Ok. So it just copy and pasted CGOU but with some minor tweaks for the most part?
Wouldn't Speed be more ideal for things such as outspeeding the pain-in-the-neck that is Dragapult, among other great qualities?
-
Welcome to Smogon! Take a moment to read the Introduction to Smogon for a run-down on everything Smogon, and make sure you take some time to read the global rules.
Metagame National Dex Metagame Discussion
- Thread starter Nashrock
- Start date
Wouldn't Speed be more ideal for things such as outspeeding the pain-in-the-neck that is Dragapult, among other great qualities?
Yes, as far as I can tell, but I also don't play SVOU so don't take my word for it.
While in theory yes, I don't think it would worth it imo, as you lose a lot of defense when doing this, and you would take a nice chunk of damage for a kill that isn't even an OHKO. But that’s the beauty of natdex, coming up with different strategies and sometimes using sets or pokemon that the community used to or currently deem “bad,” such as mons like tinkaton or galarian weezing.
Fair enough
Funny that you mention those two specifically, since they're also popping off in CGOU as we speak.
Also, is Great Tusk actually a good user of Z moves? I've seen a couple of people run Icium Z to boost Ice Spinner's damage, and it's done some stuff
Think of Z Tusk as just a good way of luring birds, I've seen Icium Z for stuff like Zapdos and Lando T, or Electrium Z (Supercell) to fuck over Moltres/Pelipper/other birds in particular
I’ve only seen Icium Z used. I’ve never run it personally and fell like it’s okay at best. I agree with the sentiment expressed in other posts it’s pretty good into the birds, lando, and tusk mirror. I will say I’d only recommend it if you’re really struggling with the bird matchup. Even then it isn’t the best. Lando can be handled with ice spinner mostly and an uninvested Moltres doesn’t even die.
252 Atk Great Tusk Subzero Slammer (160 BP) vs. 0 HP / 0+ Def Moltres: 175-206 (54.5 - 64.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
Mostly I feel Tusk can run better items and there are multiple other z move users that want it more. All this said it’s still a good set, just nothing crazy in my opinion.
I have also asked this in the QA thread, but since I am working on a mdiancie team, I am trying to get an answer here.
Why is wallbreaker mega diancie recommending power gem over diamond storm? Diamond storm comes pretty close to power gem in raw power and powerful mixed attacking is not something I would give up for a bit more damage on sth like zapdos
Why is wallbreaker mega diancie recommending power gem over diamond storm? Diamond storm comes pretty close to power gem in raw power and powerful mixed attacking is not something I would give up for a bit more damage on sth like zapdos
You are correct, the only instance I would give up on dia storm is if running a CM set, which is probably not the best on Diancie.
I wouldn’t quote me on this but I think it’s for the lando-t matchup?
-1 0- Atk Diancie-Mega Diamond Storm vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Landorus-Therian: 106-126 (27.7 - 32.9%) -- guaranteed 4HKO
252 SpA Diancie-Mega Power Gem vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Landorus-Therian: 184-217 (48.1 - 56.8%) -- 89.8% chance to 2HKO
This is uninvested tho and idk what evs you’d run on mega Diancie. You’re definitely right tho diamond storm is better 9/10 times.
I find Snow to be extremely underrated right now as a weather. People do not respect Arctozolt enough at all anymore, and this dino has a surprisingly good matchup into a lot of the metagame.
Arctozolt @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Slush Rush
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpA / 252 Spe
Naive Nature
- Bolt Beak
- Blizzard
- Low Kick
- Substitute
This is literally the same exact set that was run in Gen 8, and I don't think a thing should be changed. Low Kick hitting Kingambit alongside Ferrothorn and Blizzard targeting the much weaker SpDef of Great Tusk and Kartana is very important, but what really makes this set tick is Substitute. Zolt finds a ton of opportunities to set up subs in this meta, as it forces a ton of switches out of common Pokemon like Great Tusk, Dragapult, Garchomp, Kingambit, Toxapex, Alomomola, and Moltres. Common Defensive Pokemon can't break its Subs even outside of snow, which gives it a solid chance to break against a lot of teams even without its favorite weather up, and it gets taken to a whole new level when conditions are favorable, but we'll get to that later. Bolt Beak's power is actually fairy disappointing in the calc, which gave me some pause when building around this initially, but this means very little when you are behind a sub and can just fire away. You also get a brand spanking new Defense boost when under Snow, which matters way more than I thought it would initially. Especially when backed up by...
Ninetales-Alola @ Icy Rock
Ability: Snow Warning
EVs: 252 HP / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Aurora Veil
- Freeze-Dry
- Encore
- Snowscape
Frankly, AloTales is not a good Pokemon, but its just good enough to get Veil up consistently and be reasonably irritating to a lot of teams. It switches into Weather Ball Yard, which is very funny, and it can use Snowscape to turn the tables on Mega Tyranitar as it switches in and get Veil up in its face. Oh yeah, remember that defense boost that Ice-Types get now? Well, it gets cranked up to absolutely ridiculous levels with Veil.
252 Atk Landorus-Therian Earthquake vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Arctozolt in Snow through Reflect: 129-153 (40.1 - 47.6%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
252+ Atk Iron Fist Melmetal Double Iron Bash (2 hits) vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Arctozolt in Snow through Reflect: 102-120 (31.7 - 37.3%) -- approx. 80.2% chance to 3HKO
+1 252 Atk Dragapult Never-Ending Nightmare (175 BP) vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Arctozolt in Snow through Reflect: 147-174 (45.7 - 54.2%) -- 50% chance to 2HKO
252 Atk Kartana Sacred Sword vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Arctozolt in Snow through Reflect: 92-109 (28.6 - 33.9%) -- 0.9% chance to 3HKO (Crit Leaf Blade doesn't KO either)
252+ Atk Black Glasses Supreme Overlord 5 allies fainted Kingambit Sucker Punch vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Arctozolt in Snow through Reflect: 84-100 (26.1 - 31.1%) -- guaranteed 4HKO
+2 252+ Atk Technician Scizor-Mega Bullet Punch vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Arctozolt in Snow through Reflect: 87-103 (27.1 - 32%) -- guaranteed 4HKO
252+ Atk Tyranitar-Mega Stone Edge vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Ninetales-Alola in Snow through Reflect: 180-213 (51.4 - 60.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO (This calc comes into play a lot vs. TTar)
252 Atk Swampert-Mega Earthquake vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Ninetales-Alola in Snow: 153-181 (43.7 - 51.7%) -- 10.2% chance to 2HKO
Revenge killing this thing with a physical attack is next to impossible with Veil up. You will notice that many of these don't even come close to KOing even without Veil up, which increases flexibility overall. The calcs with Bolt Beak may not be impressive at times, but you get subs incredibly easily and can take down at least two foes, if not outright sweep, against a lot of teams these days with the right support. Its so bulky that you don't actually need to OHKO everything in front of you. These calcs get even more insane if you take a look at Kyurem, who can be challenging to fit on these teams but eats up hits for breakfast.
I plan on nomming this soon, since I didn't think about saving replays until recently, but please invest in Snow. It's not ever gonna be metagame defining since having two Ice-types on your team is not the easiest thing to build with even with the Snow defense boost, but give Zolt a try; it will surprise you.
Last edited:
The other pro about running a veil ninetails is it opens up disgusting HO teams. Granted veil shouldn’t be leaned on too heavily, but a Balance Offense team with veil would be incredible. The biggest issue I can think of for snow is that it does struggle with Zard-Y. But with some finesse in battle or some interesting tech I don’t doubt it could be overcome. It’s definitely a style I wanna try and I hope you post a team for it that me and others can try out.
I would run at most 20-30 atk to 2hko glowking, but this is not a glowking meta, so probably uninvested -spdef nature (not -atk)
Moonblast still bonks lando harder, so missing out on the glowking damage (earth power doesnt do enough), heatran (40% from diamond storm so you can run spikes over EP) seems like a big price to pay for just an easier click into lando
Since we agree that diamond storm is better in most situations or at least worth considering, why is it not mentioned AT ALL in the new analysis which currently just passed QC?
Icium Z is the most common item among Z Crystals for Tusk but you can also try more niche ones such as Electrium Z to lure Alomomola (pretty fun).
- mega charizard y structures are popping off right now, and tusk is really good on those, both for the proto boost and because of its hazard-removal prowess. not to mention its good offensive and defensive synergy with raging bolt
- partially because of yard but also because of other meta developments, rocks have gone from mandatory to super mandatory, making it better than ever to be able to set rocks and remove them from your own side of the field while keeping them on your opponent's
- every time a terrain playstyle gets better it's one more use case for tusk because it can disrupt them with ice spinner. this was especially important when deo-s was being tested and everyone slotted it on psyspam teams
- after the tera ban, it became very important to have a solid kingambit counter and a form of hazard control that can threaten gholdengo. guess who checks both boxes?
- elephant cool
would u say this fits best on ho or could be used on bulkier structures like balance?
I find Snow to be extremely underrated right now as a weather. People do not respect Arctozolt enough at all anymore, and this dino has a surprisingly good matchup into a lot of the metagame.
Arctozolt @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Slush Rush
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpA / 252 Spe
Naive Nature
- Bolt Beak
- Blizzard
- Low Kick
- Substitute
This is literally the same exact set that was run in Gen 8, and I don't think a thing should be changed. Low Kick hitting Kingambit alongside Ferrothorn and Blizzard targeting the much weaker SpDef of Great Tusk and Kartana is very important, but what really makes this set tick is Substitute. Zolt finds a ton of opportunities to set up subs in this meta, as it forces a ton of switches out of common Pokemon like Great Tusk, Dragapult, Garchomp, Kingambit, Toxapex, Alomomola, and Moltres. Common Defensive Pokemon can't break its Subs even outside of snow, which gives it a solid chance to break against a lot of teams even without its favorite weather up, and it gets taken to a whole new level when conditions are favorable, but we'll get to that later. Bolt Beak's power is actually fairy disappointing in the calc, which gave me some pause when building around this initially, but this means very little when you are behind a sub and can just fire away. You also get a brand spanking new Defense boost when under Snow, which matters way more than I thought it would initially. Especially when backed up by...
Ninetales-Alola @ Icy Rock
Ability: Snow Warning
EVs: 252 HP / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Aurora Veil
- Freeze-Dry
- Encore
- Snowscape
Frankly, AloTales is not a good Pokemon, but its just good enough to get Veil up consistently and be reasonably irritating to a lot of teams. It switches into Weather Ball Yard, which is very funny, and it can use Snowscape to turn the tables on Mega Tyranitar as it switches in and get Veil up in its face. Oh yeah, remember that defense boost that Ice-Types get now? Well, it gets cranked up to absolutely ridiculous levels with Veil.
252 Atk Landorus-Therian Earthquake vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Arctozolt in Snow through Reflect: 129-153 (40.1 - 47.6%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
252+ Atk Iron Fist Melmetal Double Iron Bash (2 hits) vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Arctozolt in Snow through Reflect: 102-120 (31.7 - 37.3%) -- approx. 80.2% chance to 3HKO
+1 252 Atk Dragapult Never-Ending Nightmare (175 BP) vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Arctozolt in Snow through Reflect: 147-174 (45.7 - 54.2%) -- 50% chance to 2HKO
252 Atk Kartana Sacred Sword vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Arctozolt in Snow through Reflect: 92-109 (28.6 - 33.9%) -- 0.9% chance to 3HKO (Crit Leaf Blade doesn't KO either)
252+ Atk Black Glasses Supreme Overlord 5 allies fainted Kingambit Sucker Punch vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Arctozolt in Snow through Reflect: 84-100 (26.1 - 31.1%) -- guaranteed 4HKO
+2 252+ Atk Technician Scizor-Mega Bullet Punch vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Arctozolt in Snow through Reflect: 87-103 (27.1 - 32%) -- guaranteed 4HKO
252+ Atk Tyranitar-Mega Stone Edge vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Ninetales-Alola in Snow through Reflect: 180-213 (51.4 - 60.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO (This calc comes into play a lot vs. TTar)
252 Atk Swampert-Mega Earthquake vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Ninetales-Alola in Snow: 153-181 (43.7 - 51.7%) -- 10.2% chance to 2HKO
Revenge killing this thing with a physical attack is next to impossible with Veil up. You will notice that many of these don't even come close to KOing even without Veil up, which increases flexibility overall. The calcs with Bolt Beak may not be impressive at times, but you get subs incredibly easily and can take down at least two foes, if not outright sweep, against a lot of teams these days with the right support. Its so bulky that you don't actually need to OHKO everything in front of you. These calcs get even more insane if you take a look at Kyurem, who can be challenging to fit on these teams but eats up hits for breakfast.
I plan on nomming this soon, since I didn't think about saving replays until recently, but please invest in Snow. It's not ever gonna be metagame defining since having two Ice-types on your team is not the easiest thing to build with even with the Snow defense boost, but give Zolt a try; it will surprise you.
Snow definitely needs to lean towards HO right now with the veil structure and low survivability along with the ability of arctozolt to get cheesed by contact, for reference see the old ox the fox hail from ssnd the most successful snow/hail team in the history of natdex
Zard Y + Pursuit is lame, yeah, but the mon itself is annoyed by a few key things, namely Hazards. Keeping up Rocks vs it can be tough but it's not impossible, though your Rocker can't be a passive mon like Clef.
Most reliable Zard Y check by far is Toxapex, which is borderline ridiculous as well with Pursuit support as well since that owns all of the Future sighters you usually would pair with Zard Y like Slowking-G.
Idk how others feel, but it does seem like Pursuit in general is too limiting. Mons like Slowking-G and Mega Latias feel borderline unviable because they are almost guaranteed to be pursuit bait and need to run garbage like Fightium Z Focus Blast or aura sphere to not get murked.
There are so few switches to Char Y, let alone switches to Char Y that don't get cooked by its partners / pursuit. I was considering using Lati even though I dislike its weakness to status, but then I realized I'd have to fit Flip Turn to not make it insanely weak to Gambit / Ttar / etc. in most matchups.
Glowking itself already straight up gets 2HKO'd without AV which is annoying.
I made this graph yesterday because I was frustrated lol:
I considered so many mons, even going into full-on shitmons to see if they could do it, and they can't lol.
Salamence itself isn't a good mon but it's had a niche on some Balance archetypes with HDB before btw, but overall there are three major archetypes to Char Y checks that are viable:
1. The Cooked By Hazards
If Moltres/Dnite/Salamence get knocked, they lose with rocks up every time.
2. The Passive Blob
Blissey, Latis (mostly) (depends on MU), Toxapex has to click Recover every time which makes it ultimately passive
3. Smoked By Coverage
Ttar/Mega Ttar (I will not take this mon as a check seriously after my full HP Mega TTar was dropped by Focus Blast on the switch), P
Keep in mind, this is from a Balance-oriented brain, most of the checks that are lower tiers or even some of the higher tiers here are much better on BO/HO where longevity is not a major concern.
Raging Bolt is a great counter to Char Y cores, as I said a few days ago, but it's F tier here because my Balance Team isn't trying to play like BO, it's trying to be flexible in what the turn count/matchup might be, and Raging Bolt can still only come in at most two times before it dies. You want a consistent answer.
I think for me the most surprising calc was Clodsire, I thought it would tank or at worst Char Y would need to calc Fire Blast, but nope it just 2HKOs fairly consistently lol.
Rocks up is obviously a great check to Char Y, but I think it's really shortsighted to just say "put up rocks easy", because Rapid Spin is very easy to run right now, Terapagos + Tusk sun is also very good imo, and that isn't stopped by Ghold exactly. This means you need to spinblock or just get every turn right to keep Rocks up, which one could say is reasonable but I wouldn't really agree for Balance, would agree for HO and (mostly) BO (sacking Ghold for it is usually worth tbh)
One thing I want to try still is Mega Altaria, but its stats are just so bleak. I found this spread
Altaria-Mega @ Altarianite
Ability: Pixilate
Tera Type: Dragon
EVs: 248 HP / 192 Def / 48 SpD / 20 Spe
Impish Nature
- Return
- Roost
- Earthquake
- 4th
which lets it switch into Max Attack Headlong Tusk (without Proto boost, note that), beat Urshifu, wall Char Y, usually beat Heatran, Ogerpon without Play Rough, Raging Bolt, good Urshifu switch (especially because knock switch), Mega Ttar, Mega Lopunny
Mon has so massive of problems though, that I really don't think it'll work. It is very passive, is an easy Ferro switch, easy Volc switch, isn't good at checking the birds, etc. etc.
If anyone has any ideas for what to pair with it LMK, I don't think this mon is actually viable but I think it could be fun to see a Mega Altaria Balance to cteam Char Y lol
Ultimately idk if I'd really support a Char Y suspect test, but I am kinda finding it to be an asshole to deal with. I think over time we'll find more Technology to deal with this mon on Balance that doesn't feel like shit, but if not then I will probably support a test tbh.
In my opinion Zard-Y would be much more manageable if Tusk didn’t exist. Tusk can take advantage of sun to become more of a tank or more offensively threatening. In addition it’s an incredible rapid spinner allowing you to keep hazards up on your opponents side(which makes switches into Zara-Y even harder) as well as removing hazards on your side to allow Zard- Y to hit even harder.
In addition if you were to look at Zard-Y’s checks you’ll see Great Tusk can help with a number of them. Moltres doesn’t like getting knock-offed by Tusk, Dragonite and Salamence don’t wanna take an ice spinner, Blissy is forced out, T-Tar is often forced out by Tusk, while taking a good chunk from headlong rush, and it can sort of help with Toxipex depending on the Toxipex’s set. While it doesn’t hard wall all of these it makes their matchups much easier and serves to apply meaningful chip to makes them take Zard-Y’s attacks much less easily.
In addition if you were to look at Zard-Y’s checks you’ll see Great Tusk can help with a number of them. Moltres doesn’t like getting knock-offed by Tusk, Dragonite and Salamence don’t wanna take an ice spinner, Blissy is forced out, T-Tar is often forced out by Tusk, while taking a good chunk from headlong rush, and it can sort of help with Toxipex depending on the Toxipex’s set. While it doesn’t hard wall all of these it makes their matchups much easier and serves to apply meaningful chip to makes them take Zard-Y’s attacks much less easily.
Dragapult is a (somewhat) check to it too tbh. Since it can take at least one Wball, and revenge with z-or specs or band or twave, it's not consistent but it's decent. Also raging bolt is way better as a check than d tier at least to me, at least top of C
no way we really want a char y suspect test…it’s wraps for the tier
My faith in the format dwindled as soon as we ended up banning Deoxys Speed. A Charizard Y suspect would be the nail in the coffin.
I didn't say I wanted a Char Y suspect I said it is probably to me the biggest problem in the builder and that if it doesn't become easier over time, then I would support a suspect lol
But in general you didn't give any real argument here so I don't get the point of this snark. I didn't want to admit that I think Char Y is pretty annoying for almost a month now, because I said "Well that mon is fine in Gen 6 OU, 7 OU, Gen 8 ND so why wouldn't it be fine here", but at the minimum we gotta admit that this is probably the best Char Y has ever been due to new tools for an almost perfectly synergistic core.
I wouldn't even be bringing this up a few weeks ago because I would've said "Put up rocks + adapt", and I'm willing to give the mon more time but IMO Balance and BOs without Bolt have an insanely hard time teambuilding with this core in the tier.
Sun teams in moderngens historically are very much focused around Fire type moves which have plenty of resists, what makes this iteration of Sun nutty is specifically that the Sun is buffing mons that have entirely different offensive-defensive profiles, while otherwise the most different it usually gets is a Grass-Type Pokemon with Chlorophyll, a generally weak type.
Meanwhile in SV OU the Sun setters are a lot worse and also you can Tera at any time to say "no" to any threat in front of you, limiting it more by letting you veto card a threat.
So my thought is just survey and do other tiering, but I think Char Y should continue to be looked at. Maybe if another Pokemon is banned then it'll be easier to handle to where it's no longer a problem, I don't know, don't claim to know. But I'm not dying on the hill of banning any Pokemon right now tbh.