Metagame NP: RU Stage 4: Do My Thang (READ POST #2)

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Honestly tangrowth is pretty outclassed in this meta, defensively by amoonguss and roselia and offensively by sceptile. I guess it has a bunch of coverage moves and can run av kinda but i have yet to see why anyone would ever use it

O well molks set isnt outclassed by something but still lol
 
Tangrowth is better offensively due to its stats and movepool. It can pull off an aggressive AV set, and its defensive set has the advantage of both Leech Seed and Knock Off. Amoonguss gives a few threats free switch-ins that could not switch into Tangrowth, like Roselia and SubCM Meloetta (as long as it doesn't switch into a status move) and is forced out by prominent Psychic types that Tangrowth can punish with Knock Off. Tangrowth can also check Cobalion with Focus Blast.

Apparently Specs / LO Tangrowth is a thing as well, but I have no experience with or against that so I won't comment on it. In this meta, Amoonguss is the better Pokemon, but Tangrowth does have its own share of advantages.
I was comparing Amoongus to Tangrowth Defensively because i don't think many high tier players use offensive Amoongus, but feel free to prove me wrong, i know Tangrowth does have a plethora of offensive moves and offensive presents to outclass Amoongus Offensivly, i guess i should rephrase in saying is there any role Tangrowth can preform that Amoongus can't do Defensively.
 

HypnoEmpire

Yokatta...
Alright everyone, I'm back with yet another Hitmonlee set!


Wallbreaker V2 (Hitmonlee) (M) @ Life Orb
Ability: Reckless
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- High Jump Kick
- Knock Off
- Double-Edge
- Foresight

Is this a little much? Yes, it is. Will that stop me? Definitely not :]

Goal: Lure in every possible counter to Hitmonlee and attempt to destroy it. I ran this set just a bit on my Sticky Web team and it's so funny to watch what used to counter Hitmonlee get absolutely destroyed by Foresight. Gligar/Golbat get 2HKOd by Double-Edge and Double-Edge 2HKOs Amoonguss, Aromatisse after a bit of damage, and anything else that can comfortably take High Jump Kick. Knock Off is for Psychic-types, but this thing still hates Cresselia. I'm not sure how I can find a way to fix that (Toxic? I'm not that crazy). Anyway, calcs below.
After Foresight:
252+ Atk Life Orb Reckless Hitmonlee High Jump Kick vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Spiritomb: 468-554 (153.9 - 182.2%) -- guaranteed OHKO
252+ Atk Life Orb Reckless Hitmonlee High Jump Kick vs. 212 HP / 0 Def Eviolite Doublade: 322-382 (103.2 - 122.4%) -- guaranteed OHKO

After Knock Off:
252+ Atk Life Orb Reckless Hitmonlee Double-Edge vs. 248 HP / 252+ Def Gligar: 147-174 (44.1 - 52.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock
252+ Atk Life Orb Reckless Hitmonlee Double-Edge vs. 248 HP / 252+ Def Golbat: 191-225 (54.1 - 63.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

Just with Double-Edge:
252+ Atk Life Orb Reckless Hitmonlee Double-Edge vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Amoonguss: 191-225 (44.2 - 52%) -- 75% chance to 2HKO after Stealth Rock and Black Sludge recovery
252+ Atk Life Orb Reckless Hitmonlee Double-Edge vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Aromatisse: 187-221 (46 - 54.4%) -- 97.7% chance to 2HKO after Stealth Rock and Leftovers recovery

It misses priority and Rapid Spin, but if you need a good lure + wallbreaker, I probably won't recommend this set still but feel free to try it out! Foresight is really only for Spiritomb and Doublade to an extent, but yeah. I'm pretty sure the only RU Pokemon that can take repeated hits from Hitmonlee is Cresselia, and I know Granbull and Qwilfish can stomach a couple hits. Double-Edge recoil also really sucks, but I use it as a wallbreaker that can open the path for another Pokemon on my team to sweep. Psychic-types appreciate Hitmonlee being able to lure in Spiritomb and KO it. Virizion likes not having to deal with Aromatisse and Amoonguss. I'm tired right now, so I'll just stop right here. I used it for a bit and it was really fun to use, so I thought I would just post it here.
 
My little cent. HypnoEmpire I agree with you about Double-Edge. You can get along without Rapid Spin, that's truth: you can build a lot of teams with a defogger or where you hold on SR/spikes. And Double-Edge is really a high-power weapon vs wallbreaker.
But I prefer don't miss prority Much Punch and hit Spiritomb and Honedge "only" to Knock Off or switch out. Lack RU moves priorities and their benefit to finish weakened pokemon lead me to think it's better carry Much Punch of Hitmonlee.
 

HypnoEmpire

Yokatta...
My little cent. HypnoEmpire I agree with you about Double-Edge. You can get along without Rapid Spin, that's truth: you can build a lot of teams with a defogger or where you hold on SR/spikes. And Double-Edge is really a high-power weapon vs wallbreaker.
But I prefer don't miss prority Much Punch and hit Spiritomb and Honedge "only" to Knock Off or switch out. Lack RU moves priorities and their benefit to finish weakened pokemon lead me to think it's better carry Much Punch of Hitmonlee.
I agree for the most part, but I run it on Sticky Web where priority isn't /as/ important, at least in my experience. Plus, it's really only to lure in Doublade and Spiritomb, so if that's a teams only answer to Hitmonlee, it basically gets a KO for free. I acknowledge that it's very match-up dependant though.
 
I agree for the most part, but I run it on Sticky Web where priority isn't /as/ important, at least in my experience. Plus, it's really only to lure in Doublade and Spiritomb, so if that's a teams only answer to Hitmonlee, it basically gets a KO for free. I acknowledge that it's very match-up dependant though.
The problem with foresight on a non rapid spin move is the same as running soak toxic alomomola: the opponent can just switch out. This means that against stall, semistall, or even a solid balance team that hitmonlee won't be getting any wallbreaking done. Besides, knocking off doublade is already enough, and after foresight, high jump kicking on spiritomb is waaay too obvious. Furthermore, one misprediction of a switch, where the opponent stays in on a foresight, and your main counter to bulky pokes is dead. Plus, priority is amazing. IMO run mach punch.
 
The problem with foresight on a non rapid spin move is the same as running soak toxic alomomola: the opponent can just switch out. This means that against stall, semistall, or even a solid balance team that hitmonlee won't be getting any wallbreaking done. Besides, knocking off doublade is already enough, and after foresight, high jump kicking on spiritomb is waaay too obvious. Furthermore, one misprediction of a switch, where the opponent stays in on a foresight, and your main counter to bulky pokes is dead. Plus, priority is amazing. IMO run mach punch.
I think the idea with Foresighting them is simply so that you can 2hko anything really. And that is a thing Double Edge Hitmonlee can do. Perhaps barring things like PhysDef Aromatisse and Cress and such though.
He basically turns Foresight from a utility move for spins into a threat generation by putting the opponent into a "okay... fuck do I do now?".

And if the High Jump Kick is so obvious on Spiritomb, the fuck does the opponent switch into? Double Ghost isn't really viable for defensive teams, and most resists will also be incredibly obvious switch-ins afterwards. Meaning you can nail them with Double Edge or Knock Off. Either or.
 

aVocado

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Since we're on the topic of Hitmonlee, here's a set that's really underrated and kind of anti-meta atm:


Hitmonlee (M) @ Liechi Berry
Ability: Unburden
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Endure
- Reversal
- Knock Off
- Mach Punch / Sucker Punch

This set got really popular at one point (r0 and r1 i believe) but died very quickly and LO Rapid Spin Hitmonlee has become the standard set. I gotta admit, this is cockblocked by Doublade, but once Doublade has been weakened enough which is at like 35-40% HP, then this should be able to automatically sweep the opponent's team unless they have a sand/hail inducer (baby hippo and mega abomasnow), which you should also look out for and eliminate.

It focuses on abusing Unburden and Reversal's extremely high BP at 1 HP, and that can be accomplished with the combination of Endure and Liechi Berry, which, when consumed, gives you +1 Attack and doubled Speed from Unburden, allowing Hitmonlee to outspeed the entire metagame bar like Scarf Ambipom or some weird shit. At that point, anything can die to a full-boosted Reversal from +1, even resists like Moltres and Aromatisse, provided the latter isn't physically defensive and has been weakened a little bit:

+1 252+ Atk Hitmonlee Reversal (200 BP) vs. 0 HP / 4 Def Moltres: 276-325 (85.9 - 101.2%) -- 12.5% chance to OHKO
+1 252+ Atk Hitmonlee Reversal (200 BP) vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Aromatisse: 332-391 (81.7 - 96.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

(for comparison: +1 252+ Atk Hitmonlee Reversal (200 BP) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Aromatisse: 225-264 (55.4 - 65%) -- guaranteed 2HKO)

By virtue, this set matches up very very nicely against HO provided Doublade has been weakened, which shouldn't be hard. For that reason it's better paired with things that can lure Doublade like Cobalion with Volt Switch, and things that can actually beat Doublade or cripple it like Spiritomb or Gourgeist with Will-O-Wisp (or in tomb's case, foul play) etc.

Mach Punch and Sucker Punch in the last slot are to prevent priority users from revenge killing this set, which works really nicely. Sucker Punch does a better job at handling Doublade especially if you've already used Endure and have 1 HP, to prevent Doublade from killing Lee with Shadow Sneak:

+1 252+ Atk Hitmonlee Sucker Punch vs. 212 HP / 0 Def Eviolite Doublade: 128-152 (41 - 48.7%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
 

Molk

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Ooh Arikado i haven't seen that set used or posted about in a while :o (although i did see it one yesterday.....paired with an Abomasnow .-.).

Anyways, i'm just gonna post here and agree that Endure Hitmonlee is a pretty cool set in the current meta, and that considering Life Orb Reckless Hitmonlee is so common these days actually has some surprise value atm that helps it work even better. Against offensive/bulky offensive teams, this can pretty much turn into a free win if played right, just weaken the bulky Fighting-type resists they have into Reversal KO range (this honestly isn't even too hard given how absurdly strong a +1 200 BP STAB move is), be sure not to use Endure and reveal your set too early, and you're pretty much good to go. What i've got to say though is that this set *is* a bit matchup based in my experience. It's excellent against offensive teams, but it really falls flat against stall. All good defensive teams have ways other than directly attacking to threaten Hitmonlee, such as Spikes, Toxic Spikes, Toxic, and Will-O-Wisp, and all of these completely cripple this Hitmonlee and absolutely ruin its sweeping potential. Even if the user of a stall team *does* attack Hitmonlee directly, there's definitely no guarantee that it will put Hitmonlee into the Reversal sweet spot at all, and most stall teams have a bulky Fighting-type resist/immunity to take a Reversal by default if they absolutely have to, making full stall a pretty poor matchup for this set. So keep that in mind, if you run this Hitmonlee set you'll probably need to pair it with some solid ways to get around stall/residual damage in general if you want to succeed :x.

Something else to keep in mind is that Spiritomb completely walls this set and hits it on the way out w/ Pursuit =/.

Might edit in something else here later.
 
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So I started running Fake out/Last Resort Ambipom as a joke, but I've found that when many of its counters are out of the way, (Doublade) it has the ability to one shot most pokemon. Opinions on this set?
it's still absolutely terrible, like very ambipom set. you need an extreme amount of support to get rid of ambipom's counters, which are some of the best and hardest to get rid of mons in the entire meta, such as doublade, rhyperior, alomomola, etc, and this is just for your set to actually be able to do any damage at all.. not to mention the fact that this set is also walled by things that don't even wall other ambipom sets such as spiritomb and banette wall this one too. overall it's a garbage set on a garbage pokemon that needs a ridiculous amount of support to do any damage at all against any serious team, and even if you can manage to provide it that support, your reward is still a garbage pokemon that simply has a stronger stab move than usual. ambipom itself is absolute trash, but this set is even worse.
 

Molk

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Hey! Ambupom can run a cool mix-lure set!

That's it, really.
Even then, the fact that literally all that Ambipom set can do is lure in *some* of the usual checks to the Fake Out set while completely hampering it against anything else means it's really not worth it imo.... I mean, Grass Knot/Shadow Ball might lure in Rhyperior/Doublade, but to do so effectively you have to dedicate investment to a *really* bad Special Attack stat while weakening everything else you might be running :x.

Also Arikado he was an alternate account of someone else.
 
Since we're on the topic of Hitmonlee, here's a set that's really underrated and kind of anti-meta atm:


Hitmonlee (M) @ Liechi Berry
Ability: Unburden
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Endure
- Reversal
- Knock Off
- Mach Punch / Sucker Punch

This set got really popular at one point (r0 and r1 i believe) but died very quickly and LO Rapid Spin Hitmonlee has become the standard set. I gotta admit, this is cockblocked by Doublade, but once Doublade has been weakened enough which is at like 35-40% HP, then this should be able to automatically sweep the opponent's team unless they have a sand/hail inducer (baby hippo and mega abomasnow), which you should also look out for and eliminate.

It focuses on abusing Unburden and Reversal's extremely high BP at 1 HP, and that can be accomplished with the combination of Endure and Liechi Berry, which, when consumed, gives you +1 Attack and doubled Speed from Unburden, allowing Hitmonlee to outspeed the entire metagame bar like Scarf Ambipom or some weird shit. At that point, anything can die to a full-boosted Reversal from +1, even resists like Moltres and Aromatisse, provided the latter isn't physically defensive and has been weakened a little bit:

+1 252+ Atk Hitmonlee Reversal (200 BP) vs. 0 HP / 4 Def Moltres: 276-325 (85.9 - 101.2%) -- 12.5% chance to OHKO
+1 252+ Atk Hitmonlee Reversal (200 BP) vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Aromatisse: 332-391 (81.7 - 96.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

(for comparison: +1 252+ Atk Hitmonlee Reversal (200 BP) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Aromatisse: 225-264 (55.4 - 65%) -- guaranteed 2HKO)

By virtue, this set matches up very very nicely against HO provided Doublade has been weakened, which shouldn't be hard. For that reason it's better paired with things that can lure Doublade like Cobalion with Volt Switch, and things that can actually beat Doublade or cripple it like Spiritomb or Gourgeist with Will-O-Wisp (or in tomb's case, foul play) etc.

Mach Punch and Sucker Punch in the last slot are to prevent priority users from revenge killing this set, which works really nicely. Sucker Punch does a better job at handling Doublade especially if you've already used Endure and have 1 HP, to prevent Doublade from killing Lee with Shadow Sneak:

+1 252+ Atk Hitmonlee Sucker Punch vs. 212 HP / 0 Def Eviolite Doublade: 128-152 (41 - 48.7%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
While i wouldn't really call it "anti meta" as Doublade is still the most common Pokemon in the tier and easily puts it in check and Spiritomb is getting quite common too i really like this set.
The fact that it can get around some of its strongest checks like Meloetta with ease and that it has a lot of sweeping potential (and is an useful emergency revenge killer too thanks to Endure+Unburden) is quite a nice twist over the regular Life Orb wallbreaking set. It also needs a lot less wallbreaking support thanks to Reversal's ridicolous base power (+1 252+ Atk Hitmonlee Reversal (200 BP) vs. 104 HP / 248+ Def Alomomola: 424-499 (85.3 - 100.4%) -- 81.3% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock :]]]]]]]]]).

And anyway can we keep the discussion on actually good Pokemon like Arikado did instead of talking about ambipom? :]
 

EonX

Battle Soul
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Wanted to talk about a set I've been having a bit of fun with as a wallbreaker for Scarf Hitmonlee that can also work pretty well with the Endure+Liechi set Arikado posted:


Cobalion @ Leftovers
Ability: Justified
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Calm Mind
- Flash Cannon
- Hidden Power [Ghost]
- Focus Blast / Substitute / Taunt

Calm Mind Cobalion hasn't really been explored all that much, but it can be a really great lure for a lot of common Fighting-type responses. It's easily able to wear down, or even defeat, the likes of Alomomola, Gligar, Slowking, Doublade, and Golbat without much difficulty. Cobalion needs Calm Mind, Flash Cannon, and HP Ghost to work the way it's supposed to, but the last slot has some options depending on how you want Cobalion to function. Focus Blast gives Cobalion a powerful STAB move to quickly break down Alomomola and to beat Registeel, and is the preferred option. Substitute actually lets Cobalion set up to +6 on Alomomola with ease and also gives Cobalion an extra turn to hit Gligar and Slowking with the appropriate move. Taunt bones a lot of common defensive responses to Cobalion and can also prevent Defog from Gligar or Golbat should Cobalion not have enough CM boosts to OHKO them when they switch in. One of the biggest things CM Cobalion has going for it is that Steel typing. This means that, unlike other CM users, it is completely immune to Toxic (Spikes) which is often the greatest enemy to CM users.
 

aVocado

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EonX that's actually a set that I've tried to popularize (lol) for a bit. Calm Mind Cobalion is a strong lure, but it doesn't beat Slowking. Still beats most common physical walls though which are things like Gligar, Doublade (the entire point of using CM Cobalion is for doublade tbh), Alomomola, and other random things like Tangrowth etc. I like Focus Blast in the last slot mainly because of its damage output and because of its ability to 2HKO Alomomola at +1, as well as hitting Registeel, which is cool.
 
cobalion has been a rising threat in uu lately thanks to the recent bans, it's obviously way too early to call but it's interesting to consider how the meta will adapt if it rises.
 

Molk

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cobalion has been a rising threat in uu lately thanks to the recent bans, it's obviously way too early to call but it's interesting to consider how the meta will adapt if it rises.
Because of the introduction of ORAS (mega evolutions, possibly tutors) it's most likely that the metagame will be completely different when Cobalion rises, if it rises at all, so it's p. much impossible to predict at the moment, sad to say :(.
 
Ok, so since this thread is kind of dead, and I feel like we haven't had a discussion of this sort in a while, I'd like to bring up something that hasn't really been discussed before until very recently, and I think it deserves to happen at the very least, which is suspecting Moltres.

To start off, Moltres 2HKOs the entire tier with an obscene 125 Special Attack, often paired up with a Life Orb, barring obscure mons like Regirock (not that Regirock is bad, mind you), and more often than not, the only support it needs is hazard control which is even more common than it was last gen, with the overall popularity of Hitmonlee and the defoggers in Gligar and Golbat, and they all get tons of opportunities to clean hazards, particularly Gligar. There's also Pursuit support from Spiritomb, which is probably one of, if not the best partner for Moltres, considering it can trap one of Moltres's best answers, Slowking, which lets Moltres spam Fire Blast freely (of course Slowking's not as much of an issue if you're using the basedlord SunnyBeam which really should be used more :^) ). And to top it all off, not only can it give pretty much any playstyle a run for their money depending on the set (SubToxic, Scarf, LO, etc.) , but it also fits on pretty much all playstyles, which is just a testament to how difficult it is to stop.


I also was considering talking about a Doublade suspect, but honestly, we haven't explored the amount of checks we have to it, and while it might be somewhat constrictive towards teambuilding, a lot of those checks are hurt by Moltres anyway, so..
 

aVocado

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If we're gonna start the witch hunt then I should post this.

I disagree with a Moltres suspect. It's simply not broken in my eyes. For one, it requires too much support in the form of a Pursuit user and a hazard remover. This isn't the same as Yanmega which was also x4 weak to rocks, as Yanmega could just blindlessly click Bug Buzz (assuming choice specs here) with almost no drawbacks unless the opponent has an x4 resist or something, and just break down walls. Speed Boost Yanmega could rip through offense. Moltres can't blindlessly click any of its STAB moves for multiple reasons: Fire-type attacks are resisted by a lot of Pokemon that are extremely common, with the most notable being Rhyperior and Slowking. Same thing goes with its Flying-type STAB. There is also the fact that one of its STABs is 70% accurate while the other is 85% accurate, and this seriously can hinder its wallbreaking capabilities, and it's happened before.

Another issue is that Life Orb Moltres usually doesn't carry U-turn. And if it does, then it doesn't carry HP Grass or Roost, and this can prevent Moltres from it's full potential. Scarf Moltres also often doesn't have HP Grass and just dual STABs (+ flamethrower) and U-turn, which again is walled by Rhyperior.

You say Slowking is the only real counter to the thing, and that's not true. Jellicent, Cresselia, Gastrodon (which doesn't lose to u-turn + tomb/pursuit mind you, but does lose to HP Grass), SpDef Alomomola to an extent, especially if it has Mirror Coat, are just some examples off the top of my head. Then there is the fact that Moltres is slow. It doesn't outspeed things like Virizion/Cobalion, Cinccino, Jolteon etc except with a Scarf, and those Pokemon can often OHKO Moltres with the respective super effective attack. Fire Blast also only has a mere 8 PP, and Hurricane is a horrible move to depend on to wallbreak.

A Pokemon I would like to see suspected though is definitely Meloetta. As much as I adore her, she's kinda broken and unhealthy for the meta imo. She's got about 6 viable sets which are Specs, Scarf, SubCM, Relic Song, SpDef (which is meh imo but it has a niche on stall I guess) and one or two more that I'm probably forgetting, but my main focus will be on the Specs and SubCM, and perhaps Relic Song, because those are the most used/seen sets. For starters, Specs Meloetta hits ridiculously fucking hard, while having two spammable STABs, good coverage in Shadow Ball, and U-turn as well as Trick, to either gain momentum against things like Registeel, or cripple them. Additionally, while the Relic Song set might be a bit risky in a metagame dominated by Doublade (and therefore can't actually transform due to ghosts being immune to relic song) and with other Ghosts like spiritomb and banette being popular, it's still got an element of surprise, and it has a completely different set of counters to its traditional sets which are special oriented. Additionally, it's usually a solid part in dual fighting-type cores because of its incredible speed, which only misses Jolteon by a few points. SubCM Meloetta on the other hand, is a lot similar to SubBU Braviary in the fact that it shits on stall with 101 HP Subs, but sadly it has no recovery. It does however have near-perfect coverage with Hyper Voice + Shadow Ball. I can't talk much about this set because I haven't used it much to be honest, but I've seen it destroy stall a bunch of times.

Of course I'm definitely not saying Meloetta doesn't have counters. Registeel is a solid counter but Meloetta + Dugtrio, like Yanmega + Dugtrio, is a pretty damn effective core that works exactly the same way as YanTrio did before. Another counter is Spiritomb which is immune to both STABs and doesn't take much from Shadow Ball.

Basically, a combination of Yanmega-like levels of wallbreaking with the Specs set, in addition to the fact that Meloetta herself is versatile as fuck with one of its sets having extremely different counters, I believe it's worthy of a test.
 

Molk

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A Pokemon I would like to see suspected though is definitely Meloetta. As much as I adore her, she's kinda broken and unhealthy for the meta imo. She's got about 6 viable sets which are Specs, Scarf, SubCM, Relic Song, SpDef (which is meh imo but it has a niche on stall I guess) and one or two more that I'm probably forgetting, but my main focus will be on the Specs and SubCM, and perhaps Relic Song, because those are the most used/seen sets. For starters, Specs Meloetta hits ridiculously fucking hard, while having two spammable STABs, good coverage in Shadow Ball, and U-turn as well as Trick, to either gain momentum against things like Registeel, or cripple them. Additionally, while the Relic Song set might be a bit risky in a metagame dominated by Doublade (and therefore can't actually transform due to ghosts being immune to relic song) and with other Ghosts like spiritomb and banette being popular, it's still got an element of surprise, and it has a completely different set of counters to its traditional sets which are special oriented. Additionally, it's usually a solid part in dual fighting-type cores because of its incredible speed, which only misses Jolteon by a few points. SubCM Meloetta on the other hand, is a lot similar to SubBU Braviary in the fact that it shits on stall with 101 HP Subs, but sadly it has no recovery. It does however have near-perfect coverage with Hyper Voice + Shadow Ball. I can't talk much about this set because I haven't used it much to be honest, but I've seen it destroy stall a bunch of times.

Of course I'm definitely not saying Meloetta doesn't have counters. Registeel is a solid counter but Meloetta + Dugtrio, like Yanmega + Dugtrio, is a pretty damn effective core that works exactly the same way as YanTrio did before. Another counter is Spiritomb which is immune to both STABs and doesn't take much from Shadow Ball.

Basically, a combination of Yanmega-like levels of wallbreaking with the Specs set, in addition to the fact that Meloetta herself is versatile as fuck with one of its sets having extremely different counters, I believe it's worthy of a test.
Oglemi and multiple other people already expressed their concerns with suspecting *anything* during the RU open unless they're absolutely unbearable, and frankly, i agree with those concerns, so i probably wouldn't expect anything until that's over.

This isn't happening, at least not right away.

Either way i actually disagree with suspecting Meloetta, and i believe it's actually more manageable than people give it credit for. Hard counters might be uncommon, but when it all comes down it they're still there (Registeel to all but Relic Song, Spiritomb to everything, Escavalier to all but Relic Song, Pursuit traps, and is neutral to duggy's EQ), and it turns out Meloetta has quite a few checks and key flaws that keep it from dominating the tier.

First off, lets start out with the Choice Specs set. Yes, the Choice Specs set hits incredibly hard and only has a fair few safe switch ins, but there's one flaw here that holds her back: Choice Specs Meloetta might hit like a nuke at first, but when it all really comes down to it you realize that being locked into a move makes it easier to take advantage of Meloetta than you think! Hyper Voice and Psychic are powerful, yes, but (non Exploud) Normal- and Psychic-type moves also happen to be two of the worst possible types to be locked into in the current metagame imo given the abundance of common Rock-, Steel-, Ghost-, Dark- and Psychic-types that would just love to take advantage of a choice locked move like that. Shadow Ball is much more spammable, but when it all comes down to it much weaker than both of Meloetta's STAB moves, and it still has to deal with other Normal-types such as Exploud and opposing Meloetta, so even Shadow Ball isn't immune to this key flaw.

Substitute+Calm Mind Meloetta doesn't have the same problem of being locked into a move, but the lack of a third coverage move, lack of U-turn, and lower overall power unboosted make it a bit easier to generally deal with imo. Some Pokemon on stall teams that can deal with subCM Meloetta include Rhyperior, Skuntank, and Meloetta herself, as well as the aforementioned Escavalier and Spiritomb, and with no U-turn to work with there's nowhere to run from these two. Also, unlike other Calm Mind Pokemon who threaten stall teams such as Reuniclus, Meloetta is still vulnerable to say Toxic Spikes :[.

I've never really liked the Relic Song set not just because of the aforementioned Ghost-type issue (once again, our good friend Spiritomb is holding Meloetta back), but because it takes a turn to actually become a threat thanks to regular Meloetta's pathetic base attack stat. If you can force out Relic Song Meloetta in any way after it's revealed to be that particular varient in the first place, it's *much* easier to deal with because of this. 99% of Relic Song Meloetta's ability to be a threat comes exclusively from its surprise value imo.

As for Moltres, i'm just going to say that the "if it's not a foolproof 100% counter it's not an answer at all" mindset is quite annoying, especially given Moltres isn't the only Pokemon in that position.
 
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Oglemi and multiple other people already expressed their concerns with suspecting *anything* during the RU open unless they're absolutely unbearable so i probably wouldn't expect anything until that's over.

...

As for Moltres, i'm just going to say that the "if it's not a foolproof 100% counter it's not an answer at all" mindset is quite annoying, especially given Moltres isn't the only Pokemon in that position.
http://pastebin.com/WbeVBMz7

That's my opinion on that matter. Might be flawed or whatever, but it's still my opinion. UU was able to work around a lot of stuff going on with the tier during their open, and the finals was even held in a tier affected by tier drops and similar stuff. In general, I think that you (I might be wrong, could be more people, I'm not in touch with what happens behind the scenes) are way too afraid to suspect test things. The general agreement is that the tier is way too stale right now, and I hope that the new TeamBuilding Competition gets people who haven't realized it yet to see how stale the teambuilding formula is. That isn't good, and on top of that, I think that waiting 2 months for changes isn't the correct thought process when dealing with this situation.

About the suspect itself: Meloetta is a no-no, and you've pretty much said everything regarding it. My opinion is that Meloetta is a jack of all trades, master of none, in the sense that it can run a solid Calm Mind set, a solid Choice Specs set, go Physical and even Specially Defensive for stall. However, there are many Pokemon with the same ability to run any of those sets, and the fact that some universal Meloetta counters exist (mostly Spiritomb, but fine) mean that it's not anything hard to handle, as even I thought after Zoroark / Yanmega bans.

Moltres on the other hand is completely worthy of a suspect test, even if it doesn't get banned. Proof of that is that even I am unsure on what to vote for Moltres, as my only reasoning is how it centralizes the metagame, and that is sort of hard to back up with actual information, since RU ladder is cancer and RU Open has a lot of people using the same teams. However, what you say about foolproof counters is slightly flawed to my eyes. It's not wrong, but the thing is: The nature of Moltres' supposed counters makes them very easy to exploit, as they're either ridiculously weak to getting trapped by Pursuit (Slowking, Cresselia), or are exploitable by common Pokemon (Regirock, Carbink). And don't even get me started on Rhyperior being a Moltres counter. The moment you have to slap a Rindo Berry on it and play around it with that in mind means that something is wrong, since Leftovers or even an offensive item would enhance it more than something as niche as a type-resist berry. So, like I was saying: It's ridiculously easy to set up on something that relies mostly on Rock-type moves to do damage, since this tier is also reigned by strong Fighting-types such as Virizion, Cobalion, and Hitmonlee, as well as Psychic-types that don't really mind taking weak Rock Slides to the face. What I'm trying to say is that to have safety against Moltres, you're required to resort to things that are average at everything else other than checking it, and that develops a toxic behavior in teambuilding patterns, in the sense that Moltres can rip through everything thanks to, alongside its obvious offensive prowess, its bulk, decent typing, and recovery from Roost.

I don't really feel like writing more on this, although I'll do so if required, since I'm not really used to write things this big. I hope that this is good enough to change some mindsets though.
 
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