Which aspect of Dragons is more broken: Pokémon or Moves?

[Senzairu]

The fact that Dragon Pokemon have strong moves that are only resisted by Steel types isn't as much of a problem as the high Base Stats these Dragons bring to the table.

Latias is quite fast and can hit hard from the special side, whereas Garchomp and Salamence have incredible stats that allow them to set up, or hit hard from either side of the spectrum.

 

[cantab]

This is complete theorycraft, and to suggest that Flygon and Latias will be outclassed is ignorant in of itself.

How so?
In the role of either special or mixed sweeper, what has Latias got over Latios? Bulk, yes, but at the cost of a big drop in offensive power. Dragonite is similar, being bulkier than Salamence, but slower and specially weaker. Mence is more used, with Nite restricted to sets that exploit its bulk. I see Latias' relationship to Latios as ending up similar.

Flygon meanwhile, is bettered in EVERY stat by Garchomp (Well, they're equal in Special Attack). And it doesn't even get any boosting moves. The only possible advantage Flygon has over Garchomp is ground-immunity - and I've never heard anyone complain about Garchomp lacking it. If being bettered in every stat and in movepool isn't being outclassed, then what the heck is?

Jesus... People need to read. Go back a page and read what I posted. It clearly states why this argument is fallacious.

Looked, haven't seen.
I'm basically saying that with sufficient rules and restrictions, we could create any metagame we wanted, including what someone might call the perfect one. But just because we can do that, I'm not sure we should.

 

[Ulevo]

How so?
In the role of either special or mixed sweeper, what has Latias got over Latios? Bulk, yes, but at the cost of a big drop in offensive power.

You just answered your own question. Even in our current meta, where Latios is absent, Latias does not always fill an offensive role. Latias has both defensive and support options, both of which Latias is superior to Latios on most accounts. Also, it is worth noting that where offence is concerned, Latias uses Calm Mind better than Latios too. Your being quite vague in your analysis, and I fear it is clouding your judgement.

Dragonite is similar, being bulkier than Salamence, but slower and specially weaker. Mence is more used, with Nite restricted to sets that exploit its bulk. I see Latias' relationship to Latios as ending up similar.

Dragonite has always been in Salamence's shadow, before and after the inclusion of Outrage and Draco Meteor. I do not see how banning these two moves would change that. Even before their inclusion, Dragonite still filled a few niche roles that would land itself in OU's teams that Salamence could not do itself.

Flygon meanwhile, is bettered in EVERY stat by Garchomp. And it doesn't even get any boosting moves. The only possible advantage Flygon has over Garchomp is ground-immunity - and I've never heard anyone complain about Garchomp lacking it.

Stats do not mean everything. Flygon has access to Thunderpunch as well as U-Turn. On top of this, Levitate grants it immunity from Toxic Spikes and Spikes. Again, as with Garchomp, Flygon will be overshadowed like it always has been, but they do not serve the same purposes, nor is Flygon entirely outclassed.

Looked, haven't seen..

http://www.smogon.com/forums/showpost.php?p=2377384&postcount=50

Edit: Also, for the record. I am not arguing necessarily that some Pokemon may or may not drop to UU in the event that Garchomp or Latios come to OU (hypothetically anyway) should we make the decision to ban Draco Meteor and Outrage. I am arguing that we will have more Pokemon viable in OU. Just because Flygon or Dragonite drop in to BL/UU does not mean that they cannot fill a role on an OU team comfortably and perform well should that team require their use over their often preferred counterparts.

 

[cantab]

You just answered your own question. Even in our current meta, where Latios is absent, Latias does not always fill an offensive role. Latias has both defensive and support options, both of which Latias is superior to Latios on most accounts. Also, it is worth noting that where offence is concerned, Latias uses Calm Mind better than Latios too. Your being quite vague in your analysis, and I fear it is clouding your judgement.

Alright, you might be right on Latias.

Dragonite has always been in Salamence's shadow, before and after the inclusion of Outrage and Draco Meteor. I do not see how banning these two moves would change that. Even before their inclusion, Dragonite still filled a few niche roles that would land itself in OU's teams that Salamence could not do itself.

I only brought up Mence and Nite as an analogy to Latios and Latias, not to comment on Mence and Nite themselves.

Stats do not mean everything. Flygon has access to Thunderpunch as well as U-Turn. On top of this, Levitate grants it immunity from Toxic Spikes and Spikes. Again, as with Garchomp, Flygon will be overshadowed like it always has been, but they do not serve the same purposes, nor is Flygon entirely outclassed.

OK, maybe not entirely outclassed. But they still seem to be pretty weak advantages.

I just took a look at the past stats, and they really speak for themselves IMHO. Back in July and August of 2008, when Garchomp was OU, Flygon languished in the 80s by rank, firmly BL territory. September Chomp was banned. By December Flygon was up to number 30, close to where it is today.

Even though the metagame is moved on, I see no reason that the reverse wouldn't happen if Garchomp was allowed back into OU, whether or not we ban DM and Outrage.

EDIT: Looks like your edit pre-empted my post somewhat. But still, even if Flygon can still fill a niche in a few OU teams, it's a pretty extreme niche. After all, almost any Pokemon is to some extent 'viable' in OU, except for those that are banned.

 

[skorpion123]

This is going to be the third time i am going to repeat this question but i read the thread looking for a counterargument not necessarily directed at one of my posts but i still can't find it.

Why ban Draco Meteor and Outrage from the movesets of Flygon , Kingdra, Altaria and Mence (since Mence has yet to be decided to be uber) ? They are not broken with those moves and so there is no reason to ban them.

Whether they would be lucky enough to remain viable choices even after the unfair (and without reason or purpose) ban of one of their moves is irrelevant.

 

[Giffca89]

[sarcasm] Yeah! Banning moves cause only a few pokemon can use them viably is stupid! Lets get rid of evasion clause and OHKO clause! [/sarcasm]

Isn't this a very possible outcome of the Suspect Testing of the Evasion and OHKO clauses?

As others have said, it is not the Dragon-typed moves themselves which make so many Dragon-typed Pokemon Uber or Suspects, but rather the combination of their movepools (made up of the admittedly powerful Dragon-typed attacks and other moves which can complement them well), the advantages given to them because of their Dragon typing, and the great total stats and stat distribution Dragon-typed Pokemon tend to have. Without one of these, these Pokemon would become significantly less powerful. My claim is supported by the fact that neither Tyranitar (who has Outrage and a great stat total and distribution) and Altaria (a Dragon with Outrage and Draco Meteor) are not Suspects. Thus, Outrage and Draco Meteor on their own are not inherently make a Pokemon broken or Suspect. You appear to admit this yourself, RB Golbat.

If moves do not break Pokemon on their own, then what grounds do we have to really ban them? You indicate that moves have grounds for banning if their removal would lead to less Pokemon being considered Uber and thus, presumably, diversifying the metagame. As X-Act states in another thread, however, diversity is not Smogon's ultimate goal; rather, it is making sure the metagame is balanced. Thus, it is irrelevant whether banning Outrage and Draco Meteor will bring more Pokemon into the Standard metagame or will hurt Kingdra and Flygon. If the moves themselves aren't unbalanced, but Pokemon who have them are partially because of them, then it is those Pokemon that need to be banned.

 

[bigfoots]

Why ban Draco Meteor and Outrage from the movesets of Flygon , Kingdra, Altaria and Mence (since Mence has yet to be decided to be uber) ? They are not broken with those moves and so there is no reason to ban them.

I think the logic behind banning the moves from all Pokemon is that the premise is that the moves themselves are broken, regardless of what Pokemon is using them. Now, if the moves truly are broken, as opposed to the suspects using them, is an entirely different argument.

 

[cantab]

I've though of what may be a better way to test whether the moves are broken. Test without Garchomp, Lati@s, and Salamence.

If DM and Outrage really ARE broken, we'll expect to see Dragonite and Flygon, the remaining Pokemon that can use them effectively (by which I mean with STAB), rise to take the place of the gone Salamence and Latias. If the remaining allowed dragons don't move much, that indicates it is not the moves that are the problem. And we could repeat the process removing Dragonite for a second test if we wanted.

 

[Garganator]

I've though of what may be a better way to test whether the moves are broken. Test without Garchomp, Lati@s, and Salamence.

If DM and Outrage really ARE broken, we'll expect to see Dragonite and Flygon, the remaining Pokemon that can use them effectively (by which I mean with STAB), rise to take the place of the gone Salamence and Latias. If the remaining allowed dragons don't move much, that indicates it is not the moves that are the problem. And we could repeat the process removing Dragonite for a second test if we wanted.

I think you should include here Dragonite, as it is almost the same as Salamence with only lower speed and slightly lower special attack. After this I think this test would be ready to start. Anyway for me this is interesting idea for suspect test, which would show everything that we need to know.

Anyway I won't be original saying that dragon moves by itself aren't broken - the raw stats of the best dragon moves users (those with STAB of course) and coverage that dragon-type provides on offensive (only steel resist ? Man, that's good) makes them close to being broken. Also high power of Outrage and Draco Meteor doesn't help here, when you include STAB. I guess that's it - it's hard to say something new here, as everything earlier is mentioned in this thread.

 

[dakidukno]

I know a shizload of ppl are going to blatantly disagree with this, but dragons aren't as broken as they seem. With the exception of Kingdra, almost every single dragon carries a double weakness to some common attack, the majority being ice attacks. Ice is everywhere in OU, ppl say "to counter dragons", but we all know its for the mass moves' coverage. That being said, all of these dragons that are equipped with powerful attacks (i should mention both Outrage and Draco Meteor have huge drawbacks that keep them from really being overpowered) can be OHKO'd with ease.

That's not to say that these dragons aren't a problem. I'm just pointing out how easily they can be stopped. Its true that they are almost too powerful, but they're typing and lack of formidable defenses make them less of a threat than most ppl think. Now if there was a Dragon out there like Cyclohm, id be worried.

 

[cantab]

I think you should include here Dragonite, as it is almost the same as Salamence with only lower speed and slightly lower special attack. After this I think this test would be ready to start. Anyway for me this is interesting idea for suspect test, which would show anything that we need to know.

Yeah, you probably should remove Dragonite too. I'd forgotten about Kingdra, so thought removing Nite would leave Flygon the only decent dragon (Altaria being so weak than some non-dragons, notably Rhyperior, do more with Outrage)

 

[xBLUEx]

I think that the Dragon pokemon are broken. As stated before me, they have higher attacks and speeds than most pokemon. By banning 2 moves, other pokemon cannot live on to their full potential. I think banning pokemon is better than banning moves because pokemon are able to battle to their full potential.

 

[MrBlack]

Frankly, a balanced metagame exists for the same reason as the word "perfect" exists. They're both impossibilities. Centralization will always occur due to trainers wanting to use what they see to the best pokemon.

I appreciate that you replied but you didn't actually answer my question xD I know it's like perfect - we can never be perfect, but by trying to be perfect we can get closer to being perfect.

I'm not questioning the existence of such a metagame, I'm just genuinely curious about its definition in Smogon's eyes.

 

[Zach]

I think to say that one aspect or the other is more broken requires oversimplification.

 

[RBG]

You fail to understand my point cantab. Currently, we have 4 almost broken dragons, who would arguably be less broken without the use of Draco Meteor and Outrage. Salamence was 100% more manageable pre Plat, but the moment it got Outrage, it became the uncounterable beast we know it is today. Likewise, one of the reasons that Latios was hailed to be uber was due to the insanse power behind it's Draco Meteors.

I fully understand that there are non-NFEs Dragons who are not broken because of these moves. I emphasize dragons because it is with STAB only that these moves are so deadly, and conveniently, every Dragon pokemon gets both of these moves. I also emphasize Dragon because these moves are only remotely close to broken on Dragons. Apart from really rare cases (I once lost cause a Scarf Charizard Outraged my Latias :( ) there is no real advantage to having non Dragon Pokemon use outrage, despite it's superior Type coverage. The main reason the moves are deadly is a COmbination of the STAB and Stats the pokemon that use them have. However, I am sure we can agree that the dragon are more managable with these moves, and arguably, that creates a more balanced metagame.

But back to the original point, the three lower OU Dragons, Dragonite, Kingdra, and Flygon, are much more potent because of these two moves. I'm sure many people remember how less threatening Kingdra and Flygon were pre plat. And how even before plat, the only reason to use Dragonite was because it had the Dragon Dance + Outrage combo to it self that is now shared amongst many Pokemon.

The point is, I think it is a fair statement to say that is very possible that a more balanced metagame could exist with a ban on Outrage and Draco Meteor.

 

[cantab]

So are you saying that we should ban things in order to create a more balanced metagame? I was under the impression we only banned things that severely unbalanced it. A fully-balanced metagame may not even be possible - indeed, while it's easy to spot gross imbalance, it's rather harder to quantify balance. Spread of usage perhaps? But do we really want a metagame where every Pokemon is seen equally often?

 

[skorpion123]

I think the logic behind banning the moves from all Pokemon is that the premise is that the moves themselves are broken, regardless of what Pokemon is using them. Now, if the moves truly are broken, as opposed to the suspects using them, is an entirely different argument.

The premise has been proven incorrect by the sheer fact that the combination of those pokemon plus moves are not banned and other than mence which is top tier the rest of the OU dragons are great but not even the biggest threats of the tier. So the moves on those pokemon are not broken. (and do not severely unbalance the metagame. Maybe Mence but how much and how other things also "unbalance" the metagame , is to be disputed. )

The combination appears to be considered uber only in the case of Garchomp and Latios and some people want to test Salamence as well. (until it's tested if it's tested it's also not uber.)

 

[Game Freak201]

I appreciate that you replied but you didn't actually answer my question xD I know it's like perfect - we can never be perfect, but by trying to be perfect we can get closer to being perfect.

I'm not questioning the existence of such a metagame, I'm just genuinely curious about its definition in Smogon's eyes.

Sorry for misunderstanding your question. Smogon's ideal metagame would be one that is perfectly balanced. Not uncentralized, or most diversified as stated by other users.

[sarcasm] Yeah! Banning moves cause only a few pokemon can use them viably is stupid! Lets get rid of evasion clause and OHKO clause! [/sarcasm]

Sarcasm gets us no where. I am trying to have a serious discussion and it would help your point much more if you pointed out actual reasons why I am wrong rather then lame and vague sarcastic situations.

In case you were wondering, the sarcasm you was mentioning was trying to make a point; though, it appears you didn't get it since you were ranting at me for my use of satire. So, here is my argument without the sarcasm:

A pokemon's power/viability/etc is a very complex structure with many components that factor into it. When I look at all these suspects, the majority of them are 600 BST dragons who have the right combination of factors to make them very powerful in their own right. It isn't the dragon typing alone who become suspects since Altaria's poor stats tell us that immediately nor is it the BST and the moves DM/Outrage alone since Tyranitar/Gyrarados with Outrage just isn't viable in competitive pokemon. It is the combination of the typing, the movepool, and the right BST that makes a pokemon a suspect.

 

[skorpion123]

So how does Altaria , Kingdra or Flygon , getting DM and Outrage unbalance the metagame , again ?

Now Latias or Mence (getting DM the one , and Outrage and Dm the other) , one could argue against it , or for it , but in this case i don't see how an arguement can even be made .

 

[blasphemy1]

Maybe there could just be a DP ladder, and a Platinum ladder? Would be very cool to play without the changes, and the mathematicians around here could probably contrast the two with statistics(this would also solve the problem of Outrage on Salamence).

 

[Giffca89]

But back to the original point, the three lower OU Dragons, Dragonite, Kingdra, and Flygon, are much more potent because of these two moves.

I don't see why you are emphasizing this point. Aren't Lucario and Infernape much more potent because they have Close Combat, rather than having to rely on Brick Break or Blaze Kick? If there were an isolated metagame in which Salamence, Garchomp, Latias, etc. did not exist, would you still think that Outrage and Draco Meteor were potentially worthy of being banned for this reason? Your argument that Suspect and Uber Dragons might be more fit for the Standard metagame if these moves are banned is a much stronger one.

The point is, I think it is a fair statement to say that is very possible that a more balanced metagame could exist with a ban on Outrage and Draco Meteor.

I have a couple of questions if this is the reason why you think banning these moves should be considered:
- What are the "characteristics" that moves, in general, need for us to ban them?
- How can we determine if this metagame is actually more balanced than the one we are approaching with the current Suspect Test process?

 

[Luminary]

I'm not totally understanding the question. Am I correct to assume that you mean, "Which would be more worthy of a ban?" If that is the case, it is a question of policy rather than power. Pokemon allows too many options for creating a metagame (what if we limited Garchomp's EVs, or banned Earthquake), so I think it's best to keep it simple for now. Banning Pokemon, not moves, is how it's been done for a while I think, and I think that's the best choice.

 

[X-Act]

I wish to make it clear that when I say that the moves are more broken, I'm not implying in any way that those moves should be banned. I'm merely answering the question: "Which aspect of Dragons is more broken: Pokemon or Moves?" And I fully believe that the moves are the more broken aspect.

I believe that GameFreak made a mistake when they introduced a physical Outrage with 120 base power and a special Draco Meteor with 140 base power. Before, Dragon was one of the worst attacking type of the game, having only Special Dragon Claw with 80 power to use (and before that, it was even worse!) GameFreak understandably tried to improve the Dragon move situation, but they, unwillingly, (or maybe willingly) created moves that are far too powerful. Maybe their message is that Dragons as a whole SHOULD be powerful by definition, I don't know...

The movepool of a Pokemon is also inherently THE most important thing that a Pokemon has. Which is better: a Pokemon with Salamence's typing, a good movepool, and mediocre stats, or the same Pokemon with a bad movepool and good attacking stats? The answer is that the Pokemon with the good movepool but bad attacking stats is better. If you read my 'Normalized Base Stats' article, there I answer the question "Which Pokemon does more damage: one that has 75 base Atk that uses Focus Punch, or one that has 150 base Atk that uses Brick Break?" The answer is that the Focus Punch Pokemon does more damage, despite having a lacklustre 75 base Atk compared to the other Pokemon's gastronomical 150 base Atk. And that means that the movepool of a Pokemon is much more important than its attacking stats.

This was extremely apparent for RBY Dragonite and RBY Persian. In RBY, Dragonite was a Pokemon with amazing stats but a horrible movepool, which ended up not being OU. Persian, on the other hand, had bad stats but an impressive move called Slash, which basically was a 140 base Normal move plus STAB. Guess what: Persian was OU in RBY, while Dragonite was not. Persian's movepool amply counterbalanced the fact that its attacking stats were poor, whereas Dragonite's attacking stats didn't counterbalance the fact that its movepool was horrible.

 

[Jonathan]

I remember reading on Serebii I think, a couple years back while DP were in the making, that Gamefreak had a contest of some sort in Japan where people could submit an idea for a Pokemon move, and that one move would make its way into DP. The move that won was Draco Meteor. XD

 

[grateking]

i think that the dragon type itself is more broken, cause no other types resist it except steels, causing the moves to have a bigger impact on the metagame. Because the dragon type is so dominant, most teams will have a steel type to take these attacks or will carry a dragon of their own. The moves arent broken because of their base power, but because of the coverage it has.