Other XY OU Viability Ranking Thread (V3) (Rank changes are over until ORAS)

[alexwolf]

Few things real quick:

Landorus is not dropping, not all people are going to like it, but that's how it is. Being in the conclusion reached list doesn't mean that Landorus is clearly above the A+ Pokemon, it means that everything there was to be said about Landorus has already been said, and a conclusion has already been reached.

Lando-T is great and we all know it, but oh my god how people like to ignore a mon's flaws whenever said mon is getting hyped by the majority. Lando-T is not moving up until i see some realistic descriptions about it, as well as comparisons with the rest of S rank.

 

[Celticpride]

I will also say what I've said several times before, I personally think Latias is better than Latios, but they should always move as a pair. Latios gives you more power, Latias gives you more support and a better ability to check things. Also, I wouldn't call Dragon Pulse as spammable as Draco Meteor. 45 BP is a pretty significant difference. The usage stats don't support popularity for it either, Draco Meteor clocks in at around 91% usage and Dragon Pulse comes in at around 5% usage between the twins. I would lean towards A+ for the twins.

 

[Jukain]

i honestly don't think the defenses to keep landorus-i in s rank so far have been very strong. i mean it's good but honestly rather overhyped. apparently it's some amazing offensive stealth rock setter but it loses to latios, latias, and starmie can get opportunities to spin against it rather easily + check it with reflect type. skarmory is becoming more and more rare, which was this defogger was supposed to beat i guess? i guess with pursuit support you can eliminate latis and whatever but really at this point bisharp trapping the latis is a crapshoot, and it's really not that hard to pressure lando not to set up rocks as it can often just get them up once. scarf ttar is a factor though i suppose, but again removing rocks once is often all that's needed. cm is pretty much worse than knock off because there's a bunch of things it can't actually break unlike knock off, rp sweeping is really rather rare espec with so much av azumarill. really the only other relevant set i'll bring up is knock off. the biggest issue with this set really is that it has A LOT of offensive checks, such as av azumarill, thundurus, mega charizard y, mega gardevoir, gyarados - stuff that can take a hit or so and retaliate with a ko. its speed tier is also kind of unimpressive making it very easily soft checked in certain scenarios by things like keldeo, latis, zam/manec/aero (fast megas). spdef talonflame and roost versions of mega aerodactyl which are both pretty damn nice checks have become more common. stuff like mamoswine, spdef mew, more dd dragonite as of late, the double bunny team that's been passing around which just shits on it in all aspects, all these things are heavily negative to its function. i won't pretend spdef gliscor is as prominent as it was with the enormous surge in acro sets for mega heracross and all, but it is still around and a rather strong wall to landorus-i.

albacore brought up two qualifications for ranking, both of which i think are factors as opposed to being independent of each other. a pokemon's ability to be checked/countered in the metagame and how easily it fits onto teams are both very relevant points that can sway a pokemon's ranking, at least from my point of view.

honestly i wouldn't drop it from s rank considering only the logic following the checks/counters line of thinking, but it faces so much competition for a teamslot it's not even funny. landorus-i only fits onto pretty specific types of offensive teams and that's because scarf landorus-t as well as defensive variants of landorus-t are so good on many of the kinds of bulky offense/offense/balanced teams it could fit on. there is definitely evidence that landorus-t sees more use. the current total tour usage stats place landorus-t at #3 and landorus-i at #14. to put that into perspective we're talking less than half the usage (258 uses vs 117 uses). the most recent 1825 ladder stats place landorus-t at #1 in usage and landorus-i at #25 in usage, again landorus-i receiving a bit less than half the usage of landorus-t. i think this speaks volumes about the viability of one as opposed to the other. sure they don't 'compete for a teamslot' but it sure can be an opportunity cost to be running, say, a bulky offense team and wow maybe i need to revenge kill threats and want to use this incredible amazing scarfer that landorus-t is. or maybe i need answers to things like talonflame, terrakion, and excadrill/a stealth rock setter and i've got that intimidate + constant momentum with u-turn. in many cases whatever traits landorus-i brings to the table are largely outweighed by the enormous overall utility that landorus-t provides for a team. this directly inhibits landorus-i's ability to fit onto a team, and is another huge negative.

oh and before anyone brings up its skills at wallbreaking/stallbreaking i refer you to the 10000 other things we have for that in this metagame, it's not like this is a role we can't fill rather easily.

Landorus is not dropping, not all people are going to like it, but that's how it is. Being in the conclusion reached list doesn't mean that Landorus is clearly above the A+ Pokemon, it means that everything there was to be said about Landorus has already been said, and a conclusion has already been reached.

first of all, i believe i have introduced new points and second of all, this was never really justified.

 

[alexwolf]

first of all, i believe i have introduced new points and second of all, this was never really justified.

It was justified, you just missed it. I made a post about it, so if you want go several pages back and find it.

 

[WideTomato]

guys, dragon pulse? its a 85 bp move, draco meteor is 130, so think about this:
Turn one, draco meteor outpower it by 45
turn two, (130*0.5=65) dragon pulse now have 20 more bp...
._.

 

[Worthlessnoob]

I'm not going to say what rank Lando-T should be in, but I would like to point out that people are indeed ignoring its problems and I'm going mention a couple of them.

First off, Lando-T is a mediocre rocks setter. It lose to common defoggers like Mew, Skarmory, usually Mandibuzz and spinners like Starmie. I know it beats Excadrill, but that's not the only relevant hazard remover in this day in age. Not everybody is using Sand Offense.

Second of all, Lando-T is bait for Heracross, Keldeo, Gardevoir, and sometime Lando-I. Let's say you try and set up Stealth Rocks after you have ridden the opposing hazard removers. That gives the opponent a free turn to switch in whatever wallbreaker they want. Of course, you can also lead with Lando-T and end of with a bad matchup against a special attacker. Also, Heracross sets up on you with sucks when you're supposed to take on physical attackers.

Finally, Landorus-T does have other sets, but I will say that even though it makes him versatile, the scarf set faces the same problems as ScarfDrill as it hates being lock into any of its moves, especially since half of them give Heracross a free switch in to wreck your team. My personal favorite set is the Double Dance set which is very underrated. However, that does not fit on many teams.

I'd also like to defend Lando-I even though it's blacklisted (Please don't hurt me). It's actually a good rocks setter, though obviously not the best. It beats defoggers like Skarmory, Mandibuzz, and cripples ones like Mew. Just so you know Lando-I is decent at setting up rocks because rather giving things free switch ins, it forces switches and sets up rocks on that turn. It also beats opposing rock setters. Combined with it is it's mandatory ability to stall break. Whatever your running, chances are, stall won't like it.

I do think Lando-I and Lando-T aren't that far off in footing, but I think the arguments presented are a bit one-sided here.

 

[Aragorn the King]

guys, dragon pulse? its a 85 bp move, draco meteor is 130, so think about this:
Turn one, draco meteor outpower it by 45
turn two, (130*0.5=65) dragon pulse now have 20 more bp...
._.

Right, but two Draco Meteors = 130 + 65 = 195, two Dragon Pulses = 85 + 85 = 170. Unless you plan on using Draco Meteor three times, which doesn't happen that often, Draco is always better.

btw idrk how this fits into Lati@s' ranking, but I just had to interject.

Anyway I wanna say I agree with Albacore that Latias > Latios. I know there's a huge power drop, but the superior handling of Landorus, Keldeo, and Charizard-Y make it able to fit on so many of my teams that Latios can't. This is probably because I can't use HO, but w/e. If either moves to S, I think it should be Latias, for its better bulk (good for BO and bal.) and access to Healing Wish (good for HO). However, I don't really think it's as good as Keld or Charizard-X. Those two are extremely versatile (Latias is a very straight forward bulky offensive defogger) and have no 100% stop (Pursuit will stop Latias [and Latios] cold every time). Latias is a hugely influential mon in OU, but I think its lack of versatility and pursuit weakness stops it from being S. Latios is much more versatile, having the room to run more coverage (it can run any of tbolt, surf, hp fire, eq) + having viable scarf and dual screens/memento sets, however the drop in defense and special defense makes it much less reliable than Latias at checking keld, chary, and lando. It also loses Healing Wish, an absolutely spectacular move on hyper offense. It's more jack-of-all trades than Latias, but struggles to find as much of a defensive niche, so it actually, imo, fits on a smaller amount of teams than its sister. Regardless, it's an absolute nuke and has very few switchins, so it's totally deserving of A+, like Latias.

 

[Magcargo]

guys, dragon pulse? its a 85 bp move, draco meteor is 130, so think about this:
Turn one, draco meteor outpower it by 45
turn two, (130*0.5=65) dragon pulse now have 20 more bp...
._.

Your right, Draco Meteor in two turns is more powerful. However, all your other coverage moves become weaker, meaning something like Ferrothorn switching in on Draco Meteor can't be OHKOed by HP Fire or something like Landorus-I can switch in and setup a free Rock Polish.

 

[AM]

So I guess I'll start with this cause there's stuff that I realistically think shouldn't be S rank and it's inflated as hell but because it's in conclusion reached with a loose justification by the ranking guys. It's suppose to be a tool to help newer players and saying that things like Lando-T doesn't fit the description of S rank word to word seems silly to me. I don't understand the pissing contest between experienced players cause the players that have some more experience know what's good, we don't need viability rankings to solely justify our decisions in team building. When I provide this to a newer player to get a glimpse of what threats are relevant in the tier, I want to give them accuracy and something precise. I want them to know right off the bat, look this thing is a top tier threat, prepare for it and don't make poor team building choices cause it's at a lower ranking. If someone is unsure of why it's at a certain rank they can simply just ask for some real justification similar to an earlier post on why Roserade wasn't ranked, forgot the name of the user. At the end of the day it's generally subjective depending on the player but theorymonning on what things like Lando-I does is great and all until like Jukain said, you realize there is so many things that actually can do what Lando-I does or even better. It was established that S rank standards have lowered. So now we're choosing to bring it up higher based on some sort of illusion that the inferior Lando is still better in a metagame that has shifted towards Lando-Ts favor? Ok then let's go with that.

 

[Jukain]

i actually didn't realize it was you who posted this because i remembered someone posting something along these lines but didn't think it was a very strong line of reasoning. anywyays:

Ok, it's time we clear up Landorus's ranking and make a definite decision about it. Landorus is staying in S rank and will be included to the ''conclusion reached'' category.

The reason for this decision is that Landorus has one amazing offensive set that is pretty consistent in general (Earth Power, Focus Blast, Knock Off, Sludge Wave / Psychic / Hidden Power Ice), and a ton of versatility, meaning no surefire counter exists and that Landorus can be tailored to fit any team's needs. And all this while having no real drawbacks, outside of lack of a spammable STAB, which is somewhat offset by the fact that most of Landorus's checks are easy to spot and hit on the switch. You could argue it's a bit slow and gets outsped by some very important Pokemon, such as Keldeo, Latios, and Greninja, but none of those Pokemon are as hard to wall as Landorus, and none of those Pokemon have the same longevity as Landorus without being choice locked. Latios and Greninja take LO damage and are both hurt by sandstorm, while Latios is also weak to Pursuit. Landorus has none of those problems. Keldeo's best set locks it to one move, making it much easier to play around than Landorus. And while Keldeo checks more Pokemon with its great defensive typing and can outspeed some Pokemon that Landorus can't (Garchomp and opposing Landorus mainly), Landorus is more difficult to counter and its best set doesn't lock it to one move, while also being more versatile than Keldeo. If there was S- rank, both Landorus and Keldeo would be there, but now that we have established that the standards of S rank are lower than they used to be, Landorus is as worthy of S rank as Keldeo.

o.k so versatility is bullshit. it's basically 1 set with an alternating last move, earth power / focus blast / psychic / knock off or stealth rock. sludge wave is pretty meh, all it really does is change a bit how well av azumarill can check you, hit mega gardevoir, and give you a prediction-free spam move against mega gyarados while letting landorus-t and gliscor as well as opposing landorus-i wall you. hp ice is mainly just for gliscor and to ohko opposing landos (rofl cbbnite ok stop pretending a set nobody has used since spring is relevant). this is nice and all for spdef gliscor mainly, but it's not like this is the death killer of stall or something anymore considering that spdef gliscor is not the only landorus-i answer people use particularly because phys def with acrobatics is so important for mega heracross. speaking of mega heracross, one of the really cool things about landorus-i is its ability to serve as an offensive check to mega heracross, but without psychic you can't do this, and psychic + hp ice is hurting you in other ways/overlaps heavily in coverage. plus, you're actually completely walled by any gyarados, mega charizard y (now a safe switch-in not even barely lol), can't actually do nearly as much in the way of significant damage to mega venusaur, specifically if, like many people, you, y'know, want to come in on it to nuke it for some big damage. plus, landorus-i already really isn't that hard to wear down, and it's worse vs the things it hits psychic and it are both supposed to hit such as thundurus-i and whatever since you have to use it in a lot of scenarios and will be racking up life orb damage rather quickly, just making landorus-i easier to deal with. cm is worse than knock off because it doesn't actually do anything significant and is just walled by latis/revenge killed in most scenarios. literally every scenario where you might think of using cm, knock off is better and i really hope i don't have to expand on this because this should be pretty obvious. the only other thing is rp which is fine i guess but really sweeps teams once in a blue moon and as a result is in a lot of scenarios a wasted slot where you'll be like 'damn, i wish i had [insert move here you don't have because of rp]'. the types of offensive teams it was meant to sweep don't exist in this metagame.

if you're seriously using a pokemon being choice-locked and being hurt by sandstorm as an argument then that's honestly just desperation, i have no idea even how to respond to that because it's just silly. keldeo being 'easier to play around' than landorus is pretty funny because imo it's really the opposite, there is no single mon in the game that wants to switch into a choice specs scald besides natural cure celebi/starmie and resttalk gyarados (btw hp electric is actually very common now so gl countering keldeo with this! or beating subcm for that matter). i don't WANT to switch in mega venusaur ever. i don't WANT to switch in latis to it because a) icy wind and b) just getting burnt means they're worn out so fast so now i can keep my rocks up if i couldn't already, yay. i NEVER want to switch in azumarill. and water stab is not like ground stab which has a bunch of immunities, practically everything that's not a bulky resist is taking a beating. plus, keldeo provides much more defensive utility and does in fact boast more heavily viable movesets. you actually dismissed these last points because of some arbitrary lowering of the s rank standards but that does nothing to prove a point at all.

 

[WideTomato]

Your right, Draco Meteor in two turns is more powerful. However, all your other coverage moves become weaker, meaning something like Ferrothorn switching in on Draco Meteor can't be OHKOed by HP Fire or something like Landorus-I can switch in and setup a free Rock Polish.

Still...

252 SpA Life Orb Latios Draco Meteor vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Landorus-T: 333-394 (87.1 - 103.1%) -- 93.8% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock

252 SpA Life Orb Latios Dragon Pulse vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Landorus-T: 218-257 (57 - 67.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock and Leftovers recovery

Its not spamable if its weak!

Lando-T is not the only thing that it does not ko, you will find that the lower power will leave you with so many threats at 20-30%

252 SpA Life Orb Latios Dragon Pulse vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Thundurus: 218-257 (72.9 - 85.9%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

252 SpA Life Orb Latios Dragon Pulse vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Rotom-W: 172-203 (56.5 - 66.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

252 SpA Life Orb Latios Dragon Pulse vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Mega Charizard Y: 161-1

 

[Celticpride]

A few things on Landorus. I really don't think anyone sold him as a great SR setter, I thought his merits were on his offensive firepower. I could be wrong there. Also, I know this isn't the point you were trying to make Jukain, but for clarity's sake Landorus-T's usage compared to everything else has nothing to do with overall viability (just want to avoid the "Rotom-W and Heatran to S-Rank because usage" conversation). However, it is a great point that in a meta where Landorus-T is so easy to slap on teams and use, that the opportunity cost for using Landorus-I is just that much higher. Would you rather use Mega Heracross+Landorus-T or Landorus-I+another Mega? That question used to be a landslide one way. Now it may have flipped. I would be ok with switching the places of Landorus-I and Landorus-T.

 

[alexwolf]

When did i say that Lando-T is not worthy or is not getting in S rank? i just want some thoughtful discussion about it instead of wall of texts that mention its pros. You can make a ton of Pokemon look S rank if you only talk about their pros, and Landorus-T is no exception. And of course if Lando-T ends up getting raised in S i will reconsider Landorus for S because of the higher opportunity cost. But for this to happen, we first have to reach a conclusion about Lando-T.

I really don't get why people are so eager to jump on the ''Lando-T should be higher than Lando, wtf is this crap'' bandwagon, when i haven't even posted a decision about Lando-T yet.

 

[Magcargo]

Still...

252 SpA Life Orb Latios Draco Meteor vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Landorus-T: 333-394 (87.1 - 103.1%) -- 93.8% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock

252 SpA Life Orb Latios Dragon Pulse vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Landorus-T: 218-257 (57 - 67.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock and Leftovers recovery

Its not spamable if its weak!

Lando-T is not the only thing that it does not ko, you will find that the lower power will leave you with so many threats at 20-30%

252 SpA Life Orb Latios Dragon Pulse vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Thundurus: 218-257 (72.9 - 85.9%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

252 SpA Life Orb Latios Dragon Pulse vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Rotom-W: 172-203 (56.5 - 66.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

252 SpA Life Orb Latios Dragon Pulse vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Mega Charizard Y: 161-1

Thundurus and Charizard Y are OHKOed by Psyshock after SR, and you have Surf for defensive Landorus-T (who shouldn't really be staying in on Latios anyways). Rotom-W is 2HKOed by Dragon Pulse and can't do jack shit to latios anyways.

 

[Karxrida]

Thundurus and Charizard Y are OHKOed by Psyshock after SR, and you have Surf for defensive Landorus-T (who shouldn't really be staying in on Latios anyways). Rotom-W is 2HKOed by Dragon Pulse and can't do jack shit to latios anyways.

Rotom-W can burn you, making you lose almost a quarter of your health each turn.

I wouldn't say Dragon Pulse is without merit, since it doesn't make your coverage moves weak after using it. I'd probably only use it on a 4 Attacks set, but it's not horrible by any means.

 

[alexwolf]

i actually didn't realize it was you who posted this because i remembered someone posting something along these lines but didn't think it was a very strong line of reasoning. anywyays:

o.k so versatility is bullshit. it's basically 1 set with an alternating last move, earth power / focus blast / psychic / knock off or stealth rock. sludge wave is pretty meh, all it really does is change a bit how well av azumarill can check you, hit mega gardevoir, and give you a prediction-free spam move against mega gyarados while letting landorus-t and gliscor as well as opposing landorus-i wall you. hp ice is mainly just for gliscor and to ohko opposing landos (rofl cbbnite ok stop pretending a set nobody has used since spring is relevant). this is nice and all for spdef gliscor mainly, but it's not like this is the death killer of stall or something anymore considering that spdef gliscor is not the only landorus-i answer people use particularly because phys def with acrobatics is so important for mega heracross. speaking of mega heracross, one of the really cool things about landorus-i is its ability to serve as an offensive check to mega heracross, but without psychic you can't do this, and psychic + hp ice is hurting you in other ways/overlaps heavily in coverage. plus, you're actually completely walled by any gyarados, mega charizard y (now a safe switch-in not even barely lol), can't actually do nearly as much in the way of significant damage to mega venusaur, specifically if, like many people, you, y'know, want to come in on it to nuke it for some big damage. plus, landorus-i already really isn't that hard to wear down, and it's worse vs the things it hits psychic and it are both supposed to hit such as thundurus-i and whatever since you have to use it in a lot of scenarios and will be racking up life orb damage rather quickly, just making landorus-i easier to deal with. cm is worse than knock off because it doesn't actually do anything significant and is just walled by latis/revenge killed in most scenarios. literally every scenario where you might think of using cm, knock off is better and i really hope i don't have to expand on this because this should be pretty obvious. the only other thing is rp which is fine i guess but really sweeps teams once in a blue moon and as a result is in a lot of scenarios a wasted slot where you'll be like 'damn, i wish i had [insert move here you don't have because of rp]'. the types of offensive teams it was meant to sweep don't exist in this metagame.

if you're seriously using a pokemon being choice-locked and being hurt by sandstorm as an argument then that's honestly just desperation, i have no idea even how to respond to that because it's just silly. keldeo being 'easier to play around' than landorus is pretty funny because imo it's really the opposite, there is no single mon in the game that wants to switch into a choice specs scald besides natural cure celebi/starmie and resttalk gyarados (btw hp electric is actually very common now so gl countering keldeo with this! or beating subcm for that matter). i don't WANT to switch in mega venusaur ever. i don't WANT to switch in latis to it because a) icy wind and b) just getting burnt means they're worn out so fast so now i can keep my rocks up if i couldn't already, yay. i NEVER want to switch in azumarill. and water stab is not like ground stab which has a bunch of immunities, practically everything that's not a bulky resist is taking a beating. plus, keldeo provides much more defensive utility and does in fact boast more heavily viable movesets. you actually dismissed these last points because of some arbitrary lowering of the s rank standards but that does nothing to prove a point at all.

The versatility argument isn't bullshit. Rock Polish Landorus can bluff the usual 4 attacks set early-game and sweep as the opponent switches out in late-game. Or, Landorus can take advantage of defensive checks (eg, Celebi and Mandibuzz) by using Calm Mind. Or catch on the switch its plethora of checks with its plethora of coverage options. Switching around and around and treading carefully before determining the full set of a particular Pokemon is what versatility is, and Landorus definitely has this.

Moving on, your problem seems to be that Landorus can't fuck up every single kind of team with only four moves. For example, you say that without HP Ice, SpD Gliscor walks over Landorus, but why is this presented as such a big deal? Landorus can still break through anything else, and no Pokemon is able to handle every kind of playstyle on its own. If you lack Knock Off, Latios and Latias are bigger issues, but it's not like this is a really detrimental problem, due to their vulnerability to Pursuit. If you lack a particular move on the last slot of all out attacking Landorus, some things will check or wall you, but the list of Pokemon able to wall you still remains extremely small, and very easy to cover from a teambuilding perspective.

Finally, of course Specs Keldeo is easier to play around, there are a ton of great initial switch-ins to Keldeo, definitely more than Landorus has. Latias, Latios, Amoonguss, Slowbro, Mega Venusaur, Alomomola, Starmie, Tornadus-T, Suicune, SpD Gyarados, and Celebi are all great initial responses to Keldeo. The worst that can happen to those Pokemon is getting burned, which is definitely an issue, but not half as big as you make it seem. On the other hand, the Pokemon that can switch into a Landorus that hasn't revealed its set safely are SpD Talonflame if SR is not up, SpD Gyarados, Mandibuzz if SR is not up, Tornadus-T, physically defensive Celebi, and Cresselia. I have excluded Pokemon such as SpD Gliscor because HP Ice screws it over, so you have to scout for it. And even though some of the Pokemon i mentioned for Keldeo can be 2HKOed by the appropriate move, such as Latios and Latias by Icy Wind, this doesn't change the fact that you got to scout Keldeo's set without losing a Pokemon and the opponent is now locked into Icy Wind, an obvious disadvantage. On the other hand, Landorus can pose a threat no matter what until the opponent scouts for the whole set or has a hard counter, making it much harder to play around than Keldeo.

 

[WideTomato]

Thundurus and Charizard Y are OHKOed by Psyshock after SR, and you have Surf for defensive Landorus-T (who shouldn't really be staying in on Latios anyways). Rotom-W is 2HKOed by Dragon Pulse and can't do jack shit to latios anyways.

If you have revealed dpulse it might, I also love how you assume zard will come in on sr n_n.

I'll just list some of the mons that can ranking dpulse and kill it.

Lando-I
Mega pinsir
Staraptor
Mega gyara after rocks

Defensive gliscor, can toxic.
Defensive quagmire

I don't really need to list more, I think you get the point n_n dpulse is just a sub-optimal option.

 

[Kyuzeth]

I'm just gonna go ahead and list the positives and negatives of Landorus's two Formes.

Landorus-Incarnate
Positives
- Seriously powerful thanks to Sheer Force and 115 Special Attack
- Has exactly the movepool to abuse Ability and stat with
- Large coverage with its Sheer Force-boosted movepool
- 101 Speed barely outpaces a majority of the metagame
- Can even run mixed sets with Knock Off or (somewhat niche) physical Sand Force sets
- Stall is terrified of it
Negatives
- 101 Speed isn't that great and leaves Landorus-I outsped by a large slew of Pokémon
- Rather predictable compared to Therian
- Has somewhat of a case of 4MSS, as Jukain explained

Landorus-Therian
Positives
- Fantastic 145 Attack stat gives it amazing physical firepower
- Intimidate gives it great initial physical bulk and forces many switches
- Combination of U-turn and Intimidate makes it a great scout (Scarf) or pivot (defensive/SR)
- Can run a variety of sets to great effect, making Landorus-T highly unpredictable and versatile
- Has a shitton of ways to cripple or get past its would-be checks and counters
- Typing is both offensively and defensively fantastic and goes greatly with its stats and Ability
- One of the best switch-ins to Sand Offense
- Checks just so fucking much in the current metagame, can do a ton of shit and is extremely versatile in general
Negatives
- 91 Speed is kinda low, so as a Scarfer, it's prone to being outsped by other Scarfers
- Worn down somewhat quickly due to lack of recovery
- Doesn't like to be locked into Earthquake or Superpower

Now, as you can see, both Landorus Formes have a lot of positive traits that more than make up for their negatives. There's not just an opportunity cost for using Lando-T over Lando-I; there's either an opportunity cost for using either or there is none at all. Let's be honest, both have about an equal opportunity cost. Using Incarnate means you'll have to miss out on Therian's utility, but using Therian means you're gonna need a replacement for Incarnate's wallbreaking prowess.
Going on about this point; there's usually an alternative for Incarnate in the form of Mega Charizard Y or Mega Gardevoir, the latter of which Therian pairs extremely well with. Both are extremely easy to slap on teams and provide a lot of synergy, but overall I personally think the current metagame is more in Therian's favor than it is in Incarnate's favor. Many Pokémon highly appreciate Therian's scouting/pivoting ability in the current metagame.

FINAL VERDICT
Both Landorus-Incarnate and Landorus-Therian have their pros and cons, the choice between the Forme all depends on what the team requires. Both are highly deserving of S-Rank, but for different reasons. Neither is perfect, but they're both fucking amazing.

Done talking about it. Sayonara.

 

[Alfalfa]

The versatility argument isn't bullshit. Rock Polish Landorus can bluff the usual 4 attacks set early-game and sweep as the opponent switches out in late-game. Or, Landorus can take advantage of defensive checks (eg, Celebi and Mandibuzz) by using Calm Mind. Or catch on the switch its plethora of checks with its plethora of coverage options. Switching around and around and treading carefully before determining the full set of a particular Pokemon is what versatility is, and Landorus definitely has this.

Moving on, your problem seems to be that Landorus can't fuck up every single kind of team with only four moves. For example, you say that without HP Ice, SpD Gliscor walks over Landorus, but why is this presented as such a big deal? Landorus can still break through anything else, and no Pokemon is able to handle every kind of playstyle on its own. If you lack Knock Off, Latios and Latias are bigger issues, but it's not like this is a really detrimental problem, due to their vulnerability to Pursuit. If you lack a particular move on the last slot of all out attacking Landorus, some things will check or wall you, but the list of Pokemon able to wall you still remains extremely small, and very easy to cover from a teambuilding perspective.

Finally, of course Specs Keldeo is easier to play around, there are a ton of great initial switch-ins to Keldeo, definitely more than Landorus has. Latias, Latios, Amoonguss, Slowbro, Mega Venusaur, Alomomola, Starmie, Tornadus-T, Suicune, SpD Gyarados, and Celebi are all great initial responses to Keldeo. The worst that can happen to those Pokemon is getting burned, which is definitely an issue, but not half as big as you make it seem. On the other hand, the Pokemon that can switch into a Landorus that hasn't revealed its set safely are SpD Talonflame if SR is not up, SpD Gyarados, Mandibuzz if SR is not up, Tornadus-T, physically defensive Celebi, and Cresselia. I have excluded Pokemon such as SpD Gliscor because HP Ice screws it over, so you have to scout for it. And even though some of the Pokemon i mentioned for Keldeo can be 2HKOed by the appropriate move, such as Latios and Latias by Icy Wind, this doesn't change the fact that you got to scout Keldeo's set without losing a Pokemon and the opponent is now locked into Icy Wind, an obvious disadvantage. On the other hand, Landorus can pose a threat no matter what until the opponent scouts for the whole set or has a hard counter, making it much harder to play around than Keldeo.

I have to disagree on you with those three being good responses to Keldeo. I would say that Alomomola and Suicune lose to SubCM, and that Slowbro does not like Specs-boosted Hydro Pumps, but not that many people actually use SubCM (though it still is really good), and Keldeo rarely ever uses Hydro Pump, despite commonly carrying it. Latias, Latios, and Mega Venusaur all hate burns more than any of those else Pokemon listed, especially if they lack recovery. Essentially, they are just checks that can be played around. You usually do not keep Specs Keldeo in any longer than one or two turns; you just lure your checks and try to burn them with Scald. Landorus can stay in for longer, but is more difficult to use. Keldeo is still much easier to build around than Landorus, and the whole Landorus being diverse thing is not so great of a point if it is not the easiest thing to slap on a team. I agree that Landorus is harder to play around because more teams are weak to it, but it still suffers from more opportunity cost than Keldeo because it clashes with LandoT, and is not the easiest thing to build around.

Also, Cresselia beats every single Landorus set one-on-one and is not worried about its set whatsoever, except maybe against Calm Mind Sludge Wave, but who uses that, and that is essentially a 50-50, so either side could win, depending on the scenario.

 

[WideTomato]

Lando-T is pretty easy to scout what set it is running, based on damage done to it, to you or whether you see lefties, and both sets have cons, though surprisingly different between scarf and deffensive, I'll leave the ones I find the worst.

Scarf:
-Relatively slow
-Fails to check some of the most intimidating physical threats, such as sand rush exca, cbtalon, mega medi and hera etc. Continuously.
-heavily relying on u-turn
-no really spamable move
-Easley rendered as setup-forder
-very predictable ones scarf is revealed
-slight lack of power, outside of eq

Pivot:
-Weak on the special side
-lack of reliable recovery, though not that much of a problem.
-very predictable
-easy to wear down
-common weaknesses to ice and water

That was all I could think of, I haven't said anything positive, so yeah... You're all amazing persons ^^

 

[AsynchronousIO]

Wow. Just because Lando-I isn't 6-0ing stall anymore people suddenly act like it's the worst thing in the world. Lest people forget, LO Sheer Force Lando is strong af. Sure, it has answers now. It's still not easy to play around for stall, and 101 is an okay enough speed and it has nice enough typing that it can hurt things on offense and balance too. Besides, Lando has teammates to deal with its limited answers. Relying on SpD Gliscor to check Lando? Good luck with Keldeo. Cress? Have fun with TTar and Knock Off users esp. Bisharp, not to mention that sand really hurts Cress's recovery.

As has been said before: If your team has a method of stallbreaking and has trouble with offense esp. sand offense, use Lando-T. If your team has problems with stall, use Lando-I. The opportunity cost is really not as great as people are making it out to be and is no argument for dropping Lando-I because they do different things. Depending on how the rest of your team is built you will most probably need one and not the other--if you have neither a method of dealing with stall nor one of dealing with offense esp. sand offense after five team slots, your team most assuredly sucks.

Lando-I is a clear S-rank as far as I'm concerned. It's not perfect, but it's still head and shoulders above everything in A+ and still one of the most frustrating things for balance and stall to go up against. I have no comment on Lando-T, though. It's very good, I'll give it that.

 

[RichieTheGarchomp]

Lando T being brung up again... Honestly I can't really think if one is outclassed by the other; they both have extremely different roles. Actually, not really. One can run a Rock Polish+3 moves set, a CM set, and an all out attacker set. On the other side, you have a plethora of sets, some filling their roles on their said teams. These include 2 Scarf Sets, one for OU and Doubles, a CB set for Ubers, a Double Dance set for OU, a few Earth Plate sets, and an SR set.
Obviously, Lando I is the former and Lando T is the second. Obviously, Lando T is less predictable then Lando I, only boasting 3 sets. It can be mentioned that Sheer Force and Intimidate do two different things. As fore mentioned, Lando T has much more bulk with intimidate on the switch in, unless the opponent has a Clear Body user out. Lando I has much more special bulk when attacking. See the roles here? Lando T forces switch outs to bulky offensive Pokemon like MHera, MPinsir, another Lando T, etc. while Lando I is an all out attacker, like Thundurus.

With that aside, we can talk about what they do.

Landorus-Therian

Pros:

-Nice 145 Atk
-Great defensive bulk with Intimidate
-Forces switch outs to attackers like MHera, MPinsir, etc.
-As mentioned, great vs Sand.
-VERY easy to switch in to other Pokemon.
-Plethora of sets
-Has little checks and counters. The only two I can think of is Greninja and Keldeo, even then Greninja usually dies with scarf sets.
-Checks so many physical sweepers
-Counters a decent amount of Pokemon.
-Only 2 weaknesses, with Ice being nonexistent.

Cons:

-No reliable recovery; and you really need to keep him alive.
-91 Spe isn't favorable.
-Sometimes Scarf does not really help you out.
-I can't think of more cons. This thing is SOO fucking good.

Landorus I:

Pros:

-Great ability; paired with LO, 2x SE moves with STAB should do 4.2x damage then normal.
-101 speed just breaks the 100 Spe barrier, with things like MGarde,Mew,Jirachi,Victini,Celebi, etc. exist.
-Amazing coverage. Psychic, Sludge bomb, Earth Power and Knock off.
-Stall does not like it.
-3 great sets
-Counters/Checks a plethora of Pokemon
-Sweeps better than your mom in bed with me

Cons:

-Defenses aren't too favorable. I see it usually die quicker than Lando T.
-Setup takes time, and as forementioned, it's defenses aren't helping it with that.
-If your a decent player, it's extremely predictable. Azumarill is out? Switch to a steel type you conveniently placed on your team.
-Should I run Knock off? Calm mind, Psychic, Sludge wave, Rock Polish, Earth Power... Quite the amount to fit on 4 moves!

Even though I kind of repeated what Kyuzeth, I did add some things to discussion. And with the plethora of Pros on Lando T's side, I am leaning for it to go to S.

TL DR; Lando T and Lando I are completely different, carrying different roles. Both have good pros and cons, but they definitely both deserve to be in S.

 

[Celticpride]

I would like to make a case for Mega Aggron to stay in C+. I have been using it the past couple days (after not using it before) and it does performs well. 140 Base Attack is great for it and often goes unnoticed, even uninvested it can hit back hard. A strong STAB in Iron Head hits a decent amount of things neutrally. It also has the coverage moves to hit it's threats. Some combination of Stone Edge, Earthquake and Ice Punch allows it to hit anything that's not Ferro or Skarm decently hard. The Tank set that consists of Iron Head, Stealth Rock and two coverage moves does a good job of handling a wide variety of different threats. It handles BirdSpam as well as Rhyperior does and it handles Sand Offense well in addition to that. It does need Wish support, but bulky wish passing Fairies, particularly Sylveon, partner extremely with it. It is literally a better Rhyperior in almost every way. I has overall higher stats, better defensive typing, and it fits better with common Wish Passers. Overall I think it needs to stay in C+ rank. Pure defensive and support sets do not merit this rank, but it's offensive Tank set does. Very effective glue on bulky offense teams.

 

[Alfalfa]

I would like to make a case for Mega Aggron to stay in C+. I have been using it the past couple days (after not using it before) and it does performs well. 140 Base Attack is great for it and often goes unnoticed, even uninvested it can hit back hard. A strong STAB in Iron Head hits a decent amount of things neutrally. It also has the coverage moves to hit it's threats. Some combination of Stone Edge, Earthquake and Ice Punch allows it to hit anything that's not Ferro or Skarm decently hard. The Tank set that consists of Iron Head, Stealth Rock and two coverage moves does a good job of handling a wide variety of different threats. It handles BirdSpam as well as Rhyperior does and it handles Sand Offense well in addition to that. It does need Wish support, but bulky wish passing Fairies, particularly Sylveon, partner extremely with it. It is literally a better Rhyperior in almost every way. I has overall higher stats, better defensive typing, and it fits better with common Wish Passers. Overall I think it needs to stay in C+ rank. Pure defensive and support sets do not merit this rank, but it's offensive Tank set does. Very effective glue on bulky offense teams.

Mega Aggron suffers from significant opportunity cost due to getting worn so easily, and is usually not worth the Mega Slot. Most of the time I would rather just use something else. Move Mega Aggron down to C Rank.

 

[Srn]

I would like to make a case for Mega Aggron to stay in C+. I have been using it the past couple days (after not using it before) and it does performs well. 140 Base Attack is great for it and often goes unnoticed, even uninvested it can hit back hard. A strong STAB in Iron Head hits a decent amount of things neutrally. It also has the coverage moves to hit it's threats. Some combination of Stone Edge, Earthquake and Ice Punch allows it to hit anything that's not Ferro or Skarm decently hard. The Tank set that consists of Iron Head, Stealth Rock and two coverage moves does a good job of handling a wide variety of different threats. It handles BirdSpam as well as Rhyperior does and it handles Sand Offense well in addition to that. It does need Wish support, but bulky wish passing Fairies, particularly Sylveon, partner extremely with it. It is literally a better Rhyperior in almost every way. I has overall higher stats, better defensive typing, and it fits better with common Wish Passers. Overall I think it needs to stay in C+ rank. Pure defensive and support sets do not merit this rank, but it's offensive Tank set does. Very effective glue on bulky offense teams.

Except rhyperior can block volturn and thus counters raikou (watch out for specs hp ice tho :[ ) and megaman, which is a GIGANTIC asset. Its really fking annoying when volt switchers just do their thing and wear down ur team if you don't have amoong.
Additionally, while maggron can take a flare blitz from talon, it doesn't resist it and it doesn't take it comfortably, especially for a mon with zero recovery. Rhyperior resists that shit, making it a far better answer to talon and flyspam as a whole.