Don't play SV BH much anymore but following some discussion on Discord a few days back I wondered, why is this meta so boring in-game? This is obviously subjective but, viewing past gen HPL games and trying out old gen BH for myself, the difference is undeniable. The two main differences are that smart midgrounds are not sufficiently rewarded in SV BH, and that the range of viable strategies themselves is more restricted. The former means that a lot of the time you're realistically shoehorned into switching into 1/2 specific Pokemon on your team, even against more defensive Pokemon, or are switching in something else not so much for positional advantage, but because the opposing SoR Garchomp might 2HKO your "main" switch-in(s). The latter means that, one way or another, some class of set, seen in standard play or otherwise, is made unviable by the state of the metagame, and consequently go relatively unseen.
This clearly happens due to some sets being "unable to keep up" with the rest of the meta, but that manifests itself in two ways: either they "can't keep up" (a multitude of meta factors make said sets not worthwhile at that time, though they have theoretical merits), or the "CAN'T KEEP UP" (the meta is constrained into a number of factors with a clearly higher power level than everything else, and so some sets get crowded out). I will go through how, in SV BH, both of these happen from my perspective. I will say first that I go with the perspective that the purposes of tiering are to maximize the expression of playing skill in-game and maximize the variety of viable teams, since otherwise nothing I say past this makes sense.
I will tackle in-game skill expression first. Frankly, quite a few of Gen 9's moves encourage dumbed-down gameplay and offer inordinate reward against the majority of mons, and therefore force rather restrictive gameplay loops. Mortal Spin is probably the worst offender. Due to 8 PP recovery and the ease of inflicting passive damage, regular poison is actually a really annoying status condition in SV BH, and combined with hazard removal and the general passivity of defensive mons it's an extremely spammable move that encourages Steels to come in strongly enough that they almost always do. Mortal poison also acts as a form of Improofing, because it's easy to deny Imposter the chance to heal its status conditions through Improofing Take Heart/Heal Bell/Jungle Healing users. I would say the hazard removal is Mortal's primary presence in-game while the Poison is what shuts down any midground plays involving staying in on the turn the opponent removes hazards. Stone Axe is similar in that it's insanely spammable in-game due to its, for similar reasons to Mortal Spin, extremely desirable effect of setting unblockable, immunity-less hazards. Stone Axe's differences from raw Stealth Rock are extremely relevant from a metagame health standpoint, since it stops Magic Bounce from being counterplay, has a double purpose of threatening Ho-Oh for many users, and is of course usable by RegenVest. Because both moves are attacks with secondaries that are so incredibly valuable in-game, using Stone Axe when practical, as well as Mortal Spin when spreading status or removing hazards are highly prioritized, are usually optimal, to a degree I would consider a roadblock to more complex and engaging gameplay.
Salt Cure is also extremely spammable, since a LOT of relevant targets get chipped 25% per turn and, in combination with Knock Off, even 12.5% completely changes the game position against almost any foe. V-create is something I'm personally fine with but enables very strong mixed attackers that force 50-50s and eliminate many true midgrounds, which would function as bona fide checks up to a point, through allowing for a variety of coverage combinations that 2HKO nearly everything. Triple Arrows, Combat Torque, and Malignant Chain are much more mild but many would-be midground decisions in-game are confounded by the risk of getting flinched/paralyzed/poisoned. These attacks' secondary effects elevate them from just "coverage moves" to strong attacks that carry commanding in-game presences that, in practice, result in a much different matchup spread of these moves than otherwise. Malignant Chain is mostly checked by Steel-types/MG blobs/Scales TH users anyway so its secondary effect is much less impactful than the former two – why no one thinks it's broken. Nevertheless, it's undeniable that secondary effects are extremely impactful in in-game decision making, and to an extent also influence what checks what in the builder.
Burning Bulwark (and to a lesser extent Baneful Bunker) are a special case that necessitates scouting to truly be safe against. Because basically every physical breaker relies on contact moves, something that normally invites physical breakers in like MG Chansey can basically project its non-proactive, one-dimensional version of BH gameplay onto that game by completely discouraging almost any other otherwise feasible strategy.
To summarize, multiple moves constrain in-game decision-making by having an imbalanced matchup spread. If you do NOT accept having to switch into specific mons that aren't as bothered by inordinately strong secondary effects, you take risks with downsides that happen to be too strong in most in-game scenarios. Consequently, boring gameplay ensues.
Now let's switch to the other half: why has the metagame turned out this way, as opposed to something more like standard mons with greater playing depth? In my mind, the main reason is the relative meaninglessness of the constituent Pokemon actually making up the metagame, making the resulting meta more like a bulkier version of Camove Chaos than anything resembling Gen 7 BH. What I mean is that the non-Pokemon substituents of a set (moves, items, and especially their Abilities) make them function like completely different mons in-game. Fur Coat and Ice Scales Audino are going to have completely different matchup spreads and in-game decision patterns. While more minute variations, like FC Take Heart Audino vs. Moonblast/Topsy/Teleport/recovery FC Audino, will still play quite differently, it turns out that doubling the bulk of a mon on either side means a lot of would-be counterplay isn't going to function as such, and as such "universal" counterplay for a mon is going to be much more restricted. Couple that with the numerous constraining moves I covered earlier, and you get a metagame where even defensive Pokemon are almost always checked passively, because direct offensive counterplay that is resistant to all of Salt Cure/Mortal Spin/Nuzzle etc. is rather specific.
Strength Sap doesn't help, either: fast Strength Sap means your breaker needs to OHKO the opposing defensive mon, rather than simply 2HKO, to get past them. The resulting effect is that slow breakers cannot individually break through almost any functional defensive core, and strongly appreciate Sapblocking – another mostly passive mechanism! In old gen BH, a variety of mons can consistently fulfill a breaker role because they just so happen to hit the "main" defensive mons hard through convenient STAB or coverage combinations, but with 18 different 120/120/120 bulk options that can double their bulk and have 120 Speed to Strength Sap anything slower, you're not going to see conventional breaking. A major component of the offensive metagame has no choice but to end up mostly passive – shifted towards role-based gameplay which involves simplified lines and overall non-engaging gameplay.
Special breakers aren't in a much better spot, either – most special breakers are simply not strong enough to break through MG blobs/RegenVests/the few good Ice Scales options by themselves. In old gen BH metagames this is no big deal since you'd switch to something else as their do-nothing mon gets chipped by hazards and is unable to make progress, however, in SV BH Stone Axe, Salt Cure and the like make most of them reasonably proactive in-game, resulting in some more same-y gameplay loops.
I will say that the above is an extremely oversimplified version of the meta, and I didn't go over what makes Take Heart users/bulky setup so threatening, the unhealthy dichotomy between broken secondary effects and Covert Cloak users, the reasons for and effectiveness of mixed breakers, or how Improofing really factors into all that in detail. None of those really promote more engaging/less mindgame-heavy gameplay, though.
Let's see the effect of all this on the tournament metagame. The more direct breaking approach is made niche or artificially slower by defensive mons you can't hope to 2HKO. The easiest way to bypass this is by selecting breakers the opponent isn't likely to bring hard checks for – in essence, educated matchup-fishing. In other words, guessing. But because of the relative monotony of gameplay, there is not much risk in just bringing something else instead. Because of how role-based gameplay is forced to be, the team with a breaker that "has matchup" is overwhelmingly easier to win with – there is less room for error due to simpler, more linearized gameplay patterns. What's the point?
How to fix all this?
Honestly, you can't. There's too much variety in the sets one could viably run even with the changes I suggest for there to really be teambuilding variety and in-game skill expression comparable to the nicer Hackmons metas. However, I think these would help. imo there's fundamentally no reason to tier on the basis of "broken-ness" when none of these contentious elements can ever actually be justified as such – better to just work towards improving the metagame through maximizing skill expression and the variety of viable teambuilding. I don't necessarily support what I listed, just some things to think about.
- Ban Mortal Spin, in my eyes it's the biggest problem with SV BH gameplay and doesn't offer enough to the metagame to really justify it staying. Magic Bounce, -ate Spin, Superman all exist as hazard counterplay regardless of Mortal's existence so I don't think the hazard removal shortage argument really makes sense. It's nice to soft Improof hazard setters I guess but with the options available to defensively Improof -ate spinners I don't think that is realistically a problem either.
- Ban Stone Axe, allows for overly effortless hazard setting, which in turn leads to linearized gameplay and teambuilding patterns. Not much of a problem with Mortal Spin around, though.
- Ban Burning Bulwark, overly limits physical breaking and on the blobs forces passive gameplay focused around the tempo of the blob user. I don't think there are enough checks to passivity or Bulwark-induced status for anti-Bulwark gameplay to remain sufficiently engaging
- Consider banning Arceus? Personally think Arceus in its current implementation is terrible for the format, since you have to prep for all of them with the fewer resources allotted by virtue of only being able to slot 1 per team (which can only be done passively or via raw damage output, which in practice is constraining). It helps curtail breakers' effectiveness but at the same time fast Strength Sap is pretty broken and it's quite proactive with Take Heart
- Maybe ban Salt Cure? Same uninteractive gameplay argument as Mortal/Stone Axe, but it contributes more significantly to the meta in that bulky setup counterplay is already rather passive and spread thin, and another tool is useful.
- Maybe ban Triple Arrows/Combat Torque etc.? Less relevant than the above but can't hurt
- Free and rebalance around Poison Heal? Probably not lol but it's a fun thought experiment. Also Poison Heal is incredible for promoting thoughtful gameplay
Other things to think about even if unrealistic: free Photon, free Mewtwos, free Shedinja, ban Sword/Beads of Ruin, ban Normalize, ban Ice Scales
Also keep an eye on Take Heart, I personally think it's healthy as an anti-status option but Jungle Healing also exists and its counterplay is mostly passive so I get the ban pov
This clearly happens due to some sets being "unable to keep up" with the rest of the meta, but that manifests itself in two ways: either they "can't keep up" (a multitude of meta factors make said sets not worthwhile at that time, though they have theoretical merits), or the "CAN'T KEEP UP" (the meta is constrained into a number of factors with a clearly higher power level than everything else, and so some sets get crowded out). I will go through how, in SV BH, both of these happen from my perspective. I will say first that I go with the perspective that the purposes of tiering are to maximize the expression of playing skill in-game and maximize the variety of viable teams, since otherwise nothing I say past this makes sense.
I will tackle in-game skill expression first. Frankly, quite a few of Gen 9's moves encourage dumbed-down gameplay and offer inordinate reward against the majority of mons, and therefore force rather restrictive gameplay loops. Mortal Spin is probably the worst offender. Due to 8 PP recovery and the ease of inflicting passive damage, regular poison is actually a really annoying status condition in SV BH, and combined with hazard removal and the general passivity of defensive mons it's an extremely spammable move that encourages Steels to come in strongly enough that they almost always do. Mortal poison also acts as a form of Improofing, because it's easy to deny Imposter the chance to heal its status conditions through Improofing Take Heart/Heal Bell/Jungle Healing users. I would say the hazard removal is Mortal's primary presence in-game while the Poison is what shuts down any midground plays involving staying in on the turn the opponent removes hazards. Stone Axe is similar in that it's insanely spammable in-game due to its, for similar reasons to Mortal Spin, extremely desirable effect of setting unblockable, immunity-less hazards. Stone Axe's differences from raw Stealth Rock are extremely relevant from a metagame health standpoint, since it stops Magic Bounce from being counterplay, has a double purpose of threatening Ho-Oh for many users, and is of course usable by RegenVest. Because both moves are attacks with secondaries that are so incredibly valuable in-game, using Stone Axe when practical, as well as Mortal Spin when spreading status or removing hazards are highly prioritized, are usually optimal, to a degree I would consider a roadblock to more complex and engaging gameplay.
Salt Cure is also extremely spammable, since a LOT of relevant targets get chipped 25% per turn and, in combination with Knock Off, even 12.5% completely changes the game position against almost any foe. V-create is something I'm personally fine with but enables very strong mixed attackers that force 50-50s and eliminate many true midgrounds, which would function as bona fide checks up to a point, through allowing for a variety of coverage combinations that 2HKO nearly everything. Triple Arrows, Combat Torque, and Malignant Chain are much more mild but many would-be midground decisions in-game are confounded by the risk of getting flinched/paralyzed/poisoned. These attacks' secondary effects elevate them from just "coverage moves" to strong attacks that carry commanding in-game presences that, in practice, result in a much different matchup spread of these moves than otherwise. Malignant Chain is mostly checked by Steel-types/MG blobs/Scales TH users anyway so its secondary effect is much less impactful than the former two – why no one thinks it's broken. Nevertheless, it's undeniable that secondary effects are extremely impactful in in-game decision making, and to an extent also influence what checks what in the builder.
Burning Bulwark (and to a lesser extent Baneful Bunker) are a special case that necessitates scouting to truly be safe against. Because basically every physical breaker relies on contact moves, something that normally invites physical breakers in like MG Chansey can basically project its non-proactive, one-dimensional version of BH gameplay onto that game by completely discouraging almost any other otherwise feasible strategy.
To summarize, multiple moves constrain in-game decision-making by having an imbalanced matchup spread. If you do NOT accept having to switch into specific mons that aren't as bothered by inordinately strong secondary effects, you take risks with downsides that happen to be too strong in most in-game scenarios. Consequently, boring gameplay ensues.
Now let's switch to the other half: why has the metagame turned out this way, as opposed to something more like standard mons with greater playing depth? In my mind, the main reason is the relative meaninglessness of the constituent Pokemon actually making up the metagame, making the resulting meta more like a bulkier version of Camove Chaos than anything resembling Gen 7 BH. What I mean is that the non-Pokemon substituents of a set (moves, items, and especially their Abilities) make them function like completely different mons in-game. Fur Coat and Ice Scales Audino are going to have completely different matchup spreads and in-game decision patterns. While more minute variations, like FC Take Heart Audino vs. Moonblast/Topsy/Teleport/recovery FC Audino, will still play quite differently, it turns out that doubling the bulk of a mon on either side means a lot of would-be counterplay isn't going to function as such, and as such "universal" counterplay for a mon is going to be much more restricted. Couple that with the numerous constraining moves I covered earlier, and you get a metagame where even defensive Pokemon are almost always checked passively, because direct offensive counterplay that is resistant to all of Salt Cure/Mortal Spin/Nuzzle etc. is rather specific.
Strength Sap doesn't help, either: fast Strength Sap means your breaker needs to OHKO the opposing defensive mon, rather than simply 2HKO, to get past them. The resulting effect is that slow breakers cannot individually break through almost any functional defensive core, and strongly appreciate Sapblocking – another mostly passive mechanism! In old gen BH, a variety of mons can consistently fulfill a breaker role because they just so happen to hit the "main" defensive mons hard through convenient STAB or coverage combinations, but with 18 different 120/120/120 bulk options that can double their bulk and have 120 Speed to Strength Sap anything slower, you're not going to see conventional breaking. A major component of the offensive metagame has no choice but to end up mostly passive – shifted towards role-based gameplay which involves simplified lines and overall non-engaging gameplay.
Special breakers aren't in a much better spot, either – most special breakers are simply not strong enough to break through MG blobs/RegenVests/the few good Ice Scales options by themselves. In old gen BH metagames this is no big deal since you'd switch to something else as their do-nothing mon gets chipped by hazards and is unable to make progress, however, in SV BH Stone Axe, Salt Cure and the like make most of them reasonably proactive in-game, resulting in some more same-y gameplay loops.
I will say that the above is an extremely oversimplified version of the meta, and I didn't go over what makes Take Heart users/bulky setup so threatening, the unhealthy dichotomy between broken secondary effects and Covert Cloak users, the reasons for and effectiveness of mixed breakers, or how Improofing really factors into all that in detail. None of those really promote more engaging/less mindgame-heavy gameplay, though.
Let's see the effect of all this on the tournament metagame. The more direct breaking approach is made niche or artificially slower by defensive mons you can't hope to 2HKO. The easiest way to bypass this is by selecting breakers the opponent isn't likely to bring hard checks for – in essence, educated matchup-fishing. In other words, guessing. But because of the relative monotony of gameplay, there is not much risk in just bringing something else instead. Because of how role-based gameplay is forced to be, the team with a breaker that "has matchup" is overwhelmingly easier to win with – there is less room for error due to simpler, more linearized gameplay patterns. What's the point?
How to fix all this?
Honestly, you can't. There's too much variety in the sets one could viably run even with the changes I suggest for there to really be teambuilding variety and in-game skill expression comparable to the nicer Hackmons metas. However, I think these would help. imo there's fundamentally no reason to tier on the basis of "broken-ness" when none of these contentious elements can ever actually be justified as such – better to just work towards improving the metagame through maximizing skill expression and the variety of viable teambuilding. I don't necessarily support what I listed, just some things to think about.
- Ban Mortal Spin, in my eyes it's the biggest problem with SV BH gameplay and doesn't offer enough to the metagame to really justify it staying. Magic Bounce, -ate Spin, Superman all exist as hazard counterplay regardless of Mortal's existence so I don't think the hazard removal shortage argument really makes sense. It's nice to soft Improof hazard setters I guess but with the options available to defensively Improof -ate spinners I don't think that is realistically a problem either.
- Ban Stone Axe, allows for overly effortless hazard setting, which in turn leads to linearized gameplay and teambuilding patterns. Not much of a problem with Mortal Spin around, though.
- Ban Burning Bulwark, overly limits physical breaking and on the blobs forces passive gameplay focused around the tempo of the blob user. I don't think there are enough checks to passivity or Bulwark-induced status for anti-Bulwark gameplay to remain sufficiently engaging
- Consider banning Arceus? Personally think Arceus in its current implementation is terrible for the format, since you have to prep for all of them with the fewer resources allotted by virtue of only being able to slot 1 per team (which can only be done passively or via raw damage output, which in practice is constraining). It helps curtail breakers' effectiveness but at the same time fast Strength Sap is pretty broken and it's quite proactive with Take Heart
- Maybe ban Salt Cure? Same uninteractive gameplay argument as Mortal/Stone Axe, but it contributes more significantly to the meta in that bulky setup counterplay is already rather passive and spread thin, and another tool is useful.
- Maybe ban Triple Arrows/Combat Torque etc.? Less relevant than the above but can't hurt
- Free and rebalance around Poison Heal? Probably not lol but it's a fun thought experiment. Also Poison Heal is incredible for promoting thoughtful gameplay
Other things to think about even if unrealistic: free Photon, free Mewtwos, free Shedinja, ban Sword/Beads of Ruin, ban Normalize, ban Ice Scales
Also keep an eye on Take Heart, I personally think it's healthy as an anti-status option but Jungle Healing also exists and its counterplay is mostly passive so I get the ban pov
- This mon I have found extreme value in as a regenvester and maybe that's just due to my playstyle but a mon who is so easily offensively improofed due to 4x vcreate weakness while being able to get the slow pivot nigh uncontested against opposing regen vesters due to it's absurdly slow speed and allowing for some interesting sets such as the pblades mortal tcage arc-ground I been running (will get to that later) because of it's unique typing is incredibly valueable. Another thing that ferrothorn beneifts from is an overall decrease of torch song usage and fire coverage being a little on the rarer side at least in terms of special attackers and the few rare torch song spammers are eaily checked by easy partners for ferrothorn such as ice scales lunala and arceus-ground. Overall ferrothorn has been a mon that post-hpl I respect a ton more and think others should begin to also.
- Fur coat arceus-ground is actually the greatest pokemon of all time and I think everyone should look into it more. Think about it, gren sees next to no usage, grass types don't exist, garchomp and blaziken don't commonly run any strong coverage for it, kyurem-white barely ever gets used, and kyurem-black doesn't exist, what is hitting this thing for super effective? Hot take but pblades tcage mortal sap arceus-ground is an overall better neutral fc than arceus-fighting and zamazenta right now just due to the fact common magic bouncers come in on them so easily to prevent sap and you no longer care to beat greninja because it's a fraud anyway. This mon is genuienly good and I think more people need to begin to heavily consider it on teams.
- While lunala may only be on one team I used for HPL I've used it on many behind the scenes teams and testing phase teams and it always puts in the work. Super easy improof with the mspin + infernal + psystrike cloak set and it beats just about every soecial attacker in the current meta while being faster than the big two physical breakers even hitting one of them for nearly an ohko. The only issue with lunala is moonSHEIST but flutter commonly will forgo ghost move and if it does run it it's more commonly astral or infernal unless specs so the only guy you genuinely have to be spooked about in most cases is alakazam which you can slot an audino-mega, ting-lu, or av regen steel on to help handle quite easily. (however where there's a zam there's a way) Mon is sheist and can easily make big time progress while checking several meta threats, heavily recomend.
- Yk I gotta mention my baby. I personally think the utter variation blaziken can have on its banded sets and even lorb sets on occasion is kinda crazy and only adds to the absurdity it can be when dealing with and the strain it can put on the builder. Knock variations with hazard stack I've personally found to be incredibly easy to make constant progress with and nuzzle also has incredible merit when paired with spikes forcing harder checks such as arceus-water and koraidon to either eat a para or eat a bunch of hazard chip. Don't know if I necessarily have changed opinions on how the suspect should've gone but upon looking into more variations of common sets I definitely think this mon has only begun to show it's true colors as it's not difficult to slap random moves on it and still improof just fine.
that if you wanna build a consistent team you can only run 1 offensive mon (+ 1 Take Heart defensive 
. Unless you wanna fish and run an inconsistent team then you're relgated to running these bozos over and over again.
series is finally here:
of the team? Dialga will handle all the slow regen guys that Lucario can't break and Lucario will handle all the fast frail guys that are threatening. With the Power of Friendship (Doom Desire + Teleport/U-turn + Steely Spirit), Lucario can also break through resists with raw power. For reference, on an average roll, Doom + 2xSunsteel does 86% on an FC water Arc so you just need rocks and a bit of chip to brute force past it. I am sure everyone including me is looking forward to seeing this team on the samples (heh). I managed to climb from 1575 to 1583 with this team, a unique feat that very few teams have achieved.