Announcement np: SM OU Suspect Process, Round 1 - Digital Love - Genesect is now banned

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6ft Torbjorn

formerly JoycapJoshST
You're naming checks with some massive baggage of their own. (Notice the fire-typing? Notice how fire is weak to rock?) Congratulations. You managed to undermine your own point.
Yeah, sorry. I was starting to contradict myself a bit and never really realized it.

I think another problem with Genesect in OU is that it's only weakness (Fire) is generally portrayed as a hyper-offensive type. And yet in THIS meta - the most relevant Fire types are slow and bulky (Awak/Heatran/Volcanion) and get outspead by Genesect (again, going back to running Uturn on every set, making it's MUs far less risky).

PS: How many sets/variations run Explosion these days?
 

Halcyon.

@Choice Specs
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Every time this thing comes down I want in banned. And then I read these suspect threads and all the terrible arguments make me want to keep it out of spite.

Something necessitating a check to it on every team does NOT make it overcentralizing. If you built an ORAS team with no check to Keldeo, it would be complete trash. But that doesn't mean Keldeo should be banned. Anyone who thinks otherwise needs to really think about why Genesect needs to be banned rather than any other meta-defining threat. What separates Keldeo from Genesect?

The answer, I think, is two-fold. Genesect has a myriad of sets that are all easily S-tier threats in the metagame. Band, RP, Specs, Ebelt (and yes, to all the naysayers, Scarf is still really good) are all metagame defining and require different checks for each. Mantine beats Scarf, but it gets demolished by Ebelt. Balance can handle Scarf but can get manhandled by Banded. This presents a problem because you're never truly safe from it even if you pack counters to one set.

The other reason is that it's so good that it's hard to justify not using it. This is what makes it overcentralizing. Its presence in the meta is almost ubiquitous in an Aegislash sort of way. There's so many sets it can run that Genesect can fit onto nearly every team in some capacity, and the momentum it can bring any team alone is invaluable.

So please, if you want to argue to ban Genesect, don't post dumb shit like it needs a counter on every team. Plenty of non-broken stuff needs a counter on every team. That is not what makes Genesect broken.
 

6ft Torbjorn

formerly JoycapJoshST
Every time this thing comes down I want in banned. And then I read these suspect threads and all the terrible arguments make me want to keep it out of spite.

Something necessitating a check to it on every team does NOT make it overcentralizing. If you built an ORAS team with no check to Keldeo, it would be complete trash. But that doesn't mean Keldeo should be banned. Anyone who thinks otherwise needs to really think about why Genesect needs to be banned rather than any other meta-defining threat. What separates Keldeo from Genesect?

The answer, I think, is two-fold. Genesect has a myriad of sets that are all easily S-tier threats in the metagame. Band, RP, Specs, Ebelt (and yes, to all the naysayers, Scarf is still really good) are all metagame defining and require different checks for each. Mantine beats Scarf, but it gets demolished by Ebelt. Balance can handle Scarf but can get manhandled by Banded. This presents a problem because you're never truly safe from it even if you pack counters to one set.

The other reason is that it's so good that it's hard to justify not using it. This is what makes it overcentralizing. Its presence in the meta is almost ubiquitous in an Aegislash sort of way. There's so many sets it can run that Genesect can fit onto nearly every team in some capacity, and the momentum it can bring any team alone is invaluable.

So please, if you want to argue to ban Genesect, don't post dumb shit like it needs a counter on every team. Plenty of non-broken stuff needs a counter on every team. That is not what makes Genesect broken.
I find this reply interesting, as you're saying that each style gets beat by a certain Gene' set. Is it not possible to, say, make a balance team with a counter to Banded Genesect? In that case, you have an answer to Scarf AND, to an extent, CB. If not, I understand perfectly.

With that, I'm aware that this may sound like a bit of a stupid question - but are we saying that if a mon can single handedly beat a given playstyle, it's cause for a suspect test (as well as what one defines as 'broken'/'uncompetitive' etc.)? I've heard that Hoopa-U 'made stall irrelevant' and, of course, Genesect has the potential to beat any style with the amount of flexibility is has in sets, as this post is implying.
 

Jukain

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so ur justifying a broken mon staying because you are required to run it to check other supposed "Broken" cores
having to run an overcentralizing mon to beat basically every relevant core is the definition of why something should be banned
also dousedrive and hpground werent "rarely used"
running a genesect on every team is diverse dynamic and healthy??????
i disagree with what abr said but what you are saying is completely different and honestly not even justification to unban something
you literally used made up scenarios to futher prove why genesect should be infact banned
except that this isn't the scenario the tier faces

this isn't a case of broken checking broken. this is a case of a very good pokemon actively making the metagame better by allowing teams to compress roles, opening up more options for teambuilding as a result. it's not constricting diversity because you can definitely build successful teams without genesect and handle it reasonably without overextending, which abr's post goes into extensive detail about so i won't expand further. the main point is that i think people are too afraid of a metagame where not everything can be handled by one pokemon. banning these pokemon has often led past gens to become stale and matchup-oriented over time, where there's a lot of stuff you can run and games just come down to whether you have answers to stuff on the opposing team or not. pokemon that force creative counterplay are healthy in this regard, without requiring very obscure/limited answers to beat them or being nearly unbeatable, because you can't just slap one pokemon on your team and counterplay the threat the same way every time. especially with the incredible new mons for balance/bulky offense cores, i feel like the tier will devolve toward stale cores and we'll just end up banning a whole bunch of mons that break those cores (tapu lele, hoopa, greninja) just because those cores are what's good.

overall, i think ou is in a pretty good place to develop into a healthy tier and that banning genesect would hinder that growth by making the metagame less dynamic and creative. and for the people saying 'why was this even allowed in ou', i'd like to remind people that genesect was barely banned last gen. being splashable and lacking hard counters are not really banworthy qualities. i feel like people are thinking too linearly and trying to pigeonhole genesect into a stereotype of a broken, unhealthy mon that it simply does not fit in the current ou metagame. keep genesect in ou.
 
I feel like I need to refute many pro-ban arguments, and elaborate on why keeping Gene for now is the right move.

1) "Genesect is overcentralizing because you need to specifically prepare for it" - You also had to use a Keldeo or Bisharp check/counter on every ORAS team, but no one's saying they're broken.

2) "Genesect is overcentralizing because there's no reason not to use it on every team" - I'm pretty sure Lando-T has more usage and things like Lati and Lando in ORAS still probably had more usage than Gene now. Usage aside, adding a Genesect can stack weaknesses and using a certain set can leave you weak to some styles, so it can't mindlessly be slapped onto a team.

3) "Genesect lacks full counters" - Well, there's also no full counters to Kyurem-B. Obviously Gene is a better pokemon but a lack of counters alone doesn't break something. You can still pivot around these mons reasonably well and revenge kill easily.

4) "Genesect is too versatile with its coverage options" - XY Greninja had coverage to beat like any possible switchin besides Clef and Chansey (taunt aside). Greninja's Protean boost is basically equivalent to a download boost (which is less reliable). Even Greninja now has few full counters if any, with even more coverage than Gene, so this doesn't make something broken.

5) "Genesect may have some walls, but it can just U-turn on them" - Any U-turn pokemon can use the move on any of its counters. Scizor using U-turn on Heatran isn't exactly a broken thing and this has more to do with U-turn as a whole rather than Genesect.

So, why exactly are people saying Gene is broken? As Finchinator said, it's something like "Similarly to Hoopa, Genesect is very tough to switch into, but it doesn't have a crippling weakness like other good breakers." What this sounds like to me is that Genesect is just a good pokemon. It may not be super frail or slow, but there is always a trade-off in using a certain Genesect set. You also aren't necessarily advantaged for using a Gene while your opponent does not.

Generally speaking, we should really only be banning pokemon that warp the tier significantly or truly are too powerful. Something like Zygarde-Complete was just too good for OU, and Aegislash definitely had a negative effect on the tier that Genesect cannot even barely compare to. In the case of Lando-I, the quickban was less clear and maybe shouldn't have happened but the council was unanimous due to its Gene-like coverage + insane power simultaneously. If we just dropped Genesect into ORAS and went by this tiering philosophy, then hell yea it would be broken. But right now we have a new Generation that is still evolving.

From this point onwards, with this test included, we need to give the meta time to settle. As we saw with Pheromosa, many people (myself included) saw it as quickban worthy early on but eventually realized it can be managed. Pheromosa's counters like Toxapex can't be used on every team, but you can still pivot into it reasonably well and revenge it even without the hard counters. Additionally, many people thought Mega Metagross was broken, but later realized it can be managed. Perhaps the same will happen with Genesect, and it won't be seen as this menacing down the road. To ban Gene at this time simply stunts the growth of the tier, as Jukain pointed out.

To suspect ANYTHING this early on is foolish. Something is either quickban worthy or it shouldn't be touched at all. Suspect tests exist to test how a metagame is with/without a given suspect. This point is rendered useless when a metagame has existed for such a short amount of time. Having a suspect test so early on was a mistake, but we can prevent consequences from this mistake by voting to not ban. If Gene turns out to still be an issue in the future, we can suspect again. Mega Sableye stayed in ou after its first test and was later banned, so please do not rush this decision and harm the tier permanently.
 
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Scribble

formerly Dartrix - Joker
is a Contributor to Smogon
I feel like I need to refute many pro-ban arguments, and elaborate on why keeping Gene for now is the right move.

1) "Genesect is overcentralizing because you need to specifically prepare for it" - You also had to use a Keldeo or Bisharp check/counter on every ORAS team, but no one's saying they're broken.

2) "Genesect is overcentralizing because there's no reason not to use it on every team" - I'm pretty sure Lando-T has more usage and things like Lati and Lando in ORAS still probably had more usage than Gene now. Usage aside, adding a Genesect can stack weaknesses and using a certain set can leave you weak to some styles, so it can't mindlessly be slapped onto a team.

3) "Genesect lacks full counters" - Well, there's also no full counters to Kyurem-B. Obviously Gene is a better pokemon but a lack of counters alone doesn't break something. You can still pivot around these mons reasonably well and revenge kill easily.

4) "Genesect is too versatile with its coverage options" - XY Greninja had coverage to beat like any possible switchin besides Clef and Chansey (taunt aside). Greninja's Protean boost is basically equivalent to a download boost (which is less reliable). Even Greninja now has few full counters if any, with even more coverage than Gene, so this doesn't make something broken.

5) "Genesect may have some walls, but it can just U-turn on them" - Any U-turn pokemon can use the move on any of its counters. Scizor using U-turn on Heatran isn't exactly a broken thing and this has more to do with U-turn as a whole rather than Genesect.

So, why exactly are people saying Gene is broken? As Finchinator said, it's something like "Similarly to Hoopa, Genesect is very tough to switch into, but it doesn't have a crippling weakness like other good breakers." What this sounds like to me is that Genesect is just a good pokemon. It may not be super frail or slow, but there is always a trade-off in using a certain Genesect set. You also aren't necessarily advantaged for using a Gene while your opponent does not.

Generally speaking, we should really only be banning pokemon that warp the tier significantly or truly are too powerful. Something like Zygarde-Complete was just too good for OU, and Aegislash definitely had a negative effect on the tier that Genesect cannot even barely compare to. In the case of Lando-I, the quickban was less clear and maybe shouldn't have happened but the council was unanimous due to its Gene-like coverage + insane power simultaneously. If we just dropped Genesect into ORAS and went by this tiering philosophy, then hell yea it would be broken. But right now we have a new Generation that is still evolving.

From this point onwards, with this test included, we need to give the meta time to settle. As we saw with Pheromosa, many people (myself included) saw it as quickban worthy early on but eventually realized it can be managed. Pheromosa's counters like Toxapex can't be used on every team, but you can still pivot into it reasonably well and revenge it even without the hard counters. Additionally, many people thought Mega Metagross was broken, but later realized it can be managed. Perhaps the same will happen with Genesect, and it won't be seen as this menacing down the road. To ban Gene at this time simply stunts the growth of the tier, as Jukain pointed out.

To suspect ANYTHING this early on is foolish. Something is either quickban worthy or it shouldn't be touched at all. Suspect tests exist to test how a metagame is with/without a given suspect. This point is rendered useless when a metagame has existed for such a short amount of time. Having a suspect test so early on was a mistake, but we can prevent consequences from this mistake by voting to not ban. If Gene turns out to still be an issue in the future, we can suspect again. Mega Sableye stayed in ou after its first test and was later banned, so please do not rush this decision and harm the tier permanently.

This is my first post on this website, so forgive me if I make any mistakes.

Moving on from that, I completely disagree with this. If Genesect only had one or two of the above traits you listed, then I would agree it is not broken. However, it has all of them. Kyurem-B lacks full counters, yes, but it can't U-turn to gain momentum, it doesn't have the best coverage or typing, and Kyurem-B is not nearly as splashable as Genesect. Kyurem-B kills something and then it loses all momentum for your team as your opponent sends in their counter. Genesect is the complete opposite.

Greninja ended up being banned anyway. This is a weak argument in favor of Genesect to stay. Genesect clearly has more coverage options. It can use BoltBeam, utilize its Bug/Steel stabs, use Flamethrower/Blaze Kick and even has priority in ExtremeSpeed or a water nuke with Douse Blast.

I also fail to see the stacking weaknesses with Genesect because Genesect is only weak to Fire, and there are barely any Fire types in the tier. As already mentioned, Genesect has the ideal typing for the kind of Pokemon it is. Its typing allows it to live a hit or two and it has passable bulk to back it up, even with a Hasty nature.

Finally, I fail to see the comparison between Genesect and Pheromosa. The difference between the two is that Genesect has existed for 3 generations, and it was banned in the two previous ones. We have a good idea of what Genesect can do by now, whereas Pheromosa (And Mega Metagross) were new. Not much changed for Genesect this generation. I believe that the meta will never be able to adapt to Genesect. Genesect has every tool it needs to adapt to the meta. Alowak becomes the top counter? Douse Drive and Hidden Power Ground sets become common. Since these become common, Mantine will become the next counter, but then Genesect will start running Thunderbolt, and so on. Pheromosa lacks these options. It has 2 viable sets, Scarf and Orb, and it lacks coverage. Genesect has so many sets it can run to do a variety of things and you can never really tell which it is running because of how naturally good it is at bluffing.

If I get the reqs in time, I will be voting to ban this monster.
 
and here comes HP Ground/Douse Drive...Also it just can U-Turn and sent out a mon which can beat them.
Also they are both weak to rocks...And wtf play Chandelure in OU for "check" a single mon.

in practice chandelure will be useless and not a genesect answer at all.
HP Ground does not do enough damage and if someone is crazy enough to run Douse Drive you will know because of the special sprite and name Genesect gets when using it. I admit, Chandelure was kinda random, but Marowak as a reliable semi-hard (as said, you will know when he carries that crap called Douse Drive) counter still stands, and many others.

There is a problem on what you said here: both Chandelure and Alolan Marowak don't have reliable recovery, so it is pretty simple pivoting out with U-turn and deal chip damage to them. If they are weakened enough, they can't check it anymore. P.S. Both these "checks" are outsped, bar Scarf Chandelure if Genesect isn't Scarfed itself.
A-Marowak also often doesn't even run Leftovers in order to abuse Thick Club, which is a CB without restrictions.

Few Fire types have reliable recovery i.e. Mega Char-X.
That applies to every single pokemon with access to U-turn or Volt Switch (the only Volt Switch user that never carries anti-ground coverage is Magnezone, so don't come on with "you can send Electric-immune pokemon") so technically, that is more a fault of U-turn itself, not Genesect.
The unpredictability "argument"... I will ignore that one, every time I comment on what I think on that everybody rages. I will limit myself to say that most of the time, you can guess the set depending on the team. It's hard to prove, but it's true. Feel free to send me teams with Genesect through MP, I bet you I will guess the sets.
 
I feel like I need to refute many pro-ban arguments, and elaborate on why keeping Gene for now is the right move.

1) "Genesect is overcentralizing because you need to specifically prepare for it" - You also had to use a Keldeo or Bisharp check/counter on every ORAS team, but no one's saying they're broken.
They had hard stops. You can never be truly sure until a few turns after Genesect has entered play what can function as a check, if you actually have the right one at all.
2) "Genesect is overcentralizing because there's no reason not to use it on every team" - I'm pretty sure Lando-T has more usage and things like Lati and Lando in ORAS still probably had more usage than Gene now. Usage aside, adding a Genesect can stack weaknesses and using a certain set can leave you weak to some styles, so it can't mindlessly be slapped onto a team.
...Stack weaknesses?

A single weakness that's easily remedied by one of the best defensive types in the game and completely ignored by a certain anti-meta burning turtle is stacking?
3) "Genesect lacks full counters" - Well, there's also no full counters to Kyurem-B. Obviously Gene is a better pokemon but a lack of counters alone doesn't break something. You can still pivot around these mons reasonably well and revenge kill easily.
Dartrix eviscerated this point completely. Refer to his post above.
4) "Genesect is too versatile with its coverage options" - XY Greninja had coverage to beat like any possible switchin besides Clef and Chansey (taunt aside). Greninja's Protean boost is basically equivalent to a download boost (which is less reliable). Even Greninja now has few full counters if any, with even more coverage than Gene, so this doesn't make something broken.
Excuse me?

Does Greninja get Flamethrower, Thunderbolt, Extremespeed, a U-turn that actually hurts, and other little nifty tricks to run over people with? And on the "has few full counters," have you ever considered that the pillowcases all fully wall the non-Spike sets? Literally, Greninja can do nothing to Blissey and Chansey- but no Pokemon can ever be said to be capable of doing the same to Genesect, not in OU.
5) "Genesect may have some walls, but it can just U-turn on them" - Any U-turn pokemon can use the move on any of its counters. Scizor using U-turn on Heatran isn't exactly a broken thing and this has more to do with U-turn as a whole rather than Genesect.
Scizor is slow and has a very limited movepool- you know what Scizor does. Genesect isn't even close to the same standard- its "walls" are often slow enough that Genesect can simply outspeed and U-turn away, and sometimes it might even be carrying a set specifically designed to bait and smash its "wall." (Nice Heatran you got there fam... TOO BAD I'M CARRYING HIDDEN POWER GROUND MUAHAHAHAHAHAHA)
So, why exactly are people saying Gene is broken? As Finchinator said, it's something like "Similarly to Hoopa, Genesect is very tough to switch into, but it doesn't have a crippling weakness like other good breakers." What this sounds like to me is that Genesect is just a good pokemon. It may not be super frail or slow, but there is always a trade-off in using a certain Genesect set. You also aren't necessarily advantaged for using a Gene while your opponent does not.
The burden of dealing with Genesect lies in your opponent when they're busy trying to play the "Which Genesect variant am I dealing with here" roulette. In the mean time, you just delay them figuring it out with U-turn or whatnot.

Also, can we please debunk your "creativity" argument already? Nobody wants to put their team on a crutch specifically to deal with a Genesect variant that they're weak to- and even then, the person might not be running the right counter to the wild Genesect that does show up. I will say this- the Choice Scarf variant is manageable, since without a specific Download boost it's not really going to do much. But when something that isn't scarfed shows up, that's when the real nightmare begins.

HP Ground does not do enough damage and if someone is crazy enough to run Douse Drive you will know because of the special sprite and name Genesect gets when using it. I admit, Chandelure was kinda random, but Marowak as a reliable semi-hard (as said, you will know when he carries that crap called Douse Drive) counter still stands, and many others.
Can I ask you a question? Did it ever occur to you that Genesect has teammates? I'm quite sure that Marowak is slow enough for Genesect to just outspeed and flutter away and still fool you into thinking he has a choice item, and then switch into Alolawak's checks.

The unpredictability "argument"... I will ignore that one, every time I comment on what I think on that everybody rages. I will limit myself to say that most of the time, you can guess the set depending on the team. It's hard to prove, but it's true. Feel free to send me teams with Genesect through MP, I bet you I will guess the sets.
And yet you can't ignore it. A lot of things can bluff a choice item, and considering Genesect's ability to gain a free stat boost on the switch and it's expansive movepool, I highly suspect that you'd guess wrong most of the time until you saw damage calculations/spent a few turns analyzing your opponent's psychology/risked a speed battle. And then again, just because you figured out the set does not mean you still have an answer to it.
 

Exiline

Banned deucer.
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HP Ground does not do enough damage and if someone is crazy enough to run Douse Drive you will know because of the special sprite and name Genesect gets when using it. I admit, Chandelure was kinda random, but Marowak as a reliable semi-hard (as said, you will know when he carries that crap called Douse Drive) counter still stands, and many others.
+1 252 SpA Life Orb Genesect Hidden Power Ground vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Marowak-Alola: 291-343 (89.8 - 105.8%) -- 37.5% chance to OHKO
we don't have the same definition for "not enough damage" I think.

also even if genesect u-uturn on the Marowak switch, you can bring something which pressures Marowak (and enemy team) as Marowak is slow af and carry sooo many weakness.
Also it is weak to Rocks and don't have any form of recovery.
 
I'm doing my best to earn reqs at the moment, and while I doubt that I'll succeed (new meta, so still figuring things out), I'd like to share my opinion. The major points are underlined.

I believe that the biggest issue that players have with Genesect is that it is very difficult to prepare for. Note that I don't say "counter", because it has none. Instead, it is the fact that Genesect is incredibly versatile and therefore it is a major challenge when a team is built to merely check the many sets that are all very viable.

Some have argued in this thread and elsewhere that this versatility, for lack of better phrasing, will "spice up" the meta and steer us away from the "stale" feeling of ORAS OU. Others argue that it is simply too powerful, too versatile, too splashable, etc. for the meta to handle. At the moment I am not sure where I stand; there is truth to both statements.

It seems to come down to the matter of whether or not we believe Genesect is healthy for the meta, in my opinion. It is clear that Genesect is powerful, versatile, and splashable, but we must ask if this is enough to warrant a ban. Many, of course, will argue that it does, but I find it easier to argue that something is unhealthy and lowers the quality of the ladder and tournament play rather than to debate whether it is "broken". Despite speculation being unreliable, I believe that the playerbase should evaluate how the meta will be affected if Genesect stays or if it goes.

Honestly, I think the biggest issue with SM OU isn't Genesect. "Of course!" you say, "It's that busted-ass mon Pheromosa/Hoopa-U/Mega Sableye/Tapu Lele/etc!". Not quite. Something that has been mentioned occasionally in ORAS OU, and is even more recognizable in SM, is that is it becoming increasingly difficult to deal with all of the threats present in the meta. Obviously this is mitigated through proper team building and knowing you opponent in the case of tournament play, but this only mitigates the problem; it does not solve it entirely. As more threats appear in the meta, it can feel as though match up has become more important than strategy. Has this always been the case? Yes. Has this "problem", should it be considered a problem, grown more prominent in recent metagames? Absolutely.

The reason I bring this up is because Genesect is a major "offender" of this "problem". Its unpredictability and difficulty to even check, based on its variety of very viable sets, can be argued as a factor that only increases the "problem" of matchup and is therefore unhealthy in SM OU. Once again, I must stress that this isn't objectively a problem, but there are many players who believe it is one. That said, it can be argued that Genesect's unique qualities are needed in the meta to breathe new life into it.

Tl;dr:

  • Genesect's suspect is largely based on how it is difficult to check its many viable sets. Is this unhealthy for the meta, or does it make it more interesting?
  • Does Genesect's presence in the tier lead to players having to play smarter? Or does it cause predictions that lean in the favor of the player that has Genesect?
  • Does virtually every team benefit by using Genesect?
  • Does Genesect exacerbate the increasing difficulty to deal with threats in the meta to an extent that is unhealthy?
  • Is the "problem" of matchup truly a problem? Or does it lead to better play and more creativity?

Please feel free to discuss.

Edit: eht 's comment shares many of my points; please give it a read
 
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ehT

:dog:
is a Contributor Alumnus
I'm not much of an OU player, but these arguments are sounding like the UU Hydreigon suspect all over again. In both cases, we have a 'mon with zero true counters due to their absurd versatility and coverage, but that can be more or less played around with ample prediction. It obviously doesn't just click buttons and win games the way that Zygarde-C and Mega Mence did, and unlike Hydreigon in ORAS UU, doesn't have any one set that's particularly overwhelming by itself, but it does have the ability to actively punish attempted counterplay with U-Turn and unexpected coverage. The question, then, isn't whether or not we have consistent defensive answers to the 'mon at hand, because we don't, but whether or not such a presence is worth having, especially in a meta as young as SuMo. Furthermore, I think we should be asking whether it's realistic and fair from a teambuilding perspective to expect your average player to have at least some sort of counterplay all the possible sets for just one 'mon, while simultaneously prepping for everybody else you have to look out for. Lastly, I think we must ask whether a 'mon as versatile, splashable, and powerful as Gene promotes creativity and diversity, like some argue, or laziness and staleness. I don't have an answer to any of these questions, but how we answer them will define the game we play as SuMo progresses on.
 
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I'm going to try and give my best personal assessment of the anti-ban view, half of which being an argument as to why Genesect is not ban-worthy and the other half contending why it not only should stay, but that we may be better off by keeping it. I won't pretend to hope that I'll change anyone's mind if it has already been made up, but as a general statement, some of the comments regarding Genesect and anti-ban posters in general have been very unfair. "How anyone could defend this not being broken is impossible", "why was this ever allowed again" ... it was unbanned because contrary to the hyperbole in these suspect threads, it has flaws and weaknesses and thus deserved to be tested. There are legitimate arguments to keeping it around even if you're pro-ban, so saying anti-ban just doesn't exist is blatantly wrong.

As for Genesect being "broken", if you want to justify a Genesect ban based on the actual definition of a broken pokemon that Smogon adheres to, I feel you would have a difficult time doing so. There is nothing about Genesect that "makes more skillful play irrelevant". If you are using it, it is absolutely not as brainless as "come in, click u-turn", and if you play this way with Genesect or with any fast pivot, this is a reflection of your playing ability and not Genesect's potentially broken qualities. It cannot outright sweep a vast majority of the metagame in a way that Mega Lucario, Mega Salamence or Zygarde-Complete can, as it either lacks necessary coverage, can only lock itself into one move and/or is out-sped and killed by priority or the numerous offensive pokemon that exceed base 99 speed. The rest of the definition goes on to discuss pokemon that are "gimmicky", have an unusually high BST or that are "uncompetitive" in that the battle is taken out of a player's hands. Absolutely none of these are defensible descriptions of Genesect, even if you are adamantly pro-ban. There is nothing gimmicky about Genesect, I don't think anyone has or would argue this. It's BST is a poor indicator of its peformance given it's ability in Download, and this argument can go both ways as the number of scenarios where Genesect has exactly the offensive capabilities it needs, exceeds what it needs or lacks the boost it needs to perform are too numerous to theorize and refute all in one post for either side.

As for the notion that Genesect is "uncompetitive", I have read this a few times in this thread and I cannot understand how in the world a word that has been rightfully applied to previously ban-worthy elements such as Swagger, Baton Pass chains, OHKO moves, Moody and etc. is now somehow applicable to Genesect. If anything, Genesect actually raises the level of skill inherent in a battle because contrary to many arguments that I read, there is in fact a difference between guessing or true unpredictability (or the dreaded "50/50s" term that I despise"), versus intelligent scouting, team preview assessment and risk analysis for your turns. Writing off the latter by simply saying "gee I have not one clue what my opponent could possibly be running and I have no way at all of figuring it out" is laziness -- you can argue reasonably that it might be difficult, but not that it is impossible. If you want to play this game on autopilot, there are plenty of teams that will allow you to do that and boy do we have a ladder just for you, but that is not the standard that we should strive for in terms of the most truly competitive areas of the community. Just because you think a scenario is a "50/50" does not mean that it is so; far too often I have either seen replays of a turn labeled as a coin-flip or have experienced them myself when, in actuality, whether we are talking about Genesect, Aegislash, Bisharp, Landorus-T vs Talon etc., there are plays that can be considered objectively "better" than others, where the reward outweighs the risk and you have some basis for your decision. So if you have a quarter nearby when you face Genesect and flipping it heads-or-tails is how you make decisions about how to deal with it, please do not vote. But if you do vote, and you do vote pro-ban, that's totally okay with me: just don't say that Genesect is "making the game uncompetitive" or "taking the battle out of my hands" because it makes you uncomfortable to play against something that can run multiple sets with set-dependent or team-based coverage.

Finally, let me bury the "checks and counters" argument in the grave where it rightfully belongs, for this suspect and future suspects. Yes, we are all astute enough to understand what it means to be a check vs a counter, how certain sets of certain pokemon are countered by certain sets of other pokemon. It is not a difficult concept to grasp. Consequently, I don't think any reasonable anti-ban poster here is trying to argue that Heatran counters LO HP Ground Genesect, or that Mantine checks Genesect variants running Thunderbolt. Obviously this is not the case, no one ever said it was. Rather, there are factors at play during an actual battle based on a variety of variables (your teammates, their teammates, what Genesect has done in prior turns, if it is shiny/not, what coverage is likely to exist based on their team preview, etc.), that can help you determine what play your opponent is likely to go for. Yes, for Genesect and for almost every single other OU viable pokemon, there are going to be turns between now and Gen 8 where you are out-predicted and out-played. Do not use this as an excuse to say that Genesect is unbeatable. If you think Ferrothorn can check Latios and you die to HP Fire, or Heatran is your check and you die to LO Earthquake, or Ttar is your switch and you're 2hko'd by Specs Surf then guess what -- you got out-predicted, or you didn't properly scout Latios' set, or you just got out-played and lost your check. I have yet to hear a solid argument as to why scenarios similar to this one are broken with Genesect, as if it is the only pokemon that can effectively use its passable bulk and wide move pool to lure its checks. Furthermore, you cannot have it both ways as a pro-ban poster and say "Genesect picks and chooses its checks" alongside "Genesect has the coverage to check whatever your team needs". In other words, if you're saying Genesect functions as this solo-agent that beats what it wants to alone, then that is going to result in it running optimal coverage to pull off its own sweep or break walls itself, whereas the latter is saying "my team needs Thunderbolt because I'm weak to bulky waters", and so you can expect Genesect to run that. This is just one way of understanding what coverage it is likely to have -- assessing what it is actually meant to do on your opponent's team. There is a reason why RP, Scarf, Band etc. run almost always the same coverage per set each time they are used -- they all perform a specific function and it is up to you to determine what that is, whether it is playing a supportive role or a more self-sufficient one. It doesn't guarantee you knowing anything's set but it goes a long way if your opponent is using a team that is at all rationally built.

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So as promised, while I am not only prepared to refute why Genesect is broken or ban-worthy, I will go a step further and argue that its presence is something that we may find beneficial in the long term development of SM OU. What Genesect does, as I stated in many past posts, is allow you to make your entire team of six pokemon more capable of supporting one-another in a way that any versatile pivot inevitably does. The difference between healthy role-compression into an offensive pivot, versus unhealthy centralization of a defensive one like Aegislash is that with something like Aegislash, you are relying on your typing, bulk, utility and/or recovery options to actually check a specific group of pokemon. This forces you to run either specific breakers or sub-optimal coverage to overcome this. With fast offensive pivots like Genesect, Greninja, Tornadus-T, you don't have the bulk or the capability to outlast individual pokemon but rather you check something offensively with your coverage and speed, forcing something out of play and gaining momentum. This isn't a phenomenon that I think is in any way broken or contrary to competitive play - I don't know why the only way we are allowed to check things is by sending in an appropriate wall every single time. If this is the only way you know how to play then play stall or fat balance teams, but also know that this shouldn't be the only acceptable way to play or win. If you want to talk about risk vs reward, that's fine, but if that's your best argument against keeping Genesect then you need to answer for the fact that in every single tier there are always at least a handful of S-rank offensive threats that are difficult to justify not-using. How much "risk" did you really take on using Clefable, or Latios, or Landorus-T on a team in ORAS? It was a very limited opportunity cost and that was about it. Having versatile offensive pivots helps a metagame avoid becoming too reliant on team match-up and bringing specific breakers to beat specific builds. Refuting this by saying "but we don't keep broken things to check other broken things" is somewhat of a red herring, because even if it were true that Genesect is very broken, it is performing a function that is very important for something else to fulfill in its absence. Eventually you get to a point where you have too many offensive threats to prepare for but none individually deserve to be banned, which is where I feel ORAS left off and as such it becomes a match-up dependent metagame revolving around the same stale pokemon checking the same stale pokemon. I'm really hoping this won't happen to Sun & Moon.
 
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I feel like I need to refute many pro-ban arguments, and elaborate on why keeping Gene for now is the right move.

1) "Genesect is overcentralizing because you need to specifically prepare for it" - You also had to use a Keldeo or Bisharp check/counter on every ORAS team, but no one's saying they're broken.

2) "Genesect is overcentralizing because there's no reason not to use it on every team" - I'm pretty sure Lando-T has more usage and things like Lati and Lando in ORAS still probably had more usage than Gene now. Usage aside, adding a Genesect can stack weaknesses and using a certain set can leave you weak to some styles, so it can't mindlessly be slapped onto a team.

3) "Genesect lacks full counters" - Well, there's also no full counters to Kyurem-B. Obviously Gene is a better pokemon but a lack of counters alone doesn't break something. You can still pivot around these mons reasonably well and revenge kill easily.

4) "Genesect is too versatile with its coverage options" - XY Greninja had coverage to beat like any possible switchin besides Clef and Chansey (taunt aside). Greninja's Protean boost is basically equivalent to a download boost (which is less reliable). Even Greninja now has few full counters if any, with even more coverage than Gene, so this doesn't make something broken.

5) "Genesect may have some walls, but it can just U-turn on them" - Any U-turn pokemon can use the move on any of its counters. Scizor using U-turn on Heatran isn't exactly a broken thing and this has more to do with U-turn as a whole rather than Genesect.

So, why exactly are people saying Gene is broken? As Finchinator said, it's something like "Similarly to Hoopa, Genesect is very tough to switch into, but it doesn't have a crippling weakness like other good breakers." What this sounds like to me is that Genesect is just a good pokemon. It may not be super frail or slow, but there is always a trade-off in using a certain Genesect set. You also aren't necessarily advantaged for using a Gene while your opponent does not.

Generally speaking, we should really only be banning pokemon that warp the tier significantly or truly are too powerful. Something like Zygarde-Complete was just too good for OU, and Aegislash definitely had a negative effect on the tier that Genesect cannot even barely compare to. In the case of Lando-I, the quickban was less clear and maybe shouldn't have happened but the council was unanimous due to its Gene-like coverage + insane power simultaneously. If we just dropped Genesect into ORAS and went by this tiering philosophy, then hell yea it would be broken. But right now we have a new Generation that is still evolving.

From this point onwards, with this test included, we need to give the meta time to settle. As we saw with Pheromosa, many people (myself included) saw it as quickban worthy early on but eventually realized it can be managed. Pheromosa's counters like Toxapex can't be used on every team, but you can still pivot into it reasonably well and revenge it even without the hard counters. Additionally, many people thought Mega Metagross was broken, but later realized it can be managed. Perhaps the same will happen with Genesect, and it won't be seen as this menacing down the road. To ban Gene at this time simply stunts the growth of the tier, as Jukain pointed out.

To suspect ANYTHING this early on is foolish. Something is either quickban worthy or it shouldn't be touched at all. Suspect tests exist to test how a metagame is with/without a given suspect. This point is rendered useless when a metagame has existed for such a short amount of time. Having a suspect test so early on was a mistake, but we can prevent consequences from this mistake by voting to not ban. If Gene turns out to still be an issue in the future, we can suspect again. Mega Sableye stayed in ou after its first test and was later banned, so please do not rush this decision and harm the tier permanently.
I'd like to respond in brief to some of these points here.

1) Genesect differs from Keldeo and Bisharp in that you need multiple checks to fully account for it. Many top tier mons have had ways around their checks before, but Genesect does so by having almost half a dozen comparably viable sets, rather than something like Latios running EQ for Heatran (which sacrificed Defog, Recover, or another coverage move). If a team is particularly inhibited by one Genesect set's check, it's not a strenuous endeavor to shift your Genesect to a different build to reduce that weakness. Genesect is not something that, even focusing specifically on it, can be properly handled by one slot on the opposing team. Having to dedicate not just one, but 2-3 slots to Genesect as a full Pokemon, an amount reserved for cores, is at least bordering on unreasonable to me.

2. Genesect isn't stupid to the point of "literally throw a set on your team with no observation", but for most teams that use offense and/or pivoting, it's very hard to find a team of this nature that doesn't see a low-cost Gain from using some Genesect set. It's not quite "no reason not to always use it" levels, but Landorus-I never reached #1 level usage and I doubt anyone will argue the presence he had one offensive teams and in the metagame at large.

3. Lacking full counters is not necessarily a cause for ban, but in combination with the other things Genesect brings, it's a severe issue to consider. Genesect doesn't even have a consistent check given the options it has available, with Fire types preyed on by HP Ground or Douse Drive, Toxapex by Thunderbolt, Bulky Dragons Ice, Steel types by Flamethrower, and that's just concerning coverage. Genesect can circumvent offensive answers using Priority, he has set up options in Shift Gear/Rock Polish, and there's bound to be other things he could dip into should the game call for it. These moves all give Genesect a large number of sets that make him all but impossible to mitigate/check, much less counter, in a single slot, but what pushes him over the edge is that Genesect doesn't forfeit momentum to most other forms of counterplay. Kyurem-B becomes a momentum drain after netting a KO since its speed and mixed bag defensive typing makes it susceptible to Revenge Killing, and it has to make every entry count because it's very hazard weak. Genesect, on the other hand, U-Turn out of most scenarios, good or bad, without costing the team pressure or momentum for doing do, and it's hard to discourage from leaving since it's SR neutral while also being immune to Toxic/Toxic Spikes and Sandstorm, meaning some decently common forms of wear and tear wouldn't work even if he does stay on the field. U-Turn prevents trapping as an option, and Genesect almost always puts the result in the user's favor based on the reactionary play he forces.

1. Genesect stays, opponent stays, Opponent is hit hard and possibly down a mon (Genesect advantage)
2. Genesect stays, opponent switches, opponent survived a Genesect turn (assuming he doesn't have an option for the new entry) (Opponent advantage usually)
3. Genesect U-Turns, opponent switches, momentum swings to Genesect with switch response (Genesect advantage)
4. Genesect U-Turns, opponent stays, Genesect user stays on the offensive unless they lack something else that matches well with the opponent (Genesect advantage)

And this is just presuming Genesect is in a situation to U-Turn and doesn't perhaps consider hard switching to, say, bluff a non-scarf set or bluff a choiced set and lure something in later. This is a simplification to some extent, but it still shows how Genesect's user is risking a lot less in a given match up with the threat of his coverage and ability to pivot as a consistently advantageous move.

4) XY Greninja still had hard stops and didn't necessarily have the power behind it to break a defensive backbone. You already mentioned earlier that Genesect has no hard counters, and I've affirmed it also lacks consistent answers. The thing that pushed ORAS Greninja to the breaking point was expansion to its coverage via Gunk Shot and to a lesser extent Low Kick. The point at which Greninja was banned it was in the position Genesect is in now: it had no consistent answers, only mons that could check some variants of it, but whereas Greninja was movepool adjustments, Genesect differs by entire sets. Greninja also lacks some of the tools that play into Genesect's proficiency, such as viable mixed offensive stats (Gunk Shot was only enough as a SE coverage on otherwise hard checks), which less consistent or not, are still backed by Download

+1 252 SpA Genesect Ice Beam vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Arceus: 119-141 (31.2 - 37%) -- 78.5% chance to 3HKO
+1 0 Atk Genesect Iron Head vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Arceus: 129-153 (33.8 - 40.1%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
252 SpA Life Orb Protean Greninja Ice Beam vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Arceus: 140-165 (36.7 - 43.3%) -- guaranteed 3HKO

Remember that if we consider Download and Protean give the same 50% power increase, Genesect isn't getting an item's power and still comes within a similar range on an invested stat. If the Genesect has a Download Boost on its STABs, the difference is even smaller without investment OR an item. This power only gets closed further if you allow Genesect to consider item options or the favorable-but-possible scenario of these factors lining up perfectly (ergo ATK Download on a Physically invested set like Shift Gear). This is all just comparing difference in power. Besides that, I'm not sure if I agree with the notion that Greninja has better coverage than Genesect. The former's viable options typically consisted of Water, Ice, Poison, Fighting, Dark, maybe Fire through HP as either primary or common secondary options, while Genesect brings Bug, Steel, Fire, Ice, Electric and off Water/HP Ground options. They each have a decent array of types to fire off, but Genesect's movepool is comparable if not much more powerful in terms of those options actual moves (Poison on Greninja only being through its lower invested ATK stat), and while I will have to properly confirm this, including Fire, Ice, and Electric alone in that coverage pool makes for phenomenal coverage within just two slots.

Genesect also puts the above behind U-Turn, pivoting being a role that a typical Greninja wasn't going to fill in lieu of AoA. This makes Genesect a hard to block core breaker offensively, and he also generates momentum even if faced with an answer, something the Genesect user will probably know before the opponent does and can disguise reasonably well since U-Turning isn't exactly a move most users have to be forced into.

5) It is true that U-Turn's benefits are not restricted to Genesect, but I also don't think it's hard to argue Genesect is the best user of the move in OU because of the sum of all factors on the table for it. Besides being a fairly decent user of the move in terms of Power + Speed, Genesect excels at forcing switches because of the threat presented by his sets and movepool, a quality that further bolsters U-Turn since it reduces the opponent's firing off moves at the incoming mon or wearing Genesect down on the exit (depending on the speeds). Genesect's ability to force switches also means he does not have to outright rely on U-Turn to keep Momentum on his side, rather it's among the options he can use to do so. He can use U-Turn as much as a proactive as a reactive move, whereas the common use, as you described in your point, is mostly reactive to get momentum back from a counter switching in. Genesect is just as free to U-Turn out of a weak match up as a strong match up, and for reasons such as the ability to bluff or simply the decent power behind its neutral STAB U-Turn, the choice's benefit isn't limited to the Momentum grab. And even if the above is something that can still be applied to any U-Turn user I'll ask again: does any other mon have nearly as many strong points going for it (set versatility, coverage options, overall/mixed power, strong defensive typing w/ acceptable bulk) at once as Genesect does?


As for the notion that Genesect is "uncompetitive", I have read this a few times in this thread and I cannot understand how in the world a word that has been rightfully applied to previously ban-worthy elements such as Swagger, Baton Pass chains, OHKO moves, Moody and etc. is now somehow applicable to Genesect. If anything, Genesect actually raises the level of skill inherent in a battle because contrary to many arguments that I read, there is in fact a difference between guessing or true unpredictability (or the dreaded "50/50s" term that I despise"), versus intelligent scouting, team preview assessment and risk analysis for your turns. Writing off the latter by simply saying "gee I have not one clue what my opponent could possibly be running and I have no way at all of figuring it out" is laziness -- you can argue reasonably that it might be difficult, but not that it is impossible. If you want to play this game on autopilot, there are plenty of teams that will allow you to do that and boy do we have a ladder just for you, but that is not the standard that we should strive for in terms of the most truly competitive areas of the community. Just because you think a scenario is a "50/50" does not mean that it is so; far too often I have either seen replays of a turn labeled as a coin-flip or have experienced them myself when, in actuality, whether we are talking about Genesect, Aegislash, Bisharp, Landorus-T vs Talon etc., there are plays that can be considered objectively "better" than others, where the reward outweighs the risk and you have some basis for your decision. So if you have a quarter nearby when you face Genesect and flipping it heads-or-tails is how you make decisions about how to deal with it, please do not vote. But if you do vote, and you do vote pro-ban, that's totally okay with me: just don't say that Genesect is "making the game uncompetitive" or "taking the battle out of my hands" because it makes you uncomfortable to play against something that can run multiple sets with set-dependent or team-based coverage.

Finally, let me bury the "checks and counters" argument in the grave where it rightfully belongs, for this suspect and future suspects. Yes, we are all astute enough to understand what it means to be a check vs a counter, how certain sets of certain pokemon are countered by certain sets of other pokemon. It is not a difficult concept to grasp. Consequently, I don't think any reasonable anti-ban poster here is trying to argue that Heatran counters LO HP Ground Genesect, or that Mantine checks Genesect variants running Thunderbolt. Obviously this is not the case, no one ever said it was. Rather, there are factors at play during an actual battle based on a variety of variables (your teammates, their teammates, what Genesect has done in prior turns, if it is shiny/not, what coverage is likely to exist based on their team preview, etc.), that can help you determine what play your opponent is likely to go for. Yes, for Genesect and for almost every single other OU viable pokemon, there are going to be turns between now and Gen 8 where you are out-predicted and out-played. Do not use this as an excuse to say that Genesect is unbeatable. If you think Ferrothorn can check Latios and you die to HP Fire, or Heatran is your check and you die to LO Earthquake, or Ttar is your switch and you're 2hko'd by Specs Surf then guess what -- you got out-predicted, or you didn't properly scout Latios' set, or you just got out-played and lost your check. I have yet to hear a solid argument as to why scenarios similar to this one are broken with Genesect, as if it is the only pokemon that can effectively use its passable bulk and wide move pool to lure its checks. Furthermore, you cannot have it both ways as a pro-ban poster and say "Genesect picks and chooses its checks" alongside "Genesect has the coverage to check whatever your team needs". In other words, if you're saying Genesect functions as this solo-agent that beats what it wants to alone, then that is going to result in it running optimal coverage to pull off its own sweep or break walls itself, whereas the latter is saying "my team needs Thunderbolt because I'm weak to bulky waters", and so you can expect Genesect to run that. This is just one way of understanding what coverage it is likely to have -- assessing what it is actually meant to do on your opponent's team. There is a reason why RP, Scarf, Band etc. run almost always the same coverage per set each time they are used -- they all perform a specific function and it is up to you to determine what that is, whether it is playing a supportive role or a more self-sufficient one. It doesn't guarantee you knowing anything's set but it goes a long way if your opponent is using a team that is at all rationally built.

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So as promised, while I am not only prepared to refute why Genesect is broken or ban-worthy, I will go a step further and argue that its presence is something that we may find beneficial in the long term development of SM OU. What Genesect does, as I stated in many past posts, is allow you to make your entire team of six pokemon more capable of supporting one-another in a way that any versatile pivot inevitably does. The difference between healthy role-compression into an offensive pivot, versus unhealthy centralization of a defensive one like Aegislash is that with something like Aegislash, you are relying on your typing, bulk, utility and/or recovery options to actually check a specific group of pokemon. This forces you to run either specific breakers or sub-optimal coverage to overcome this. With fast offensive pivots like Genesect, Greninja, Tornadus-T, you don't have the bulk or the capability to outlast individual pokemon but rather you check something offensively with your coverage and speed, forcing something out of play and gaining momentum. This isn't a phenomenon that I think is in any way broken or contrary to competitive play - I don't know why the only way we are allowed to check things is by sending in an appropriate wall every single time. If this is the only way you know how to play then play stall or fat balance teams, but also know that this shouldn't be the only acceptable way to play or win. If you want to talk about risk vs reward, that's fine, but if that's your best argument against keeping Genesect then you need to answer for the fact that in every single tier there are always at least a handful of S-rank offensive threats that are difficult to justify using. How much "risk" did you really take on using Clefable, or Latios, or Landorus-T on a team in ORAS? It was a very limited opportunity cost and that was about it. Having versatile offensive pivots helps a metagame avoid becoming too reliant on team match-up and bringing specific breakers to beat specific builds. Refuting this by saying "but we don't keep broken things to check other broken things" is somewhat of a red herring, because even if it were true that Genesect is very broken, it is performing a function that is very important for something else to fulfull in its absence. Eventually you get to a point where you have too many offensive threats to prepare for but none individually deserve to be banned, where is where I feel ORAS left off and as such it becomes a match-up dependent metagame revolving around the same stale pokemon checking the same stale pokemon. I'm really hoping this won't happen to Sun & Moon.
I see where you're coming from, and while I share the sentiment on the Broken definition in regards to Genesect, I disagree in some respects with the other arguments

Uncompetitive: Later in the post you mention Genesect's ability to check opponents in an offensive manner by threatening them out with coverage and speed. Genesect is not mindlessly down to "enter and click U-Turn", a point you mention and I agree with, rather he posses the coverage to viably threaten a large portion of the OU metagame as well as U-Turn. Being able to check a certain set of mons and U-Turn out of his own answers in turn is by no means specific to Genesect, but the magnitude of the pool Genesect can offensively check compared to how much he has to U-Turn against (as opposed to being able to choose U-Turn among other responses) is significantly larger than any other pivot OU has or has had. In my personal opinion, when a mon has as favorable a risk-reward ratio as Genesect does both in what he does individually and/or what he is able to provide for a team in a single slot, it enters into uncompetitive territory because reaping the needed rewards from building a team with and using Genesect does not take the same degree of skill at the top level that other mons did. In past gens, mons like Clefable and Latios certainly offered immense reward, but it took a significant degree of finely tuned teambuilding to cover their weaknesses and in-battle skill to properly outdo your opponent with them. An improperly played (relative to top ladder or tournament level skill) Clefable will not do its job right, but it's entirely possible for a sub optimally played Genesect to still swing a lot of momentum and offensive pressure in its user's favor. Genesect is a step above a jack-of-all trades, as the amount of utility and benefits it offers to the team before having to compromise any aspect of it is significantly greater than anything I think OU has right now.

Checks and Counters: The issue is not the idea that Genesect lacks checks altogether, but the issue becomes that Genesect is more than capable of using whatever it chooses in response to what would-be checks it is most likely to encounter at relatively minor-to-no cost to its overall performance. In your Latios example, Latios did indeed have options to deal with common checks, but it in turn had to give up something in order to do so: using a moveslot for any of those cost Latios either Roost or Defog, two moves that were definitely important factors in the roles it was viable for; HP Fire in Gen 6 required Latios to give up its Base 110 Speed tier, which was a cost in a gen where said tier was getting crowded with other viable Pokemon with the influx of Megas alone; Specs comes with its own general set of issues, as it locks Latios in as Choice items do and thus meant it had to be that much better at predicting when the target would come in, not to mention being harder to hide since typical Latios would carry a Life Orb, a much more easily identified item than something like bluffing Choice Scarf/Specs with an Expert Belt. Genesect doesn't run into an immense number of roadblocks in his own right by changing up his coverage moves, and they're not necessarily any easier to scout for outside of the more obviously announced Douse Drive, which only solves the issue of having scouted for it in battle and leaves the matter of having a check prepared for it in the first place. And the two supposedly conflicting points you mentioned ("Genesect picks and chooses its checks" alongside "Genesect has the coverage to check whatever your team needs") are not necessarily jobs that Genesect does at the same time on one team, but Genesect possess both of these qualities and thus is well suited to a team in almost any situation barring an entirely different playstyle like Stall. It is just as easy to build around a particular Genesect as it is to add Genesect into the team late in the building process to patch up a hole, and it might not even be a hole that specifically needs Genesect compared to a role that many mons can fill and Genesect happens to be the best pick for, such as an offensive pivot or just a general coverage based balance breaker. Genesect is a mon that often already goes onto a team for a general purpose like Pivoting, but even when observing the rest of the team it still can take scouting to figure out how he's going about that job, and the Genesect user by all means should be just as aware of the ability to read the team.

Say they're running Tapu Koko, a mon that's stopped hard by Alolawak, but their team also includes Gengar, a fast mon with a Super effective option who can deal well with Alolawak. Is Genesect another Alolawak checked mon that they feel safe using because they have Gengar (and possibly other answers), or is Genesect running HP Ground as another means to beat Alolawak and create a winning scenario for Tapu Koko? In situations like this, the Alolawak user is always the one taking risks because there's a plausible (rather than niche/lure) outcome to how they have to adapt to either possibility: If they play as if HP Ground, Alolawak can't check a very dangerous mon in Genesect and they have to be careful of the pressure on their other checks; if they assume no HP Ground, Genesect could very well take out their most reliable answer to another dangerous member of the team. Unless the Alolawak user makes very risky/unconventional moves (such as bringing in and immediately withdrawing Alolawak to try and bait HP Ground), the Genesect user probably won't reveal the information that should govern optimal play until they've gained such an advantage that it won't disadvantage them anymore, and this is assuming said risky play works and the Genesect user doesn't take the safer option of switching/U-turning to withhold that information regardless. This is one particular scenario, but many of the proposed Checks to Genesect's sets are fairly viable OU mons, so it's not unreasonable to think a team would have answers to them whether they inhibit a Genesect set they use or not. The knowledge of what Genesect set a player is running and how it governs their actions in a battle is valuable information, and a good Genesect user is aware of this and will make use of the opponent's need to know, whether it's through offensive pressure the opponent can't respond to without knowing, intentionally playing in such a manner as to keep them second guessing, or even altering their ideal manner of play to feed a false impression of what the information is. This is why the ability to tailor Genesect's checks to either the player's whim or the team's need is a valuable tool inherent to Genesect as a Pokemon and as a presence in the tier.


As for your closing argument, I fail to see how an offensive pivot inherently reduces team match up, as it simply means both sides are going to grapple for momentum with each other since both are equally capable of running said pivot. Team match up came down as much to lacking many options to break a defensive backbone as being weak to an opposing offensive core. Is the suggestion that trends and teams became very defensive to handle the large number of strong-but-not-bannable offensive threats? In that case those teams are not using Genesect and he's either too weak to help break them down or too strong for the defensive playstyle to check the offense he promotes without becoming broken itself. For offensive teams, Genesect himself is powerful and overall makes the playstyle stronger since he provides ever important momentum to a playstyle that already thrived without him there to offer it in such a degree. Barring that, I don't see why Genesect would promote anymore variety, as he inverts the problem in a sense to "I need to check Genesect's common sets and answer those common checks", which given the power behind Genesect's sets both individually and as a collective presence to prepare for, is a very limiting set of options on the first half and something to keep in mind for the second. I'm sure your idea makes more sense than I'm making of it, but as presented I'm do not see anything to make me agree with Genesect as a healthy presence.

As a minor closing point, I also think Aegislash is not a strong choice for describing defensive centralization alone: while his defensive presence was certainly a major (if not the primary) factor in how he centralized the game, the strong neutral coverage of his STAB, ability to break said STAB's common resistors, and high offensive stats due to Stance Change made his influence a combination of high offense and defense, even if it leaned (much) more heavily on the defense.
 

Nix_Hex

Uangaana kasuttortunga!
is a Site Content Manager Alumnusis a Forum Moderator Alumnusis a Researcher Alumnusis a Top Contributor Alumnusis a Battle Simulator Moderator Alumnus
I'm not going to pick a side because I have never played a SM match, but what I have to say is incredibly relevant, transcending generations.

If you are a new user who is pro-ban and missed the Greninja suspect last generation, listen up. Your best argument for Gene being broken offensively is that it is so diverse that a minor tweak in its moveset changes its list of counters, allowing a single teammate to pick up the slack (pick anything B- rank and above that you want and Gene will likely pair perfectly with it, or at least very well). It even has pseudo-Protean if you get the right Download boost. This also takes a massive dump on arguments like "it can't run all of U-turn, Bug Buzz, Tbolt, Ice Beam, Flamethrower, HP Ground, Shift Gear, Blaze Kick, Iron Head, Extreme Speed, and Douse Drive Technoblast on every set so it's not broken." Also, changing its item alters its functionality drastically, dumping on "it can't be Scarf, Band, LO, Experiment Belt, and Douse Drive at the same time" arguments as well.

If you have never participated in a suspect test before and have never read through the ORAS Lando-I or Greninja suspects, and you are anti-ban, here are some arguments NOT TO MAKE that will make everyone think you are a joke:
-It has 4MSS / can only use one item - see my last two points above, I need not expound on it further. 4MSS arguments really only apply to Pokemon with small movepools or a bad balance of stats.
-No one uses Douse or HP Ground lolol - usage does not = brokenness
-Poor thing won't do well in ubers! - That's not how tiering works. Bug Arceus, Deo-N and Reshiram traditionally have been outclassed heavily in ubers, but they would demolish OU with little effort, wouldn't they?
 
As for Genesect being "broken", if you want to justify a Genesect ban based on the actual definition of a broken pokemon that Smogon adheres to, I feel you would have a difficult time doing so. There is nothing about Genesect that "makes more skillful play irrelevant". If you are using it, it is absolutely not as brainless as "come in, click u-turn", and if you play this way with Genesect or with any fast pivot, this is a reflection of your playing ability and not Genesect's potentially broken qualities. It cannot outright sweep a vast majority of the metagame in a way that Mega Lucario, Mega Salamence or Zygarde-Complete can, as it either lacks necessary coverage, can only lock itself into one move and/or is out-sped and killed by priority or the numerous offensive pokemon that exceed base 99 speed.
You're correct that Genesect isn't about coming in and spamming U-turn.

Up until where most of the time, that's actually a viable tactic. Like, you wrote THIS:
as it either lacks necessary coverage
What the fuck dude? Genesect is infamous for it's coverage. Have any of the anti-ban people even seen its movepool lately? Genesect threatens with its coverage, and suddenly it's a 50/50: whether or not you'll stay in, expecting the U-turn and hopefully get a chance to set up or predict the switch- but the Genesect player can now instantly prepare for your next move, die/take serious damage when the Genesect player actually pulls the trigger, or you switch out and they didn't U-turn, or they DID U-turn and now you're left scrambling again. In the instance where Genesect DOESN'T have a coverage move for you- and considering that the BoltBeam combo is still good, decades later, and that Flamethrower when fire types are kind of at a premium is pretty damn great- he still has a team. With a correct Download boost, Genesect actually CAN sweep the metagame with Rock Polish, or he can work as a great cleaner with just a Choice Scarf- or maybe he puts on a Choice Band, goes in for a physical download boost, and Extremespeeds everyone into the ground. I mean, yeah, sure, there's Blissey/Chansey, Tapu Fini, and Toxapex, but they wall different variants- they aren't even close to being consistent counters, and they have baggage of their own.

The rest of the definition goes on to discuss pokemon that are "gimmicky", have an unusually high BST or that are "uncompetitive" in that the battle is taken out of a player's hands. Absolutely none of these are defensible descriptions of Genesect, even if you are adamantly pro-ban. There is nothing gimmicky about Genesect, I don't think anyone has or would argue this. It's BST is a poor indicator of its peformance given it's ability in Download, and this argument can go both ways as the number of scenarios where Genesect has exactly the offensive capabilities it needs, exceeds what it needs or lacks the boost it needs to perform are too numerous to theorize and refute all in one post for either side.
Okay, this little bit made zero sense. Most of the thread discussing "gimmick" Pokemon have been talking about counters for Genesect that we"d have to be "creative" for.

Oh for fuck's sake. There is nothing creative about having to deal with the "which Genesect variant am I dealing with here" roulette, and once you've figured it out you still might not even be carrying the right check. I think a ton of the anti-ban people are truly underestimating how flexible Genesect is. Hidden Power Ground isn't even technically a "gimmick" if its express purpose is to screw over Heatran which is a pretty consistent check to Genesect as long as Genesect doesn't just U-turn out first. The rest of your statement made even less than zero sense, considering that Download essentially means that Genesect always comes in with a +1 to some offensive stat- it technically has a BST about 100 points higher than it's actual BST due to Download ALWAYS giving the damn thing a boost, the trick is trying to get the right one.

If anything, Genesect actually raises the level of skill inherent in a battle because contrary to many arguments that I read, there is in fact a difference between guessing or true unpredictability (or the dreaded "50/50s" term that I despise"), versus intelligent scouting, team preview assessment and risk analysis for your turns.
The term 50/50 is used because it's pretty useful in expressing a lot of situations. Regardless, how in YHVH's name does Genesect raise the skill level, because everyone should have to use those three italicized terms to deal with Genesect? Alright, that's fair- if you're serious about competitive battling, then you should definitely have those three qualities in some capacity. What you seem to be misunderstanding is that just by HAVING Genesect- and Genesect, as previously established, and you wisely chose not to refute this point, is supremely splashable due to its bulk and easily circumvented single weakness- you force a greater mental burden onto anybody facing Genesect. You suddenly have to theorymon what it could be just by looking at a fucking team, because you don't you risk getting bushwhacked when it suddenly reveals that it wasn't scarfed. Let's do an example with a throwaway team I thought up in fifteen seconds:

1. Heatran
2. Genesect
3. Therian Landorus
4. Pheromosa
5. Tapu Fini
6. Alolawak

Can you reasonably tell me what set Genesect is going for? On one hand, it's probably not wearing a scarf- Pheromosa is faster than most scarfers anyways, it just can't come in on nearly as many situations. But if that's true, what could it be? Could it be a Rock Polish set, an Expert Belt set, a Life Orb set, or a Choice Band set for wallbreaking? Congratulations, you still have four more sets to analyze and you still have no clue of its moveset or coverage options. To be fair, it's probably running Thunderbolt since the team in general is lacking electricity coverage and the BoltBeam coverage is just so damn good, so Ice Beam is also there, so we can reasonably disregard the Choice Band set.

Or of course the player decided to run a Scarf anyways and with that, your entire thought process was rendered null and void.

Do you understand how many mental gymnastics you're asking people to undergo? Everybody anti-ban is, in one way or another, asking for an exception to be made for this Pokemon when literally every other Pokemon in the OU meta is relatively straightforward and has a limited number of viable sets that can be reasonably expected. You CANNOT say the same for Genesect.


If you want to play this game on autopilot
Seriously? You're resorting to a fucking straw man? Nobody said anything close to this. Don't put words in people's mouths.

But if you do vote, and you do vote pro-ban, that's totally okay with me: just don't say that Genesect is "making the game uncompetitive" or "taking the battle out of my hands" because it makes you uncomfortable to play against something that can run multiple sets with set-dependent or team-based coverage.
Understatement of the century

Finally, let me bury the "checks and counters" argument in the grave where it rightfully belongs
Uh, you didn't bury shit. You just wasted a lot of words.

Yes, for Genesect and for almost every single other OU viable pokemon, there are going to be turns between now and Gen 8 where you are out-predicted and out-played. Do not use this as an excuse to say that Genesect is unbeatable. If you think Ferrothorn can check Latios and you die to HP Fire, or Heatran is your check and you die to LO Earthquake, or Ttar is your switch and you're 2hko'd by Specs Surf then guess what -- you got out-predicted, or you didn't properly scout Latios' set, or you just got out-played and lost your check.
Okay...? Are you seriously going the straw man route again? How does this relate to the issue of Genesect again? Are you implying everybody who doesn't like Genesect's absurd flexibility is somehow bad at the game and just needs to predict better or something?

I have yet to hear a solid argument as to why scenarios similar to this one are broken with Genesect, as if it is the only pokemon that can effectively use its passable bulk and wide move pool to lure its checks.
Because Hidden Power is a move limited to a power of 60- specifically, it almost never has a boost backing it up, it's weak by itself, and it's used specifically in the hope of killing an expected check. Genesect's specific checks are- wait. Genesect doesn't actually have specific checks. The checks vary by the set that's actually in play, with the most consistent ones probably being Heatran which has its own issues (Such as a x4 weakness to the ground type) that can be exploited, and Toxapex for sets that don't run Thunderbolt but also has its own issues (Such as literally zero offensive presence).

Furthermore, you cannot have it both ways as a pro-ban poster and say "Genesect picks and chooses its checks" alongside "Genesect has the coverage to check whatever your team needs". In other words, if you're saying Genesect functions as this solo-agent that beats what it wants to alone, then that is going to result in it running optimal coverage to pull off its own sweep or break walls itself, whereas the latter is saying "my team needs Thunderbolt because I'm weak to bulky waters", and so you can expect Genesect to run that. This is just one way of understanding what coverage it is likely to have -- assessing what it is actually meant to do on your opponent's team. There is a reason why RP, Scarf, Band etc. run almost always the same coverage per set each time they are used -- they all perform a specific function and it is up to you to determine what that is, whether it is playing a supportive role or a more self-sufficient one. It doesn't guarantee you knowing anything's set but it goes a long way if your opponent is using a team that is at all rationally built.
For heaven's sake, did we really need an essay on how to play the game? Regardless, it's very easy to say "Genesect picks and chooses its checks" alongside "Genesect has the coverage to check whatever your team needs." You pick the checks by picking your specific variant of Genesect you want to use- and if you're a good team builder, you pick a team that both handles that Genesect variant's checks and is reinforced by your chosen Genesect variant. The problem is that there are a half dozen viable Genesect variants and Genesect makes itself REALLY use. Have you seen its typing/stats/movepool lately? This makes it very, very flexible in the teambuilding process. Oh, your team has enough speed? Change your Scarfsect to Expertsect. What's this? Looks like I'm weak to speedy sweepers? I guess I can run Choice Band with Extremespeed!



So as promised, while I am not only prepared to refute why Genesect is broken or ban-worthy, I will go a step further and argue that its presence is something that we may find beneficial in the long term development of SM OU
What part of dealing with a Pokemon that's strong, decently bulky, has great typing, and that can become anything the player wants is beneficial to the OU metagame? Forcing us to perform extra mental gymnastics?
 
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Shurtugal

The Enterpriser.
is a Tiering Contributor
I feel like I need to refute many pro-ban arguments, and elaborate on why keeping Gene for now is the right move.

1) "Genesect is overcentralizing because you need to specifically prepare for it" - You also had to use a Keldeo or Bisharp check/counter on every ORAS team, but no one's saying they're broken.

2) "Genesect is overcentralizing because there's no reason not to use it on every team" - I'm pretty sure Lando-T has more usage and things like Lati and Lando in ORAS still probably had more usage than Gene now. Usage aside, adding a Genesect can stack weaknesses and using a certain set can leave you weak to some styles, so it can't mindlessly be slapped onto a team.

3) "Genesect lacks full counters" - Well, there's also no full counters to Kyurem-B. Obviously Gene is a better pokemon but a lack of counters alone doesn't break something. You can still pivot around these mons reasonably well and revenge kill easily.

4) "Genesect is too versatile with its coverage options" - XY Greninja had coverage to beat like any possible switchin besides Clef and Chansey (taunt aside). Greninja's Protean boost is basically equivalent to a download boost (which is less reliable). Even Greninja now has few full counters if any, with even more coverage than Gene, so this doesn't make something broken.

5) "Genesect may have some walls, but it can just U-turn on them" - Any U-turn pokemon can use the move on any of its counters. Scizor using U-turn on Heatran isn't exactly a broken thing and this has more to do with U-turn as a whole rather than Genesect.

So, why exactly are people saying Gene is broken? As Finchinator said, it's something like "Similarly to Hoopa, Genesect is very tough to switch into, but it doesn't have a crippling weakness like other good breakers." What this sounds like to me is that Genesect is just a good pokemon. It may not be super frail or slow, but there is always a trade-off in using a certain Genesect set. You also aren't necessarily advantaged for using a Gene while your opponent does not.

Generally speaking, we should really only be banning pokemon that warp the tier significantly or truly are too powerful. Something like Zygarde-Complete was just too good for OU, and Aegislash definitely had a negative effect on the tier that Genesect cannot even barely compare to. In the case of Lando-I, the quickban was less clear and maybe shouldn't have happened but the council was unanimous due to its Gene-like coverage + insane power simultaneously. If we just dropped Genesect into ORAS and went by this tiering philosophy, then hell yea it would be broken. But right now we have a new Generation that is still evolving.

From this point onwards, with this test included, we need to give the meta time to settle. As we saw with Pheromosa, many people (myself included) saw it as quickban worthy early on but eventually realized it can be managed. Pheromosa's counters like Toxapex can't be used on every team, but you can still pivot into it reasonably well and revenge it even without the hard counters. Additionally, many people thought Mega Metagross was broken, but later realized it can be managed. Perhaps the same will happen with Genesect, and it won't be seen as this menacing down the road. To ban Gene at this time simply stunts the growth of the tier, as Jukain pointed out.

To suspect ANYTHING this early on is foolish. Something is either quickban worthy or it shouldn't be touched at all. Suspect tests exist to test how a metagame is with/without a given suspect. This point is rendered useless when a metagame has existed for such a short amount of time. Having a suspect test so early on was a mistake, but we can prevent consequences from this mistake by voting to not ban. If Gene turns out to still be an issue in the future, we can suspect again. Mega Sableye stayed in ou after its first test and was later banned, so please do not rush this decision and harm the tier permanently.
The reverse is also true: you can ban a pokemon and re-suspect it later. Pretty sure we have done this for Garchomp and Excadrill in BW if memory serves correctly. I would not vote no ban in the hopes of a re-suspect etc. and simply focus on the present metagame and the conclusions we can make from it.

There is just something you are not understanding about Genesect.

First, your comparison to Genesect to Protean Greninja is like comparing apples to oranges. In ORAS Greninja got banned because it got even more coverage, but even then the coverage of Protean Greninja cannot even compare to Genesect's arsenal. Greninja will still lose to fat mons like Chansey and does not have to luxury to go mixed or hit from any spectrum like Genesect does.

Genesect's versatity is unlike any other Pokemon because it truly doesn't have any sufficient counters in OU. It has about 8 different viable S Tier sets, Greninja never came that close to versatility at all.

The issue with Genesect is literally U-Turn. You mention that other pokemon such as Scizor and Landorus-T get U-Turn, but once again this is a poor argument ignoring many factors; another case of apples to oranges. Genesect separates itself from any other U-Turn pokemon because of its versatility. It's versatility forces more switches than Scizor or Landorus-T, and it's download-boosted STAB U-Turns are strong enough to do sufficient damage to anything switching into it, allowing Genesect to punish the opponents, wear down counters, and give the Genesect player momentum with little to no cost. Take for example: I switch my red Genesect in vs the opposing Landorus-T. I could literally be Banded with Iron Head / U-Turn / Blaze Kick / Extremespeed but the versatility of expert belt / scarf genesect will put a lot more stress on my opponent, making U-Turn an easy and spammable option because my opponent will most likely not be able to afford risking the Ice Beam.

Basically: Genesect's access t 8 viable sets makes it obnoxiously hard to scout, especially since the Genesect player can easily spam U-Turn and make insane bluffs that don't require much skill due to the high risk v reward Genesect brings by merely existing.

Download is not as inconsistent as you suggest: certain pokemon like shiny genesect itself or mega gyarados or guaranteed to give you an attack boost, to list an example off the top of my head.

What sets Genesect aside from other breakers is its a.) versatility (you will likely lose at least 1 or 2 pokemon merely scouting it), b.) download & ability to be mixed, and c.) amazing offense / defensive typing with fairly reasonable bulk for an offensive pokemon.

Genesect is more than just good: it is completely advantageous to the one using it due to its sheer existence on the field and it's easily spammable U-Turn and lack of ny real counters.

Please ban this.
 
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You're correct that Genesect isn't about coming in and spamming U-turn.

Up until where most of the time, that's actually a viable tactic.
Aside from the personal stuff which was pretty unfair, I'll ignore that as the other 95% of your post was substantive and I'm happy to respond.

Regarding U-turn spam, which set are you exactly referring to? Because if it's the banded set that is the easiest to check, unless we disagree on that too, you've given it away the second you click u-turn and it's tough to argue that you'll brainlessly click u-turn against something that can out-speed and kill you. If it's LO u-turn then as I've said before I personally find that to be very sub-optimal and that's really the most controversial set in question as far as I'm concerned. If it's scarf u-turn spam then my only response is that I really don't find that to be too hard to deal with, I was under the impression that most people don't either and if you feel strongly otherwise then maybe we'll just agree to disagree. I'm not saying it's universally a bad tactic but you're going about this as if it is totally un-punishable and zero-risk, which I don't think is accurate.

Like, you wrote THIS:

What the fuck dude? Genesect is infamous for it's coverage. Have any of the anti-ban people even seen its movepool lately? Genesect threatens with its coverage, and suddenly it's a 50/50: whether or not you'll stay in, expecting the U-turn and hopefully get a chance to set up or predict the switch- but the Genesect player can now instantly prepare for your next move, die/take serious damage when the Genesect player actually pulls the trigger, or you switch out and they didn't U-turn, or they DID U-turn and now you're left scrambling again. In the instance where Genesect DOESN'T have a coverage move for you- and considering that the BoltBeam combo is still good, decades later, and that Flamethrower when fire types are kind of at a premium is pretty damn great- he still has a team. With a correct Download boost, Genesect actually CAN sweep the metagame with Rock Polish, or he can work as a great cleaner with just a Choice Scarf- or maybe he puts on a Choice Band, goes in for a physical download boost, and Extremespeeds everyone into the ground. I mean, yeah, sure, there's Blissey/Chansey, Tapu Fini, and Toxapex, but they wall different variants- they aren't even close to being consistent counters, and they have baggage of their own.
You took a piece from my original post about why Genesect is not capable of sweeping a large portion of the metagame as one broken quality it could possess but does not, and you extrapolated it to mean that if Genesect lacks the coverage it needs to do so in one battle, it lacks it in its entire movepool. I never said this and I really shouldn't have to respond to this as it's just a fallacy that you're trying to use to undermine my point, but nonetheless you took it out of context so I felt the need to clear that up.

Okay, this little bit made zero sense. Most of the thread discussing "gimmick" Pokemon have been talking about counters for Genesect that we"d have to be "creative" for.

Oh for fuck's sake. There is nothing creative about having to deal with the "which Genesect variant am I dealing with here" roulette, and once you've figured it out you still might not even be carrying the right check. I think a ton of the anti-ban people are truly underestimating how flexible Genesect is. Hidden Power Ground isn't even technically a "gimmick" if its express purpose is to screw over Heatran which is a pretty consistent check to Genesect as long as Genesect doesn't just U-turn out first. The rest of your statement made even less than zero sense, considering that Download essentially means that Genesect always comes in with a +1 to some offensive stat- it technically has a BST about 100 points higher than it's actual BST due to Download ALWAYS giving the damn thing a boost, the trick is trying to get the right one.
I don't know what is so confusing about what I said here. I took the definition that smogon agrees upon as a description of a "broken" pokemon, which is listed on the page before this one along with a few others, and I went point by point to try and give my refutation for each clause. I never said anything about pro-ban calling Genesect a gimmick, it was in the definition which I guess in hindsight I should have just reposted but despite my lengthy posts I do sometimes try to save space.

I don't really want to get into a long winded discussion about Download boosts, who gives Genesect what and when and how. All I will say as a response is that it is incredibly situational and only relevant in certain cases. Like even if you're +1 SpA on the scarf set, if you're locked into a move that can't sweep an opponent's team, it doesn't really matter. If you're a fully physical set or fully special, getting the opposite raise means that you effectively have no ability at all, or at best, you have a boosted U-turn without having to invest EVs into doing so. I don't see any of this changing games.

The term 50/50 is used because it's pretty useful in expressing a lot of situations.
It's not the term I take issue with, but rather how people perceive it. This recently happened: an opponent calls it a 50/50 between me staying in regular form with Gyarados vs going for a Mega Evolution against scarf terrakion, and whether they in response click Stone Edge or Close Combat. You're giving the impression that the odds of you making a certain play is truly the flip of a coin when in actuality, there is a "best" play, in this case staying in regular form, but no one will bother to run an actual calculation to confirm this because it's written off as a coin-flip scenario. That's why it bothers me, because there are such a small handful of cases where it is actually a dead-even chance for your opponent to make one of two plays, each with an identical level of risk versus reward. This is what I meant to imply by saying that Genesect, or situations that it creates, promote players having to think more deeply about their move choices and analyzing their opponent's team. Nowhere did I say that those three italicized concepts are the be-all and end-all measurements for being good at this game, but just what separates those at the top from those in the middle.

You suddenly have to theorymon what it could be just by looking at a fucking team, because you don't you risk getting bushwhacked when it suddenly reveals that it wasn't scarfed. Let's do an example with a throwaway team I thought up in fifteen seconds:

1. Heatran
2. Genesect
3. Therian Landorus
4. Pheromosa
5. Tapu Fini
6. Alolawak

Can you reasonably tell me what set Genesect is going for? On one hand, it's probably not wearing a scarf- Pheromosa is faster than most scarfers anyways, it just can't come in on nearly as many situations. But if that's true, what could it be? Could it be a Rock Polish set, an Expert Belt set, a Life Orb set, or a Choice Band set for wallbreaking? Congratulations, you still have four more sets to analyze and you still have no clue of its moveset or coverage options. To be fair, it's probably running Thunderbolt since the team in general is lacking electricity coverage and the BoltBeam coverage is just so damn good, so Ice Beam is also there, so we can reasonably disregard the Choice Band set.

Or of course the player decided to run a Scarf anyways and with that, your entire thought process was rendered null and void.
You're making the point for me in this entire example that I'm trying to get across. The only thing you can ever do in this game is to assume that your opponent is a rational actor who is trying to do everything they can to win. That includes the plays they make, how they construct their team's synergy and cover up weaknesses, or even counter-prepare for a particular opponent. Going through a totally rational analysis of a person's team only to find that your opponent brought something that wouldn't have helped them as much as something else ... says nothing about Genesect being broken. If a team needs hazard removal because they're running Charizard Y, and they're actually running LO 4 attacks Starmie because fuck it why not, is Starmie broken? Furthermore, I never said that you should know all of Genesect's set at team preview, just what it is likely to have and then work backwards from there, they're just some starting deductions that you could make. You learn about Genesect's set every single time it comes into play, whether it even clicks a move or not, because you're always free to ask yourself "if they were really X set, or had X coverage, why would they not use it / am I safe to assume it's not there?" If this sounds unreasonable to you then I don't know how better to explain it.


Seriously? You're resorting to a fucking straw man? Nobody said anything close to this. Don't put words in people's mouths.
I really wish that I were, but unless you wanted me to screenshot everything that I'm told in games, see in chats and have read in this thread and past threads, I'm not engaging this any further. It wasn't a straw man.

Uh, you didn't bury shit. You just wasted a lot of words.
Genesect may be banned but the arguments that I am trying to describe on behalf of why some people think it should stay are not going to go away. All I was trying to get across is that using the number of a pokemon's "checks and counters" should not be the only metric that determines how ban-worthy they are. I don't even think you disagree with that so I don't know why you took so much objection to what I said. Am I that off-base to suggest that perhaps we can have other forms of counterplay to fast offensive pivots that don't include hard-countering them?

Okay...? Are you seriously going the straw man route again? How does this relate to the issue of Genesect again? Are you implying everybody who doesn't like Genesect's absurd flexibility is somehow bad at the game and just needs to predict better or something?
Not what I said. There are plenty of people who have posted here that have listed very well-articulated pro-ban argument, who I do not know personally but whose ability to play this game is worth respecting. I don't care if people vote pro-ban and I don't think you're promoting a skill-less metagame or that you lack skill to do so. I've never once said specifically that people need to predict better, just to use some basic rational thought in preparing their move choices, and that certain builds require you to honestly think harder than others. I mean how hard is "xtra chirps" to use, really, or speed-pass into Manaphy/etc? That's all I meant by autopilot strategies, I don't know why you get so offended.


For heaven's sake, did we really need an essay on how to play the game?
Explaining why I feel Genesect helps players analyze risk versus reward better is a major part of my argument, sorry if you didn't feel like reading more than a few lines but hey, you did.
 
Honestly, I don't know why we keep suspecting this thing. Repetitive arguments and name-calling aside, the end result always depends on each player's view of Pokemon as a competitive game: Those that believe that Pokemon is solely a game of prediction (in which each player is to use their prior knowledge of the tier to guess all of the opponent's sets) tend to vote not to ban it, whereas those that believe anything severely hurting the scouting process (due to insane versatility) of a battle should be banned because it is unhealthy for the metagame. History is shown that majority of ladder and tour players believe Genesect to have an unhealthy presence in the tier because it disrupts the scouting process, and personally, I don't see that changing this time around. I'd provide examples of arguments on both sides of the fence, but the reality is that every pro-ban argument and every anti-ban argument has been made since Genesect was introduced in B2/W2, and that no truly original ones exist. Perhaps if a Pokemon with solid longevity that could counter all of Genesect's sets were introduced, my view would certainly change. Because that's not the case, I believe Genesect will once again get the boot.

tl;dr: If history repeats itself like I think it will, then we already know the outcome of this suspect test. Genesect is likely to be banned for the same reason it always was in the past.
 
Yeah, sorry. I was starting to contradict myself a bit and never really realized it.

I think another problem with Genesect in OU is that it's only weakness (Fire) is generally portrayed as a hyper-offensive type. And yet in THIS meta - the most relevant Fire types are slow and bulky (Awak/Heatran/Volcanion) and get outspead by Genesect (again, going back to running Uturn on every set, making it's MUs far less risky).

PS: How many sets/variations run Explosion these days?
The designated counter of Genesect has always been bulky fire type, which as a class is meta irrelevant thanks to stealth rock.

Some people bring up drouse drive as an option but giving a free scout to your opponent(notably for not having a scarf) practically ends its relevance tbh.

Honestly, I don't know why we keep suspecting this thing. Repetitive arguments and name-calling aside, the end result always depends on each player's view of Pokemon as a competitive game: Those that believe that Pokemon is solely a game of prediction (in which each player is to use their prior knowledge of the tier to guess all of the opponent's sets) tend to vote not to ban it, whereas those that believe anything severely hurting the scouting process (due to insane versatility) of a battle should be banned because it is unhealthy for the metagame. History is shown that majority of ladder and tour players believe Genesect to have an unhealthy presence in the tier because it disrupts the scouting process, and personally, I don't see that changing this time around. I'd provide examples of arguments on both sides of the fence, but the reality is that every pro-ban argument and every anti-ban argument has been made since Genesect was introduced in B2/W2, and that no truly original ones exist. Perhaps if a Pokemon with solid longevity that could counter all of Genesect's sets were introduced, my view would certainly change. Because that's not the case, I believe Genesect will once again get the boot.

tl;dr: If history repeats itself like I think it will, then we already know the outcome of this suspect test. Genesect is likely to be banned for the same reason it always was in the past.
Well I think it is this contoversial aspect of Genesect that keeps demanding retests.

While the polar position between the two philosophies exist, most people do fall somewhere at the middle ground instead of the two very ends, so as the nature of the meta itself. There is a level of balance that people looks for when they make meta decisions and having Genesect or not swings this balance around.

Put aside some of the cancerous arguments regarding brokenness. A new sentiment that appears this time is the hate towards the late oras meta, which Genesect is able to stir up. In other words, the meta has perhaps tilt a little too much to the opposite end and Genesect as an element of the meta may just be tilting the balance to a more desirable position. If Genesect manages to stay this would very well be the reason.
 
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Aside from the personal stuff which was pretty unfair, I'll ignore that as the other 95% of your post was substantive and I'm happy to respond.

Regarding U-turn spam, which set are you exactly referring to? Because if it's the banded set that is the easiest to check, unless we disagree on that too, you've given it away the second you click u-turn and it's tough to argue that you'll brainlessly click u-turn against something that can out-speed and kill you. If it's LO u-turn then as I've said before I personally find that to be very sub-optimal and that's really the most controversial set in question as far as I'm concerned. If it's scarf u-turn spam then my only response is that I really don't find that to be too hard to deal with, I was under the impression that most people don't either and if you feel strongly otherwise then maybe we'll just agree to disagree. I'm not saying it's universally a bad tactic but you're going about this as if it is totally un-punishable and zero-risk, which I don't think is accurate.
Your experiences against a particular set does not equate to the set's performance. Not to say you're blatantly making that argument outright, but the phrasing here does imply a sense of confirmation bias. While you've been underwhelmed by LO sets using U-Turn, it has to mean something if it's the one high level players are citing among all the things Genesect is able to do.

No one is saying U-turn is unpunishable on Genesect, or even that the idea behind its use is exclusive to Genesect, but Genesect as a mon creates a much better Risk:Reward for the move compared to other common users. If you take Risk:Reward to be comparing Sub-Optimal:Optimal outcome comparison, Genesect shifts it from a typical 40:60 to something more like 25:75. As I've noted in previous posts, his coverage and power means he forces switches often, which in turn fuels his momentum grabbing with U-Turn as an offensive option rather than reactionary as mons like Landorus tend to use it.



I don't know what is so confusing about what I said here. I took the definition that smogon agrees upon as a description of a "broken" pokemon, which is listed on the page before this one along with a few others, and I went point by point to try and give my refutation for each clause. I never said anything about pro-ban calling Genesect a gimmick, it was in the definition which I guess in hindsight I should have just reposted but despite my lengthy posts I do sometimes try to save space.

I don't really want to get into a long winded discussion about Download boosts, who gives Genesect what and when and how. All I will say as a response is that it is incredibly situational and only relevant in certain cases. Like even if you're +1 SpA on the scarf set, if you're locked into a move that can't sweep an opponent's team, it doesn't really matter. If you're a fully physical set or fully special, getting the opposite raise means that you effectively have no ability at all, or at best, you have a boosted U-turn without having to invest EVs into doing so. I don't see any of this changing games.
I agree Genesect is not broken and addressed why I think the other description in my last post.

One thing, Genesect's job isn't to sweep the opponent's team in most cases, unless it's the Rock Polish/Shift Gear set, where it's waiting until lategame to go for it anyway. Genesect's job for the other sets is to use his coverage and power to wear down and break cores so proper sweepers can break the team down instead. And that's not even to say Genesect is incapable of being a sweeper, but Download is not a factor in how he's doing it.

Download is relevant in more than "certain" cases, it's relevant in a significant if not the majority of Genesect's match ups. The ability can't be totally irrelevant, as several mons sprinkle EVs into a defense just to control which Boost Genesect gets off of them, others flat out don't get to choose which boost he grabs because of the discrepancy in their stats (like Skarmory), and others still might simply be boned regardless because Genesect can OHKO them based on coverage and base power already. The fact that mons account for this already means it has at least a minor impact on teambuilding, and it also makes Genesect responses important because he holds onto Boosts. For example, if Expert Belt or LO gets a Special Attack Boost off of, say, Buzzwole, some specially inclined checks like Celesteela can't avoid a 2HKO anymore since he retains the +1. Download may not be totally controllable, but it works considerably often and is a significant factor when considering how to respond to Genesect.

It's not the term I take issue with, but rather how people perceive it. This recently happened: an opponent calls it a 50/50 between me staying in regular form with Gyarados vs going for a Mega Evolution against scarf terrakion, and whether they in response click Stone Edge or Close Combat. You're giving the impression that the odds of you making a certain play is truly the flip of a coin when in actuality, there is a "best" play, in this case staying in regular form, but no one will bother to run an actual calculation to confirm this because it's written off as a coin-flip scenario. That's why it bothers me, because there are such a small handful of cases where it is actually a dead-even chance for your opponent to make one of two plays, each with an identical level of risk versus reward. This is what I meant to imply by saying that Genesect, or situations that it creates, promote players having to think more deeply about their move choices and analyzing their opponent's team. Nowhere did I say that those three italicized concepts are the be-all and end-all measurements for being good at this game, but just what separates those at the top from those in the middle.
While not uncompetitive in the sense of Aegislash assessments (admittedly one of the weaker times that term was thrown around), it's not a grievous or knee jerk misuse of the term: there are 4 broad scenarios that emerge if we assume Terrakion only KOs landing a Super Effective move

1. Mega + Stone Edge = Gyarados wins
2. Mega + Close Combat = Terrakion wins
3. Normal + Stone Edge = Terrakion wins
4. Normal + Close Combat = Gyarados wins

Half of these scenarios favor Terrakion, the other half favor Gyarados, hence the impression of 50/50. Regardless, the better articulated pro-ban arguments aren't simplifying the arguments to "Genesect is impossible to scout", they're discussing the fact that Genesect's coverage options and mixed power means that the cost/damage to your team in the process of scouting a reasonably played Genesect will often put you in a position where you cannot properly respond with that knowledge unless you build a team with multiple checks to account for all of Genesect's viable options, at which point your team is being pigeonholed into a certain style, or at the very least taking a hit in terms of viability against the rest of the metagame. Scouting Genesect, even for a skilled player, doesn't come cheap, and doesn't even lead to you having the means to respond

You're making the point for me in this entire example that I'm trying to get across. The only thing you can ever do in this game is to assume that your opponent is a rational actor who is trying to do everything they can to win. That includes the plays they make, how they construct their team's synergy and cover up weaknesses, or even counter-prepare for a particular opponent. Going through a totally rational analysis of a person's team only to find that your opponent brought something that wouldn't have helped them as much as something else ... says nothing about Genesect being broken. If a team needs hazard removal because they're running Charizard Y, and they're actually running LO 4 attacks Starmie because fuck it why not, is Starmie broken? Furthermore, I never said that you should know all of Genesect's set at team preview, just what it is likely to have and then work backwards from there, they're just some starting deductions that you could make. You learn about Genesect's set every single time it comes into play, whether it even clicks a move or not, because you're always free to ask yourself "if they were really X set, or had X coverage, why would they not use it / am I safe to assume it's not there?" If this sounds unreasonable to you then I don't know how better to explain it.
In your Starmie example, you're also assuming Starmie is the only thing on the team that would be removing hazards. What if they also run Latios on the team? Now you have to scout for and deduce if the Starmie is a Rapid Spin set or if the Latios is a Defog + 3 Attacks set. Latios isn't a bad choice in general for this, as he covers Electric and Grass types for Zard and Starmie, while Starmie covers Ice moves and Zard deals with Fighting and Bug types. Now consider Genesect can create mind games like this with practically any teammates on any offensive team in OU. The most rational review of a team optimistically pins Genesect down to two or three sets, and each of those can potentially draw in and break each others' checks, mean you can't necessarily play your checks freely against them.

You don't necessarily learn something about Genesect just because he came in and acted, because he could be clicking U-Turn every time as much to avoid divulging more of the set as to simply pick his best response to whatever they predict you're doing. Genesect can just U-Turn often and hard-switch out of attacking options to feign a Choice Scarf, and if he leads the opponent to believe that, they may keep something in after eating a move from him: Genesect KOs something on a sac with Ice Beam, the opponent tries to threaten the locked Genesect out or use the free turn to, say, Defog with Tapu Fini, and then Genesect fries it with Thunderbolt. It's not a matter of simply getting more actions out of the Genesect, the Genesect user needs to make particular plays before any definitive or helpful information is gleaned.

Genesect may be banned but the arguments that I am trying to describe on behalf of why some people think it should stay are not going to go away. All I was trying to get across is that using the number of a pokemon's "checks and counters" should not be the only metric that determines how ban-worthy they are. I don't even think you disagree with that so I don't know why you took so much objection to what I said. Am I that off-base to suggest that perhaps we can have other forms of counterplay to fast offensive pivots that don't include hard-countering them?
The issue isn't the number of checks and counters. The issue is that optimal counterplay to Genesect most often does not inhibit the Genesect player, rather it's just minimizing the benefit he creates without actually being able to negate it. People are pointing out that the issues with Genesect's minimal/inconsistent checks aren't a reason for his ban, rather it's a consequence of the things that make him unhealthy: absurd coverage, mixed power, pivoting ability, strong typing and above average bulk for his role lending him to a multitude of extremely viable sets that make reading him all but impossible before he's put in significant work for a match, and even attempting to do so is a massive constraint on teambuilding precisely because he has checks, but said checks only work on some sets. Offensive checking/counterplay as a broad concept is a thing in OU, but Genesect himself is fairly resistant to that as a consequence of being so good at it himself. The definition you gave for offensive checking is to use "your coverage and speed, forcing something out of play and gaining momentum", but Genesect has possibly the best coverage of any OU mon, speed that isn't phenomenal but still good for his role, and by nature of the previously mentioned traits is bar none the best momentum generator in the game. It's a tall order to check and take momentum from the mon who lists "best momentum grabber in OU" as one of his consistent selling points across his multitude of sets. It's like saying all a mon needed to have good hazard control in ORAS is the ability to set up rocks and hazards, in a metagame where that entailed competing with Mega Sableye, a utility mon with unparalleled control over the hazard field, up until the literal last days of the generation.

It sounds fine in theory, but the philosophy for this type of playstyle balance that Genesect enforces so well in turn is not keeping him in check as it would need to for him to be a centralizing/dominating force in the metagame without being an outright controlling one
 
It does take 2-3 pokemon to check/counter it due to the unpredictability of its sets. Until its entire move pool for the match has been scouted you can't switch in to it without it punching a massive hole in your team. Say you want to switch in Alolan Marowak because you know it has u-turn and thunderbolt; thats fine except you still have to wonder what its other 2 moves are and you don't necessarly know what item it has outside of life orb (if its already attacked and dealt damage and taken its 10% from LO) and scarf (due to it outspeeding something it otherwise shouldn't), and if its running LO you're probably screwed anyway because of the coverage it gets by virtue of its massive move pool, It can still carry hp ground or u-turn out to a counter for A-Marowak. If it u-turns out you can't assume that it doesn't have hp ground or douse blast, especially if its taken some damage from priority or hazards. And thats another major point that people in favor of keeping it around are missing. It creates a mind game where the person using Genesect is always at an advantage. Does he use u-turn because he is choice locked? or is he using it because he doesn't have coverage? or does he fear a possible K.O. from a fire attack from my check/counter? there is no way of knowing or predicting what they will do until you have scouted it completely and even then you have to deal with all the checks and counters that they brought along to deal anything that would be able to take out Genesect. It requires consedirably more skill on the part of the opponent not using genesect to win or even have a chance of winning than it does for the player using genesect.

As for your argument about a safe switch in it is irrelevent because there are no safe switch ins. A-Marowak can absorb a thunderbolt sure, and it will take resisted damage from u-turn, but if it switches into anything else it takes a big hit. Then if the chosen move is U-turn and you switch in A-Marowak its not too bad since you only ate a resisted attack that won't hurt you too much or barely hurt you, but then your opponent switches to their counter for your check/counter to Genesect which forces you to either switch or lose your only counter/check to their momentum grabing monster. Either way its a lose/lose situation for the non-genesect player. You can sit there are argue that it can take massive damage from reseiseted hits and even neutral hits like Earthquake and won't be able to just freely switch, but that means very little as people won't be switching it in to take hits unless it is super resistant to them and even then they likely won't do that unless they have no other alternative. It grabs momentum and swings it in its user's favor early on, during the mid game, and can clean up in the late game. Every argument I see in favor of keeping it unbanned is paper thin and practically irrelevent when faced with the facts. Lets not forget that it can easily change its sets with the meta. If people start to run mainly fire types to counter it you can bet that its team will have dugtrio and hp ground at the ready to take them down or a nice strong water type that can counter those ghost and fire types that can't be trapped if they become too common along with thunderbolt being on practically every set. so then the meta will change again to counter that with strong ground types of their own like hippowdon, excadrill, landorus-T, etc... and then its team mates will switch to counter what it can't again or its sets will include ice beam or douse blast or hp water. So then you start to use steel types to counter it because they take neutral or resist almost everything, well then you have dugtrio and magnazone to deal with along with hp ground, blaze kick, flamethrower, etc...do you see where I'm going with this? Its so freaking flexible that it can adapt to anything the meta throws at it, that isn't a good thing! It should have at least one reliable counter (and even then it would still be broken) but it dosen't.

Genesect is BROKEN it is a fact that is not subject to opinion, you can delude yourself all you want (this goes for everyone not just for the person I quoted) but it will not change the fact that it is a broken mon that unbalences the metagame and quite frankly (in my opinion) sucks the fun out of playing. All you have to do is look at its stats, typing, and versatility to see this. Any counter play you imagine is non-existant outside of eleminating its teammates first.
Douse Drive has a visual tell. The chip on his back is a watery blue

For a little more substance, I don't usually support banning, but this is the third time that you've been through this song and dance now. I'm not sure what change you're looking for to make Gene tolerable, but it seems it won't happen no matter how much power creep there is. Perhaps this decision should be the last one.
 
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gene is great but i agree that u guys (pro ban) cant act like it can run every move it needs at the same. orb/band are great vs more stallish stuff, scarf vs offense, douse drive vs heatran and stuff etc, so its gonna be great in some matchups and worse in others. of course it can happen in a game that it has every move it needs to beat you, but this happens with other mons with great moverpool (like greninja, but a single move can change some matchups by its own anyway)

what concerns be tbh, aside its great moverpool, is that strong u-turn + decent speed tier which limits the counterplay vs it, and unlike sciz it can u-turn on a much larger pool of mons thanks to that speed tier, and it also doesnt burn ur mega slot like sciz does. ofc u can counterplay that with helmets or rocks, but u gotta realize it has the coverage to beat the most common helmet users (ice beam for landot, and chomp, ft for skarm) so u gotta be careful, and you have to consider the chance that rocks might be on ur side when gene u-turns too (which is of course not unlikely).

with that said, im not too sure yet if its better if gene goes or not, its hard to tell anyways with just 60ish games on ladder. guess ill see more on spl week1 where gene should be in and in suspect tours. i agree with abr that we should see how sm ou turns out in the next weeks/months to some extent, although i believe that at the end genesect may be too much for the tier
 
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