Thanks for this great analysis. I agree with you, Iron Boulder is an interesting Mon, but it’s very very MU dependent. I’ve been curious to try Future Sight+Tera Dark Weavile to pressure balance structures even more.
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Metagame SV OU Metagame Discussion v4
- Thread starter TPP
- Start date
The meta tends to be broadly cyclical and rotates through the same advancements based on the current dominant team structure. This has happened time and time again over the past two years, as the meta trends through the rough pattern of:
Offense -> Boots -> Breakers -> Offense
Each style is advantaged against the one that comes before it. Boots spam, hazard stack, and cind balance match up well into the extreme offenses, but get packed up by strong breakers, which are in turn handled by applying pressure, ensuring they aren't able to repeatedly hit the field.
After Moon was banned, it quickly became apparent that offensive teams were struggling to break holes in boots spam, so the initial meta featured a lot of BO and bulky boots spam. Early WCoP saw a lot of these teams featuring Moltres, Pecharunt, Garganacl, Zapdos, etc, but the past few days have shown signs that we're moving into the next phase of the cycle, with strong breakers featuring in several games of Rain, Volcanion, SpA Specs Wake as well as the games mentioned above.
This shift is also visible on ladder, taking a look at usage stats for May vs April you can see that Kyurem has skyrocketed in usage in 1825+ going from #15 -> #7 with a majority of usage being specs, Ogerpon is surging in popularity (#10 -> #6), while boots staples like Ting (#6 -> #10) and Scor (#7 -> #12) drop in popularity.
This has played out enough times that we can make broad predictions about what's going to happen next: we'll see a few weeks of balance, weathers, and other diverse styles featuring strong breakers, then people will start to cook offenses that farm these teams and the circle will begin anew. I've personally felt it very hard to craft consistent HO teams without Moon to force progress, but thanks to Tera there is a ton of room for creativity this generation and I'm excited to see what the next phase looks like.
offense teams care way way less about chip damage than defensive teams and offense teams have more viable items than defensive teams so item clause hurts defensive teams more
it works in vgc because defensive teams are unviable in other ways there too
What are your thoughts on Volcanion? I find the Choice Specs set to be very efficient at breaking down many defensive cores found on balance teams if you give it enough support.
Eventually we will have to add it. Just speculation but im pretty sure if Defense see the light of viability again Game Freak kills it for good.
But serious take now: Game Freak nerfed Defense so much it's borderline unviable. We should worry about them? Because any ban or change we do here, no matter what, will hurt someone so i think we should go to the one with the least collateral damage.
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Also, im still bringing concern about Terastalization. I still believe we should do action on it but im against banning. Like i said in the v3 Meta discussion thread, the solution i propose is the same as VGC: The Tera Type of all mons are revealed, because some of them are broken not because they can tera to X/Y type but because you simply don't know if they'll Terastalize into a specific type, as a good amount of OU mons has a lot of viable options to choose(See the Tera Type Index thread) making the games a guessing game. If you know in advance that a Kingambit has Tera Dark, you wont think twice before letting Great Tusk in front of it. Nowadays you dont because you fear that if you click close combat you run into a Tera Fairy, or click Headlong Rush and fear that you might run straight into a Tera Flying. Or for example, if you know the opponent dont have a Tera Ghost and it's not by default a Ghost type, it's safe to click Facade with your Ursaluna. And if he is, you can click Headlong Rush instead, unless he is Levitate. Nowadays, this kind of play is Risky. A lot risky.
If you know the opponent cant tera out of a Specific weakness, then you can exploit it and make the games less of a Guessing game.
If needed, a thing that can be done is do just like Gen 6 UU with Scald, open a ladder with that rule for Tera Types, and after 15-30 days people can vote on a Survey to opine whether the change helped or not.
CaioXLive12 your Terastallization point was a concern I had a while ago, and you are exactly right to bring it up. I won't dig through the archives to link the post I made a few months ago that goes into detail, but people I respect slammed the door on fixing this four months ago and said "let's move on." I do not agree with that take, but I understand why it was their take and have no interest in fighting it again.
In other formats, I found concerns that even Tera Preview might not be enough. I had a Draft League matchup for the Ghosting Tournament that is a great example here. (Tagging my teammates stainedMorph! Jay if they want to provide their context, as well). The tournament uses Tera Preview. In this battle, momentum for the Brazen Bidoofs (my squad) was in our favor for most of this game. Then Minior comes out, Shell Smashes, whips out Tera Electric the next turn, and sweeps to salvage the game. That is how Gen 9 players have won the entire generation. Boost two or more stats at once -> use Tera to shield revenge killing or secure a kill -> wipe out any counterplay -> knock down the remaining dominoes and say gg. That right there is the formula that wins tournaments this generation and always has been. Item Clause from VGC does nothing to stop that chain reaction. This chain reaction also explains why offense works better than defense. Mega Sableye stall builds from Gen 7 have way too much dimensionality to handle at once to shut down consistently in Gen 9. Big Stall can build teams that top the ladder and do build excellent ones, but even they don't always bring Big Stall to high stakes best of one matches with everything on the line.
The upside to that style of play is it has kept SV OU much more dynamic than other generations at this point in the release cycle. SS OU was maybe a better metagame, but became stale after a few years. SV in some ways still feels fresh enough to play and enjoy. It's harder to win because it has to be harder. Experienced players have mastered the earlier stages and need more variance to manage. For newer players, this is way too much to handle - and I empathize with their plight. It's not an easy needle to thread and please everyone, but both GameFreak and the SV OU council have done an admirable job in managing the complexity.
In other formats, I found concerns that even Tera Preview might not be enough. I had a Draft League matchup for the Ghosting Tournament that is a great example here. (Tagging my teammates stainedMorph! Jay if they want to provide their context, as well). The tournament uses Tera Preview. In this battle, momentum for the Brazen Bidoofs (my squad) was in our favor for most of this game. Then Minior comes out, Shell Smashes, whips out Tera Electric the next turn, and sweeps to salvage the game. That is how Gen 9 players have won the entire generation. Boost two or more stats at once -> use Tera to shield revenge killing or secure a kill -> wipe out any counterplay -> knock down the remaining dominoes and say gg. That right there is the formula that wins tournaments this generation and always has been. Item Clause from VGC does nothing to stop that chain reaction. This chain reaction also explains why offense works better than defense. Mega Sableye stall builds from Gen 7 have way too much dimensionality to handle at once to shut down consistently in Gen 9. Big Stall can build teams that top the ladder and do build excellent ones, but even they don't always bring Big Stall to high stakes best of one matches with everything on the line.
The upside to that style of play is it has kept SV OU much more dynamic than other generations at this point in the release cycle. SS OU was maybe a better metagame, but became stale after a few years. SV in some ways still feels fresh enough to play and enjoy. It's harder to win because it has to be harder. Experienced players have mastered the earlier stages and need more variance to manage. For newer players, this is way too much to handle - and I empathize with their plight. It's not an easy needle to thread and please everyone, but both GameFreak and the SV OU council have done an admirable job in managing the complexity.
I'm honestly surprised this still gets perpetuated this late into the generation even after multiple cycles of the metagame where bulkier archetypes have been some of the strongest archetypes in the meta.
Defense is viable just as before.
Open Tera is necessary for Vgc for the faster pace of games which rarely cross double digits. This matters because sudden unknown tera in vgc has potential to swing and end a game on the spot. This isn't nearly the case for Singles. Certain Pokemon aren't sweeping because you didn't know they were a certain tera type, but because they're circumventing counterplay through gaining access to coverage they didn't have (Tera Blast) or using Tera to bypass weaknesses and bolster set up or deny revenge kills.
Tera is much less a guessing game in this tier, as being informed and up to date on metagame trends will help you be able to make informed guesses on opposing tera types based on team preview and how the opponent is playing. You're much less likely to see a random off meta tera.
Furthermore, Open Tera in singles is arguably a negative due to creating new mind games that are weighted more in the favor of the player with a strong boosting threat (ex Kyurem, Kingambit, Dragonite) and can use the threat of those pokom to force the opponent to walk on egg shells. It's just not something that works here or is necessary (without even getting into how tera preview removes certain skill elements from ghe game)
What are your thoughts on Volcanion? I find the Choice Specs set to be very efficient at breaking down many defensive cores found on balance teams if you give it enough support.
It's decent and pretty hard to switch into especially since a fair amount of teams tend to try and skimp out on checks since there isn't a ton of offensive water type play in the tier, and Volcanion exploits this. It's good at pushing damage into Ting-Lu and has some decent defensive use.
That said I think it's weird to build with at times so it isn't the easiest to slot into teams. Someone else who's more experienced with the mon can jump in and correct me if I got anything wrong.
VCG doesn't have open team sheets because of terastalization, they have open team sheets because the game doesn't readily allow locking into a specific team for tournaments, and thus open sheets prevents cheating. It also has the side benefit of reducing scouting from an absolute necessity to a useful assist.
I think the best Volcan teams rn are double hazard removal with specs by far. Tera Water on this thing is downright nasty, but you can make a huge argument for Tera Ground as well with EP. I think the grassy seed set with rillaboom used to be pretty solid, but the current amount of grass resists are a bit of a nightmare to contend with unless you seriously build some anti dragon/steels for it. With that being said, I think Volcan has some larger potential due to the mixture of its coverage and bulk. Feels like a mon that's a few team building sessions away from being unlocked
It's a niche mon, but it can work well within the right team comp. Part of that comp needs to be hazard support. I don't actually love Specs that much in a tier with Wellspring being so common. It makes it annoying spamming Steam Eruption, which is otherwise its most spammable move. It's not that Choice Specs is bad. I just don't love using it in this metagame climate. But if I were to use Specs Volc, Tera Ground is the way to go.
What are your thoughts on Volcanion? I find the Choice Specs set to be very efficient at breaking down many defensive cores found on balance teams if you give it enough support.
My favorite set is a trapping one to counter Wellspring. With Taunt and Fire Spin, you can match up well against a lot of passive walls. I was running Tera Poison with Air Balloon. I might try Tera Bug for the added Ground resist while still resisting Grass/Fighting. It makes the Tusk matchup better. (Not that this is the reason to use it.) But Tera Poison often completely walls Clodsire if the Air Balloon is up since they only have EQ/Toxic. It's especially nice to have that matchup when you run into the Water Absorb variant.
Of course, Wellspring would just tech more U-turn if this set became too common. So IDK if it can be anything more than niche anti-meta, but at least it is good against most stall type mons. You could do something like run Rocky Hemlet chip mons and hazards to chip down U-turn Wellspring, but it's probably not worth going out of the way for.
I find a potentially cool thing to experiment with is hbd tera fire volc. Since now you maintain your fire resists but also increase fire stab and better check wellspring. Havent tried it myself but it sounds nice on paper
What are your thoughts on Volcanion? I find the Choice Specs set to be very efficient at breaking down many defensive cores found on balance teams if you give it enough support.
I honestly disagree. WCOP and High ladder are (I guess) the best indicatives to see what is viable. And defensive teams are getting ran over by a sweeper every single game. In fact the few times stall has been used in WCOP this round 1, it has been beaten every single one iirc. Defensive play is weaker and there are less viable walls, and those walls easier than ever to break.
Semi-stall / balance structures are much less common than pure offensive teams and set up sweeper after setup sweeper to muscle throught the game.
In fact, team structures have become more offensive in general and that is reflected in which mons are considered for each archetype (Blissey was a pick for Balance in Gen8 and now is strictly used in Stall) and in the game’s pace, which are usually a lot faster.
I don’t want to say that Gen8 or 9 is better than the other because of this. What I want to express is that defense at the moment in Gen9 is clearly worse than offense and that’s reflected in tournaments right now, usage stats (the highest defensive pokemon used is Corviknight or Pecharunt and they were below the top 10).
I don’t think this is a just HO brainless meta, only that offense is generally stronger.
Don't want to dismiss your points, but this is because Blissey lost both Toxic and Teleport, which are huge moves to make it a lot less passive (it also lost Wish which while less important, still is something noteworthy).
Don't want to dismiss what you are saying btw, but there is a reason why Blissey is not used outside of Stall, its simply really passive and while you could make it work, ting lu or glowking are usually better due to there decreased passivity.
Haven't checked World Cup replays recently, so I can't argue against or for any other points in this post.
I don't think this is quite an argument or dismissal of their point so much as an explanation as to why it is. Blissey losing those anti-passivity and pivoting options mean it is significantly less effective outside of Stall for sure, and Balance losing the option in turn costs them a major piece of their defensive play into offensive teams (who rely hard on breaking and momentum as opposed to having Stallbreaker tech for something that fat).
You're completely right there yeah, my bad. I didn't think about Toxic and Teleport being removed from its arsenal (and when you think about it, it's probably the reason why Pokémon like Hippowdon are really rare at the moment).
I agree that a lot of moves getting cut from its arsenal (Lando-T not having Defog or Toxic, for example, or Dnite losing Heal Bell and Defog) is also a nerf to defensive play. Again, you're right about it and thanks for pointing it out.
Hello, I think, I may have found a "bug". I'm not sure if this is intendent or not, but Icy Rock doesn't seem to work on Chilly Reception.
According to Bulbapedia and other pokemon wiki sites, it should work.
Icy Rock bulbapedia
According to Bulbapedia and other pokemon wiki sites, it should work.
This isn't where bug reports are reported, but I can confirm Icy Rock does work on Chilly Reception
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9ou-2383681508
I've seen people reporting bugs here, do I thought it would be the right place. I'm not sure why it didn't work on me. I may be just going crazy. I'm going to test it out once more, also thanks for answering.
Gking and Ting were in the top 10 and saw fairly decent success. I get they can be bulky offense mons, but they are also solid on most general balances & i consider them defensive mons, moreso than something like Pursuit Tar in past gens (which saw use on defensive teams in the past).
Whilst defensive mons tend to struggle more compared to offensive pokemon in this tier due to its high power level and the sheer power of some wallbreakers, Bulky playstyles are still very much viable as long as they aren’t passive stall which is exploitable due to its lack of any offense or speed, however they aren’t as viable as they were in Gen 8.
Bulky offense is a top playstyle rn due to pokemon like Galarian Slowking and Ting Lu providing solid utility and defense to support their teammates and balance still has a place in the metagame for all its flaws due to mons like two mentioned above and pecharunt which checks multiple physical threats with its bulk, typing and poison + confusion
Now defense ain’t what it used to be, the power points for most healing moves have been halved to 8, restricting the longevity of multiple defensive pokemon, and multiple transfer moves have been removed which have multiple walls like Blissey, Toxapex and Clefable with limited options. The most notable lost transfer move is toxic which was utilised by nearly every defensive pokemon in some capacity since the ability to threaten increasing damage every turn made these pokemon less passive and toxic stalling was a common strategy. The lost of other moves for pokemon such as knock off and defog were also unkind.
Offense has also gotten far stronger due to the introduction of tera to either boost stabs even further, get stab on coverage moves or gain coverage you didn’t have before via tera blast, we have also gotten offensive powerhouses like the versatile iron valiant, and the hard hitting kingambit that exploit or simply overpower these defensive mons respectively, not to mention that wellspring ogerpon is legitimately restricting on defense since it demands some form of defensive counterplay whilst also being one of the most devastating wallbreakers in the history of competitive pokemon.
But for all these setbacks, defense isn’t close to borderline unviable due to good defensive pokemon such as Ting Lu, Pecharunt, Galarian Slowking, Garganacl, Gliscor, Zapdos and Corviknight all offering something for potential bulky teams due to their unique traits and ability to consistently check common threats despite the high power level, there are also more niche options outside of OU that can fit on certain teams for a specific but important role. Overall defense has been noticeably nerfed, but unless you only consider stall and semi stall to be defense, its still able to work and in the current metagame I do not believe it borders on unviable.
Bulky offense is a top playstyle rn due to pokemon like Galarian Slowking and Ting Lu providing solid utility and defense to support their teammates and balance still has a place in the metagame for all its flaws due to mons like two mentioned above and pecharunt which checks multiple physical threats with its bulk, typing and poison + confusion
Now defense ain’t what it used to be, the power points for most healing moves have been halved to 8, restricting the longevity of multiple defensive pokemon, and multiple transfer moves have been removed which have multiple walls like Blissey, Toxapex and Clefable with limited options. The most notable lost transfer move is toxic which was utilised by nearly every defensive pokemon in some capacity since the ability to threaten increasing damage every turn made these pokemon less passive and toxic stalling was a common strategy. The lost of other moves for pokemon such as knock off and defog were also unkind.
Offense has also gotten far stronger due to the introduction of tera to either boost stabs even further, get stab on coverage moves or gain coverage you didn’t have before via tera blast, we have also gotten offensive powerhouses like the versatile iron valiant, and the hard hitting kingambit that exploit or simply overpower these defensive mons respectively, not to mention that wellspring ogerpon is legitimately restricting on defense since it demands some form of defensive counterplay whilst also being one of the most devastating wallbreakers in the history of competitive pokemon.
But for all these setbacks, defense isn’t close to borderline unviable due to good defensive pokemon such as Ting Lu, Pecharunt, Galarian Slowking, Garganacl, Gliscor, Zapdos and Corviknight all offering something for potential bulky teams due to their unique traits and ability to consistently check common threats despite the high power level, there are also more niche options outside of OU that can fit on certain teams for a specific but important role. Overall defense has been noticeably nerfed, but unless you only consider stall and semi stall to be defense, its still able to work and in the current metagame I do not believe it borders on unviable.
Hello friends
Do you think this is it? has gen 9 'settled'? is this what we're stuck with?
I dont forsee much happening as much as I want things to be retested (IE bans in a completely different metagame)
Are we happy with it? Is this just how gen 9 ends? Questions that demand answers!
I'd give my personal feelings on it but im not entirely sure its warranted.
Hope you've all had a wonderful weekend!
Do you think this is it? has gen 9 'settled'? is this what we're stuck with?
I dont forsee much happening as much as I want things to be retested (IE bans in a completely different metagame)
Are we happy with it? Is this just how gen 9 ends? Questions that demand answers!
I'd give my personal feelings on it but im not entirely sure its warranted.
Hope you've all had a wonderful weekend!
Im guessing this is it. Woger kyurem gliscor are maybes but I do not think even likely. Retests will not happen until its no longer current gen. Once we're in Gen 10 or working with a champions meta gen 9 will probably eventually see some things happen. Even if its 5 years too late i would be satisfied to see if Tera blast absent started a retest chain that resulted in less bans and a balanced meta.
But at this point I do expect this is about it. It's been pretty good. I still play and its alright. Really looking forward to champions and what is hopefully a regularly vastly changing singles meta. The subtle progession of strategy around mostly the same 20 pokemon just isn't enough to keep me extremely interested, personally. But its been more fun than gen 7 or 8 for me personally
It's probably as settled as we are going to get. There may be a few tests or retests pop up if someone discovers a broken AF set ala Roaring Moon with Tera Blast Fairy Bulky Dragon Dance, but I don't expect much from here. I wouldn't call SV OU a perfect metagame, but it is the metagame we deserve for better or worse. It's a decent equilibrium point that a lot of people have put a lot of effort in to make stable, and that effort has provided stability over time.
The meta has generally settled, gamefreak won’t be dropping any new mons to mess stuff up and nothing is receiving support for an immediate suspect test
Maybe a future test for wellspring could change some parts of the meta but apart from that, this seems to be how the metagame will stay for now
Maybe a future test for wellspring could change some parts of the meta but apart from that, this seems to be how the metagame will stay for now
I really hope this mon gets tested at some point. It needs a little more support but honestly it's just incredibly stupid, they didn't even have the courtesy to make it a contact move meaning it just gets to freely spam it until whatever shaky check you are using collapses. It being tera locked is hardly a drawback either since it just makes clicking ivy cudgel even more brainless and lets it live hits from revenge killers it frankly, has no business living thanks to the spdef boost. Frankly the dynamics wellspring creates in the metagame are just incredibly toxic and I hope we can agree to suspect it at some point.