren't even that common as it lacks type coverage.


Just my thoughts.

 

[Mr Escalator]

However, I'm not seeing what good bug really offers; most of the Pokemon that bug would hit super-effective have a secondary typing which cancels which it out. It helps against Latias and Celebi (and Alakazam, but it's on the frail side anyway), but not much else.

Bug STAB is super effective versus these OU (BL) threats:
Abomasnow
Alakazam
Azelf
Celebi
Cresselia
Gallade
Latias
Starmie
Tyranitar
Weavile

You are right that there are some Pokemon who resist it through their secondary to make it neutral (Bronzong, Metagross, Jirachi), but no where close to most.

I don't see the need to have two amazing STABs to make this a threatening attacker; Metagross doesn't need to use Psychic at all to be dangerous, as one example, and Steel isn't even that great of an attacking typing (much unlike the Primary typing Electric we already have).

On the defensive side, it does cancel out the ground weakness, but it adds two more in, fire and rock, in its place. And that SR weakness really isn't great for it no matter which way we go, with frail offensive Pokemon naturally not liking it as it makes it even trickier for them to get in, and makes defensive Pokemon need to heal right off the bat much more often, which also isn't good. Bug just doesn't offer too much either way, so I'm not sure it's worth it.

Electric/Bug
Neutral: Bug, Dark, Dragon, Flying, Ghost, Ground, Ice, Normal, Poison, Psychic, Water
Resistances: Electric, Fighting, Grass, Steel
Weaknesses: Fire, Rock
Immunities: None

These are the Pros and Cons of this typing. It is resistant to the common attacking types Electric and Fighting, as well as being resistant to Steel attacks such as Gyro Ball (if we give this guy speed) and Bullet Punch. Grass isn't as common an attacking type, but this combination is resistant to both of Breloom's STABs. Downside is that this combination is weak to the also common Fire and Rock, which includes Stealth Rocks. What helps to separate this from the other typings is the neutrals; Dragon secondary makes it weak to other Dragon types as well as giving it a 4x Ice weak and keeping a Ground weakness, Poison gives it a 4x Ground secondary weakness (and 2x Psychic but not important), and Grass secondary (which also boasts neutrality to ground) is weak to the very common Ice.

I don't think it's fair to say this combination offers little, and only focus on the Stealth Rocks weakness. How does Gyarados deal with SRs? He has team support, as will this guy if given the Bug typing. We don't need a God-Mode typing, especially since we will be focusing on the great lesser used abilities and building on that.

What you didn't mention was how helpful this typing is to a support movepool. Flavor-wise, Bug offers plenty of moves that are usable ((Toxic)Spikes, Spider Web*, Knock Off, Uturn, Sleep/Poison Powder, etc.). Hell, a lot of the good abilities that are stuck to the lower tiers are attached to Bug Pokemon, such as Tinted Lens, Shield Dust, Effect Spore, and Anticipation. Skill Link Pin Missile anyone?

One criticism of Electric/Water is Lanturn, but it's not a huge deal.

So yeah, Electric/Bug hasn't been done, so it's a good note to carry on with this Neglected Ability concept.

*Spider Web was just a joke. I'm not advocating a spider at all.

 

[Veedrock]

Why is everybody mentioning Flying type moves? They are not used, so having a resistance or neutrality to them is really not worth consideration.

I am not nominating, simply giving my observations.

Dragon: I still believe we should save a Dragon CAP until we have some direction. "Neglected Ability" doesn't give us any framework to build with, and with as great a typing as Dragon is, I wouldn't put it past us to go too far. Just my insight.

Ground: Ground does nothing with Electric, honestly. It hads weaknesses to Ice and Water (read: BAD), and doesn't add any really notable resists (rock?). Not doing much if you ask me.

Bug: Stealth Rock weak and another U-turn abuser? No thanks. Only worth consideration to neutralize Ground weakness, which is outweighed by Stealth Rock demolishing this thing. I see no reason to use this over Grass outside of Fighting resist (again, SR hurts more).

Grass: Grass is better than bug anyday (if only to not be Stealth Rock weak), but outside of neutralizing Ground damage it doesn't add anything special. The only notable resist would be water, but even then the weaknesses outweigh that IMO.

Fighting: This would be a nice type combo that would be interesting to use. It resists SR which is great, and it's neutral to Flying thanks to the Electric pair up. Psychic is the only added weakness, but Psychic-type moves aren't even that common as it lacks type coverage.

Psychic is used in the CAP metagame quite a bit. 3 CAPs (off the top of my head) are weak to it, two already being Fighting types! CAP =/= Standard.

Bug STAB is super effective versus these OU (BL) threats:
Gallade

Nitpick: Gallade is neutral.

 

[Infiltrator]

Fear the roar of the Dragon: Electric/Dragon is a great secondary typing, it provides great resistances and offensive properties. It will also provide a very large movepool and can go either defensively and offensively in my point of view.

Don't eat the apple it has Poison: would be a very good second choice, resisting flying, poison, electric, steel, and fighting type moves. Poison would also help soak up toxic spikes that have been laid down of the field and would prevent harm from toxic. The 4x ground weak would be very scary though, but look at things like Heatran, it had a 4x ground weak and is still and excellent OU Pokemon.

 

[m190049]

Bug: Stealth Rock weak and another U-turn abuser? No thanks. Only worth consideration to neutralize Ground weakness, which is outweighed by Stealth Rock demolishing this thing. I see no reason to use this over Grass (STAB Bug is meh).

Demolishing? It's only a 2x weakness. Gyarados has the same thing but remains quite popular.

And Bug also resists or takes neutral from many other popular attacking types.

 

[DougJustDoug]

Electric/Ground has some nice potential for an offensive pokemon.

It hits a ton of stuff SE -- Water, Flying, Steel, Electric, Fire, and Poison. In the current metagame, that's a nice list of types to threaten.

Here are some top OU pokes that it can hit SE -- Heatran, Gyarados, Infernape, Metagross, Tyranitar, Lucario, Jirachi, Starmie, Vaporeon. Five of those pokes are in the top ten in OU usage. The ability to threaten both Steel and Water is a very interesting combination. Since Water and Steel are very prominent defensive types in OU -- it could be an innovative way to shake up the metagame.

However, its STABs are walled hard by Salamence, Latias, Celebi, and Gliscor. I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing. If we made it a powerful pokemon, it could be a nice balance to have some clear, natural counters. And, depending on the stats we give it, all four of those pokemon might get a nasty surprise from a CAP8 running HP-Ice...

The Ground typing gives this a wonderful resistance to Stealth Rock, which can give it the longevity of a more defensive pokemon, without having to give it a defensive stat spread. I envision Electric/Ground possibly working somewhat like Lucario -- an offensive pokemon that can hang around a while because of some key typing assistance. Also, this pokemon would have total immunity to TWave -- which can be a huge help for sweeping in today's metagame.

Yes, it gets hit hard by Water, Ice, Grass, and Ground -- but, it's not as bad as it seems. Water and Grass are quite predictable, so they can be easily managed. EQ is somewhat hard to see coming -- since so much stuff MIGHT be carrying it. But, with all the Heatran use in OU, I suspect most metagame players have learned to sniff out EQ quickly. And EVERYONE has several switchins for Ground attacks anyway -- so, the Ground weakness is not much of a liability to the team. Ice can be sneaky with all the HP-Ice users lurking to hit Dragons -- but since this is only 2x weak to Ice, an unstabbed 70BP move is not a death knell for CAP8 like it is for Salamence, Flygon, et al.

I'm not completely sold on Electric/Ground -- but I think it has potential that we should explore some more. I'd love to hear other feedback on it.

 

[Joatmon]

Dragon. If you've been on the server you've probably heard me lobbying for Elec/Dragon and here's why:

- Electric/Dragon has good resistances: Water, Grass, and Fire resistances are really cool to me and I wanted them on this CaP badly. On top of that you have an Electric resistance and a Flying resistance (as well as a Steel resist). Sure, some of the types are paired offensively with SE types (Water and Ice, Fire and Dragon/Ground), but odds are the pokemon using said moves won't be doing much without STAB, and if they are packing STAB, you'd have no business in on them regardless.

- Neutrality to Stealth Rock: I would have pushed for Electric/Bug or Electric/Flying, but I decided that a neutrality to Stealth Rock and less weaknesses made Electric/Dragon a much better typing defensively, even though the above two resisted Fighting and weren't ground weak.

- Not Pursuit-weak: Uggh I hate Pursuit-weak defensive pokemon. I would have liked Electric/Ghost or Electric/Psychic (as they also had excellent resistances), but they were Pursuit weak and overall that made me want Electric/Dragon more.

- No need to look past a 4x Ground weakness! Ground is still a threat, but now it doesn't pose one that can OHKO sans Shuca Berry. We picked an Electric-type pokemon, so we don't need to make it's one weakness even bigger. Also, bulky waters and grasses outside of Celebi don't usually pack Ground type moves (and even then celebi would be hard-pressed to run 3 moves on defensive sets). Water types often have Ice Beam or something of that sort, but switching in on a STAB Thunderbolt or even Dragon Pulse would be tricky, and unSTABed SE moves won't be doing too much usually since it is only 2x weak. The only resisted type that does carry ground moves is Steel (because Bronzong and Metagross and the rare Forretress run Earthquake). Flying types don't because they generally don't have access to EQ. Heracross, Syclant, Yanmega, and Scizor (the only commonish Bug pokemon) don't run EQ, but Syclant has better things to do with its own STAB here. Ground won't be an issue. Electric/Dragon-mon will still have plenty of pokemon to wall.

Of course, there is no Psychic weak, which is good seeing as it is very common on the CAP server, and it means there isn't that chance that Metagross, Jirachi, or other steels can come in without taking some sort of damage from an attack.


Electric/Dragon is an excellent defensive and offensive typing, and if you want a defensive or offensive ability/pokemon then it's a fine choice to pick for CaP8!










In all seriousness (No offense, EM! I thought that this little parody might be funny while still presenting why I like Electric/Dragon, and they do say copying is the greatest form of flattery ;D), Electric Dragon is great typing, and allows a lot of versatility as far as Defense/Offense goes, so no matter what sort of ability we vote on it can still come out quite alright. That, and Fire/Water/Grass/Electric/Steel/Flying resist is super sexy <3. Only Steelix and Magnezone wall it, but hey, its not like a Fire or Ground move is an impossibility here. Zapdos is terrified by this typing, too.

Electric/Grass doesn't sound bad either, and I am getting more convinced on bug, but no way does it have me sold.

(If needed or prompted, I will gladly edit the first part of my post out.)

 

[ChronoSquare]

I'm quite torn between Electric/Poison and Electric/Ground... The former seems like it would get more switch-ins to resist the fighting, while Ground to me seems like the best option should it be decided that Metagross/Jirachi threaten the former with Zen Headbutt too much.

I guess it all comes down to whether this CAP is going to be more defense or offense oriented; poison for more defensive, and ground for more offensive (as its STAB threatens a larger ranger than Poison does.)

Since Poison already has several supporters, I'll cast my vote in with Ground as the secondary type.

 

[tennisace]

everyone on #cap already agreed that voting rock is the best choice.

When did anyone but you say that, because last time I checked half the people on #cap are on split on everything, in addition to the fact that #cap isn't a voting block anymore.

Anyway, I love Dragon, but not just because it's "cool". With a concept this flexible, it would be best to leave all avenues open. Electric/Dragon is a really good offensive typing, scoring neutral hits on everything save the odd Steelix / Steel/Rock Pokemon. There are high-bp moves for both types, and they're all (mostly) reliable. However, we could go the opposite route. Electric/Dragon can also serve in a tankish role, with nerfed offensive stats and bulky defensive stats, it can use its plethora of resistances to fill a key niche in the metagame, easily switching in on some big threats with ease. The ability to go both offensive and defensive is why this typing fits so well with the concept: almost all the abilities mentioned in the thread fit with this. It can use offensive abilities effectively, as well as defensive.

As for people who "don't want another dragon because we have to many", open your mind a bit. There are three dragons in the top 20 stats. That isn't what I'd call "too many" by any stretch. Latias is number 2, Salamence is number 4. I don't know what the effect of adding another dragon will do to the stats, I can only assume it will either raise the number of other dragons or reduce it. However, that is the point of CAP; explore the metagame. What better way to explore a supposedly dragon-centric metagame then by adding another dragon?

 

[SgtWoodsy]

Throwing my support behind Dragon.

Incredible offensive (hits everything bar Steelix and Magnezone neutral) and defensive typing (resists Water, Fire, Grass, Electric, Steel and Flying, and can actually do well against Togekiss, which no other CAP has been able to do), no weakness to Stealth Rock, no weakness to Pursuit and extreme flexibility with Abilities, which is the entire point of this CAP.

 

[DougJustDoug]

FINAL WARNING

This is not a POLL!

If you can't even bother to read the OP or notice the title, you deserve the infraction you will receive if you post another stupid "bold vote" in this thread.

This is discussion about the secondary typing. If you have something to add to the discussion, then please post. But, we really don't need a "show of hands", and we definitely don't need people counting votes here.