Ladder Monotype [Read post #393 for Tiering Updates]

[scpinion]

the forcing 50/50s argument is kinda shit. If anything, predictions are healthy for a metagame and that is what 50/50's are. If you get it wrong u lose momentum and the tides flip in a battle, if you win it, then you get one more step closer to winning. Without 50/50s competitive pokemon as a whole wouldn't be what it is. With that logic battles would be decided by team match up (which sometimes is the case), but it is not the case a lot of the time. predictions and or 50/50's are what makes and breaks the winner of a battle so that argument is just kinda dumb from my perspective.

Well, this was going to be my argument if someone really wanted to argue the point.

To clarify, if it is a true 50/50 then it isn't good, but most situations are not. They are all about risk management, which I think is what Croven is getting at.

 

[Croven]

Well, this was going to be my argument if someone really wanted to argue the point.

To clarify, if it is a true 50/50 then it isn't good, but most situations are not. They are all about risk management, which I think is what Croven is getting at.

basically my point. the argument here shouldn't be whether or not true 50/50s are good, but whether or not genesect successfully manages to force an unhealthy amount of 50/50s. most predictions are essentially risk management, or if you know who you are playing well, taking in their style and playing to counteract that. however, for simplistic purposes, all the examples i stated were assuming you are playing someone you have never seen play before.

i dont have the time or energy to try and explain the difference between predictions and 50/50s with examples and all that trash, but i'll give you all what i think about this in quick words:

a prediction is where you weigh the risk and reward of your plays and your opponents plays, decide what your opponent is going to do by this, and then decide if it is worth it to predict that play based on your own risk/reward.

a 50/50 is where you and your opponent has 2 plays, each of which have the same risk and same reward (usually occurs in the end of a game, with risk being lose the game and reward being win the game; see aegislash meta XY OU for more details). you literally cannot read your opponent unless you know their playstyle and skill level; if you can determine this based off the previous parts of the game, ur actually an amazing pokemon player, but for the rest of us casuals, its merely a guessing game. when there are 2 high level players that know the other is a high level player, its a complete coin toss. it is very, very unlikely that previous plays can make you know what the opponent is going to do in a true 50/50 (after all, they could realize that their own style warrants them to do this play, and they could switch plays too! :^) that's what makes it a 50/50 people). its legit just a coin flip stop saying its healthy

video that explains when its an actual 50/50 and when u just need to use risk/reward to make ur best play

real question that should be asked: does genesect force an unhealthy amount of 50/50s in this metagame? if yes, ban it, if no, dont ban it for this reason (it could still be broken by other means)

whoo, this post probably makes no sense and if nobody really knows what i'm talking about, its probably because i can't write good arguments for shit
pls notify me if nobody understands whatever garbage i'm trying to tell you, i'll do whatever i can to make it simple so i dont go crazy trying to be elaborate and fail

 

[Wanka]

lol i haven't really talked that much in this argument but i really disagree with this statement. 50/50s aren't predictions, its literally a 50/50, or a coin flip. each play has the same chance of occurring and the risk in both scenarios are the same: you lose a pokemon. sure if you get it right, you get to take one of his. but there's literally no skill involved in a 50/50; i could take a coin and flip it every time i get in one of these scenarios and i'd likely do just as well as someone who thought through the play for a full 2 minutes and finally clicked a move. forcing 50/50s is in no way "healthy"; it detracts from skill and makes the game really just decided by a coin.


what makes or breaks the winner of the match is in no way the winner of a coinflip, and even saying that prediction makes the winner is a stretch. in truth, prediction is just glorified guessing, and if that was what all pokemon matches were about, i'm pretty sure all of us would have quit by now. a good pokemon battler takes into account win cons, win scenario, opposing threats, what is useless in a match and what to sack, how to counteract the opponents win con, etc. now, prediction does play a part in this. for example, double switching to bring in a big threat is a good play, not denying that. also predicting an opponent's double switch is a very risky play, but if it works out, good for you, you just gained a ton of momentum. but at the end of the day, i can make 0 predictions (besides just "ok he has a keldeo in, lemme go to my special wall"), and as long as i keep in mind the overall game plan, i can easily win most of my matches.

in no part of that earlier paragraph did i make a mention of 50/50s, as they are not healthy for any metagame. in essence, they are guesses, since the risk and reward for each of the plays is the same for you and your opponent, so there is really no way of knowing what they will do, and the exact same goes for your opponent.

tl;dr ur wrong 50/50s aren't predictions they're coinflips; arent needed in a good meta, and largely detract from a healthy meta

i finished my Freeroamer style rant lets move on and have a nice day everyone

I probably should've made this clearer, but the 50/50s we are referring to are very crucial plays and really only occur late in battles when it's like 2-2 and that is where the coinflip comes into play. The thing is, those coin flips don't only apply to genesect, they can happen with any other mons as well.

Lets say we are talking bug, and a magnezone kills your lead shuckle with a flash cannon. You then proceed to bring in your genesect, lets say it is indeed scarfed, but your opponent doesn't know that, he could be thinking it's scarfed or life orb or specs. Lets say the magnezone is specs locked and does not want to stay in and get popped with a flamethrower. Your opponent is most likely going to switch into his/her zapdos to sponge the flamethrower and threaten back with a heat wave or a discharge. Now the question is, do you flamethrower and let zap get in for free and fire off a heat wave against mono bug? Or, do you bop the zapdos with an ice beam and cripple it for the rest of the battle. There are TWO scenarios to that situation, so its a 50/50 right? No, that situation by know means is a 50/50. That is simply you making a choice on what you think your opponent is MOST LIKELY going to do. If you get it right you are rewarded with a near dead zapdos, you ice beam and he stays in, you catch a powerful flash cannon to the mouth and gene is taking close to half. Now that play is not going to cost anyone a game which is where I think the mix up is. Those 50/50s are late game 2-2 occurrences which happen all the time and should not be applied to gene.

As far as predictions dictating the course of a match, Yes they most certainly do. I probably did exagerate in saying they make or break a battle because those are the late game 50/50s, but you did prove my point for me in saying that they are determining factors in playing around win cons and and all the other stuff. That is more or less what I was trying to get at. The situation above is a perfectly healthy situation and should not be put against genesect.

I just really suck at getting my thoughts across on here, sigh.

 

[Sabella]

I really like ur take on it croven. Makes sense to me. I thinks all the coverage and unpredictability that causes those scenarios with genesect. I could be wrong tho. Like to hear how other users feel besides me

 

[Wanka]

basically my point. the argument here shouldn't be whether or not true 50/50s are good, but whether or not genesect successfully manages to force an unhealthy amount of 50/50s. most predictions are essentially risk management, or if you know who you are playing well, taking in their style and playing to counteract that. however, for simplistic purposes, all the examples i stated were assuming you are playing someone you have never seen play before.

i dont have the time or energy to try and explain the difference between predictions and 50/50s with examples and all that trash, but i'll give you all what i think about this in quick words:

a prediction is where you weigh the risk and reward of your plays and your opponents plays, decide what your opponent is going to do by this, and then decide if it is worth it to predict that play based on your own risk/reward.

a 50/50 is where you and your opponent has 2 plays, each of which have the same risk and same reward (usually occurs in the end of a game, with risk being lose the game and reward being win the game; see aegislash meta XY OU for more details). you literally cannot read your opponent unless you know their playstyle and skill level; if you can determine this based off the previous parts of the game, ur actually an amazing pokemon player, but for the rest of us casuals, its merely a guessing game. when there are 2 high level players that know the other is a high level player, its a complete coin toss. it is very, very unlikely that previous plays can make you know what the opponent is going to do in a true 50/50 (after all, they could realize that their own style warrants them to do this play, and they could switch plays too! :^) that's what makes it a 50/50 people). its legit just a coin flip stop saying its healthy

video that explains when its an actual 50/50 and when u just need to use risk/reward to make ur best play

real question that should be asked: does genesect force an unhealthy amount of 50/50s in this metagame? if yes, ban it, if no, dont ban it for this reason (it could still be broken by other means)

whoo, this post probably makes no sense and if nobody really knows what i'm talking about, its probably because i can't write good arguments for shit
pls notify me if nobody understands whatever garbage i'm trying to tell you, i'll do whatever i can to make it simple so i dont go crazy trying to be elaborate and fail

ik its a double, but that is what im trying to get at. I was more so addressing the fact that putting genesect on the spot for forcing healthy predictions was bullshit and healthy predictions are good for a metagame.

 

[scpinion]

For this 50/50 (or lack thereof) business I'll use the CharY vs scarf Genesect in a fire versus bug game, since I (incorrectly) referred to it as one.

This is a perfect example, actually, of how Genesect isn't forcing unhealthy 50/50's. (I'm using the term 50/50 to refer to a situation where both players have 1 of 2 decisions to make, not necessarily "coin flip decisions")

I'd argue the best play in most instances of this situation is to stay in with Charizard.

If you switch and they click u-turn, then you're facing down Heracross. At least 1 if your mons is going down and you've done nothing to them.

If you click a fire move and they try to be cute by clicking U-Turn, something on your opponent's team dies.

If they click Thunderbolt and you stay in, CharY goes down. However, Rotom or Heatran comes in next turn and bops something on their team. You're trading mons, which is generally a good thing to do when you have a type advantage.

The only thing you gain by switching is the possibility of preserving CharY, which probably isn't your win con in this matchup anyways. Staying in guarantees you trade KOs at the least.

 

[Wanka]

For this 50/50 (or lack thereof) business I'll use the CharY vs scarf Genesect in a fire versus bug game, since I (incorrectly) referred to it as one.

This is a perfect example, actually, of how Genesect isn't forcing unhealthy 50/50's. (I'm using the term 50/50 to refer to a situation where both players have 1 of 2 decisions to make, not necessarily "coin flip decisions")

I'd argue the best play in most instances of this situation is to stay in with Charizard.

If you switch and they click u-turn, then you're facing down Heracross. At least 1 if your mons is going down and you've done nothing to them.

If you click a fire move and they try to be cute by clicking U-Turn, something on your opponent's team dies.

If they click Thunderbolt and you stay in, CharY goes down. However, Rotom or Heatran comes in next turn and bops something on their team. You're trading mons, which is generally a good thing to do when you have a type advantage.

The only thing you gain by switching is the possibility of preserving CharY, which probably isn't your win con in this matchup anyways. Staying in guarantees you trade KOs at the least.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

This is exactly the kind of healthy situation im talking about. Situations like that are by no means unhealthy for a metagame.

Thx for helping me clarify.

 

[Croven]

I probably should've made this clearer, but the 50/50s we are referring to are very crucial plays and really only occur late in battles when it's like 2-2 and that is where the coinflip comes into play. The thing is, those coin flips don't only apply to genesect, they can happen with any other mons as well.

exactly what i'm trying to say, true 50/50's rarely happen outside of the end of the match, due to the odd circumstances, which i'll just touch upon later in the post

Lets say we are talking bug, and a magnezone kills your lead shuckle with a flash cannon. You then proceed to bring in your genesect, lets say it is indeed scarfed, but your opponent doesn't know that, he could be thinking it's scarfed or life orb or specs. Lets say the magnezone is specs locked and does not want to stay in and get popped with a flamethrower. Your opponent is most likely going to switch into his/her zapdos to sponge the flamethrower and threaten back with a heat wave or a discharge. Now the question is, do you flamethrower and let zap get in for free and fire off a heat wave against mono bug? Or, do you bop the zapdos with an ice beam and cripple it for the rest of the battle. There are TWO scenarios to that situation, so its a 50/50 right? No, that situation by know means is a 50/50. That is simply you making a choice on what you think your opponent is MOST LIKELY going to do. If you get it right you are rewarded with a near dead zapdos, you ice beam and he stays in, you catch a powerful flash cannon to the mouth and gene is taking close to half. Now that play is not going to cost anyone a game which is where I think the mix up is. Those 50/50s are late game 2-2 occurrences which happen all the time and should not be applied to gene.

this is a good time to point out what i said previously: a 50/50 is a situation in which there are, usually, 2 plays for each player. All 4 plays (2 for each player) have the exact same risk and the exact same reward as the others. Let's take your example. Lemme try and list the risk and reward for each play without using a table because lol effort.

Genesect user

Flamethrower
Risk
Letting Zapdos come in for free and getting a hit off on your team. The degree of this risk varies depending on your team: e.g. if you have Armaldo/Volcarona, the reward is very little, as the attack will not do much damage at all. If not, there is a larger risk in letting Zapdos come in for free, making this play slightly less safe than before.

Reward
KO'ing Magnezone (or if you can't KO it, heavily damaging it). Degree of the reward depends on both of your teams; if nothing on your team can stomach a hit from Magnezone, then this is a very high reward for you. However, if Mag is outsped and KO'ed by nearly all members of your team, or is hard walled by something (Bulky Rona), this is a small reward and the value of using Flamethrower goes down. Now, if Mag is the opponents only answer to a mon on your team, and he needs to keep it healthy for this reason, there is an immense reward; opening up a position for that particular mon and helping it possibly win the match entirely.

Ice Beam
Risk
Letting Mag get off a large hit on you and weakening Genesect to a very low number, and subsequently getting of a hit on the incoming mon. If Genesect is your way of winning this match (breaking through opposing team or cleaning it lategame), then this is a large risk (don't forget to take into account if you need Gene healthy or not; if SR/Spikes won't be an issue in the match and you won't be using it to stomach any hits [priority] then Genesect doesn't really need to have its health for any reason in particular and the Risk of this play drops dramatically). However, if Gene isn't really that needed in the match, and you have a clear cut (or close to this) way of winning even if Gene is weakened, then there is low risk. Also think about the turn after Gene gets Flash Cannoned; if something will die to the next Flash Cannon (Gene can't stay in; is locked into Beam), then the Risk of such a play is generally very high. Even if you have a useless mon, it's nice to keep that for later in the match.

Reward
Crippling Zapdos and subsequently KO'ing it or getting a big hit off on another mon. Depends on teams; how important Zap is at beating this Bug team, how many Ice Beam switch ins the opponent has, etc (shortening this due to lack of time)


Ok i dont have enough time to really get into this (i would do mag plays too), but you get the idea. if you notice, i gave multiple scenarios where the risk/reward increased or decreased dramatically. my point is that all of this heavily depends on the team, since with 6 different mons you get a lot of different plays and the risk/reward changes a lot. this is exactly why 50/50s rarely happen outside of the endgame; there are just so many factors to take into account in early game and midgame that it really just can't happen. hopefully the example above clarified how risk/reward changes depending on the specific battle, and when looking back on 50/50s (where the risk/reward is literally "lose game, win game"), it clarifies how unhealthy they are, since this cannot be used in those scenarios and these "predictions" are reduced to a mere coinflip.

As far as predictions dictating the course of a match, Yes they most certainly do. I probably did exagerate in saying they make or break a battle because those are the late game 50/50s, but you did prove my point for me in saying that they are determining factors in playing around win cons and and all the other stuff. That is more or less what I was trying to get at. The situation above is a perfectly healthy situation and should not be put against genesect.

yea predictions definitely dictate the course of the match, but i would say not as much as long term thinking and overall game plans. however, that isn't what we're here to discuss. if the above scenario is all that genesect forces, then it is by no means broken by "creating too many 50/50s". that scenario can be caused by several pokemon that simply have decent coverage.

i'm not gonna give my opinions on whether or not gene does force these unhealthy 50/50s, due to lack of experience battling genesect, but there needs to be more than this example, or the one scp posted above (char y vs gene), as those are not 50/50s at all; guesswork can be completely avoided by simply thinking out risk reward (which i might add scp did very well there; risk of switching out is facing heracross, who could possibly get multiple kills. risk of staying in is a ko on each side. reward of switching out is getting a kill, reward of staying in is getting a kill. since reward is the same, there is less risk with staying in, so that is clearly the better play)

replays will be immensely helpful in arguing the point that gene forces 50/50s, since its difficult to theorymon this and it is much better shown with a replay. just pointing out again that i am not going to take any side of gene ban, due to lack of experience, but i most certainly will step in when people get things that are healthy and unhealthy mixed up, as that could be detrimental when creating a balanced meta

 

[Freeroamer]

Think y'all are forgetting how fat Zard is:

252 SpA Genesect Thunderbolt vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Mega Charizard Y: 166-196 (55.8 - 65.9%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

It's also unlikely you have the Download boost because you most likely came in on a revenge kill cos if you hard switched Genesect into Fire and got away with it you might just be a little bit of a god...

That said I agree with the point on risk management and all that jazz, I actually don't think there's that many true 50-50s in this game if you're aware of your gameplan and what you need to do to win a game, because then you become aware of what is the least worst play and can play to that. Personally I'm a huge fan of Genesect staying, I think it's been a fantastic addition in that it doesn't make any one type unviable and it also doesn't make Bug stupidly OP, so yea keep the weird metallic bug.

 

[1 True Lycan]

Although I rarely post on forums, I do often read through the arguments posted here. The topics being discussed at the moment are quite important for shaping our metagame so I would like to give my two cents on these matters. I usually ladder enough to stay in the top 30 or so on the ladder but rarely attempt to go past that because, due to decay, I would have to ladder daily to stay higher up. I have used every type at a high level so I think I can talk about potential bans without too much bias.

Altaria: Beats types such as dark, electric and psychic almost single handedly. Has a huge list of viable moves/sets and creates a very strong core with other flying pokemon. Ban

Zard X: I feel most strongly about this pokemon because I feel it's power and unpredictability has been overlooked. This pokemon destroys types such as steel, electric and ice. It is more of a threat to ice than most other fire types since it has access to dragon dance. When I say it destroys steel, I mean it DESTROYS steel. If it is running flare blitz, eq, wisp, roost, the only check is balloon heatran (or sac a mon and bring in a scarfer, which is hardly fair). Heatran is a very important pokemon vs flying and keeping its balloon intact for the whole game is almost impossible.
If zard is using 3 attacks roost, then steel has no switchin. It its DD 3 attacks, then the only revenge killer is sucker punch Bisharp. You have to sac a pokemon or 2 just to find out what set it is, and even then countering it is difficult since the flying user can just switch out (lets not forget flying has access to landorus-i and tornadus-t as well).

Here are 2 replays of Void Orion and I fighting Pk-kaiser's flying team. We are both considered to be pretty good with steel, and lets just say the match doesn't end well for either of us. Neither of us knew his sets beforehand.
http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/eos-monotype-28304 Orion vs Kaiser
http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/eos-monotype-33991 Lycan vs Kaiser

I did defeat Crystal Inferno who was using the same team as Kaiser, but that's only because she played poorly and didn't bring charizard out until the end. Here's the replay for anyone who is interested. http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/eos-monotype-33840

I am in favour of banning both Mega Altaria and Mega Charizard X from flying. If this happens then reintroducing zapdos would be a good idea in my opinion, but we can decide that later.

As for genesect, I am quite neutral since it never seems OP when I use it or when I face it with most types. The only time it becomes a problem is when I use ice because Genesect + Scizor + Volcarona + Heracross is too much for ice to handle from my experience.

 

[n64lord]

Let's talk about something different. When Hoopa and Hoopa-U are released tomorrow, will we follow OU's decisions or do you think we'll make a split with them again?

 

[Freeroamer]

I can't find anything that confirms the release date as tomorrow, but it's very likely to be this month so sure let's take a look...

Hoopa:

Typing:

Stat Spread: 80 HP / 110 Atk / 60 Def / 150 SpA / 130 SpDef / 70 Spe (600 BST)

Hoopa-Unbound:

Typing:

Stat Spread: 80 HP / 160 Atk / 60 Def / 170 SpA / 130 SpDef / 80 Spe (680 BST)

Notable Moves:
Calm Mind
Dark Pulse
Destiny Bond
Drain Punch
Energy Ball
Fire Punch
Focus Blast
Foul Play
Grass Knot
Gravity
Gunk Shot
Hidden Power
Hyperspace Fury <- 100 BP Physical Dark move, does not check Accuracy, always lowers Defense by 1 stage, goes through Protect, only available to Unbound forme
Hyperspace Hole <- 80 BP Special Psychic move, does not check Accuracy, goes through Protect, can be used by either forme
Ice Punch
Knock Off
Magic Coat
Nasty Plot
Power-Up-Punch
Psychic
Psyshock
Shadow Ball
Signal Beam
Skill Swap
Substitute
Taunt
Thunder Punch
Thunder Wave
Thunderbolt
Trick
Trick Room
Zen Headbutt

Other interesting stuff:

Hoopa transforms into Hoopa-Unbound using a Key Item called the Prison Bottle, which can be assumed to work like Shaymin and the Gracidea. If this is true it means 2 important things, 1. Hoopa-Unbound will be able to hold an item, and 2. it will be for use on Psychic and Dark monos, while Hoopa is for Psychic and Ghost.

My opinion:

Hoopa-Unbound looks like a freaking insane wallbreaker, Nasty Plot sets are going to be vicious and Dark STAB is just amazing. I think we'll mainly see it going Special or Specially biased if it goes mixed, because it's Physical moves just don't look as threatening as it's Special do but saying that it's best move is Physical so I really don't know! It's typing is cool offensively, but kinda ass defensively, with literally 0 resists and one immunity meaning you're going to struggle to get it in. Strong ass mon doe.

Hoopa looks kinda outclassed by it's Unbound forme on Psychic, with it's only real distinction being able to block Rapid Spin if you want to try some hazard stacking Psychic or something. I think a speedy Sub set will be best on Ghost, able to force a 50-50 with Bish is nice, and it has excellent 3 move coverage in Psyshock / Shadow Ball / Focus Blast. SubPlot could also work.

Looking forward to these two coming to mono.

 

[n64lord]

I think the ghost hoopa could be used for psychic teams wanting to screw over fire and bug, the Unbound one looks like a mixed wallbreaker more than a sweeper to me, but megamedicham can get around physical walls in the same role, and mega gardevoir can get around special ones, and neither has a big utility cost since they cover some of psychic's weaknesses. Although Hoopa-Unbound could threaten scarf or even assault vest, and not lose the power of the other two, so it'll probbably end up with mega gallade as far as psychic goes.

I feel like dark could use the shot in the arm. The ghost form would be out of place on actual ghost teams, as chandelure can handle difficult fire and fairy mons better, has only 5 less special atk, and the same speed.

Also the way I remembered the official press release for Hoopa was that it would be an event download on the day the Hoopa movie was released (originally July 5th)

 

[scpinion]

I think the release date is the 18th. At least that is what Google told me.

 

[Acast]

Prediction:

Regular Hoopa will see some use at first on Ghost, but in the end it's typing will drag it down too much and it will just increase Ghost's massive weakness to Knock Off and other Dark and Ghost moves. I don't think it will become a regular member of a "generic" Ghost team (if such a thing exists).

On Psychic, Unbound will obviously overshadow regular Hoopa and see usage on many, if not most teams. Despite the 4x weakness to Bug, its typing is decent and its stats are outstanding, leaving me wondering why you wouldn't at least try it out. 80 base speed is just enough that a Choice Scarf set is a viable way of running it, but I imagine Assault Vest or Leftovers will be the most popular items to take advantage of its special bulk and amazing power. I bet a few people will be running Choice Band/Specs sets as well just because it fits a wall breaking role so well. I can see it pairing well with Slowbro, since Hoopa-Unbound's physical defense is awful. I'm predicting the end result is that it will be banned from Psychic, but I'm really not sure about its fate on Dark.

tl;dr: People will test regular Hoopa on Ghost at first but we won't see it very much after the initial popularity. Regular Hoopa will be completely overshadowed on Psychic, so it won't be used much on that type either. Unbound will be on most Psychic and Dark teams, but it will probably be banned from Psychic. Not sure about Dark.

 

[Anttya]

Can we ban Psychic already it's getting all the good mons :(

Ghost might actually do Ok tho, shame Hoopa can't really do anything to Dark monos

 

[Freeroamer]

It gets Focus Blast to smack stuff around, doubt Sableye enjoys a Shadow Ball from base 150 SpA if it's like most spreads and catered towards Defense. Sub messes around with Bisharp, which if current trend stays the same and Hoopa runs Timid, will be an annoyance for it. I think played carefully, it will actually be able to do work in this matchup, however it is a sitting duck for anything faster with a Dark move :c

252 SpA Life Orb Hoopa Shadow Ball vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Mega Sableye: 168-199 (55.2 - 65.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

252 SpA Life Orb Hoopa Focus Blast vs. 248 HP / 108 SpD Mandibuzz: 177-208 (41.8 - 49.1%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery or 2HKO after rocks

 

[TheWyvernKing]

I'm looking forward to the upcoming released and I can see both forms doing pretty well.
Hoopa: I have seen many people suggest this set already but I can imagine a sub-hoopa doing rather well and if I were to use it, I would probably run something along the lines of shadow ball, focus blast, knock off/psyshock/nasty plot, and sub
Hoopa-U: I honestly think Hoopa-U would work as a friggin boss wallbreaker here with moves such as hyperspace fury, gunk shot, ice punch, zen headbutt, fire punch, and drain to support a physical spread along with an awesome special movepool with the likes of energy ball, thunderbolt, psyshock, focus blast, and dark pulse. Really look forward to seeing this thing destroy.

 

[KannaVZ]

hi frens... from what I'm seeing hoopa U is a beast, but either needs a LO or a scarf and deffo wants the 252 speed timid, so that hinders the set, since bulky sets with AV are just fodder to u-turn spamm (knowing that both it types are weak to it) so IMHO the most common set might be a timid 252 spA, 252 speed and 4 hp with psyshock, shadow ball, hyperspace fury and hidden power fire/ground/focus miss and with that in mind I can say some things about it against vs a lot of the types
in psychic with its support it will be amazing and OP even though you'll have to replace a mon and since you can't lose bro, mew and your mega it can only replace meloetta victini and your other hard hitter (metagross, gallade, a dragon twin, alakazam the other mon you don't want to mega and that's it) which all are precious to generic psy soo it's a tough call and I don't see it filling the role to a T but again is that good it might be worth it, so LOL for psy

Now in dark it's a different story, dark needs it but it doesn't really help them that much since it's frail af and slow af causing a lot of predictions and dark can't really afford that, but since dark has a lot of mons it can replace I say give it a go.

btw hoopa-U can OHKO almost everything in this meta, but it gets OHKOed just as easily and having a regular-bad defensive typing it can do some late-game sweeping
but like I said it just dies to almost every team there is in the 9 most used teams, and it takes a lot of damage from mons it can't OHKO, IK that it has some good teammates but again is just another glass cannon but this one isn't even speedy enough to do what it wants...

TL;DR it needs a scarf but said Item hinders it severily, also it's main attack has like 8 PP iirc soo having a couple mons that can take the hit and hit it back just remedies the mon, also hazards are one of it main counters since without scarf it's gonna be switching out a lot, and add that to LO damage it's not gonna be around a lot...

 

[Acast]

We obviously have very different definitions of the word "frail", because I would never consider 80 HP and 130 SpD to be frail. Hoopa-Unbound is frail in the same sense that Blissey is frail. It'll tank special hits like a champ, but if you even poke it with something physical, it goes down. "Glass cannon" is the LAST role I would put Hoopa-U into. I wouldn't be surprised if Scarf becomes the most popular set to run, but people aren't just going to overlook its special bulk.

252 SpA Choice Specs Keldeo Hydro Pump vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Hoopa: 214-253 (58.7 - 69.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

252 SpA Choice Specs Keldeo Hydro Pump vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Assault Vest Hoopa: 144-169 (39.5 - 46.4%) -- guaranteed 3HKO

Keldeo is debatably the best Special Wallbreaker in the game and it can't even 2HKO Hoopa-Unbound with Hydro Pump if Hoopa has any investment or an assault vest. U-turn is a huge issue that Unbound needs to worry about, but this thing is not frail.

 

[Freeroamer]

I mean, me and a few frens were doing some calcs for this thing, and it literally has no switchins. Dark resists by themselves are hard to come by, but when combined with this things coverage, it becomes almost impossible to even fathom how you're going to defensively check it. You're going to be hoping that it doesn't have the move to hit your check, for example lets take a standard Dark defensive core of Tyranitar / Mandibuzz / Sableye. Tyranitar is sent to the void by any Fighting move, Mandibuzz will be dropped by any number of things such as Ice Punch or Thunderbolt, or even by Focus Blast if it's majorly physically defensive. Sableye is hilariously useless against this thing, being 2HKOed by either STAB. This thing is ridiculous, and I honestly can't see it being allowed on what is already a very strong type in Psychic for long. If you want to abuse it while it's here, the set below looks cool:

Hoopa-Unbound @ Life Orb
Ability: Magician
EVs: 220 Atk / 72 SpA / 216 Spe
Hasty Nature
IVs: 29 HP
- Hyperspace Fury
- Gunk Shot
- Focus Blast
- w/e the hell you want cos you p. much already covered everything

EVs always 2hko max Def Mega Sableye, and outspeed max speed base 75's such as mega hera

 

[Tyke]

Hi.

I was thinking about Monotype; the meta, the chatroom, and the community and honestly I feel really, really frustrated with the current state of affairs. It's not the current metagame that frustrates me, unbalanced as it is (suspect mega-altaria already); but rather a collection of issues with the way the meta is discussed, evaluated, and balanced.


1. The means through which players discuss the meta are obtuse
Monotype, as a meta, has become into the most popular OM with a thriving user base and a vigorous metagame worthy of balancing. But you wouldn't think it looking at these forums, where all discussion on the monotype metagame is squashed into 3 massive, unwieldy threads. We have outgrown these threads, which are wholly un-conducive (IMO) to a coherent, community-driven discussion of the meta-game. We deserve our own sub-forum where community discussion isn't as restricted and can spread out and grow in an accessible, efficient way.

2. The means through which the community evaluates the meta-game is inefficient.
As I'm not staff, I can't speak to the exact methods by which suspects, unbans, and other meta discussions are decided upon; but as a user I can say that whatever the process is it is deeply inefficient. It feels as though whatever efforts are put forth to balance the metagame are mired by the obtuse means of discussing it and lack of dedicated staff/players to said evaluation. And again, as a layman I can't say whether the problem lies in shoddy management, low motivation, or gridlocking amongst the staff; but that leads me to my third point.

3. There is a massive disconnect between the community and the monotype staff.
There is a huge lack of dialogue between the monotype staff (or whatever entity evaluates the meta) and the user base at large. There is overlap with the previous two points here, in that the average user is completely disconnected from the threads upon which all discussion of the metagame is forced to take place. And that whatever the obscure processes that govern the future of the monotype meta are, the average user is neither aware of them or empowered to affect it, and that's worrisome. It leads to scenarios like the Zapdos ban where the majority of players were entirely clued out.


Idk; There are so many active, motivated monotype players that fill the chat rooms; such a wealth of unharnessed energy that could be channeled into truly community-driven discussions of the meta-game and how to balance it. But we, or at least I, feel disempowered; it's hard to have agency when the threads upon which all discussion of the meta takes place are so incoherent and produces so few tangible results. And even if problems were being addressed by staff the lack of dialogue means we wouldn't know or feel involved in those proceedings.


Those are just my thoughts. These issues aren't anyone's fault, but they should be addressed for the benefit of the metagame and the community surrounding it. I might be entirely wrong here, but IMO the monotype community and staff need to be more aggressive about opening up means for accessible community-driven discussions; perhaps by getting a sub-forum in the OM's page. And from there just practice more transparency with the community and making more effort to involve the growing userbase in discussing the meta.

um... so yeh.

Bye.

 

[Freeroamer]

This isn't the way to do this, it's no secret that I've not exactly been overjoyed with how long it takes things to get passed through and all the rest of it, but making posts here is in a way, disrupting this thread even more and in reality isn't going to achieve that much compared to just putting it into a PM. Ik it looks good, you're thinking oh it's all out in public now maybe it'll get listened to, but in reality, all you've done here is trashed this thread and made it quite difficult for anybody to respond to. You're also going to create a huge amount of negative feeling which is going to make the room feel even worse compared to just putting this in a PM and maybe people could've taken your opinions on board and started working on it.

1) is something we've asked for before, but (fairly so imo) we've always been rejected, most likely because we stand no chance of ever becoming an official metagame, and to create your own subforum would require people to moderate it, and very few people in Monotype have the posting clout on forums such that staff would be willing to give them moderating powers.

2) I don't disagree, but if you know that Nani runs all suspects and is the guy who makes the final decision, why not PM this to him, rather than put it all here?

3) I was on the staff for the Zapdos ban, and we only had a vague knowledge of what was happening. If you don't know exactly what goes on, find out before commenting about it. We didn't have secret threads nor did we at any point stop considering the playerbase opinions, but this was one of the most contrived bans in Monotype, and was a very difficult one to finally do. We had a long discussion with Nani at one point, where he outlined all his ideas, and we discussed them and debated them. A couple of weeks later we were told Zapdos was being type banned, and since a lot of people such as Kaiser have said it was a good decision, so while the process undoubtedly wasn't the most transparent it led to a good solution. I understand you want the community to be more involved, but where do you draw the line? It's incredibly hard to justify public tests or votes because the majority of people main a type and will vote in accordance with that type, or worse will vote according to the bias of their league.

How can the monotype staff be responsible for getting a sub-forum, those are decided by the OM leaders it's not like they can just snap their fingers and it'll be there. I get we're the largest and most active OM and all that, but we're still just an OM, we don't actually have any more right to demand a forum than something like AAA or STABmons. Having our own PS room isn't a factor here either. Like I say, I've been critical of a few things lately, like why on earth do we still have that team switching rule but you're going about this the wrong way, especially when you're misinformed on a fair number of things.

 

[n64lord]

I feel like we have a kind of workaround for #1 if we consider that we're spilling over from the smogon forums to the projects on the monotype homepage.

Not even the people who participated in the bans knew what was going on, so I guess we'll have to wait for someone to give Nani a model for the suspect process. Regardless I feel doing something -even if it wasn't the best thing- turned out well, since the teams you see on the ladder are much more varied than they used to be.

If you feel distant from the staff, do the same thing to get close to them that you did to get in cliques in school... don't expect them to come to you. Or we could have a timeclock meme where they punched in and out so we'd know there was always someone in the room.

 

[Tyke]

This isn't the way to do this, it's no secret that I've not exactly been overjoyed with how long it takes things to get passed through and all the rest of it, but making posts here is in a way, disrupting this thread even more and in reality isn't going to achieve that much compared to just putting it into a PM. Ik it looks good, you're thinking oh it's all out in public now maybe it'll get listened to, but in reality, all you've done here is trashed this thread and made it quite difficult for anybody to respond to. You're also going to create a huge amount of negative feeling which is going to make the room feel even worse compared to just putting this in a PM and maybe people could've taken your opinions on board and started working on it.

1) is something we've asked for before, but (fairly so imo) we've always been rejected, most likely because we stand no chance of ever becoming an official metagame, and to create your own subforum would require people to moderate it, and very few people in Monotype have the posting clout on forums such that staff would be willing to give them moderating powers.

2) I don't disagree, but if you know that Nani runs all suspects and is the guy who makes the final decision, why not PM this to him, rather than put it all here?

3) I was on the staff for the Zapdos ban, and we only had a vague knowledge of what was happening. If you don't know exactly what goes on, find out before commenting about it. We didn't have secret threads nor did we at any point stop considering the playerbase opinions, but this was one of the most contrived bans in Monotype, and was a very difficult one to finally do. We had a long discussion with Nani at one point, where he outlined all his ideas, and we discussed them and debated them. A couple of weeks later we were told Zapdos was being type banned, and since a lot of people such as Kaiser have said it was a good decision, so while the process undoubtedly wasn't the most transparent it led to a good solution. I understand you want the community to be more involved, but where do you draw the line? It's incredibly hard to justify public tests or votes because the majority of people main a type and will vote in accordance with that type, or worse will vote according to the bias of their league.

How can the monotype staff be responsible for getting a sub-forum, those are decided by the OM leaders it's not like they can just snap their fingers and it'll be there. I get we're the largest and most active OM and all that, but we're still just an OM, we don't actually have any more right to demand a forum than something like AAA or STABmons. Having our own PS room isn't a factor here either. Like I say, I've been critical of a few things lately, like why on earth do we still have that team switching rule but you're going about this the wrong way, especially when you're misinformed on a fair number of things.

first off, thanks for taking my post seriously :)

Second off, I'm of the opinion the more people are included in a dicussion the more ideas/solutions that discussion will produce. If I thought either I or the staff had all the solutions to these problems, I would've used a PM; but I don't believe that. I also don't agree that a discussion generating "negative feeling" is a reason not to have it; so long as the potential to address the issues exists (which i believe it does). That said, I agree I chose a crappy place to post this and should've put more thought into that. My bad :<


1. My main issue is that the threads are cramped and non-conducive to the kind of coherent, community-driven discussions that I personally want to see. For me, a sub-forum seems like the easiest fix, but as you've pointed out that's a lot more complicated than it sounds. I don't have the solutions; but bringing awareness to the problem could bear fruit.

2. As I said, i feel an open discussion would be more productive than a PM.

3. The only comment I made on the zapdos ban was that "the majority of players were clued out". I have no idea what the process was to reach that ban, and neither did a lot of players. That was my point.


Bottom line, I'm just frustrated. I didn't pick the best place to express that and it was churlish of me to make suggestions when I don't have all the information, but my intent is to start a discussion amongst the community through which new ideas can be reached regarding the meta, the userbase surrounding it, and the forces which govern it.