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Metagame SV OU Metagame Discussion v4
- Thread starter TPP
- Start date
HO should not be the most consistent playstyle in a meta, it shouldn't even be top 3 tbh. This is all subjective but it just feels wrong when a meta is this dominated by sweepers and RK tactics. Typically the metas regarded as the most solid and all-around skillful/enjoyable are not those where HO is king. Gen 8 for example, ppl can say they don't like it but if they're being fair no one can say that meta isn't like, serious/respectable when it comes to how well balanced everything is. HO is fine in gen 8 but so are all the other playstyles. Balance/BO is actively at a disadvantage in gen 9. The last time I saw a meta this dominated by Offense was D-Max in early gen 8...
The ability to run away with the game has frankly never been easier and that's not really fun for either side in the long term. It's boring to sweep a team after a single turn of set-up and the right Tera, and it's boring to have it happen to you, where all skill is basically removed. Sure, they can defensive Tera but then that just opens up another one of your 4-5 powerhouses to clean everything up a few turns later. It creates a MU fishing snooze fest.
We don't have proper exchanges this gen due to Tera, simple as that. Tusk could be a consistent answer to something like Bolt but it can just Tera Fairy. The mons/moves are too strong for this mechanic to create anything other than the meta we find ourselves in.
I mean... you ask some of the best players this gen and they will still tell you that BO / Balance are the best & most consistent playstyles even now.
An issue is that a lot of the Pokemon you see like Samurott-H, Kingambit, Great Tusk, Raging Bolt, Darkrai, Ting-Lu, and Lando-T just work on every style so distinguishing between whats HO, Balance, and Bulky offense can be tough & really depends on how you tweek the set.
Hell this might've been difficult last generation too since most of the insane Pokemon like Landorus-T, Toxapex, and Ferrothorn worked really well on most styles as well.
I think the type of mons that the meta centralized around sorta determines how players will see which styles are the best even if technically the same styles are still the strongest.
Then your assessment on what constitutes an evolution or regression just depends on what playstyles you consider legitimate or acceptable. A playstyle making a comeback because people have found a way to make it more effective is an evolution.
Ladder will almost always be dominated by HO as it is simply the best team style to consistently climb. If you have a >50% win rate, the most efficient way to gain rank is to play as many games as possible so that, over a large sample size, you are gaining as much ELO as possible. This is true for any game with a competitive ranking system. For mons, this means that people who care purely about rank are incentivized to play the team style that ends games in a short number of turns.
We can see from usage rates in tours that when you aren't rewarded for winning quickly, there is a large variety of usable options. OUPL has plenty of bulky mons in the top 15 (Ubermoose is #5, Clef and Moltres are tied with Moon, Zapdos and Scor have the same usage as moth...)
Offense being overrepresented on the ladder is not an inherent warning sign. In fact, you could go as far as to argue that the opposite is true: when a metagame is dominated by more defensive threats and it becomes the optimal playstyle even on ladder, it's a sign that it's a bit overcentralizing (see: Zap/King/Lu). I'd only really consider HO to be a real problem if almost every tour game ends up being an HO mirror, as that would indicate something wrong with the meta (SCL Ubers, for example, aka bike/zacian speed tie city).
We can see from usage rates in tours that when you aren't rewarded for winning quickly, there is a large variety of usable options. OUPL has plenty of bulky mons in the top 15 (Ubermoose is #5, Clef and Moltres are tied with Moon, Zapdos and Scor have the same usage as moth...)
Offense being overrepresented on the ladder is not an inherent warning sign. In fact, you could go as far as to argue that the opposite is true: when a metagame is dominated by more defensive threats and it becomes the optimal playstyle even on ladder, it's a sign that it's a bit overcentralizing (see: Zap/King/Lu). I'd only really consider HO to be a real problem if almost every tour game ends up being an HO mirror, as that would indicate something wrong with the meta (SCL Ubers, for example, aka bike/zacian speed tie city).
In addition to this, balance is by far the worst its ever been. In quite literally every other gen balance is one of, if not the best playstyle. In gen 9 it just feels wrong that a historically consistent playstyle feels like a mid tier even bordering bad playstyle. It is of course still viable, but the fact that balance legitimately feels less consistent than HO should raise some eyebrows.
HO spam is generally a sign of unhealthy metagames. I don’t think its a knock at the playstyle, but when the offensive threats are as absurd as they are in gen 9 ou with tera to boot it can often times feel better to just ignore defensive utility altogether in favor of just screaming offense (aka HO). For example, why have trouble switching into wellspring or kyurem when you can just sack something and bring the next offensive monster in without losing much, compared to balance which can’t just sack every time something like wellspring gets a switch. HO in general is a very high risk high reward playstyle, which shouldn’t be as common as it is. A bunch of people will try it claim HO isn’t as common as we say, but when pokemon like iron moth and roaring moon that are almost always HO exclusives have 20% usage, I don’t think thats true. Can you name any other gen where HO has even 10% usage?
Another important thing to note is HO gets to bypass a lot of common teambuilding rules, which can make it a more attractive option when the top threats cause such a strain on teambuilding
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So this means Palafin is fine ? The only Mon actually being able to « check it » that only work on fat teams ? What about palafin + manaphy in rain, ur just cooked if ur forced to run super fat stuffs just for Palafin, manaphy cook then. Stall unusable from there, u can still heal Palafin w healing wish hatt, in brief, what the fuck does it even add to the tier, let’s not unban random mons just bc they are bad in Ubers. Just play Ubers UU
The line between BO and HO is more blurry this gen than any I recall, that's for sure. My logic is that it's never been safer to load up HO in a serious game- be in tournament or high ladder. Personally, I think the top 3 styles rn are BO, HO, and Stall. I'll def agree that BO/Balance is consistent and viable, but the ability to stop HO has never been more difficult, imo. I feel like HO and Stall should be more niche than they are, and only played by those who actively enjoy that style, win or lose. The fact that these styles are top tier right now just doesn't feel right. HO and Stall are on the extreme ends of the playstyle spectrum but here they are being dominate playstyles; I feel this illustrates a problem with the meta but I can't quite extrapolate as to why exactly, tbh.
Ladder loves HO because shorter games and less intense on the brain. The most consistent style to climb is actually Stall. A good chunk of the top 30 on the ladder and/or with players 88gxe+ run stall. Pre-1600ish elo many players simply just forfeit turn 1. They also just click X around turn 40 at the latest lol. Stall has wildly good MU in a MU fish meta. A lot of standard teams barely have the tools to handle full stall, if any tbh. It's not a free win style at all and requires skill but if that skill is present and the stall is current and on-meta there is no better style right now to hit 90gxe with. The math is actually better if you play less and win more.
Tour scene is its own bubble and I have thoughts about this I won't get into right now, but ladder is a lot different. They're practically two different games. Tour scene is "Oh I'm matched up with GloobMeister400 they love HO I better bring xyz to cover it." or "SillyPants123 loves to bring this core, let me build against that." Surprise is much more of a factor in tours due to it being a 1 and done. I saw a Tera Fire Bax just rip though a team in a tour game because who tf preps for that? So tour games will never end up being HO mirrors because one of them is going to C-Team HO if they think the other is bringing it. Or inversely, and to my point, someone known for bringing defensive cores loads up HO as a surprise, and since HO is so stupidly strong this gen that could be GG at team preview. I could go on but to compare ladder with tour scene does both a disservice.
When a metagame is dominated by defensive threats it does actually increase the skill level of the meta. More turns, more predication needed, more doubles, etc. It's better to win off a hard fought battle at turn 42 than win off a speed tie between two Gambits turn 14. The ladder is skewed towards offense just a bit too much for me, again just imo. When offense is this good, and this consistent, it simply just creates more of a MU fish meta than I'd like to see. I'm not married to these thoughts and am open to change, just trying to brainstorm in real time why the enjoyment and comp scores have been consistently subpar for about two years now.
What even is this post? It feels like you're an AI being trained on posts from Smogon.
if palafin is at risk of being banned in ubers uu then it should doubly be nowhere near OU where its already struggling with immense powercreep lol
From the perspective of adding to the tier I do think palafin offers a bit with the strong priority, which will always bring value to all types of teams in order to check a good chunk of the faster threats like Rai, certain KG, and Iron Gambler. Mon is also a fast encore user which will have its merits, though I feel like it will struggle to fit the move into its moveset given that it wants 3 water moves already (Jet Punch, Flip Turn, Wave Crash, I guess you could drop flip turn). I think the speed advantage over Samurott-H will give it MUs that it will clearly shine against on certain balance teams, like Kyurem, Specs Crown, and most Tera variants of Roaring Moon.
I am hoping that during the suspect test players will get as creative as possible in experiementing with the varients of the bulk up set, running shit like Covert Cloak Tera Poison, Tera Blast Ground, Tera Electric + Bolt Beam coverage, Tera Fire, Tera Ghost, Tera Steel, Tera Flying + Grassy Seed + Acrobatics, Tera Dragon Outrage lmao, etc. In practice it may be to very hard to make use all these options, but how far this set can be stretched will 100% determine what Fin's future will be.
This is like saying: "hey, this meta needs something to check Roaring Moon! Let's unban Zacian-Crowned!". And then the Palafin becomes the next busted, uncheckable offensive threat that breaks through everything.
And this won't help slower balance teams either, since anything slower than Palafin will be near-unviable with the combo of huge damage and Taunt+Encore.
You're swallowing a spider to deal with the fly.
(And about experimentation, I agree with you that if this suspect goes through, we do our best to find alternative ways to use Palafin -- more likely than not, it'll be OU in Gen 10 if gen 9's powercreep is any indicator of the future.
But it's almost certain that the basic offense sets will be overtuned, and the mon will be banned again.)
well dozo does wall it…
When I think about things missing from gen 9 OU, strong priority is not one of them, could be wrong
You're not thinking like a real grandmaster -- the thought is Palafin priority is so strong that all other priority users will fall out of the meta, thus creating a role vacuum for Palafin to fill.
Except dragonite because extreme speed is just that good (also dragonite beats palafin anyway)
So Palafin knocks the priority users down a peg, which means the hole is left vacant for some teams, and Palafin...becomes the new priority user for that team? Maybe i'm reading this wrong, or taking it too literally, but, to me at least, it reads like Palafin is solving a problem it created. And, like AerionT mentioned, there's not exactly a shortage of strong priority users in this gen
Have u only seen the calcs from I don’t know who ?
That's exactly what would happen, yeah lmao. Like 90% of posts in this thread, that post was reaction farming bait, sorry if it was too believable
Fair enough. I think the lack of diversity of playstyles (although all are usable) has marked this gen. It’s definitely a matter of opinion though.
Everyone says this and then when pressed for a balance team they don’t have one. Finch provided one nice balance team but it is noticeably weak to set up spam HO. Especially veil cheese like Lati.
It's fine.
Every now and then dose of Ampharos gameplay to keep you sane:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9ou-2263822523
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9ou-2263822523
Hold on you may have cooked
Palafin-Hero (M) @ Choice Band
Ability: Zero to Hero
Tera Type: Dragon
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Close Combat
- Jet Punch
- Outrage
- Wave Crash
why tf does it learn outrage