Lower Tiers Doubles OU Viability Rankings

[megacyber]

Rotom-Wash From Tier 1 to Tier 1.5
It feels weird saying this because Rotom-Wash has been the most consistently good pokemon for the longest time, but Rotom-Wash is really not liking the current meta. The amount of hyper offense teams right now is insane and, although rather bulky, Rotom-Wash cannot effectively switch in on any hits from popular HO mons (minus Talon). Similarly to Kyurem-Black, there are matchups where Rotom-Wash does wonders, and there are some where it just feels like dead-weight. If needing a water type for a team, I almost never consider washtom because Keldeo exists. Iunno I might be wrong here but I haven't seen Rotom-wash really pull its weight recently.
EDIT: Also getting buttfucked by literally every dragon sucks and I see either hydreigon, Kyub, or Latios on p much every team

I cant believe you didnt mention skymin lol. But yeah, i totally agree

 

[shrop]

I cant believe you didnt mention skymin lol. But yeah, i totally agree

"popular HO mons"
:]

 

[Laga]

in huge agreement, I've actually been pushing for this for some time now

even with the literal best typing in the game, it's defensive stats are just not enough to take neutral hits (or even strong resisted hits). All of the big metagame trends favour offense and / or hyper offense as styles over bulkier teams, and now that almost every single teams has at least one of [cube / hydreigon / latios], most teams have absolutely no problem in basically trampling over rotom-w and shamelessly taking advantage of it for free turns.

 

[Fangame10]

Mega Manectric Tier 2 to Tier 3

It's not that manectric is bad to say. But someone using it would have to be a pretty niche player. Because it's a mega it has no room for an item not allowing it to take advantage of a 135 SPATK. Also its ability, Intimidate, Isn't really that useful on it either because of its poor defense of 70/80/80. Also things like Rotom-H, Rotom-W, Thunderus and Zapdos even do its job much better WITH better defenses

Edit: Rotom-H has literally everything Manectric has (Overheat and other fire related moves) but can hold an item, bulky and actually able to almost OHKO amoongus +SpDef Amoongus

 

[Derivatives]

Mega Manectric Tier 2 to Tier 3

Mega Manectric Tier 2 to Unranked
I don't think it should even be ranked, you can make teams work easily with other things, but Mega Manectric is the hardest thing to fit onto a team since it a) takes up a mega slot and b) it's really underwhelming. Intimidate doesn't buff the 0 bulk it has. I guess it could be used as a cleanup mon, but it doesn't do that well on 99% of teams. Diancie can do this because of its amazing coverage, but Manectric struggles to do this.

edit: if I could I'd like to take back my nomination for dropping Latios, I was thinking of it wrong. after thinking about it and using it it's not comparable to the other two dragons, each one covers their own niche(s) well.

 

[Arcticblast]

Sylveon to Tier 3

It's just kind of bad right now, its only niche is beating Kyurem-B and Hydreigon but once it does that it's pretty much useless, as Keldeo and Terrakion both do big damage and nothing else really gives a shit (Mega TTar actually lives a Hyper Voice with a lot more than 1% left).

 

[xzern]

Mega Charizard X to Tier 3

charx doesn't deserve to be unranked. at the very least, it should be tier 3. it's a really cool setup sweeper that cant be burned. flare blitz from a +1 charx hits like a truck on steroids. however, its most powerful stab wears it down very easily and its completely walled by heatran. it also needs lots of support to maximize its potential.

 

[Kutscher]

Aromatisse to tier 3(or something higher)

aromatisse is a very nice mon in doubles, she is one of the best TR setters, since she can't be taunted, tnks too Aroma Veil, witch helps her ally. she also have a good bulk and a very nice moverpool to help the team.

 

[Fangame10]

Aromatisse to tier 3(or something higher)

aromatisse is a very nice mon in doubles, she is one of the best TR setters, since she can't be taunted, tnks too Aroma Veil, witch helps her ally. she also have a good bulk and a very nice moverpool to help the team.

Aromatisse has poor bulk in reality (72 def and 89 spdef out of 101 make it less bulky than a mew and victini at TR who both have 100/100/100). She also is one of the "sit there" trick room pokemon preferring to not do any actual damage and die in 2 turns. Additionally aromatisse's typing is not good either bc it makes is complete garb in front of Aegislash and bisharp and most people use those pokemon anyways to counter ghost setters. Also: slowbro: 95/100/80 defenses and oblivious(prevents taunt) and can beat amoongus(not in one hit) and burn physical mon with scald, completely outclassed. It's a bad TR setter imo

 

[Stratos]

cress to 1.5

other cress sets havent been 1-worthy for a damn long time and now that weve all gotten over our collective cm circlejerk i think we can agree it is unmerited in 1

 

[Heliosan]

where do you guys think Hoopa will fit on this assuming it is legal in this format?

 

[Derivatives]

Hoopa-U would be Tier 1. Few flaws, those flaws being terribly low physical defense and a need for speed control. However, it has very good coverage (only complete resists are dark types and sylveon), very good special bulk, and its useful niche of being able to take advantage of every turn of Tailwind/Trick Room rather than just 1 or 2. Due to how easy it is to cover a low physical defense (though in Hoopa-U's case, it is very poor) or a need for speed control, it definitely outweighs its faults.

 

[kingmidas]

Hoopa-U would be Tier 1. Few flaws, those flaws being terribly low physical defense and a need for speed control. However, it has very good coverage (only complete resists are dark types and sylveon), very good special bulk, and its useful niche of being able to take advantage of every turn of Tailwind/Trick Room rather than just 1 or 2. Due to how easy it is to cover a low physical defense (though in Hoopa-U's case, it is very poor) or a need for speed control, it definitely outweighs its faults.

I'd say 1.5 is a good starting point of hoopa-u, while the points you made are 100% true, it still suffers from an awkward speed tier of being slightly to fast for TR, which isn't a total issue except for when its weakened to the point of an aegi KO who it can never underspeed, among other atks. And outside of TR its too slow at times to threaten more offensive teams. Add on its vulnerability to all the spread moves, issues getting into matches, and a need to run LO to get those really important KOs on mons like amoonguss (alongside a nice amount of investment). As you stated it does do very well under tailwind and TR due to its amazing stabs, hitting on both sides very hard, alongside impressive sdef and a psychic immunity definitely seems like a case for 1.5 to me.

 

[Derivatives]

There's no way you can move in Trick Room (assuming you are the opponent and you are NOT using a Trick Room team) when Hoopa-U is out unless it's Amoonguss or Ferrothorn (or a random tr mega), as it practically OHKOs a fair portion of the non-dark type mons, as well as removing the option to stall out Trick Room/Tailwind without taking damage. If it doesn't pick up the KO on something (such as Sylveon, for instance) it has a partner to finish it off.
Aegislash run speed, so Hoopa-U at min speed will underspeed almost every time. The only ones that are Quiet these days are Shadow Sneak Aegislash and/or TR Aegislash in which case you'd just use Hoopa-U to annihilate opposing Trick Room teams (252 Atk Life Orb Hoopa-U Hyperspace Fury vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Cresselia: 330-393 (74.3 - 88.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO, assuming Calm Mind Cresselia and 116HP/252Atk/140SpA Quiet Hoopa-U).
Its awkward speed tier is so easy to support with the right Pokemon, but its low Defense stat may not be so easy.
edit: Addressing Hoopa-U without proper speed control, it does well against Sun/Rain due to its high Special Defense, despite functioning poorly against most Hyper offense teams.

 

[Bughouse]

Hoopa does not just beat everything under TR lol. It's good there but there are numerous mons slower that hit plenty hard. It does do a great job of keeping TR from going up though.

 

[Derivatives]

Electabuzz to Tier 3

Magmar to Tier 3
These two are extremely niche but I think redirecting Kangaskhan/Metagross for Flame Body/Static and Talonflame for Static on Electabuzz is about equal to Friend Guard Clefairy. They also have nice typings, though Electabuzz moreso with the Flying resist as well as the Steel resist. I'd like to nominate them for Tier 3, redirecting those top threats is pretty neat when you can burn/paralyze them.

 

[Stratos]

There's no way you can move in Trick Room (assuming you are the opponent and you are NOT using a Trick Room team) when Hoopa-U is out

or like, togekiss, or bisharp, or a dozen other things

i mean hoopa-u is good but you're overstating it pretty drastically and it has definitely not yet shown me that it belongs in tier 1

 

[Laga]

im siding with pwne for once here

hoopa-u is a threat when field effects are up, but otherwise it's p non-threatening. I actually think it's nice to have something in the meta that's not particularly threatening but completely fucks up aegislash (aka the most annoying thing in the world) and punishes allowing the opponent to set field effects.

 

[Stratos]

laga please you side with me all the fuckin time

edit: we agreed on every vote last round except one

 

[atomicllamas]

Hi, I am offended by the lack of Hariyama in this thread. As a TR fake out user, I understand why many people would prefer Scrafty, as it's access to intimidate and secondary Dark-typing is (usually) very helpful. However, Hariyama probably deserves to be in tier 3, as it has an excellent match up against 2 pretty common team archetypes: Sun and full TR, while still retaining use against other teams. I also had success in spite of my relative newness to doubles (I'm not new, but I never consistently play it, though I should cause its fun!), in the summer seasonal with my Hariyama team, that went 6-1 between round 6 and round 9, and the only loss was to Stratos who it also beat twice, lol.

Hariyama Minaj (Hariyama) @ Sitrus Berry
Ability: Thick Fat
EVs: 252 Atk / 128 Def / 128 SpD
Brave Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Close Combat
- Fake Out
- Iron Head
- Rock Slide

This is the set I used, but the reality is that Hariyama has quite a few options, Knock Off is almost certainly better than iron head, unless you are real as fuck and super counter teaming stratos (actually I'm sure cc does a shit ton to diancie I should prolly change that, lol). Thick Fat + Rock Slide is really nice for pooping on common sun builds under TR (pair w/ goggles cress on Semi Room). Also Hariyama has the slowest fake out of any fully evolved mon iirc, which is once again super useful against opposing TR. Guts is also a cool ability if you are going full TR, but I like Hariyama to retain some use outside of it. I'd like to think its superior match ups against Sun and opposing TR let it fit into the tier three criteria (I'm sure other people could build a good team w/ hariyama, I just can't build doubles for shit :x) (also its gotta be better than Virizion e_e).

more importantly:

HARIYAMA MINAJ IRL

this message was Arcticblast approved.

 

[Pocket]

Heavy booty Slam if Hariyama is a true Minaj

252+ Atk Hariyama Heavy Slam (120 BP) vs. 56 HP / 200 Def Sylveon: 296-350 (85.7 - 101.4%) -- 12.5% chance to OHKO
252+ Atk Hariyama Heavy Slam (120 BP) vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Mega Gardevoir: 384-454 (112.9 - 133.5%) -- guaranteed OHKO
252+ Atk Hariyama Heavy Slam (120 BP) vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Diancie: 384-452 (126.3 - 148.6%) -- guaranteed OHKO
252+ Atk Hariyama Heavy Slam (120 BP) vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Azumarill: 164-193 (40.5 - 47.7%) -- guaranteed 3HKO

squashing pixies

 

[Bughouse]

I mean his Hariyama set is is far from perfect...

But yes it's a totally viable mon and deserves a rank

 

[xzern]

3 -> 2.5 under the fucking description floating in the middle of rank 2. you know what i fycking mean

everyone knows im a sucker for mawile, but i think that it's a bit more viable now because of how trick room is a lot better because of hoopa and how it makes a good tr core with hoopa as well (posted by aurarayquaza in the effective cores thread). also, speaking of hoopa, mawile just eats it. i think mawile's biggest drawback is how it has horrid stats before mega evolving so its pretty hard to bring it in, but also how it doesn't have that many good matchups vs some tier 1 threats, like stratos has said.

also stops hp bug mega gengar :O

unranked -> 1.5

needs a rank and i didn't see it on the rankings, so correct me if i'm wrong. i think that 1.5 would be the best place for it since it doesn't "fit on all teams" because it pretty much requires speed control in order to maximize its potential. could rise to 1 in the future but this seems like a good starting rank for it.

 

[Checkmater]

1.5->1

This mon has good matchups against all of tier 1, except diancie or stone edge landorus, but even then there's always maxspeed flash cannon for diancie. The huge pressure of prankster twave and it's good matchups vs the other electric type in the meta (aka rotom-wash) make it an incredibly strong pivot capable to ripping apart ho teams. It also greatly constrains the way trick room teams have to play, either leading no setter or just not setting it, or using mental herb on amoonguss/the setter

It's also the fastest taunt except for whimsicott.

Capable of outspeeding +spe 110s and neutral talonflame, and has great team synergy with a huge portion of the metagame, most notably landot.


(btw first time posting in this thread plz don't beat me up k thnx)

 

[Pocket]

I was surprised when I first learned that Flash Cannon is a legit coverage move on offensive Thundurus-I. Unlike HP Steel Mega Gar, Flash Cannon not only gives you a solid kill-Diancie button, but also trashes Kyurem-B looking for a free sub (ends up with ~30% after a sub and 2 turns of lefties). Other fullproof Thundurus checks like TTar, Abomasnow, and esp. Mamoswine (despite its rarity) take a good hit/dies. With Mega Diancie around, max Speed offensive LO Thundurus is gettin hotter, as handful of you have been touting already.