np: OU Suspect Testing Round 4 - Blaze of Glory

[Texas Cloverleaf]

Also, strong hitting pokemon find it easy to get past Reuniclus. For example on my current rain team I run CB Gyarados where a Waterfall will easily 2HKO Reuniclus. 20% flinch chance aside, a CM version lacks the power to do a particularly large amount of damage to a pokemon with gyarados's bulk and a TR version has only one turn to attack it, iirc it cant KO either. While it can of course, switch out, Gyarados is then getting a strong hit on the switch in and has done its job by forcing away the threat. There are many, many pokemon that can outspeed and 1 or 2HKO a Reuniclus on its own. Another example is Rotom-W. While in many cases it is a bulky version, which still hits powerfully, on Rain teams it has the option of running Specs, either OHKOing Reuniclus with Hydro Pump or 2HKOing with Thunder, which also catches any potential Water Absorbers on a switch.

Basically there are a lot of pokemon that can serverly limit Reuniclus as long as you dont allow it to set up. If you see that your opponent has Reuniclus and you have a Ferrothorn, you attempt to limit the chances for Reuniclus to come in. it just takes smart play.


As a final note I am aware that the checks I mentioned function best in weather, however these augment the ranks of Scizor, Jirachi etc as pokemon that can check Reu, and with the prominenct of weather it is hardly irrelevant to include them.

 

[Virizion]

Also, strong hitting pokemon find it easy to get past Reuniclus. For example on my current rain team I run CB Gyarados where a Waterfall will easily 2HKO Reuniclus. 20% flinch chance aside, a CM version lacks the power to do a particularly large amount of damage to a pokemon with gyarados's bulk and a TR version has only one turn to attack it, iirc it cant KO either. While it can of course, switch out, Gyarados is then getting a strong hit on the switch in and has done its job by forcing away the threat. There are many, many pokemon that can outspeed and 1 or 2HKO a Reuniclus on its own. Another example is Rotom-W. While in many cases it is a bulky version, which still hits powerfully, on Rain teams it has the option of running Specs, either OHKOing Reuniclus with Hydro Pump or 2HKOing with Thunder, which also catches any potential Water Absorbers on a switch.

Basically there are a lot of pokemon that can serverly limit Reuniclus as long as you dont allow it to set up. If you see that your opponent has Reuniclus and you have a Ferrothorn, you attempt to limit the chances for Reuniclus to come in. it just takes smart play.


As a final note I am aware that the checks I mentioned function best in weather, however these augment the ranks of Scizor, Jirachi etc as pokemon that can check Reu, and with the prominenct of weather it is hardly irrelevant to include them.

Most TR Reuni's I see on Random Matchup carry Thunder supposedly for bulky Waters, like your Gyarados.

 

[Texas Cloverleaf]

interesting given that Ive never seen a single Reuniclus carry Thunder. CM versions cant because of movepool issues. Standard TR Reu carries Psychic, Shadow ball and Focus Blast. Given that it isnt dropping Psychic, if it drops Shadow Ball, its hard countered by any Psychic. If it drops Focus blast it is hard countered by T-Tar and the Steel/Psychics or Steel/Bugs. The same holds true for HP Fire bar the Steel pokemon.

 

[THE ENEMY]

Here's the kicker. People who are saying Reuncules isn't Uber are tending to bring up a counter for him in that argument.

Like I've said, that argument falls through because "good" counters for him are over centralized, while the "checks" for him arent good enough. I'll restate some of my points here:

Talking Points: Quick Reasons Why Reuniclus is Uber:

1. Magic Guard means the only way to get rid of Reuniclus is through direct attacks. There are problems with this. They deserve their own sublist:
1A. Reuniclus can switch out when it is threatened WITHOUT penalty. Dealing with Reuniclus is one thing, but making abosulute sure that your Reuniclus counter can make it through the duration of the battle through entry hazards at the very least while Reuncules is immune WITH recover makes it an uphill battle from the start.
1B. Reuniclus is Bulky. Even univested, Reuncules can take neutral and resisted hits pretty well. Very rarely is he univested too. This can be augmented by Calm Mind further. Plus recover.
1C. Reuniclus will probably attack first due to Trick Room anyway.

2. With a Life Orb, Reuniclues Base Special Attack should read somewhere around 166 or so. With 3 moves and 1 boost, he can OHKO just about eveything in the game, while easily 2HKOing the things that wont go down in One hit. OHKO's with residual damage. Even without a boost, he can 2hko almost eveything anyway, while only very specific and over centralize counters wont be.

3. With 2 moves, he only loses coverage only on Psychics, pokemon who can't really touch him anway, and can be easily dealt with (other than himself of course).

4. His counters can either be easily beaten or are too over centralized to him, and serve no other important purpose. Well examine both separately.
4A. For the "counters" that are useful, Reuniclus can pretty much beat them with the right set and/or prediction. Take Scizor and Ttar. Trick Room lets him go first, and Focus Blast will OHKO TTAr and 2HKO Scizor. If Reuniclus doesn't have Trick Room, or if it doesnt have Scizor (or excavalier) in OHKO range, it can simply switch out. If it predicts Pursuit, it can stay in and recover off damage and/or attack again and kill it.
4B. There are pokemon that exist which can be chosen and tailor made to somewhat counter him. Pokemon Like a Specially defensive Drapion, etc... The problem is that this is overcentralization for Reuniclus, and that is what a ban is for in the first place. Not to metion that he can beat these counters too over time....

 

[haunter]

Talking Points: Quick Reasons Why Reuniclus is Uber:

1. Magic Guard means the only way to get rid of Reuniclus is through direct attacks. There are problems with this. They deserve their own sublist:
1A. Reuniclus can switch out when it is threatened WITHOUT penalty. Dealing with Reuniclus is one thing, but making abosulute sure that your Reuniclus counter can make it through the duration of the battle through entry hazards at the very least while Reuncules is immune WITH recover makes it an uphill battle from the start.
1B. Reuniclus is Bulky. Even univested, Reuncules can take neutral and resisted hits pretty well. Very rarely is he univested too. This can be augmented by Calm Mind further. Plus recover.
1C. Reuniclus will probably attack first due to Trick Room anyway.

it's weak to pursuit, hence it can't switch out with impunity that easily.

2. With a Life Orb, Reuniclues Base Special Attack should read somewhere around 166 or so. With 3 moves and 1 boost, he can OHKO just about eveything in the game, while easily 2HKOing the things that wont go down in One hit. OHKO's with residual damage. Even without a boost, he can 2hko almost eveything anyway, while only very specific and over centralize counters wont be.

3. With 2 moves, he only loses coverage only on Psychics, pokemon who can't really touch him anway, and can be easily dealt with (other than himself of course).

Latios\Latias would like to have a word with you. They can 1-2hko with specs draco meteor depending on Reuniclus' EV spread. Opposing Reuniclus can wall it, as well as setting up on it. Victini ohkos it with vcreate while resisting both focus blast and psychic. Celebi can setup on shadow-ball less Reuniclus. The list of counters goes on.

4. His counters can either be easily beaten or are too over centralized to him, and serve no other important purpose. Well examine both separately.
4A. For the "counters" that are useful, Reuniclus can pretty much beat them with the right set and/or prediction. Take Scizor and Ttar. Trick Room lets him go first, and Focus Blast will OHKO TTAr and 2HKO Scizor. If Reuniclus doesn't have Trick Room, or if it doesnt have Scizor (or excavalier) in OHKO range, it can simply switch out. If it predicts Pursuit, it can stay in and recover off damage and/or attack again and kill it.
4B. There are pokemon that exist which can be chosen and tailor made to somewhat counter him. Pokemon Like a Specially defensive Drapion, etc... The problem is that this is overcentralization for Reuniclus, and that is what a ban is for in the first place. Not to metion that he can beat these counters too over time....

This is just not true. There are several ways to beat TR Reuniclus. You can encore its last move and set up on it or just be smart and switch until TR ends. Without calm mind it also lacks the power to ohko certain bulky Pokemon that have access to recovery moves (Burungeru and Vaporeon are good examples) so they can just stall out TR and slowly wear Reuniclus down. You're also forgetting that TR Reuniclus usually lacks recover so it loses health when switching in and setting up TR. Also keep in mind that centralization doesn't mean much. If anything, Pokemon like TTar and Scizor aren't centralizing the metagame because of Reuniclus anyway.

 

[RotatingAtom]

(...)

LEAVE LATIOS ALONE WE ALL WANNA ABUSE HIM

I'd like to draw your attention towards this for a second.

If you use a Pokémon a lot and find out that it is too powerful / broken
or overcentralizing in any way, don't be afraid to nominate it regardless!

I read something like this several times during the last suspect testing round,
and people seem to nominate Pokémon they hate fighting against far quicker
than they nominate Pokémon they love (ab)using themselves, no matter
how good these Pokémon are. Take this into consideration when
you post your suspects! This also goes for abilities, items and combo bans!

 

[Nanoswine]

The problem is differentiating between what is an overcentralized counter, and what is just a Pokemon that is good in the metagame. Is SpDef Jirachi used because it beats Latios, or because it beats a several common special attackers including Latios? Pokemon are used on a team to beat other Pokemon, so at what point does it go from Gliscor counters Breloom to Gastrodon counters Kyogre?

With Latios, it's hard to tell. If Latios was Uber, there would be a lot less SpDef Jirachi and Ttar floating around. But partly because it is OU, they are everywhere. Does this make Latios overcentralizing?

 

[Hallow]

I'd like to remind you of the importance of Fire-type moves and Bullet Punch resistance in the Pt metagame, on that note.

The reason for that didn't go to Uber.

 

[THE ENEMY]

it's weak to pursuit, hence it can't switch out with impunity that easily.

Latios\Latias would like to have a word with you. They can 1-2hko with specs draco meteor depending on Reuniclus' EV spread. Opposing Reuniclus can wall it, as well as setting up on it. Victini ohkos it with vcreate while resisting both focus blast and psychic. Celebi can setup on shadow-ball less Reuniclus. The list of counters goes on.

This is just not true. There are several ways to beat TR Reuniclus. You can encore its last move and set up on it or just be smart and switch until TR ends. Without calm mind it also lacks the power to ohko certain bulky Pokemon that have access to recovery moves (Burungeru and Vaporeon are good examples) so they can just stall out TR and slowly wear Reuniclus down. You're also forgetting that TR Reuniclus usually lacks recover so it loses health when switching in and setting up TR. Also keep in mind that centralization doesn't mean much. If anything, Pokemon like TTar and Scizor aren't centralizing the metagame because of Reuniclus anyway.

A: predicting pursuit insnt hard at all, even more so that there are only 2 popular users of it (ttar + scizor). Also, he can usually kill them anyway...

B: the point i made about psychics was just that they are easily dealt with and reuncules can come back in later to wreak havoc or when they are weakened. Also, to argue that reuncules counters itself as a Non-ban argument defeats its own purpose.

C: Seven Deadly Sins made this point as well. In the end, Magic Guard on such a powerful pokemon is the deal breaker. Its just too popular a pokemon to be able to have the ability to have immunity to every form of damage besides direct attacks.

 

[KurashiDragon]

Special Defensive Jirachi is used because it beats the majority of common special attackers in BW. Latios is one of them, but don't say ridiculous statements like "Latios is the metagame". Examples being Tornadus, Reuniclus, Thundurus (luck is a factor on both sides for this one), CM Virizion and Rotom-W. It also provides useful paralysis on things like Politoed coming in to get Rain up and use specs hydro pump (Tyranitar benefits greatly from being able to outspeed Politoed), Gliscor switching in for the first time, negating Poison Heal (and therefore taking away its recovery), and basically everything else.

Latios, Reuniclus, Excadrill etc, none of these pokemon centralise OU. If anything, Ferrothorn is the pokemon everything is centralised towards. I would even be willing to say that Ferrothorn's popularity is why things like Starmie will probably not make OU.

You misread my post by 1 word and that's "in". Latios is in the metagame. It's not the face of the metagame. That is exclusive to rain. However, by just being in the metagame Jirachi, T-tar, Ferrothorn are all used more because of their ability to check Latios. I also never stated that they centralized the metagame. I just simply said they're used more because of latios. Much like how Scizor was used more in gen 4 because of Salamence and Latias.

On the Reuniclus discussion: I'm kinda surprised this is still being brought up. Did anyone notice that with each suspect test Reuniclus has gotten it has gotten less bans than the last suspect test?

Pro Ban: Reuniclus has the best ability in the metagame, Magic Guard. This combined with it's natural bulk and Recover allow it to switch in almost whenever it wants and set up to it's hearts content. The Calm Mind Set tears through Full stall rather easily because with magic Guard it's not damaged by the hazards full stall sets up and full stall doesn't have powerful enough attackers to break through Reuniclus. As a result Reuniclus is a direct counter to almost all full stall.

With the TR set Reuniclus' low Spd, High SpA, and brilliant coverage allow it to tear through full offensive teams. While it lacks calm mind to set up, it's 125 SpA allow it to break though the low defensive power of offense and with it's low speed it can effectively use Trick Room to deal with the high speed of offense.

Argument's against ban: Reuniclus' Calm Mind set suffers from a 4 moveslot syndrome. It's forced to choose between Focus Blast, Shadow Ball, and HP Fire. Focus Blast deals with the most troublesome threat in Tyranitar who's CB Crunch has a chance to ohko and pursuit which has the same chance to ohko if Reuniclus Switches out. Focus Blast also semi Deals with Scizor who's CB Bug Bite ohko's and also has cb Pursuit and U-turn. However, Focus Blast makes it difficult to deal with other Psychic types such as CM Roar Latias and gives a counter in Spiritomb and, in DW, Sabalye. Shadow Ball allows it to deal with any set up psychic type like Latias and lets it combat spiritomb and Sabalye. However, it loses to tyranitar and Scizor and gives it extra trouble against Durant and Escaliver. how can ohko with their respective bug moves. HP fire gets rid of Scizor, Durant, and Escaliver but gives it trouble against all of those it could get rid of with Focus Blast and Shadow Ball. Therefore it literally has to choose it's counters with Focus Blast, Shadow Ball, and HP Fire. Once you figure out what moves the Calm Mind set is running it's rather easy to play around and eventually beat.

The TR set doesn't suffer from the 4 moveslot syndrome like the CM set but trades it's bulk for more power. Taking away the Def evs and recover make it so Priority can tear through the TR set easily. Also any pokemon with a strong enough attack (which again is much easier to find with the lack of bulk in the TR set) and enough bulk to deal with at least one attack can force Reuniclus out or possibly get rid of it alltogether. Finally, the TR set has a counter in Escaliver who has the SpD to take all of Reuniclus' attacks and is slower than Reuniclus meaning it's "Faster" than Reuniclus under TR. CB Megahorn also has a 100% chance to ohko the tr set.

My opinion: Pro banners I can understand your plight. I've used CM Reuniclus and have torn through Full stall myself. However, I know it's weaknesses and I've actually been beaten by a full stall team with my CM Reuniclus because they knew how to play around it and eventually break it. In my personal Expirience with Reuniclus I haven't found it to be broken.

@Virizion

That seems a little silly to me. Just because you see alot of TR Reuniclus on "Random Matchup" run thunder doesn't mean most Reuniclus use thunder. That actually seems like a bad move to me sense your messing up it's perfect Psychic / Ghost / Fighting coverage.

p.s: AGAIN! Wtf is that and why can't I get rid of it?

 

[jrrrrrrr]

This new metagame is pretty bad IMO. We need to ban auto-weather and unban Blaziken and Manaphy.

Also, the only thing currently in OU that I would vote to ban is Latios. The Specs set is an absolute monster, and the number of pokemon the Scarf set can come into for free and OHKO is extremely high.

 

[Ulevo]

Here's the kicker. People who are saying Reuncules isn't Uber are tending to bring up a counter for him in that argument.

Um. Isn't that the whole point? Or did I miss something here?

Like I've said, that argument falls through because "good" counters for him are over centralized, while the "checks" for him arent good enough. I'll restate some of my points here:

So... You're saying that his common "counters" are popular. And this makes him Uber how? If anything, this would make him less effective.

Talking Points: Quick Reasons Why Reuniclus is Uber:

1. Magic Guard means the only way to get rid of Reuniclus is through direct attacks. There are problems with this. They deserve their own sublist:
1A. Reuniclus can switch out when it is threatened WITHOUT penalty. Dealing with Reuniclus is one thing, but making abosulute sure that your Reuniclus counter can make it through the duration of the battle through entry hazards at the very least while Reuncules is immune WITH recover makes it an uphill battle from the start.
1B. Reuniclus is Bulky. Even univested, Reuncules can take neutral and resisted hits pretty well. Very rarely is he univested too. This can be augmented by Calm Mind further. Plus recover.
1C. Reuniclus will probably attack first due to Trick Room anyway.

1) Pursuit.

2) Switching is not a valid argument since EVERYTHING barring maybe Steel types in an example involving Magnet Pull, anything without Levitate and a Flying type involving Arena Trap, Shadow Tag and Pursuit are able to switch out. That includes like... Almost everything.

3) You're overestimating how bulky Reuiniclus is. Even after 252/252 Bold, my Tyranitar with no EV investment in Attack and no beneficial nature with just an Expert Belt 2HKO's Reuniclus with Crunch. It needs investment if it wants to last.

4) Again, you can't just assume its running Trick Room while including the other benefits. If it has Trick Room, its losing out on durability, coverage, or both. Also, it needs a turn to set up Trick Room, so its NOT going first.

2. With a Life Orb, Reuniclues Base Special Attack should read somewhere around 166 or so. With 3 moves and 1 boost, he can OHKO just about eveything in the game, while easily 2HKOing the things that wont go down in One hit. OHKO's with residual damage. Even without a boost, he can 2hko almost eveything anyway, while only very specific and over centralize counters wont be.

It gets really tiring reading this "KO's or 2HKO's everything in OU" crap. There's how many Pokemon that fit this bill now? He's strong, admittedly. That doesn't make him broken.

Also, even if this were true (which its not by the way, there's Pokemon Reuniclus can't even touch), it would only be in the event that Reuniclus has the proper coverage, and it would require him to run AT LEAST Psyshock, Focus Blast, and Shadow Ball. He suffers major move set syndrome at this point.

3. With 2 moves, he only loses coverage only on Psychics, pokemon who can't really touch him anway, and can be easily dealt with (other than himself of course).

Pokemon that can't touch him anyway? Um. Latios and Latias have Trick and Draco Meteor all day. Victini has V Create and U Turn. I'm sure Starmie wrecks face with Hydro Pump or Surf in the rain, and it learns Recover too, so variants lacking Calm Mind are threatened by that. Starmie also learns Trick. Espeon learns Shadow Ball, admittedly I am not sure if Espeon is used much at this point. Timid Wobb laughs at Reuinclus as it switches in and forces you to waste all the PP to your Recover, Trick Room, or forces you to Encore Calm Mind while they switch to something that can OHKO or 2HKO Reuniclus, either directly or via stat up to sweep. Metagross Pursuits/Meteor Mashes you. If you lack Trick Room, Jirachi has fun flinching you to death, using Trick, or entering a Calm Mind war.

4. His counters can either be easily beaten or are too over centralized to him, and serve no other important purpose. Well examine both separately.
4A. For the "counters" that are useful, Reuniclus can pretty much beat them with the right set and/or prediction. Take Scizor and Ttar. Trick Room lets him go first, and Focus Blast will OHKO TTAr and 2HKO Scizor. If Reuniclus doesn't have Trick Room, or if it doesnt have Scizor (or excavalier) in OHKO range, it can simply switch out. If it predicts Pursuit, it can stay in and recover off damage and/or attack again and kill it.

Prediction goes both ways, and is not a valid argument when considering whether or not a Pokemon is suspect.

Also, Focus Blast I believe does not OHKO all variants of Tyranitar. Also, it doesn't OHKO Scizor, while Scizor OHKOs you with U Turn.

Again, switching is not a valid argument. You switch, you give your opponent a free turn. Stat up, Pursuit, U Turn. Your opponent isn't just sitting there.

4B. There are pokemon that exist which can be chosen and tailor made to somewhat counter him. Pokemon Like a Specially defensive Drapion, etc... The problem is that this is overcentralization for Reuniclus, and that is what a ban is for in the first place. Not to metion that he can beat these counters too over time....

Man. You're playing WAY too much Papermon and not enough Pokemon.

 

[haunter]

A: predicting pursuit insnt hard at all, even more so that there are only 2 popular users of it (ttar + scizor). Also, he can usually kill them anyway...

Predicting pursuit is not easy at all. If you mispredict against Scizor it will ohko you with u-turn or bug bite. Mispredicting against TTar will make you eat a CB crunch which means ohko for the Reuniclus user.

B: the point i made about psychics was just that they are easily dealt with and reuncules can come back in later to wreak havoc or when they are weakened. Also, to argue that reuncules counters itself as a Non-ban argument defeats its own purpose.

Easily dealt with? What are you talking about? Why do people always assume that counters to a given threat are always weakened\dead when they want to ban something? Also keep in mind that we don't have to make non-ban arguments, Reuniclus is currently OU, so it's your burden to make compelling ban arguments.

C: Seven Deadly Sins made this point as well. In the end, Magic Guard on such a powerful pokemon is the deal breaker. Its just too popular a pokemon to be able to have the ability to have immunity to every form of damage besides direct attacks.

While I respect SDS, the fact that he thinks that Reuniclus is broken won't make your point stronger, this "ipse dixit" argument will take you nowhere. Nobody is denying that Reuniclus is a powerful Pokemon, but Gen 5 metagame is filled with powerful Pokemon and the main issue here seems to be that some of you prefer to ban these Pokemon rather than adapt to them.

 

[capefeather]

Lately, I've been torn on Reuniclus. I'm of the opinion that it's the closest thing to broken in this metagame, and I have had a lot of battles both easy and hard with teams using Reuniclus.

Of course I experiment during the suspect test, but I keep an account high on the leaderboard using teams I know are good because I have opinions on the metagame and want to vote.

That's great, and I'm sorry that I went after you like that. But can we really say this about the entire future voting population? I also think that there's a problem when testing is so separate from making reqs, but I think that that's an issue for a different thread.

 

[Lork]

reinclus is great if you have scizor because you're almost garunteed to switch it in, and it garuntees you momentum.

 

[Diana]

Reuniclus is amazing right now, but I'm seriously on the fence on it. I find the Trick Room set better right now with the offensive teams all over but damage does build up on it quite quickly.

Still looking for good ways to handle Excadrill, which is a total pain. Too early to call though.

I've actually seen a few teams run other Sand Veil/Snow Cloak Pokemon but Garchomp's power is what pushes it over the edge with it, not just the evasion. Nothing else with it is nearly as good, I'm really thinking it's just Garchomp and not the 20% chance of missing.

Also looking forward to when we get back to the Drizzle/Swift Swim matter but concentrating on this right now. Sun is good too with Victini but outside of that I haven't had too much trouble with it yet.

 

[Mishra]

reinclus is great if you have scizor because you're almost garunteed to switch it in, and it garuntees you momentum.

And that is why Hp Fire is becoming more common. Mines runs it to great sucess because versing a team with ttar and scizor, they will always bring scizor out, even if isn't sand streaming. Why? Because everyone fears the Focus blast.

I am not the only case, I think hp fire may be more common on Reuc, not only to suprise scizor on the switch, but also because even when I correctly predict the focus blast, it will miss on me and makes me sad =(.

Um. Isn't that the whole point? Or did I miss something here?

I think for once, you and I are in agreement. The whole idea of determining if a poke is broken or not is to look to the counters. blazeken only had one solid one, which died if it was mixed, salamence in gen 4 only really had scizor and swampert as hard counters (plus a stealth rock weakness).

@Ecadril: I originally wanted to see him gone, and then realized both gliscor and conkledurr were great counters to him. He has a couple others of course, but I think his biggest weakness is his shallow movepool. Earthquake, SD, Rock slide, and something else...

 

[Crim09]

I feel in terms of sun that Victini with vcreate is the only possibly broken pokemon under it (not released as of yet so TBD). On teams that use weather, weather counters or even no weather that I have used I have been able to deal with most. Even when I lost there was nothing that stood out as too overpowered or broken for the current metagame. I think if people are focusing on banning sun they are passing over some more current and prominent threats to the stability of the game.

In terms of Reuniculus I think that it has counters, what should determine if it goes to ubers is how reliable those counters are to it. Remember, by definition a counter must be able to switch in and faint the opponents pokemon. I believe on the old Garchomp or Salamence discussion thread for banning in 4th gen that was a determining factor because of the lack of true counters.

 

[Mario With Lasers]

That said, I really don't think Victini being overpowered under Sun is any reason to ban Sun, we've claused SwSw out from Rain and voted on Excadrill three times, the weather itself shouldn't be the target if there are a small minority of mons it breaks. Also, since Sun was voted OU with a huge majority last round and the only thing added to it is Victini, I find it hard to believe that Sun is the broken factor here.

I feel in terms of sun that Victini with vcreate is the only possibly broken pokemon under it (not released as of yet so TBD).

I still haven't played in this round neither have I faced any V-Create Victini so what I'm about to say may seem a bit irresponsible, but has it occurred to anyone that, if "V-Create Victini under Sun" comes to be considered broken, the culprit would be... V-Create? Banning V-Create wouldn't feel like watering down Darkrai by banning Dark Void as people believed DV was only one factor in Darkrai's brokeness; Victini really doesn't have anything which would make it even close to broken, except for V-Create, and it's the only relevant pokémon to learn it (Smeargle would objectively never use it, under any circumstances, just like it would never use Dark Void in Singles).

V-Create's only user is weak to Pursuit, has its STABs resisted by glorious Tyranitar since the dawn of time, has no boosting move, has one hundred base Attack, the move reduces its defenses and Speed by one stage... and yet it's going to be used like hell (you don't need a Ph.D in Advanced Theorymon to know that); Victini's V-Create is ~9.5% weaker than Darmanitan's Flare Blitz and, while it doesn't have recoil, forces it to switch out or else it's going to be as frail (and slower) than Darmanitan... and yet it's going to be used. Hell, will there even be a reason to use Victini without V-Create? I would say people won't use V-Create because it's awesome on Victini, but use Victini because V-Create is awesome instead.


But of course, I'm not saying it's broken. Not even close. We don't need to start this round with the sentiment of having to find something to ban. I just hope people may have the sensibility to identify the real problem should we ever come to that, but without trying to "water down" anything.

and I'm off to abuse Victini now, it's not like my team didn't need any help with its anemia after all

 

[Nubbins]

I find it interesting that people who want to ban Reuniclus can only offer theorymon to back up their claims. "Magic Guard makes Reuniclus OP since it takes no residual damage!!" So what? Prove that Magic Guard makes it OP besides just stating stuff you can copypaste off bulbapedia.

On the other hand, people who want to keep Reuniclus in OU can give concrete examples on how Reuniclus is not unbeatable and several different checks and counters. What's more, these counters can be used in any type of team, be it weather or stall.

Let's not forget Spiritomb and Escavalier as almost hard counters, adding even more pokemon to the list.

 

[THE ENEMY]

While I respect SDS, the fact that he thinks that Reuniclus is broken won't make your point stronger, this "ipse dixit" argument will take you nowhere. Nobody is denying that Reuniclus is a powerful Pokemon, but Gen 5 metagame is filled with powerful Pokemon and the main issue here seems to be that some of you prefer to ban these Pokemon rather than adapt to them.

I hope I'm not the only one who doesn't know what "ispe dixit" means. So i don't know what you mean there.

Regardless, I agree that people are quick to press "BAN" on powerful pokemon. The reason i'm focusing on Reunicles is that out of all these "suspect pokemon" I believe him to be the most suspect. Whether or not you think he should be banned, i think we can at least agree on that point.

Now the point of disagreement arises when you think he is not powerful enough where things can't adapt adequately, and I think that this adaptation is causing an overcentralization.

Ttar and Scizor are good checks, but can be beaten. The thing is, after them, where do you go? every other check and counter is without a doubt over centralized directly to counter Reuncules, and even they are beatable. Its just a big mess.

 

[Aeroblacktyl]

What you call hard counters most people would call extremely dedicated counters.

Anyways, as someone who used V-Create Victini on a Sun team (illegally) about 2 rounds ago, it wasn't that great. It'll have the same issue that all Sun teams do and that's controlling the weather. What I found myself doing most of the time was spamming it's U-Turn because let's face it, you're not doing shit to a Politoed with V-Create and you're going to get Tar fucked with the -stats.

In fact the way you use a Victini is so different than you would a Sun sweeper. Sun teams HATE switching about. SR limits you as it is already but esepecially now. And for Victini to keep on removing it's negative stat drops, it's causing more damage to your own team than you'd like. Of course Victini could TR to fix this problem but if you're dead before your TR runs out, the rest of your +speed sweepers are absolutely fucked.

So don't try to theorymon that Victini "in Sun" is broken because the "in Sun" part is a very, very fluid concept. If you worked hard enough to destroy their other weather Pokes and then sweep with Victini, then it's just like a regular Pokemon battle, and that doesn't make it 'broken.'

 

[Tobes]

Ok, time to unload my thoughts.

Deoxys-S: This is really the only thing I regret not voting Uber last round. It's no longer to much of a problem as a spiker, as Ferrothorn is arguably the better spiker now. My main problem with it is the Dual Screen set, which I at the time of the vote had believed would just end up being replaced my Mew or Deoxys-D. Definitely a mistake on my part, as I should have realized that that speed means everything. It really allows set-up sweepers to become too difficult to take down, and I intend to get it out of here this round.

Latios: I don't understand why people thinks this need to go. He's hardly the problem here, as the metagame has naturally shifted to handle not just him but nearly all of the powerful special attackers. What confuses me even more was that people voted to ban him but not sun or rain. I don't think either need to be banned, but at least be consistent people.

Blaziken: Ah yes, Blaziken. Although I voted not to ban him on the grounds that he helped keep weather in check I have to agree that he's Uber. I actually see quite an interesting parallel to Aldaron's proposal here in that Blaziken was just as broken as 1st / 2nd round Drizzle due to power + speed because of the speed moreso than the power. What I had been worried about was sun's relative lack of fast and powerful sweepers, something that rain now has a definite advantage with Genies / Starmie. With the release of V-create Victini I no longer have any concerns about weather balance, as it seriously helps fill in the power gaps while still being fairly quick. I no longer have any intention of nominating Blaziken for a re-test. In the meantime Volcarona had risen up to become the most threatning sun sweeper, in my opinion, as it is very difficult to take down Morning Sun variants before they set up if you don't carry Rock-type moves. Victini and Infernape are still very deadly in their own right, and I'm going to experiment with Morning Sun Volcarona + SD Nape (perhaps with lefties over LO to mitigate Flare Blitz damage) + CB Victini for smashing apart cores.

Weather: Yes, weather is the metagame, but that isn't really a concern in my opinion. Argue "overcentralization" all you want, but I feel that if you want to ban weather just because you don't like seeing it all the time you're doing it for the wrong reasons. It's been said before, but we're not recreating gen 4 here. Now, if you argue that it makes things too strong, I can understand that, but I feel that each weather has plenty of ways of dealing with other weathers, and there are definitely easy ways to check weather even if you don't run it yourself (although I wouldn't recommend not running a weather inducer or at least a weather move). For example, Specsdra walks all over rain teams that have lost Ferrothorn. Bronzong completely walls Excadrill and Landorus, although Terrakion can break through it. Thundurus can paralyze threats without any trouble. There are plenty of viable ways of dealing with weather, and I honestly think it doesn't need to go.

Reuniclus: I played extensively with this last round, and I feel it isn't broken. Very powerful, doubtlessly a top-tier threat, but not broken. Its bulk is a bit problematic but it can still be hit quite hard and is usually ending up as only a 1-for-1 trade off as long as you know what you're doing. Chopletar easily beats it one-on-one, which really should be used more as it mericlessly rapes Thundurus, Tornadus, and random HP Fighting Latios. On another note, the metagame handles TR Reuniclus fairly easily for the same reasons it handles Latios. For example, Trick Room variants with LO HP Fire are not OHKOing specially defensive Ferrothorn (read: all), which means it's not 2HKOing in rain, which means Ferrothorn can actually kill with TR up if Power Whip doesn't miss for three hits or set up three layers if it's running Gyro Ball over Power Whip, which hurts Reuniclus's teammates which in turn makes it easier to deal with as the things it can switch out to are being worn down, which I think is something people are not taking notice of: Reuniclus's teammates are still susceptible to entry hazards. Reuniclus can keep switching out up until the point where its teammates are worn down and either dead or no longer able to switch in safely.

tl;dr Nails sux

I probably won't be laddering until R_D programs in Fusion Bolt on Victini (no rush Dusk!), since two of the teams I have planned need it. I'm also going to try something interesting in that I'm running my TR team without a Water-resist (mostly because the Water-resistant TR setters can't take Specs Hydro Pumps well enough), forcing me to rely on Tar + Solosi + Wobb in order to deal with rain. It'll be quite interesting to see if it works out as planned.

I think for once, you and I are in agreement. The whole idea of determining if a poke is broken or not is to look to the counters. blazeken only had one solid one, which died if it was mixed, salamence in gen 4 only really had scizor and swampert as hard counters (plus a stealth rock weakness).

wut

 

[Gengar FTW]

im pretty sure speed boost blaziken is banned and not blaze ones

so if u wana use blaziken just use the blaze set, and besides this thing will still be good in uu when the tiers are done

keep speed boost blaziken in uber its pretty hard to stop once it gets a SS and a speed boost

also reinclus is good but not broken

specs latios is a monster

latias im not sure however

 

[haunter]

I hope I'm not the only one who doesn't know what "ispe dixit" means. So i don't know what you mean there.

for your convenience.

Regardless, I agree that people are quick to press "BAN" on powerful pokemon. The reason i'm focusing on Reunicles is that out of all these "suspect pokemon" I believe him to be the most suspect. Whether or not you think he should be banned, i think we can at least agree on that point.

When building my teams I'm usually more worried about Pokemon like Garchomp or Thundurus, but this is not really important here.

Now the point of disagreement arises when you think he is not powerful enough where things can't adapt adequately, and I think that this adaptation is causing an overcentralization.

And I'll tell you once more that centralization=\=brokeness. Other than that, I'm pretty sure that the dominance of TTar and Scizor in this metagame is not determined by Reuniclus.

Ttar and Scizor are good checks, but can be beaten. The thing is, after them, where do you go? every other check and counter is without a doubt over centralized directly to counter Reuncules, and even they are beatable. Its just a big mess.

The same can be said for pretty much every other sweeper in the game: you lose your counter to a given threat and you risk getting swept by that Pokemon. If anything, Reuniclus is easier to revenge kill when compared to things like Garchomp or Lucario because it's extremely slow and lacks priority.

im pretty sure speed boost blaziken is banned and not blaze ones

Blaziken is banned as a whole.