Cresselia suspect discussion (See post #45)

[Molk]

here are some calculations of max HP cress vs a mesprit vs with the same investment

CB aggron head smash vs cress (68.92% - 81.31%)

vs mesprit (94.23% - 111.26%)

(assuming max speed, cresselia is guarenteed to get both screens up and set up a lunar dance, mesprit is guarenteed to get 2hkoed after stealth rock)

LO durant X-scissor vs max hp cress (86.94% - 102.70%)

vs mesprit (118.68% - 140.11%)

cress has a CHANCE to set up at least 1 screen, mesprit doesnt CB ohkoes both

LO adaptability crawdaunt's Crunch vs max Hp cress (82.88% - 98.20%)

vs mesprit (113.19% - 134.07%)

once again, cress can switch in on crunch and at least sometimes set up a screen, mesprit cant.

the sheer difference in bulk is just too much. cresselia can set up screens against many things that mesprit cannot with its slightly higher speed and way higher bulk, uxie doesnt have access to a varient of lunar dance, making its screen support different.

i will add more damage calcualtions in a different post if needed, remember that this cress is only max hp, not max hp and defense

also, its interesting to note that max bulk mesprit, still barely matches max speed cress in bulk, and cress can also run bulk

edit: I ALSO RAN BOTH CRESS AND MESPRIT ON MY TRICK ROOM TEAM, WHILE THE OFFENSIVEPRESENCE MESPRIT HAD WAS NICE, CRESS USUALLY WAS ONLY ATTACKING TO BREAK SUBS ANYWAY, AND MOONLIGHT REALLY HELPED TO KEEP TRICK ROOM UP THROUGH THE WHOLE MATCH, MAKING CRESS SUPERIOR IN THE END

 

[alexwolf]

^ Why the hell are you comparing Mesprit to Cresselia?
If you do the right comparison which is between Uxie and Cresselia, you will see that not many things change.
Also people keep on talking about Lunar Dance on Cresselia as if Uxie does not have a move except U-Turn to help sweepers on offensive teams. Memento is very similar to Lunar Dance for offensive times and even better sometimes.

I will ask again what is the big difference about Cresselia as a Dual Screener from Uxie?

As i said Cresselia has better bulk and Lunar Dance and Moonlight, while Uxie has better speed, SR, U-Turn and Memento.

None of those 2 is plain better as a DS supporter because each one has its merits. Uxie fits a lot better on offensive teams, while Cresselia fits better on balanced and Stall teams.

 

[Molk]

^ Why the hell are you comparing Mesprit to Cresselia?
If you do the right comparison which is between Uxie and Cresselia, you will see that not many things change.
Also people keep on talking about Lunar Dance on Cresselia as if Uxie does not have a move except U-Turn to help sweepers on offensive teams. Memento is very similar to Lunar Dance for offensive times and even better sometimes.

I will ask again what is the big difference about Cresselia as a Dual Screener from Uxie?

As i said Cresselia has better bulk and Lunar Dance and Moonlight, while Uxie has better speed, SR, U-Turn and Memento.

None of those 2 is plain better as a DS supporter because each one has its merits. Uxie fits a lot better on offensive teams, while Cresselia fits better on balanced and Stall teams.

im comparing cress to mesprit, because it has healing wish, and is the only other pokemon bar gardevoir that can get that combo of moves

 

[alexwolf]

Yeah but Memento is quite similar. The one move heals back 1 sweeper to give it one more chance of sweeping, while the other gives you one almost free chance of setup. They are not the same but they are in the same category of support moves imo. When one is talking about Cresselia and Uxie as DS supporters and mentions Lunar Dance, Memento should be mentioned as well!
And i haven't seen one person talking about it yet...

 

[SevilitheArcanine]

so, say Cressilia does get banned. It would have to move up a tier, and the next tier up is UU. And considering the things that can 2HKO cress in RU, imagine the deadly things it would have to face up in UU. UU has tons of threats that Cressilia would have absolutely no chance against. one of the biggest threats would be Bisharp. It has powerful SE Stab in night slash and has sub to block t-wave. a +2 adamant LO bisharp will always OHKO 252 hp/252 def bold cress after SR damage. and adamant CB Escavilier will always OHKO that same cress with megahorn after SR. and Jolly Guts Heracross when statsued OHKOs Cress with Megahorn after SR, and always kills after a SD. other physical attackers that can OHKO-2HKO include Krookidile, Darmanitan, and Rhyperior. then, theres the special attackers. which is a bit harder. assuming Cress is calm with 252 hp/252 sp def, pokes such as chandelure, houndoom, and zoroark can 2HKO after SR, and if cress is bold, they can even get an OHKO. if for some odd reason Cress does get banned from RU, it will stand no chance agaisnt the powerful threats in UU.

 

[Molk]

a pokemon's ban from a tier has no relavence to its performance to the tiers above it

 

[Machi]

Yeah but Memento is quite similar. The one move heals back 1 sweeper to give it one more chance of sweeping, while the other gives you one almost free chance of setup. They are not the same but they are in the same category of support moves imo. When one is talking about Cresselia and Uxie as DS supporters and mentions Lunar Dance, Memento should be mentioned as well!
And i haven't seen one person talking about it yet...

Because the sweepers in a trick room - which Molten has emphasized through the way he uses Cresselia - don't exactly set up with boosts but most of the time, e.g. Druddigon, enter and already hit quite hard so that they don't really need Memento as much (it works for smash pass but not for TR). More importantly Lunar Dance/Healing wish isn't just for a safe switch in but for giving sweepers a second wind (meaning they were already injured and on the verge of KO but are given a second opportunity as they are essentially given a full heal) Memento doesn't really provide that second wind but creates a switch in opportunity to set up. The two are quite different when you take that into consideration.

 

[alexwolf]

Because the sweepers in a trick room - which Molten has emphasized through the way he uses Cresselia - don't exactly set up with boosts but most of the time, e.g. Druddigon, enter and already hit quite hard so that they don't really need Memento as much (it works for smash pass but not for TR). More importantly Lunar Dance/Healing wish isn't just for a safe switch in but for giving sweepers a second wind (meaning they were already injured and on the verge of KO but are given a second opportunity as they are essentially given a full heal) Memento doesn't really provide that second wind but creates a switch in opportunity to set up. The two are quite different when you take that into consideration.

We all know what each moves does, but they both help sweepers sweep and they both kill you, that's why they are compared.
For TR teams, Lunar Dance is more helpful indeed, because as you said there are not many setupers. But for many offensive/weather teams Memento is more useful giving to your sweeper the chance he needs to end the game.

 

[Machi]

We all know what each moves does, but they both help sweepers sweep and they both kill you, that's why they are compared.
For TR teams, Lunar Dance is more helpful indeed, because as you said there are not many setupers. But for many offensive/weather teams Memento is more useful giving to your sweeper the chance he needs to end the game.

Still works for non-TR teams in that its still a second wind that could be used by some very dangerous sweepers, e.g. Porygon-Z. As it gives them a second chance to set up - Memento is a first time set up with the idea of sweeping entirely while Lunar Dance would ideally be for the 2nd time for the Pokemon to set up AGAIN assuming you had already failed the first time to sweep through but had already removed the counter that intervened in the first place (or sweepers heavily crippled by hazards + LO that run around in RU). Add that with both screens and you've basically created a scenario again for a second sweep. They're both useful no doubt but they act entirely different for the support they provide.

 

[Honko]

I've been talking with windsong a bit about Cresselia, and he brought up a very good point. The real problem with Cress's defensive set is that it destroys Balanced teams. She's not doing much to opposing stall, and all-out offensive teams can definitely spare at least one teamslot for a Cress-killer (if your entire HO team gets paralyzed by Cress, either you badly misplayed or it's a bad team). It's the balanced teams that suffer. They only have one or maybe two real power hitters, and Cress's presence means the options to choose from are limited to the Pokemon that can 2HKO her; anything that can't, like CB Entei, is a liability. And even if you do choose something from that pool, it's still probably going to get paralyzed. In an earlier post I said it was a good trade if my Feraligatr or Durant gets paralyzed in exchange for KOing Cresselia, and from a HO perspective that's definitely true, because I only need 1 KO from each of my sweepers to win. But from a balanced team's perspective, that Feraligatr or Durant is my primary sweeper and I need it to get multiple KOs, or else it's going to be a long and difficult match, so having it get paralyzed is a much bigger problem. And if my power hitter gets taken out before Cress goes down, that's pretty much gg, because now Cress can simply wall the rest of my team. So you're basically forced to build your balanced team around a sweeper that can beat Cress, and even then you're at a disadvantage when you face it.

I still think the SubCM and Dual Screens sets are being vastly overhyped, and the defensive set isn't the invincible titan some people are making it out to be, at least not against offensive teams. However, the way it brutalizes balanced teams is making me strongly consider voting to ban.

What do you guys think, especially those of you who played balance this round (since I didn't)? Does Cress really make balanced teams obsolete?

 

[sandshrewz]

Well I've been on the fence pretty much for Cressy... Agreeing with Honko and Windsong totally. Cresselia isn't really broken offensively through SubCM, because of its poor coverage and abysmal Special Attack. +1 and +2 aren't too bad, and within those few turns it takes to set up, it isn't too hard to switch to the appropriate counter before it gets too many boosts. I didn't play balanced either, but exchanging probably your only hard hitter just to KO Cress sounds really bad for balanced teams.

Personally I play rain. I feel that Cress is way too bulky, for RU standards. Cresselia simply can't be OHKOed, even by boosted attacks, unless it's super effective. +2 Adamant, rain, and Life Orb-boosted Qwilfish's Waterfall does only 64.2% - 75.7% to 252/252+ Cresselia. Not even close to OHKOing. In RU, I think only opposing (Intimidate) Qwilfish and Ferroseed can wall a boosted Qwilfish, mainly because of resistance or immunity to its dual STABs. However, Cresselia doesn't even resist it. It can just wall it with its sheer bulk, although it can't directly switch in. Then it can either Thunder Wave it, or just finish it with a STAB move. Nothing in the tier can match Cresselia's bulk. 120 / 120 / 130 defenses are way too much to handle. I don't think anything other than super effective hits are going to take down her.

In DPP, Cresselia was a tier above Uxie. For what reasons, I can't be sure. Even though there are other originally higher tier Pokemon, such as Honchkrow and Electivire, Cresselia is completely different from them. How many Cress checks do not fear Thunder Wave or status of some sort? Probably not many. There are other checks that come from BW, and not just the DPP era, such as Durant. Durant can KO Cress, but what if, while countering Cress, it finds itself paralyzed? Probably from switching in or something?

Cresselia does have a fair share of checks and counters, but most of them aren't going unscratched against her. But is she 'unhealthy' for the tier? Probably, though that's not for me to decide. If she does break through balanced teams that easily (or in some way cause that to happen), I don't think she should remain here, even if its just one playstyle. Having the ability to probably instantly win against a single playstyle is bad enough. She's not much of a stallbreaker, but probably a 'balancebreaker' that can work well on her own. Probably that's too much.

K, this got too long >.> hopefully brought up something to consider :x

 

[spuds4ever]

I agree with Honko on this point. You can't make a fool-proof balanced team any more with cresselia running about. Once you have to pack a team with a slot for countering only one pokemon, you know it dosen't belong in the tier and that's one of the major traits that can get a pokemon banned (look at excadrill back in OU, everyone had to take either azumarill or Gliscor and even then they'd usually have to sacrifice a pokemon in the process to bring him down).

 

[Mazinger]

Uh yeah as council member I should post here etc

Let me start by saying that I didn't play RU last time cress was allowed, so I couldn't care less about how its two best checks left or anything. Nonetheless, unless someone brings up some kind of incredibly convincing argument that nobody else thought of before, I'm gonna vote ban on this, as its versality and high effectiveness are just too much for this meta. Killing the defensive set (252/252 bold, for example), is very difficult for even HO teams, since you basically have to have a STAB SE attack, (with a few exceptions) and most mons carrying those have in common that they hate Twave (Durant, Sharpedo, Accelgor, Scolipede etc) and are crippled for the rest of the match when they switch in on the wrong move, after which cress can just switch out while outlasting the frail sweepers. It should also be noted that because of its ridiculous bulk, trying to hit switches is considerably less risky than on other pokemon. Pursuiting it is not that great of an option either, as only CB Spiritomb hits anywhere near hard enough, and even then its damage (49% - 58% if cress switches) is still managable, not to mention that it's complete set-up bait and being forced to run it just to kill cress is ridiculous. So to sum it up, cress destroys most offensive teams by walling a ton of threats and crippling most of the others.

Stall doesn't have much of a problem with defensive cress, however the CM set can cause a ton of trouble without a haze user (roar and WW can be circumvented by leaving cress as your last mon) as defensive mons have a hard time breaking its subs and most taunt users are hit super effectively by psychic (qwilfish) or ice beam (gligar). It also has a number of other sets, but I don't have a lot of experience using or facing them, so I won't talk about them. Those two are broken enough on their own.

tl;dr voting ban unless someone has a really good post up their sleeve.

 

[RyanJavery]

Typhlosin nets a potential to hit kill with Choice specs. Scolipede with sword Dance and countless others get firm two hit kills. Well not countless 22. Not even different sets different pokemon. Calcs found here http://www.honko.freehosting.com/wall_calc.html

Also this is based on the dual screen version so take it as you will.

Don't take this as me underestimating how good it is. I run one and it's great, totally makes my team by setting up screens and switching to a sweeper. Late game a lunar dance can revive a key sweeper to help regain momentum. But this impervious wall thing is myth.

 

[DittoCrow]

I've changed my mind about Cresselia. I haven't seen anyone provide calcs of Cress getting OHKO'd (100% of the time) by a Pokemon with no boosts. Plus, Cresselia won't be staying in on anything that can OHKO it. In my previous post, I forgot to mention how the threats that 2HKO it get crippled in the process. This right here makes Cresslia ban-worthy. It can paralyze its threats and Moonlight; it can even KO it if the Pokemon is weakened enough.

 

[Sabinfrost]

Typhlosin nets a potential to hit kill with Choice specs. Scolipede with sword Dance and countless others get firm two hit kills. Well not countless 22. Not even different sets different pokemon. Calcs found here http://www.honko.freehosting.com/wall_calc.html

Also this is based on the dual screen version so take it as you will.

Don't take this as me underestimating how good it is. I run one and it's great, totally makes my team by setting up screens and switching to a sweeper. Late game a lunar dance can revive a key sweeper to help regain momentum. But this impervious wall thing is myth.

Specs Eruption isn't really a counter to anything because of rocks/priority/scarfers. Scolipede is weak against psychic, rocks and is frail, so it wont get the opportunity to set up.

No Pokemon is unkillable, there are plenty of obscure solutions to a lot of threats, I OHKOd a Lugia with a Cleffa using sash/endeavour in the hail. The point is not that something can't be beaten, it's that it's clearly a cut above the competition, so it should be tiered with stronger opponents for the health of the metagame.

 

[Windsong]

Typhlosin nets a potential to hit kill with Choice specs. Scolipede with sword Dance and countless others get firm two hit kills. Well not countless 22. Not even different sets different pokemon. Calcs found here http://www.honko.freehosting.com/wall_calc.html

Also this is based on the dual screen version so take it as you will.

Don't take this as me underestimating how good it is. I run one and it's great, totally makes my team by setting up screens and switching to a sweeper. Late game a lunar dance can revive a key sweeper to help regain momentum. But this impervious wall thing is myth.

Just wanted to point out a few things.
1) You should be doing the calcs with the Calm Mind or defensive support Cresselia sets which are arguably the best ones. Max HP / Def with 4 SpD.
2) Choice Specs Typhlosion cannot OHKO standard Cresselia. Read the calc carefully and you'll notice that it only OHKOs with Eruption with Blaze active, and although the calc still treats Eruption as having max power, this is impossible - it would actually be significantly weaker than basically any of Typhlosion's other attacks.
3) Err, not sure what you're counting when you say that 22 things can OHKO Cressy. The calculator shows a grand total of two RU mons being able to OHKO it, one of which is an error on the calculator's part (the Blaze + Eruption power issue).

Anyways I've talked with a couple of the voters about Cresselia and it's honestly pretty broken. Although Honko's earlier argument was that it was nothing more than myth that Cressy could flat out stop offense, it's the damage that it does to most balance teams that's the real problem, since they're often forced to run rather obscure mons as solutions for it. Effectively nearly voiding a playstyle as it does should be grounds enough for a ban, imo, but it's pretty clear that Cresselia's just too absurdly good at this point.

 

[AJC]

using cress i find that it just is too good at supporting others while the old gen 4 uber characteristics are no longer valid IMO cress would fall under the 3rd it just supports too well for the health of the metagame it's in.

almost nothing in RU has the power to stop cress from doing what it wants to do and the few things that do are really easy to work around or to neuter so they are rendered almost insignificant to stop what you want cress to do.

 

[Oglemi]

I apologize for the tone of my last post in here, but hopefully you all understand that when making arguments, I want it done in an intelligent matter backed by evidence. Keep the theorymonning to a minimum!

Thank you for your cooperation, Cresselia was highly contested in a 5-4 vote and is banned.

EDIT: Woops! Miscounted