Metagame SV OU Metagame Discussion v4

[Time Waster]

Considering the people who posted in Policy Review dumped on the idea of a Tera Blast suspect for the most part, the OU Council is clearly deciding between Volcarona and Ogerpon-Wellspring to be the next suspect target. I hope the OU Council truly picks the one that the community feels more strongly about, which I believe is Volcarona since it has greater snowballing potential against non-stall teams. I could be wrong though since Vert believes Ogerpon-Wellspring might be the only mon that has the support for a ban, and he probably has a better gauge of the pulse of the playerbase than I do.

Even though Volc has 8 different tera types and like half a dozen sets that are very hard to read, it does offer some defensive utility. Wellspring's utility is almost entirely limited to punishing pink fish teams. Ogerpon is also more consistent in most match ups. Tera ground Volc vs a team with Rillaboom might not be too useful in the match. I think that's the logic for why Wellspring would have more support. Volc's sheer unpredictability could balance this out though.

Both could certainly use a suspect because they've both been complained about for a long time. I think the tier is fun to play but I wouldn't mind if either or both left.

 

[DaRotomMachine]

In the midst of the OU metagame discussion thread's 409th annual upcoming ban debacle, take a break and enjoy this gravity team destroying stall by clicking right here. Fun fact: hustleband Flapple using grav apple in gravity is the strongest unboosted physical hit in the tier, surpassing band rilla wood hammer in terrain by a little bit. I do think this team (and gravity as a whole) has potential, but I haven't worked out all of the kinks yet. What do you think about gravity?

My two cents on the whole ban situation is that we should accept this gen is a bit more offensive than previous ones, rather than trying to achieve gen 8 in gen 9 by banning every mon and tera. Try to think about which of these would be more enjoyable for a bit. Gen 8 is fine but we already have it. No need for gen 8: 2. There are no autowin mons anymore; the possible exceptions might be moon and volc which are very MU fishy, and very difficult to deal with for some teams after 1 boost, but idt it's quite banworthy either, and it's not like mons like these haven't existed before. I've already expressed this multiple times, but I'll say it again: The tier definitely feels playable and enjoyable rn.

If anyboy uses Sub Bulk-Up Lando-T then yeah Gravity is good

 

[DaddyBuzzwole]

Fun fact: hustleband Flapple using grav apple in gravity is the strongest unboosted physical hit in the tier, surpassing band rilla wood hammer in terrain by a little bit.

well, some slight corrections:

• it does the exact same amount as hustleband flapple using outrage outside of gravity
• if we're counting field conditions like gravity despite needing another mon to set them up, we should also factor in grassy terrain to boost flapple's number even more. let's also factor in tera because well duh
• even after factoring in all that, it still gets outdamaged. guess fucking who
  • 252+ Atk Choice Band Hustle Tera Grass Flapple Grav Apple (120 BP) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Tera Fighting Dondozo in Grassy Terrain: 486-574 (96.4 - 113.8%) -- 81.3% chance to OHKO
  • 252+ Atk Choice Band Protosynthesis Tera Fire Gouging Fire Raging Fury vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Tera Fighting Dondozo in Sun: 504-594 (100 - 117.8%) -- guaranteed OHKO
• neither of these have jack shit on the actual strongest unboosted physical hit in the tier, which also happens to be the strongest unboosted hit of any kind in any tier
  • 252+ Atk Choice Band Galvanize Tera Electric Golem-Alola Explosion vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Tera Fighting Dondozo in Electric Terrain: 862-1016 (171 - 201.5%) -- guaranteed OHKO
• that is, "any tier" unless we want to count adapt tera ghost band basculegion last respects with 7 or more allies fainted. yes, that's right, 7 or more. revival blessing doesn't make the last respects counter go down (they capped the counter at one hundred for some reason), and 2 mons learn it, so if you want to waste half your teamspace on gimmicky bullshit it's technically entirely possible to end up with a calc that looks a little something like this:
  • 252+ Atk Choice Band Adaptability Tera Ghost Basculegion Last Respects (400 BP) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Tera Fighting Dondozo: 949-1118 (188.2 - 221.8%) -- guaranteed OHKO

 

[EpicGuy321]

well, some slight corrections:

• it does the exact same amount as hustleband flapple using outrage outside of gravity
• if we're counting field conditions like gravity despite needing another mon to set them up, we should also factor in grassy terrain to boost flapple's number even more. let's also factor in tera because well duh
• even after factoring in all that, it still gets outdamaged. guess fucking who
  • 252+ Atk Choice Band Hustle Tera Grass Flapple Grav Apple (120 BP) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Tera Fighting Dondozo in Grassy Terrain: 486-574 (96.4 - 113.8%) -- 81.3% chance to OHKO
  • 252+ Atk Choice Band Protosynthesis Tera Fire Gouging Fire Raging Fury vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Tera Fighting Dondozo in Sun: 504-594 (100 - 117.8%) -- guaranteed OHKO
• neither of these have jack shit on the actual strongest unboosted physical hit in the tier, which also happens to be the strongest unboosted hit of any kind in any tier
  • 252+ Atk Choice Band Galvanize Tera Electric Golem-Alola Explosion vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Tera Fighting Dondozo in Electric Terrain: 862-1016 (171 - 201.5%) -- guaranteed OHKO
• that is, "any tier" unless we want to count adapt tera ghost band basculegion last respects with 7 or more allies fainted. yes, that's right, 7 or more. revival blessing doesn't make the last respects counter go down, and 2 mons learn it, so if you want to waste half your teamspace on gimmicky bullshit it's technically entirely possible to end up with a calc that looks a little something like this:
  • 252+ Atk Choice Band Adaptability Tera Ghost Basculegion Last Respects (400 BP) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Tera Fighting Dondozo: 949-1118 (188.2 - 221.8%) -- guaranteed OHKO

in National Dex AG, I think with ReviveCats you can power up Last Respects up to 100 times, where it caps at 5050 BP. This produces the following calc:

252+ Atk Choice Band Adaptability Tera Ghost Basculegion Last Respects (5050 BP) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Tera Fighting Dondozo: 11959-14069 (2372.8 - 2791.4%) -- guaranteed OHKO

 

[Eeveeto]

in National Dex AG, I think with ReviveCats you can power up Last Respects up to 100 times, where it caps at 5050 BP. This produces the following calc:

252+ Atk Choice Band Adaptability Tera Ghost Basculegion Last Respects (5050 BP) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Tera Fighting Dondozo: 11959-14069 (2372.8 - 2791.4%) -- guaranteed OHKO

You actually can,t, since if you have Last Respects, you will sometimes call Last Respects instead of Revival Blessing.

 

[DaddyBuzzwole]

You actually can,t, since if you have Last Respects, you will sometimes call Last Respects instead of Revival Blessing.

theoretically, if you managed to get unrealistically lucky, it could happen. only on paper, really, but in practice it'll never happen because you'd have to find two people willing to play a game of natdex ag

 

[Eeveeto]

theoretically, if you managed to get unrealistically lucky, it could happen. only on paper, really, but in practice it'll never happen because you'd have to find two people willing to play a game of natdex ag

Huh, maybe you can achieve that without National Dex and Assist...

Cresselia (F) @ Leppa Berry
Ability: Levitate
Tera Type: Psychic
IVs: 0 Atk
- Lunar Dance
- Rest
- Sleep Talk

Pawmot @ Leppa Berry
Ability: Volt Absorb
Tera Type: Electric
IVs: 0 Atk
- Revival Blessing
- Rest
- Sleep Talk

Rabsca @ Leppa Berry
Ability: Synchronize
Tera Type: Bug
IVs: 0 Atk
- Revival Blessing
- Rest
- Sleep Talk

Smeargle @ Leppa Berry
Ability: Own Tempo
Tera Type: Normal
IVs: 0 Atk
- Lunar Dance
- Rest
- Sleep Talk
- Court Change

Basculegion (M) @ Choice Band
Ability: Adaptability
Tera Type: Water
- Last Respects

Pelipper
Ability: Drizzle
Tera Type: Water
IVs: 0 Atk
- Tailwind

 

[Anchor9]

Huh, maybe you can achieve that without National Dex and Assist...

Cresselia (F) @ Leppa Berry
Ability: Levitate
Tera Type: Psychic
IVs: 0 Atk
- Lunar Dance
- Rest
- Sleep Talk

Pawmot @ Leppa Berry
Ability: Volt Absorb
Tera Type: Electric
IVs: 0 Atk
- Revival Blessing
- Rest
- Sleep Talk

Rabsca @ Leppa Berry
Ability: Synchronize
Tera Type: Bug
IVs: 0 Atk
- Revival Blessing
- Rest
- Sleep Talk

Smeargle @ Leppa Berry
Ability: Own Tempo
Tera Type: Normal
IVs: 0 Atk
- Lunar Dance
- Rest
- Sleep Talk
- Court Change

Basculegion (M) @ Choice Band
Ability: Adaptability
Tera Type: Water
- Last Respects

Pelipper
Ability: Drizzle
Tera Type: Water
IVs: 0 Atk
- Tailwind

Too bad this can only be achieved in Gen 9 AG. (Last Respects is an unhealthy and evil move)

 

[EpicGuy321]

Hi chat! I cooked up some more spicy sets and mons for you guys to try out. Enjoy: https://pokepast.es/629aa7cf75955557

 

[DaddyBuzzwole]

Huh, maybe you can achieve that without National Dex and Assist...

Cresselia (F) @ Leppa Berry
Ability: Levitate
Tera Type: Psychic
IVs: 0 Atk
- Lunar Dance
- Rest
- Sleep Talk

Pawmot @ Leppa Berry
Ability: Volt Absorb
Tera Type: Electric
IVs: 0 Atk
- Revival Blessing
- Rest
- Sleep Talk

Rabsca @ Leppa Berry
Ability: Synchronize
Tera Type: Bug
IVs: 0 Atk
- Revival Blessing
- Rest
- Sleep Talk

Smeargle @ Leppa Berry
Ability: Own Tempo
Tera Type: Normal
IVs: 0 Atk
- Lunar Dance
- Rest
- Sleep Talk
- Court Change

Basculegion (M) @ Choice Band
Ability: Adaptability
Tera Type: Water
- Last Respects

Pelipper
Ability: Drizzle
Tera Type: Water
IVs: 0 Atk
- Tailwind

we're reaching depths of depravity that no one ever thought possible. i must try it at once

Too bad this can only be achieved in Gen 9 AG. (Last Respects is an unhealthy and evil move)

i can't think of any world within the branches of yggdrasil where that's "too bad"

 

[arnimacarni]

Hi chat! I cooked up some more spicy sets and mons for you guys to try out. Enjoy: https://pokepast.es/629aa7cf75955557

Oh my that Jirachi set is evil. I'm building Ribombee + Meow + TWave Ghold as we speak I'm going to paraflinch y'all to death

 

[Rekka's Backend]

Hi chat! I cooked up some more spicy sets and mons for you guys to try out. Enjoy: https://pokepast.es/629aa7cf75955557

Keep my Samu and curse sets off the public record, buddy. I can't keep cheesing this tier if you let some of this secret tech go wide

 

[DaddyBuzzwole]

Hi chat! I cooked up some more spicy sets and mons for you guys to try out. Enjoy: https://pokepast.es/629aa7cf75955557

confuse ray could actually be kinda gas on cryogonal. when i was last playing i was experimenting on what to run as its fourth move, since the ground tera blast set i was using in dlc1 is no longer worth running over kyurem. list of things i've tried:

• water tera blast. combined with freeze-dry, it's unresisted coverage, but cryogonal's damage output is honestly kind of lackluster. it's very much not iron bundle and i feel that trying to make it into a breaker/cleaner wasn't really the direction to go
• haze. a tried-and-true randbats option, and compressing haze and rapid spin into a single slot was interesting, but i just never found myself clicking it
• bind. yes, really. no, seriously, hear me out. hitting someone with a bind on switch can prevent them from doubling while you switch into your answer to what they now have out. it doesn't work at my skill level because people don't double, but the better your opponent is at positioning, the more effective it is to take away their ability to switch at any given time
• a secret tech that could possibly work quite well if played right but i don't have the raw skill to pilot that kind of heat properly. i'm willing to tell someone with actual building and laddering skills or some tour player in need of wacky ideas and see if they can find out what the optimal team comp for it is and whether it's any good, but i don't want to shout it out in public just yet just in case it actually works

maybe i'll try confuse ray on it whenever the next suspect happens

 

[Heatranator]

a secret tech that could possibly work quite well if played right but i don't have the raw skill to pilot that kind of heat properly. i'm willing to tell someone with actual building and laddering skills and see if they can find out what the optimal team comp for it is and whether it's any good, but i don't want to shout it out in public just yet just in case it actually works

I could see ice shard, reflect and frost breath working.

• Ice shard: Yes, off a pitiful base 50 attack stat. As long as you have a naive or hasty nature, this can be pretty good. It can do 25% to dragapult, it can do 33% to dragonite minimum and do 22% to meow. A niche option, but something that could be done.
• Reflect: You simply make your piss poor defense stat actually useable. With that, you can actually always live a meow flower trick from full, always live a non boosted (no supreme overlord too) gambit iron head and always a five allies boosted sucker punch too. Pretty impressive.
• Frost Breath: Hate clodsire using amnesia on you? Well no more, with all new frost breath. It doesn't do the most damage, but it does have a chance to 3hit ko. That's it. No, seriously, it beats amnesia clodsire. Idk, find something else with it. Once blissey is out of the picture, it can destroy stall teams.

 

[ianlazerbeem]

Do people have the opposite of rose tinted glasses for the DLC1 metagame (crimson tinted glasses? green tinted glasses??) because it was not as bad as everyone is saying. In September almost fell out of OU. It was 34th in usage with 31 and 21. October had them move up but none of the "big three" reached near top 10, the closest being at 18. In November after the , , and bans finally moved to the top 10 but only had 15% usage while offensive mons like , , . , and remained the majority of the highly used mons. We barely had a month after the big DLC1 offense bans to let the metagame settle before DLC2 shook everything up. If these bulkier hazard balance teams were so prevelant then why didnt see high usage (it did) to counter bulky styles like everyone is saying it is banworthy now for?

The metagame hardly had time to develop and I think making statements about the state of affairs for a metagame where was on only one in eight teams is a folly.

"Oh no I have to play against actual good balance teams 1/8 times I queue into the ladder" is not a particularly unwelcome endpoint to aim for

"October had them move up but" LOL do not think you can bury this lede; September was less than 20% of the duration of DLC1, basing your numbers solely off the fresh tier gterrain offense meta where everyone was spamming Hearthflame Bloodmoon and wellspring and responding to said teams with based Gliscor stall as a way to downplay the zap king Lu bullshit that was characteristic of the post Gliscor DLC 2 period is just citing incorrect statistics, looking at the usage based tier update for December 1 2023, which is to say the duration of November 2023, as well as the OUPL week 1 usage statistics, chosen because they are the only week entirely within November and are a more relevant data point because they are entirely post Gliscor ban and overall a higher level of play:

was #9 on the ladder and #3 in OUPL at 15 and 35 percent respectively
was #12 on ladder and #4 in OUPL, at 13 and 33 percent respectively
was #19 on ladder and #8 in OUPL, at 10 and 23 percent respectively, bearing in mind Gliscor was banned nov 11 at 11% usage so we can correct the former statistic to closer to 15%
a common partner for these teams ranked #6 and 16 respectively
common partner of these teams ranked #10 and #14
another common pair with these hazard stacking cores ranked 4th and 10th, appearing on over 1 in 4 or 1 in 5 teams respectively
the other most common team style during this period made up 19 and 23 percent of teams respectively

So in a given period of late DLC1, over 1/3 of teams were zap king Lu cores (which were not just balance by the way, bulky offense teams can and did use the exact same core at the time) and about 1/5 were grassy terrain offense, combined those two very same team styles were nearly 60% of the meta

But of course those are just the (more relevant) numbers, a metagame where over half of teams are very one note isn't inherently bad, so let's get into exactly why a gen 9 meta centered around is extremely unenjoyable to play and not particularly skillful either:

static shuts down virtually any physical attacker barring wellspring which doesn't want to take a hurricane, the counterplay to Zapdos is dont use attacks. Zapdos shuts down any progress attempt made by being a disastrous u turn switch in and punishing... attacking
by pivoting with chilly, the zap king Lu user never falls victim to the same tactic and also through future sight guarantees beneficial doubles or a kill for the team, further taking away agency from the opponent
absurdly fat, never fails to get multiple layers up
and once they're up absolutely nothing can be done about it
you cannot counter any of these teams with any other structure of balance, yet fails to be a "balance breaker" against zap king Lu since it misses the ko on Zapdos and dies to cane. If wellspring doesn't just shred your team, it knocks it off and you lose to lu's hazards. Overall these teams are very one note to play and play against and have a very low chance of losing when piloted competently, with the best counterplay being to pilot the same team but better.

So we can try to revise history and pretend that this meta was enjoyable to play but i refuse to participate in that reframing of the truth, zap king lu DLC1 was not a good period of the meta at all and in fact I rated it a 2 in enjoyment at the time but looking back it may have honestly been a 1.

 

[DaddyBuzzwole]

static shuts down virtually any physical attacker barring wellspring which doesn't want to take a hurricane, the counterplay to Zapdos is dont use attacks. Zapdos shuts down any progress attempt made by being a disastrous u turn switch in and punishing... attacking

then where is it? why'd it fall off so hard if it's as good as you're claiming here? you'd think something where "the counterplay to it is to not attack" would be thriving in any offense-heavy environment, or indeed any environment at all. it's almost as though there's an entire other category of attacks that don't make contact. you can't just go around saying "the best counterplay to zapdos is to not use attacks" when not only is that untrue but we've also had multiple mons for which it is true this very gen (annihilape and archaludon). the best counterplay for it is to not let its presence in the back psych you out or deter you from clicking contact moves when it's not in, and also to run something with special moves for god's sake

by pivoting with chilly, the zap king Lu user never falls victim to the same tactic and also through future sight guarantees beneficial doubles or a kill for the team, further taking away agency from the opponent

remember all those physical attackers that zapdos shuts down? as it turns out, they can take a big bite out of glowking if you correctly predict it using chilly. or if you use a non-contact physical move to cover the zapdos switch-in option also. or if you just click knock, which zapdos can't switch in on without being seriously crippled against rocks and ting-lu can't switch in on without severely cutting into its longevity. seriously, knock off just kinda solves this entire core

absurdly fat, never fails to get multiple layers up

so do you want spikes on the field or don't you? you seethe so hard whenever someone mentions ting-lu, but whenever someone even types half of the name "gliscor" you act like you just won the lottery. make up your mind chief

and once they're up absolutely nothing can be done about it

now here i agree with you. imagine how different things would be if we hadn't let ourselves get used to this sparkly little shitgremlin and its obnoxious meta warpage. at this point i say we just go back in time and convince the council to qb it alongside palafin and bundle—solving time travel would be easier than convincing the community to do something about ghold

you cannot counter any of these teams with any other structure of balance, yet fails to be a "balance breaker" against zap king Lu since it misses the ko on Zapdos and dies to cane. If wellspring doesn't just shred your team, it knocks it off and you lose to lu's hazards.

she does in fact break zap-king-lu if you tera. you kill zapdos easily and, if you inexplicably fail to kill, you still comfortably live hurricane (or even whatever electric move it decides to use, that +1 spd puts in work). but overall, her presence does help the core more than it hurts them… unless of course she gets banned, which she should have been since last october

so the true problems with zap-king-lu don't lie with zap, king, or lu, it's the two hyphens in between that are the issue. the main core is composed of three mons that aren't broken individually but happen to be very good in tandem. their supporting cast, on the other hand, consists of a mon that eats everything that normally answers the core and another mon that's been warping the fuck out of the meta since the flutter mane ban. honestly, even with ghold i can see the core (if it ever returns to dominance, which is unlikely) becoming way more straightforward to deal with in the absence of waterpon

thus, submitted for the approval of the zap-king-lu fearmongers: BAN WATERPON and zap-king-lu will never return to dominance because other balance structures will start existing

 

[DaddyBuzzwole]

dammit i just realized i missed post 9669

 

[Unscripted]

I refuse to interact with the drivel being spewed in response to my earlier post and this will be the only acknowledgment of it by me. It appears that constructive conversation is not going to change your opinion and I find it meaningless to argue further.

now here i agree with you. imagine how different things would be if we hadn't let ourselves get used to this sparkly little shitgremlin and its obnoxious meta warpage. at this point i say we just go back in time and convince the council to qb it alongside palafin and bundle—solving time travel would be easier than convincing the community to do something about ghold

This is what I would like to address and its something I've been sitting on for a while. has had minimal effect on the hazard metagame and banning it wont magically solve all the problems associated with hazard stacking or spikes spam. Lets take a quick look at all the hazard removers

.... yikes.
would probably be a solid remover with gone and the only major beneficiary of such action. It still struggles facing a lot of hazard setting mons like which can remove its item and use it for swords dance setup, which can use ruination to burn pp and whirlwind to mess with booster mons or force unfavorable gamestates, and which threatens with encore or razor shell defense drops (or straight up killing on switches into its banded variants)
already can defog vs , not a particularly usable mon in OU regardless
maybe an argument can be presented for its usage in OU but it can already threaten it with knock off and foul play or pivot against it with uturn (breaking its air balloon in the process). It also loses to even more hazard setters than such as outright losing to toxic or taking neutral damage from uturns. I see very little uptick in usage if is removed from the tier
is a complete garbagemon that needs recovery to function in a support role. Without it, I see it maybe having one or two niches on faster teams but is not the reason this thing cant defog
already can defog against gholdengo
and look me in the eyes and tell me with conviction that these mons will see any usage as defoggers

Rapid spin isn't much better. and (lol) already beat and its not like other ghosts don't exist or wouldn't see increased usage with a ban on cheese string man. ( also beats but its not really used as hazard removal)

and already have hazard management that works past but have other drawbacks

doesn't mind (strictly talking about hazard removal/management)

The fundamental problem with hazards is that Game Freak removed defog from some of the best mons in the tier. I would fully support a ban if or the tapus (assuming they were present) kept defog. But they don't. Game Freak gutted removal off of good mons and has been acting as a scapegoat for people to vent their frustrations about hazards. Defog is utter garbage and Mr. 1000 is not the reason for it being unviable. Is a healthy presence for the tier? I think so, I'm not going to pass judgement but bholgengo is a great mon thats splashable and sees high usage for a reason, even on teams that don't require keeping hazards up at all cost.

I'm just glad we got HDB before this gen

 

[Heatranator]

maybe an argument can be presented for its usage in OU but it can already threaten it with knock off and foul play or pivot against it with uturn (breaking its air balloon in the process).

While I do agree with most of your post, mandibuzz does not actually beat ghold 1v1. It knocks off the balloon (which does 57% max) and then, nothing. Like sure, knock does 40% max, but that's 1. A high roll, its doing around 37%. and 2. Ghold commonly runs recover to make sure the damage isn't permanent. Meanwhile, +2 make it rain absolutely destroys mandibuzz and has a really good chance to ohko mandi.
And that's just the offensive ghold set, dont even get me started on the defensive set. Mandi is not OU because it is passive, and the ghold matchup shows. On paper, it should win against ghold, but in practice, you get a knock off, and then get obliterated by it. Sure, it can u-turn against it, but that's really constricting its moves. If its defogging, it has 3 moveslots to fit all of knock off, foul play, id, roost, toxic and u-turn.

 

[Bold School]

would probably be a solid remover with gone and the only major beneficiary of such action.

I just want to point out that Corv is actually a good remover now if you pack U-turn and teammates that can support the Ghold matchup. You just can't mindlessly click like Defog on it like you could in gen 8. Yes, removing Ghold would help it. But it's also not strictly speaking necessary for it to fill that role.

Compounding this is the fact that some hazard stack teams don't run Ghold because they really only need to keep up pressure.

 

[tommytt22]

then where is it? why'd it fall off so hard if it's as good as you're claiming here? you'd think something where "the counterplay to it is to not attack" would be thriving in any offense-heavy environment, or indeed any environment at all. it's almost as though there's an entire other category of attacks that don't make contact. you can't just go around saying "the best counterplay to zapdos is to not use attacks" when not only is that untrue but we've also had multiple mons for which it is true this very gen (annihilape and archaludon). the best counterplay for it is to not let its presence in the back psych you out or deter you from clicking contact moves when it's not in, and also to run something with special moves for god's sake

remember all those physical attackers that zapdos shuts down? as it turns out, they can take a big bite out of glowking if you correctly predict it using chilly. or if you use a non-contact physical move to cover the zapdos switch-in option also. or if you just click knock, which zapdos can't switch in on without being seriously crippled against rocks and ting-lu can't switch in on without severely cutting into its longevity. seriously, knock off just kinda solves this entire core

so do you want spikes on the field or don't you? you seethe so hard whenever someone mentions ting-lu, but whenever someone even types half of the name "gliscor" you act like you just won the lottery. make up your mind chief

now here i agree with you. imagine how different things would be if we hadn't let ourselves get used to this sparkly little shitgremlin and its obnoxious meta warpage. at this point i say we just go back in time and convince the council to qb it alongside palafin and bundle—solving time travel would be easier than convincing the community to do something about ghold

she does in fact break zap-king-lu if you tera. you kill zapdos easily and, if you inexplicably fail to kill, you still comfortably live hurricane (or even whatever electric move it decides to use, that +1 spd puts in work). but overall, her presence does help the core more than it hurts them… unless of course she gets banned, which she should have been since last october

so the true problems with zap-king-lu don't lie with zap, king, or lu, it's the two hyphens in between that are the issue. the main core is composed of three mons that aren't broken individually but happen to be very good in tandem. their supporting cast, on the other hand, consists of a mon that eats everything that normally answers the core and another mon that's been warping the fuck out of the meta since the flutter mane ban. honestly, even with ghold i can see the core (if it ever returns to dominance, which is unlikely) becoming way more straightforward to deal with in the absence of waterpon

thus, submitted for the approval of the zap-king-lu fearmongers: BAN WATERPON and zap-king-lu will never return to dominance because other balance structures will start existing

For my own clarification as I'm very tired, are you being sarcastic or do you truly think waterpon helps this core rather than hurts it

 

[DaddyBuzzwole]

For my own clarification as I'm very tired, are you being sarcastic or do you truly think waterpon helps this core rather than hurts it

not only was she a frequent presence on zap-king-lu teams to help with the matchup against other kinds of balance teams, but waterpon's mere existence in the meta was (and is) suppressing said other kinds of balance teams. zap-king-lu teams also ran waterpon as a check for herself—the best switch-in to a +2 tera water ivy cudgel is a water absorber who's guaranteed a kill if she wins the speed tie. so yes, she did help zap-king-lu both against non-zkl balance teams and against herself

 

[Heatranator]

not only was she a frequent presence on zap-king-lu teams to help with the matchup against other kinds of balance teams, but waterpon's mere existence in the meta was (and is) suppressing said other kinds of balance teams. zap-king-lu teams also ran waterpon as a check for herself—the best switch-in to a +2 tera water ivy cudgel is a water absorber who's guaranteed a kill if she wins the speed tie. so yes, she did help zap-king-lu both against non-zkl balance teams and against herself

No joke, but hurricane, knock off walking wake kinda destroys the core. Knock cripples both zap and glowking, hydro steam destroys ting lu and hurricane annihilates waterpon.
I'm kinda interested in utility wake because for some reason it gets so many good moves it should not have. But yeah, zap king lu teams were a bit bad to play against, but I potentially think that counterplay could have been found. Or maybe not, but at least it was better than the gliscor meta. I would take ten zap ting lu metas before I have another gliscor meta.

 

[tommytt22]

No joke, but hurricane, knock off walking wake kinda destroys the core. Knock cripples both zap and glowking, hydro steam destroys ting lu and hurricane annihilates waterpon.
I'm kinda interested in utility wake because for some reason it gets so many good moves it should not have. But yeah, zap king lu teams were a bit bad to play against, but I potentially think that counterplay could have been found. Or maybe not, but at least it was better than the gliscor meta. I would take ten zap ting lu metas before I have another gliscor meta.

not only was she a frequent presence on zap-king-lu teams to help with the matchup against other kinds of balance teams, but waterpon's mere existence in the meta was (and is) suppressing said other kinds of balance teams. zap-king-lu teams also ran waterpon as a check for herself—the best switch-in to a +2 tera water ivy cudgel is a water absorber who's guaranteed a kill if she wins the speed tie. so yes, she did help zap-king-lu both against non-zkl balance teams and against herself

knock off walking wake against zapdos is asking for static trouble. weather teams in general blow past the core with their massive damage output. if the sun is up you do like 80% MINIMUM with hydro steam to zapdos and if youre proto spA its a clean OHKO. even max spdef Glowking has 5% chance to live 2 specs hydro steam. if youre proto spA its guaranteed 2hko. if these teams carry waterpon then just spam draco until it dies as well.

I dont play weather teams much but even i can see the zapdos/glowking/ting lu core basically hinges on glowking getting off a chilly reception to stop the sun, otherwise they get crushed.

If you want to play balance against those teams then theres lots of options too, like sub dragapult, spdef sub kyurem, calm mind clef, calm mind primarina the list goes on. I'm a little confused, back then it didnt feel like we had the tools to deal with waterpon but now it seems perfectly manageable for any playstyle. that ting lu hazard stack itself is a problem for waterpon because as we all know, its really weak to hazards.

 

[Ctann]

samurott makes a great lead.

I really like this mostly lead set, what are everyone’s thoughts?


Samurott-Hisui @ Assault Vest
Ability: Sharpness
Tera Type: Water
EVs: 168 HP / 88 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Ceaseless Edge
- Razor Shell
- Sacred Sword
- Aqua Jet

the most common problematic matchups:

• Glimmora can’t KO and can be razor shelled back
• Deoxys can’t KO with superpower
• Darkrai can only KO 37% of the time if it’s got both focus blast and life orb, otherwise it cant
• specs Kyurem only has a similar 37% chance to KO with freeze dry
• landorus can’t KO with any move
• Tusk needs close combat
• Ribombee can’t KO
• Dragapult can’t KO, even choice band, unless it uses Tera

It doesn’t use focus sash so it can also be useful if it’s not the lead
thoughts ?