Gen 5 The OU Viability Ranking thread

[DoABarrelRoll]

As the guy who got the non-choice set on the analysis back in BW1 (which was honestly better than the Scarf set in the BW1 meta but for some reason they put Scarf first anyways), I can assure you Medicham doesn't even deserve to be on this list. In terms of being a raw power attacker, it's outclassed at Kyu-B at every turn, and other Fighting types do the whole "be a fighting type" thing better. It used to work because of the nature of the metagame, and how team structure used to look. Now all those factors have changed, and Medicham simply has no spot in the metagame.

I'd support removing the analysis more than putting Medicham on the list TBH. It was a BW1 analysis and would need a BW2 update if it was actually viable, and it isn't.

I actually think Medicham deserves a place here. At least Medicham has coverage, whereas Kyu-B needs to rely on a mixed set with Hidden Power Fire to beat Ferrothorn.

I think Cobalion should be B- rank, and here's why. It can reliably set up rocks while beating Ferrothorn, has access to Volt Switch, can beat Gliscor and Lando-T with HP Ice(which is something Terrakion dreams of doing), it has a great Steel/Fighting typing which gives it a lot of resistances, and 129 physical defense is nothing to scoff at.
Cobalion is not as bad as people think.

 

[Gavin313]

Well it's about the only bulky water in OU with WishPass. Which is an incredible niche to have along with Hydration.

Seconding this. Vaporeon doesn't really play the same role as Jellicent. Though both are best used defensively, Vaporeon's pure Water typing helps it against Tyranitar, keeping it from being super effectively Crunched or Pursuited by the offensive sets. Vappy can also pass massive Wishes without being an incredible liability against half the metagame a lá Blissey. Having room for Protect is nice, too, for scouting Choiced Pokémon.

Yeah, Jellicent is better at countering Keldeo, but as a Wish-passer with good mixed defenses and stellar HP, Vaporeon serves a different and more team-oriented role.

 

[Poplolita]

I wouldn't say that Vaporeon is a pokemon that dies very easily. It is able to take both physical and special attacking moves exceptionally well."

In the OU metagame, Vaporeon and Jellicent play two very different roles. Since Jellicent is part ghost type, it is an excellent counter to pokemon that use rapid spin, because rapid spin is a normal type move.

Vaporeon is a bulky water type pokemon that has one major role: wish passing. It is one of the only water type pokemon that can learn wish and baton pass. This allows Vaporeon to benefit other members of the team by healing them. One main rival to Vaporeon is Jirachi. Vaporeon is able to learn Heal Bell, which is a move that heals the statuses of the entire team. However, Jirachi is unable to learn Heal Bell so ultimately, Vaporeon is overall better than Jirachi as a support pokemon. Roar is another common move that can affect Vaporeon. Two major wish passer are Jirachi and Blissey, which are very common in OU. Neither of them can learn Roar which is very beneficial to Vaporeon.


Overall, Vaporeon is an excellent choice for a support pokemon. With all of the valuable moves that Vaporeon can learn, it will make an great addition to anyone's team. Vaporeon should not be overlooked in the slightest



***I would like to give credit to someone who helped me type this as English is not my first language: ZHoover94 From showdown.

 

[Soul Fly]

^That is why it's not an A-Ranker like Jellicent, but in it's given niche as a bulky water with acceptable offensive presence it successfully and with a high degree of consistently executes it niche without you having to dedicate a whole lot of team support to it, definitely makes it a B rank candidate.

And You're just focusing on hydration. It is perfectly viable on non-weather balance needing a bulky water mon too with Water Absorb (which is used more anyways). Putting a full stop to something like Keldeo in this meta while simultaneously punishing it by stealing momentum and/or healing something is a huge asset for any team.

 

[SmashBrosBrawl]

Meh i used acid armor vaporeon for awhile and it could just stall entire teams once it start to setup and using rest+hydration made it impossible to kill outside of something ridiculous like specs thundurus-t thunder. The wish+protect set is also really effective and annoying and is something no other bulky water can boast. Theres also the more offensive sets which can catch people offguard with rain stab life orb boosted surfs/hydro pumps from base 110 sp atk. Vaporeon lacks of dark weakness and superior bulk give it an edge over jellicent. Of course it doesnt have nifty tools like taunt and will-o-wisp. All in all B-Rank sounds fair for it.

 

[Poplolita]

I would also like to add that vaporeon boosts chandelure a c rank pokemons to tremendous level. There is no other wish passer or water pokemon in the game that could support this pokemon as well as vaporeon. Jellicent share ghost and dark weaknesses. Jirachi share ground weaknesse with chandelure. And blissey and chansey can't absorb waterfall from gyarados as well as vaporeon, it got water absorb, which can actually ether roar it against substitue version or burn it against taunt version with scald. And to top it off, it nulify chandelure weaknesses to steath rock. This is just an EXAMPLE of how good vaporeon is at what it does.


F If you ever face one of the top 100 players like ROMAN , Mr. Rothanel or bluette and many other that often use vaporeon, you'll probably have a better idea of what vaporeon is really capable of. And please guy, keep in mind that vaporeon best set is the water absorb wish support roar/heal beal/toxic used in weatherless team and sometime in sandstrom team, not the hydration one.

 

[ninjawhitetiger]

I have used chandelure to great effect, it has great coverage options and it lays in a decent speed tier, more recently i have used it in a core with ferrothorn expecting either a fire type move or a fighting type move i switch and am either imune or gain a special attack boost from flash fire i then procede to start a sweep without setup and a majority of the time i get through atleast 3 of the opponents pokes i use a life orb set with Hp fighting/Psychic ( i alternate ) shadow ball, fire blast, and energy ball i usualy highly invest in special atack and speed

 

[victinivcreate1]

I have used chandelure to great effect, it has great coverage options and it lays in a decent speed tier, more recently i have used it in a core with ferrothorn expecting either a fire type move or a fighting type move i switch and am either imune or gain a special attack boost from flash fire i then procede to start a sweep without setup and a majority of the time i get through atleast 3 of the opponents pokes i use a life orb set with Hp fighting/Psychic ( i alternate ) shadow ball, fire blast, and energy ball i usualy highly invest in special atack and speed

Chandy's frail and has mediocre typing, and 80 speed is terrible for an offensive mon in OU. Plus Gengar has (not as high but still excellent) 130 Sp. Atk and is much faster.

 

[dice]

Chandy's primary niche is checking Scizor as an offensive spinblocker while simultaneously checking Sun. I only say the latter part since someone will point out Jellicent can do the same, but lol offensive Jellicent. Scarf Chandelure in Sun is very cool since it wrecks with Fire Blast and is Tyranitar bait so you can try switching into Dugtrio. Substitute + 3 Atks also has amazing coverage.

 

[Gary]

Nominating Sharpedo to B- Rank

One will say that Sharpedo can't sweep teams. Okay, that's a stupid statement because it only comes out late-game. If it nabs a Protect it's pretty much GG. with good neutral coverage, good attcking stats, and mind-boggling speed, Sharpedo can defeat weakened teams pretty easily. Sharpedo doesn't have to worry about priority from Scizor that much either. It only 2HKOes. Sharpedo's only fear is Breloom and Conkeldurr and when paired with Gothitell, it can clean pretty easily late-game. the problem is those bad defenses meaning it can only switch into Psychic and Magikarp's Splash, so it is hard to get this thing in free. But look at the the definition of B-Rank. It is a good revenge-killer, and late-game sweeper and is only set-up bait for two major sweepers. SD Breloom and CM Jirachi, which are both stopped by most teams due to Breloom's bad coverage and Jirachi's reliance on CM to hit hard. It also properly fulfills an offensive niche, and is outclassed by few A-Rank pokemon, but even less in rain, and is NOT completely eclipsed by the above pokemon as the def. of C-Rank. Sharpedo is easy to play around thougj, but if given good support, it is defenitly a pokemon who can barely swim pat the line into B-.

Sharpedo is a bit of a toss up for me. On one hand, Sharpedo is one of the best late game cleaners on a rain team that doesn't have to sacrifice a turn of setup, it has great coverage, can run a nasty mixed set, and it's powerful. On the other hand, it's one of the frailest offensive Pokemon in the game, and it dies to pretty much any move that hits it for super effective damage and even to a lot of neutral hits as well. My biggest beef with it is that it HAS to kill or be killed. If it fails to KO something, then it's dead. That thing seriously dies to anything that has access to a decently powerful neutral STAB move. Even Specs Politoed can OHKO it with Surf in the rain, and Scizor does a whopping ~60% to it with BP. Speaking of which, priority a big problem to the shark as well, fearing even an unboosted E-Speed from Lucario. Sharpedo isn't that easy to check after a speed boost, but if you can survive at least one hit from this thing, then you can at least pick it off that way. Last but not least, Sharpedo has a bad case of 4MSS. Sharpedo wishes it could run Waterfall / Crunch / Ice Fang / Protect / Earthquake / Hidden Power Fire / Ice Beam, but sadly it can only run 4 moves, one sacrificed for Protect which sometimes doesn't even get used.

All in all, Sharpedo requires a good amount of support to function properly, and it's somewhat difficult to just slap on any rain team with the presence of Keldeo, Gator, and Gyarados all giving it competition, but Sharpedo is a very underrated threat in this metagame that can sweep on a dime if you are willing to support it well enough. It's a tough one, but it seems like Sharpedo is still a C-rank Pokemon. It requires a lot of support, but it's still very underrated, and amazing in rain.

 

[BKC]

sharpedo has the potential to be very scary but with the ridiculous amount of strong priority attacks in the metagame right now he's not going to be doing much sweeping. keep it in c-rank.

 

[Chou Toshio]

Vaporeon's BW problem is ultimately: Not enough resistances

It's hard for almost any defensive Poke in BW to be really effective without several useful resistances. Defensively, pure water + hydration isn't good because you have the exact same typing as Politoed. Doubling up on defensive pokes lacking many resistances is a kiss of death for a defensive team in a meta with so many powerful and varied offensive threats. It's not a meta where over half of HO teams are walled by 'generic bulky water' like in dppt

 

[Shiruba]

I'd think that Sharpedo is a top-tier [and underrated] UU threat because priority is quite scarce in the tier. Nothing S Rank in the viability thread has access to priority that uses it very commonly [lol Mienshao's Fake Out], and only Weavile and fellow Sharpedo [and it's rare on Sharpedo] possess it in the A tier. Thing is, priority is more common in OU, especially due to the prevalence of Hyper Offence [which isn't good in UU], and, as such, Sharpedo takes a tumble because it dies to a burp and requires the bulky Pokemon in the tier to take an often high amount of damage before it can sweep [with Ferrothorn in particular resisting both STAB moves], in addition to anything at all with priority if it lacks Aqua Jet [and even then, Extremespeed.]

So, yeah, I think it's good where it is. It's amazing if you manage to take out all of the problem Pokemon - especially if it's in the rain - but overall so many things just fuck it over that it's somewhat situational.

 

[DoABarrelRoll]

Nominating Crustle for B-.

I have used it to great effect in OU. It sets itself apart from custap Forretress and Skarmory by being able to beat something. skarmory is completely shut down by Taunt while Forry can't do much bar explode or use Gyro Ball, which has terrible coverage. crustle on the other hand has access to Stone Edge and X-Scissor, or Earthquake if it wants to beat heatran. This sounds like the definition of B rank to me: Crustle is partially eclipsed by Forry and Skarm but it's still a big threat. And it's RIDICULOUSLY underrated in OU. (Charizard had 10x more raw usage than it.)

 

[Neliel]

nah, i think crustle should stay there. i tried it but honestly i feel like its outclassed by forretress, which can spin and explode too, and skarmory, who can also go for taunt, tailwind, whirlind ect. i know they are beaten by taunt but its not like crustle isnt different: you still lose to taunt terrakion unless you use eq, and even then you will probably wont setup your shit anyway. The same goes for azelf or aerodactyl, you will still have sr in your field and no hazards in your opponent's field.

 

[Gary]

The biggest thing separating Crustle from the other hazard setters is its ability to beat Starmie if Sturdy is intact or it's in Custap range, which is a pretty big deal seeing as Starmie can beat out Skarmory and Forretress normally. Other than that, Crustle is a bit outclassed by Forretress and Skarmory like Neliel stated. It's a good Custap Lead and can surprise the occasional Starmie with X-Scissor, but I never really found it particularly useful over something like Forretress who functions similarly but with the added bonus of being able to Rapid Spin. Crustle may have more of an offensive presence, but it's STABs are commonly resisted anyway. It should stay in C-rank. Roserade has more of a defined niche in B- than Crustle would.

 

[Vis Mage]

Nominating Porygon2 for B-.

I have used it, and it has shown to have great effect in OU. With Evolite, it gets base 135/143 as base, with work wonders even with base 85 HP. I myself have found Porygon2 to be very effective as a status spreader (Toxic and T-Wave) as it can survive an enormous beating outside of fighting moves, of course, base 105 Sp. Attack is nothing to sneeze at, especially when given so much utility and diversity in moves like Ice Beam, Thunderbolt, Tri Attack, Psychic, Psyshock (For a physical attack), Trick, T-Wave, Toxic, and many more! Recover is used for longlivity, but Pain Split could catch someone off guard. Even though he is no speed demon, he can outspeed a surprising amount of stuff is you T-Wave them on a switch. Alternatively, he is a prime suspect to both set up, and be run in a Trick Room team. If you are able to get him behind some screens, he simply will refuse to die! He can run a variety of less commonly seen utility moves like Icy Wind and Electro Web, even set up Sun or Rain if absolutely needed. He could also run Solarbeam or Thunder on a sun or rain team respectively. Overall, this duck if capable of far more than merely sipping water, and thus why I strongly feel he deserves to be bumped up to at least the B- range. Thank you for you team in reading this, and I hope you consider the points I have brought up in considering bumping Porygon2 up to B- rank.

 

[inanimate blob]

Nominating Porygon2 for B-.

I have used it, and it has shown to have great effect in OU. With Evolite, it gets base 135/143 as base, with work wonders even with base 85 HP. I myself have found Porygon2 to be very effective as a status spreader (Toxic and T-Wave) as it can survive an enormous beating outside of fighting moves, of course, base 105 Sp. Attack is nothing to sneeze at, especially when given so much utility and diversity in moves like Ice Beam, Thunderbolt, Tri Attack, Psychic, Psyshock (For a physical attack), Trick, T-Wave, Toxic, and many more! Recover is used for longlivity, but Pain Split could catch someone off guard. Even though he is no speed demon, he can outspeed a surprising amount of stuff is you T-Wave them on a switch. Alternatively, he is a prime suspect to both set up, and be run in a Trick Room team. If you are able to get him behind some screens, he simply will refuse to die! He can run a variety of less commonly seen utility moves like Icy Wind and Electro Web, even set up Sun or Rain if absolutely needed. He could also run Solarbeam or Thunder on a sun or rain team respectively. Overall, this duck if capable of far more than merely sipping water, and thus why I strongly feel he deserves to be bumped up to at least the B- range. Thank you for you team in reading this, and I hope you consider the points I have brought up in considering bumping Porygon2 up to B- rank.

I'll back this up and also bring up Porygon2's Trace ability. I used a Porygon2 around a month ago for a while, with a bulky defensive EV spread and a moveset of Recover/Toxic/Ice Beam/Thunderbolt. With Trace, Porygon2 can often predict moves to become immune to (like a Thundurus-T Volt Switch or Heatran Lava Plume), or even nerf a Pokemon (like Landorus-T) an force a switch. Porygon2 is surprisingly versatile, and with a team with hazards, can often force switches to help rack up some more damage. He can also be used as a tank of sorts if you don't want to spend two slots on a defensive and special defensive poke.

 

[Soul Fly]

Just Chiming in to echo the view that Trace+Eviolite bulk rocks. But I dunno if that alone is worthy of a B tier rank.

So opinion reserved.

 

[Shurtugal]

Porygon2 is a good Trick Room sweeper too. I mean, 507 SpA is quite nice.

 

[Ehrmantraut]

About the Sharpedo discussion earlier here

Forretress used Volt Switch!
It's super effective! The foe's Sharpedo lost 50% of its health!


i find this really funny. sharpedo is just way too frail to be good, much better in UU where there is less priority and Ferrothorn isn't everywhere to absorb it's hits.

 

[Erico9001]

So people are already talking about porygon2! I came here to check on its ranking in viability and I agree, it deserves higher ranking. As a wall, it can wall the most of the ou metagame, and then toxic stall as well. It is weak to fighting, so should be teamed up with a check to things like conkeldurr, terrakion, and breloom. A few pokemon who can boost their atk or spatk can take advantage of porygon2. It is not immune to toxic. It needs some support. Doesn't this describe the 'A' rank?

A Rank: Reserved for Pokemon who can sweep or wall significant portions of the metagame, but require some support or have some flaws that prevents them from doing this consistently. Supporting Pokemon in this rank may give opponents free turns or cannot create free turns easily themselves, but can still do their job most of the time.

Let me run some damage calculations to show its viability.
252 SpA Keldeo Secret Sword vs. 252 HP / 184+ Def Eviolite Porygon2: 152-182 (40.64 - 48.66%)
252 SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Landorus Earth Power vs. 252 HP / 72 SpD Eviolite Porygon2: 148-175 (39.57 - 46.79%)
+1 252 Atk Genesect U-turn vs. 252 HP / 184+ Def Eviolite Porygon2: 90-106 (24.06 - 28.34%)
252 SpA Choice Specs Latios Draco Meteor vs. 252 HP / 72 SpD Eviolite Porygon2: 220-261 (58.82 - 69.78%)
-2 252 SpA Choice Specs Latios Draco Meteor vs. 252 HP / 72 SpD Eviolite Porygon2: 111-132 (29.67 - 35.29%) (cannot be 2hkod)
252+ Atk Tyranitar Superpower vs. 252 HP / 184+ Def Eviolite Porygon2: 162-192 (43.31 - 51.33%)
252 Atk Life Orb Mamoswine Superpower vs. 252 HP / 184+ Def Eviolite Porygon2: 187-221 (50 - 59.09%)
252 Atk Garchomp Outrage vs. 252 HP / 184+ Def Eviolite Porygon2: 108-127 (28.87 - 33.95%)
252 Atk Salamence Outrage vs. 252 HP / 184+ Def Eviolite Porygon2: 111-132 (29.67 - 35.29%)
0 SpA Porygon2 Ice Beam vs. 0 HP / 0- SpD Salamence: 384-452 (116.01 - 136.55%) -- guaranteed OHKO
252 Atk Kyurem-B Outrage vs. 252 HP / 184+ Def Eviolite Porygon2: 132-156 (35.29 - 41.71%) -- guaranteed 3HKO


That's all without abusing its ability.

¤ On switching in to a boost, porygon can still take out outraging dragonite thanks to its traced multiscale + bulk.
¤ Porygon2 can switch in to Jolteon's thunderbolt/volt switch to heal itself with volt absorb. It can do the same for thundurus-t, but must be wary of focus blast, which can 2hko it.
¤ If heatran's fire moves have been boosted by one of yours, that's fine, since porygon2 is immune to heatran's fire moves.
¤ He takes good use of Celebi's natural cure, being able to switch in to it, take the status, and switch out freely.
¤ Porygon2 can use Dugtrio's arena trap against it, trapping it in for an easy kill with toxic/ice beam.
¤ Perfect check to gyarados, especially if gyarados runs intimidate.
¤ Same goes for landorus-t
¤ It can switch in to Jirachi for Serene Grace, and using discharge, can be very annoying.
¤ Can switch in to expected water attacks from pokemon immune to water like gastrodon with storm drain. Is immune to Jellicent's shadow ball and water attacks, though must be careful of toxic.
¤ Gliscor with toxic heal can accidentally give porygon2 toxic healing.
---Many other abilities can be traced by porygon2 for its advantage---

I think this replay may help to show some of its viability (even though I made some stupid decisions in this battle :P) http://pokemonshowdown.com/replay/oususpecttest-34876156

You can see how I was able to wall and toxic volcarona, use trace to heal from jolteon, wall and toxic both latios and vaporeon. I could have toxic stalled them both if I wasn't impatient in this match.

While low in usage in OU and legal in UU, Porygon2 is much more viable in OU than C rank.

 

[Princess Bubblegum]

Here is Porygon2's main problem, why not use Chansey? Chansey is a much better special wall, and lets be real here, Porygon2 has no place fighting a good portion of physical threats like Terrakion. Chansey has more team support for a team, Stealth Rock, Heal Bell, Wish, ect, Porygon2 has... Trick Room? I understand that Porygon2 has some uses over Chansey, such as its usable offensive stats and Bolt-beam and more defense to take on things like Salamence. To it has maybe 2 niche uses over a Pokemon... that's B- rank, at best it is on par with Chansey.

 

[Ehrmantraut]

Here is Porygon2's main problem, why not use Chansey? Chansey is a much better special wall, and lets be real here, Porygon2 has no place fighting a good portion of physical threats like Terrakion. Chansey has more team support for a team, Stealth Rock, Heal Bell, Wish, ect, Porygon2 has... Trick Room? I understand that Porygon2 has some uses over Chansey, such as its usable offensive stats and Bolt-beam and more defense to take on things like Salamence. To it has maybe 2 niche uses over a Pokemon... that's B- rank, at best it is on par with Chansey.

well it sounds to me like you're pointing out that Chansey is a better support pokemon than Porygon2. Porygon2 shouldn't be used for support, it should be used as an offensive tank.

edit: erm with that said i'm not sure if I agree with A-rank.

 

[Erico9001]

Before people blow up over the A rank I gave porygon2, I was just going off of the description which I quoted, and the description of B ranks in my saying it deserves an A rank. Particularly in the part where it says A pokemon can wall the majority of pokemon, and B cannot wall the majority. Now after comparing it to other pokemons' ranks, I would place it in the B range. It turns out the descriptions don't really fit the actual rankings...

As Ehrmantraut said, Porygon2 is not just support. He is best used walling attacks, and sending back toxic to stall or ice beam and discharge/thunderbolt. You can't really compare him to Chansey for viability - different roles.