Salamence - The Face of The Next Suspect, or Merely OU's Strongest Dragon?

[cantab]

True, but one would usually only be using a Porygon2 to counter DD Mence...but it is more than capable of countering MixMence as well. Anyway, a Porygon2 at 87% (itt one after Stealth Rock damage) survives standard MixMence's Draco Meteor if memory serves.

As has been said many times before, when your other player produces Salamence, you don't know what sort of Salamence it is.
If Porygon2 can be EV'd to survive the Draco Meteor, as well as the Outrage, then I'd suggest a TrickScarf set. That way you outspeed it before it's danced. Otherwise you're taking a hit on the switch and another before you attack.

Yes, but that is still esentially neutralizing the threat of Salamence, especially if it had used Dragon Dance; making it lose all of those boosts is almost as much of a victory as KOing it.

Making it lose one turn of set-up. Now certainly, once you know it's a Dragon Dancer, it's then a lot easier to counter. But it's not got rid of, and you'll be wanting to protect your DDMence counter, while your opponent gets rid of it. Information works both ways - you may know it's a DD Mence, but your opponent knows how you're countering it. Also there is the rare Mixed Dancer set to surprise you.
Of course, this kind of stuff goes for anything threatening you forced out I guess.

Yeppers, thats my exact point! Loads of shit revenges Mence. As for the question, your closest thing to a full mence counter is a Porygon2 or Mespirit, but they cannot have taken any prior damage. Latias fares excellently against MixMence, switching in on Fire Blast / Earthquake, then outspeeding and OHKOing.

And mine and others' point is that revenge killing isn't a great answer to a Pokemon.

And Mesprit? Doesn't Cresselia or even Uxie work better?

 

[pmjc]

I disagree that Salamence should be Uber, since I feel that there's always going to be one sweeper that exceeds in skill above others. While I have limited experience playing Pokemon, from all my battles with Salamence variants, I usually found them to be easily counterable when a little bit of thought is used. I think a lot of competitive battlers have gotten into the habit of thinking that just because something doesn't have an extremely obvious counter (say how Gliscor counters Heracross), it is broken and ought to be banned. While it is true that there are probably no direct counters to all of the variant Salamence sets, it doesn't necessarily mean it's broken. Salamence is just an extremely good Pokemon.

Plus I think we're slightly confused as to what extent a Pokemon must be "over-centralizing" in order to have it banned. A Pokemon that's over-centralizing, for instance, would be a Pokemon that's impossible to not have a team with. For example, if Mewtwo or Darkrai were unbanned and put into the OU tier, it's fairly clear that every single team in the leader board would have them, because it would literally be impossible to win without them. I have not seen that happen with Salamence, and therefore don't think there's a legitimate reason as to why it should be banned.

 

[WECAMEASROMANS]

Salamence is not uber, period. True, it has some extremely good stats. Speed, Attack, Special Attack, reasonable defenses backed by intimidate. It's versatile because it can run so many sets, including mixed, dd, specs, etc. However, Salamence does not fill the role of other fellow ubers. The metagame does not centralize around him. It's not really that hard to take Salamence down. And don't give me bullshit about counters either. Pokemon is more than just countering. Latias can beat it 1 on 1, and Scizor can revenge kill it. Swampert, Vaporeon, and Suicune can all survive +1 outrage and KO back with ice beam. This being said, I honestly don't think Salamence should go to ubers.

 

[MrIndigo]

Not necessarily.

You can get situations where one sweeper is a huge margin better than the next-best sweepers.

People who are opposing the test/Uberness need to realise that its not being proposed just because Salamence is the top sweeper in the metagame. It is not the argument of the pro-Uber camp that Salamence is the best sweeper, therefore it should go.

The assertion is that Salamence is so much better than his comrades that he is unbalancing and centralising the metagame.

Furthermore, centralisation doesn't mean "Salamence is invincible" or "Salamence is on every team". As has been pointed out, Salamence OHKOs more than 30 of the top pokemon around even if they run heavily bulky defensive spreads, and 2HKOs everything with a +1 Outrage. The fact that nothing else in the format boasts that kind of raw power is substantial evidence in favour of Uberdom, but even more so for a Suspect test.

This is why the 'slippery slope' argument doesn't explicitly mean that you shouldn't ban anything; the point is not that there is one pokemon at the top, and if you ban it then there's a new pokemon at the top, and you have to ban that, and so on.

It's that one standout pokemon is significantly removed from the other high-ups in the metagame.

In fact, that there is so much dispute at all means that a Suspect test is appropriate.

 

[Senzairu]

Okay. Let me run through this scenario.

Salamence switches in on Pokemon it forces out.
Salamence uses DD, you switch to your counter.
Salamence is now at +1 and can deal those amounts of damage to some of the Bulkiest Pokemon.

To KO him before he takes you out after he DDs, you have to be faster than a +1 Mence, so generally you're going to need to have enough HP to take a hit. If Salamence comes in late game you probably don't have enough to take a +1 Outrage. It could still even be a MixMence and you could be 2HKOd still, as I showed in my last post. And if you switch to a scarf Pokemon, you have to base 100 + or higher (as most run Naive) which is not a lot of Pokemon. 48 Pokemon non-Uber, 15 OU.

Libelldra is the calculator I used, by the way.

You also consider all the priority moves there are in today's metagame. That's a big part of the reason why "Bulky Offense" is a large part of the OU metagame. Scizor and Metagross can hit him with Bullet Punch, Lucario has ExtremeSpeed, among others.

Then consider 30% of teams have Scizor just one of the many priority users. That means with Stealth Rock chipping away 25% EVERY time Mence switches in (which could easily be more than once thanks to Roar and Whirlwind.) and Priority Moves, Mence can be easily checked since more often than not, it's carrying Life Orb which is taking 10% of it's health every time it attacks.

I get that Salamence is an awesome OU Pokemon, but is very doubtfully a Suspect worthy Pokemon.

I stand with the opinion that most people want Salamence in the Suspect testing because he requires a lot of prediction when facing, as do a lot of other Pokemon. Salamence is just the one getting singled out.... for now.

-EDIT-

Thanks for letting me know which calculator you used; I've been trying to find a good one for a while.

 

[Tagrineth]

I disagree that Salamence should be Uber, since I feel that there's always going to be one sweeper that exceeds in skill above others. While I have limited experience playing Pokemon, from all my battles with Salamence variants, I usually found them to be easily counterable when a little bit of thought is used. I think a lot of competitive battlers have gotten into the habit of thinking that just because something doesn't have an extremely obvious counter (say how Gliscor counters Heracross), it is broken and ought to be banned. While it is true that there are probably no direct counters to all of the variant Salamence sets, it doesn't necessarily mean it's broken. Salamence is just an extremely good Pokemon.

The point isn't that Salamence is the best and thus too good, or hard to counter and thus too good.

Lucario is similarly "hard to counter" since it can carry one move for each of its possible hard counters (that is to say, it can carry Crunch for Rotom, Stone Edge for Gyarados, and Ice Punch for Gliscor) with Gliscor the only remaining pokemon with any semblance of an ability to "hard counter" Lucario since an Ice Punch + Extremespeed might not KO and definitely won't without Stealth Rock... but nobody's arguing that Lucario should be a suspect at all, because it's predictable and limited enough by its moveslots to keep it perfectly reasonable.

The problem with Salamence is that even with pokemon that are set up to blockade it, whatever Salamence comes in on, if you aren't already carrying priority or a fast hard attack (in which case the Salamence player screwed up anyway), you're going to HAVE to switch and whatever you switch to is guaranteed to lose far too much health. You can't switch in anything safely at all since there's such an incredibly limited array of pokemon that can survive any attack from Salamence, let alone if they predict correctly and nail you with a super effective attack. Sure you brought in your physically bulky Porygon2 and Traced Intimidate, but you just got hit by a Fire Blast or Draco Meteor. Specially Bulky Porygon2 instead? Well you just ate an EQ or Outrage. Porygon2 is the single best-equipped pokemon for switching in on Salamence, and even then there's a good chance Sally will still crush the poor duck instantly because of P2's disappointing lack of resistances.

And that's even before bringing up that P2 can't do anything back to Salamence once it's in. If Sally Danced, even a Scarf can't make P2 outspeed it, and if it didn't dance, P2 got hit for at least 50% of its health and will die next turn before making a move.

Basically, the argument against Salamence is much the same as the problem with Garchomp - that it can too easily tear down at least one pokemon per battle, and there's really not a whole lot you can do about it unless you, effectively, get lucky and out-guess your opponent. Salamence doesn't have Garchomp's bulk or Swords Dance, but it uses Life Orb instead, a different set of resistances (including Ground immunity), is faster after a Dragon Dance, and trades the raw power on the physical spectrum for an extremely capable Mixed variety that makes it even harder to come in on. Not only that but even with Mence's lower attack, Life Orb + Dragon Dance is VERY close in power to Chomp's SD. the only thing Mence is really missing is STAB on Earthquake.

Salamence is not uber, period. True, it has some extremely good stats. Speed, Attack, Special Attack, reasonable defenses backed by intimidate. It's versatile because it can run so many sets, including mixed, dd, specs, etc. However, Salamence does not fill the role of other fellow ubers. The metagame does not centralize around him. It's not really that hard to take Salamence down. And don't give me bullshit about counters either. Pokemon is more than just countering. Latias can beat it 1 on 1, and Scizor can revenge kill it. Swampert, Vaporeon, and Suicune can all survive +1 outrage and KO back with ice beam. This being said, I honestly don't think Salamence should go to ubers.

I'd also like to point out that there is no "centralization characteristic". If there was, Scizor would be Uber in a heartbeat right now. Centralization tends to be an end result of a Pokemon being overpowered, but it isn't a requirement and isn't an absolute. Wobbuffett is currently the only pokemon banned despite not technically meeting any characteristics, and it didn't even centralize the game - it just absolutely sucks ass to play with and against it, not to mention the fact that Shadow Tag outright breaks the game state (hence Wynaut's banning alongside Wobbs despite its significantly lower stats).

Latias can beat Mence 1 on 1... unless Mence Danced, in which case Latias is SOL and JWF. Unless Latias is Scarfed, which is pretty insane in and of itself (Choice Scarf on a base 110 speed? it takes pokemon the likes of Skymin, Garchomp, Latios, Salamence, and Deoxys-S to cause that one... and we all saw the results of the first part of stage 3... that was one goofy metagame). Not to mention if Latias comes in on a Meteor or Outrage, she's flat out dead or at least crippled beyond repair.

The bulky Waters can do the job, but they can't switch into Garc--- Salamence, and they're all too slow, relegating every one of them to "Revenge Killer".

I think that's actually a pretty good measuring stick right now, actually, for the Offensive Characteristic. When the best solution is to let something die so you can revenge kill, the pokemon is too strong. The only other pokemon right now I can think of that's like this more often than not is Latias. Nothing else really meets that condition.


edit, addendum:

You also consider all the priority moves there are in today's metagame. That's a big part of the reason why "Bulky Offense" is a large part of the OU metagame. Scizor and Metagross can hit him with Bullet Punch, Lucario has ExtremeSpeed, among others.

Look at what you just said though. You were saying this in response to "Switch in counter, but watch a Dragon Dance." None of those priority users can switch into Salamence with any remote semblance of safety. If it's a MixMence and it uses Fire Blast on the Switch, all three of those pokemon are absolutely cooked. Earthquake hits all but Scizor extremely hard, as well.

And then there's Draco Meteor - against max HP Scizor, the "New MixMence" build does about 50% of Scizor's health on the switch in, and Scizor has only a ~50% chance of KOing it back with Bullet Punch (though if it fails to KO, Mence still dies to LO recoil on the next attack).

Metagross may be a strong priority user, but even a CB 252-attack Adamant Metagross does all of

607 Atk vs 196 Def & 331 HP (40 Base Power): 135 - 159 (40.79% - 48.04%)

with Bullet Punch to a 0/0 Salamence. If Mence has only taken SR damage, Metagross is dead and there went your "counter" to Mence.

Scizor fares much better - again, CB 252-attack Adamant

591 Atk vs 196 Def & 331 HP (60 Base Power): 195 - 229 (58.91% - 69.18%)

which means Scizor is dead if Mence has only taken SR damage, and a low enough damage roll (65% or less, which has about a ~60% chance of occurring) means Mence won't die to Life Orb recoil, leaving Mence one more turn to smash something before dying. Unless your team is carrying a second priority user... and God forbid you don't have SR up because if it's not, Mence can repeat this process even with another priority user on your team.

This also disregards the clear issue of your opponent pulling Mence out of the fray temporarily to bring in Magnezone on your Choice Band-locked Bullet Punch and laughing its way to the bank. So much for your Sally checks.

Also, Ice Shard users have it even worse. The only move any of those can come in on is Earthquake (Mamoswine and Donphan), anything else is pretty much dead on the switch in.

 

[DIABLO69]

I think we are confussing a damn good OU Pokémon for a Pokémon which is too good for OU .
Salamence is one of those Pokémon which sweeps our team once, we add check to our team, or a move which can combat it, and the salamence sweep is gone.

Salamence is lke any other powerful Pokémon it can sweep, but it needs the support of it's team. If a Pokémon could sweep without any support from it's team, in OU, then it would Uber. Can salamence do this?
Short answer:it can't.
Long answer:it can not.

Let's look at it this way, when you were last making a team for OU you (if you are a good team builder) made sure you had a check for for the majority of offensive threats in the metagame. Salamense is just another one of those threats. Nothing special.
Now if Salamence was so dangerous that I included weaville on every one of my teams just so it could stop Dragon Dance Salamence , then we could really consider Salamence as an Uber.

Salamene is a strong, solid OU Pokémon. And that's the end.

 

[.Diclonius]

I think we are confusing a damn good OU Pokémon for a Pokémon which is too good for OU .

Salamence is one of those Pokémon which sweeps our team once, we add check to our team, or a move which can combat it, and the Salamence sweep is gone.

Salamence is like any other powerful Pokémon, it can sweep, but it needs the support of it's team. If a Pokémon could sweep without any support from it's team, in OU, then it would Uber. Can Salamence do this?

Short answer: It can't.
Long answer: It can not.

Let's look at it this way, when you were last making a team for OU you (if you are a good team builder) made sure you had a check for for the majority of offensive threats in the metagame. Salamence is just another one of those threats. Nothing special.

Now if Salamence was so dangerous that I included Weaville on every one of my teams just so it could stop Dragon Dance Salamence ,then we could really consider Salamence as an Uber.

Salamence is a strong, solid, OU Pokémon. And that's the end.

I have to agree with this post entirely. One of the main reason Garchomp (former best OU Dragon) was banned to Ubers was because it caused overcentralization, forcing everyone to run a Garchomp, a Garchomp counter, a check for your opponent's Garchomp counter, another Garchomp counter, and then something with a fast Ice attack. Garchomp practically focused OU entirely on itself, something Salamence does not do.

Sure, if Salamence is versatile, and sure, it's unpredictable, but not as unpredictable as you might think. Honestly, when was the last time you saw a Physically Bulky Mence, or a Specs Mence, or something of that sort? The most likely sets you'll see on Salamence on the Ladder, or in any battle really, is Dragon Dance Salamence and either New or Old Mixmence. DDMence is checked by Scizor (and yes, it is checked, since Scizor is guaranteed the the KO bar Critical Hit) and Mixmence can be checked by ScarfLatias (which can come in on a Fire Blast or Earthquake), Scizor (coming in on a Outrage), Blissey (coming in on a Draco Meteor and Thunder Waving it), hell, even Mixape checks Mixmence of any variety.

Here's another thing that keeps Salamence in OU: Survivability. It has none. All common Salamence sets run Life Orb. Automatically, you're shaving off 10% right there. Stealth Rock is, nine times out of ten, set up on the field, so shave another 25%. And then we have a variable, which is Sandstorm. Tyranitar usage has definitely risen, which means Sandstorm is seen more often, so that's another 1/16% off (that's correct, isn't it? 1/16?). With all of that, you've just lost, at the very least, if you chose to attack that turn, 35% of your health, just prime for Scizor to waltz in and wipe you out with Bullet Punch.

Yes, sometimes you may have to sacrifice a Pokemon to see what set it's running, but can't we say the same thing for a few Pokemon? Rotom-A for example. You could switch in a Tyranitar, but you don't know whether or not to expect a Will-O-Wisp or a Trick, or even a Substitute.

Latias is another perfect example. Using the Calm Mind/Refresh/Recover combination, it can easily set up on any Blissey that tried to wall it when it used Dragon Pulse.

And don't even get started on Jirachi. Jirachi, using Thunder Wave and Iron Head, easily decimates teams due to the opponent never being able to get off a single hit. Now before you go "Heatran walls it LOL!11!", isn't that why Gyarados was created? Jirachi is almost as versatile as Salamence, easily pulling off everything from Support to Substitute Calm Mind to Choice band. If anything, Jirachi is more versatile than Salamence, and can easily turn the tide of battle. As an example, say that your opponent sends out a Jirachi against, oh, say a Scizor Bullet Punch. Now obviously, you switch out. But wait, now you have to think for a moment. Is this Jirachi a Support Variation, Choice Band, Mixed, or SubCM? Making the wrong decision in that scenario can easily cost you the game.

I personally believe that Salamence should stay in OU where he belongs, not in Uber, where he'll have no true place. I mean, c'mon. Putting him in Ubers with Garchomp and Rayquaza is practically giving Salamence's usability the death sentence. Thank you for your time, and I hope you take all these things into consideration during your next Suspect test.

 

[Urza]

at the very least, it deserves some sort of test. i think it will probably fall into OU, but there is no other pokemon in the standard metagame that currently deserves a test as much. the only other poke i can think of is scizor (throwing HP fire on random shit is overcentralizing to some degree), but really, OU seems fairly balanced att he moment. sure, you see the same 6-8 pokes over and over, but all it's gonna take is the right set for a random poke (feraligatr maybe? raikou? gallade? or maybe a current OU like celebi, swampert or jirachi...) and there will be a metagame shift. in the meantime, why not test salamence? it certainly is doing a lot of centralization, being the central dragon type threat. if you're prepared for mence, you've got dragonite, flygon and latias covered...but mence can still sometimes come out on top. worth the test, imo.

 

[Objection]

Okay, but when going to build a team, incorporating a scarf user or priority user may not be what's best for the team. This means you don't have those options to deal with Salamence consistently. Consistency is key to defining sweepers in OU. We can deal with every threat consistently, but not Salamence or we wouldn't be having this discussion. Salamence takes prediction, switching, and synergy to deal with; it does not take just one counter Pokemon. That is why Salamence at least deserves a test (note I don't say ban), so that we can see and possibly define the line that is between OU and Uber.

At this point, I am starting to wonder if counters are of any significance either way. For example, I wouldn't run a Rotom-H just to counter Gyarados. I'd run a Rotom-H to counter Gyarados and do something else as well, whether it be my main special sweeper or spin blocker or the pokemon that paralyses everything or something else entirely. Likewise, when considering counters or checks for Salamence, all of them almost certainly have some use on an offensive or balanced team besides countering Salamence. I don't know enough about how stall teams operate to pass any judgement regarding them.

 

[Ulevo]

at the very least, it deserves some sort of test. i think it will probably fall into OU, but there is no other pokemon in the standard metagame that currently deserves a test as much. the only other poke i can think of is scizor (throwing HP fire on random shit is overcentralizing to some degree), but really, OU seems fairly balanced att he moment.

I never realized we as community went around looking for suspects, just because. I had this idea that we utilized stable theorymon in conjunction with supportive statistics to hypothesize, and then test the suspects in question, all under the premise that they may be unhealthy for the competitive OU environment.

My bad. The next time someone from the PR mentions this, I'll be sure to let them know!

 

[Stylish Interval]

Let's look at it this way, when you were last making a team for OU you (if you are a good team builder) made sure you had a check for for the majority of offensive threats in the metagame. Salamense is just another one of those threats. Nothing special.
Now if Salamence was so dangerous that I included weaville on every one of my teams just so it could stop Dragon Dance Salamence , then we could really consider Salamence as an Uber.

When you put in a check for Salamence, you also have to know that it's a check. That means either you have to predict correctly to get it in or you have to revenge kill it. You can't every single time expect to stop Salamence with that one Pokemon. It'll probably take two or three of your own Pokemon, some of which will not be on your team by the time you deal with it. If you use a Steel to switch in on a Dragon Dance Salamence, you assume he is going to Dragon Dance. Will this happen everytime? No. If you switch in a choice user expecting the Dragon Dance, will it happen every time? No. He could just as easily attack as he could set up. You can't consistently deal with him, unless you revenge kill him. Even then it's a gamble if you're only base 100 to deal with Dragon Dance Salamence when revenge killing.

At this point, I am starting to wonder if counters are of any significance either way. For example, I wouldn't run a Rotom-H just to counter Gyarados. I'd run a Rotom-H to counter Gyarados and do something else as well, whether it be my main special sweeper or spin blocker or the pokemon that paralyses everything or something else entirely. Likewise, when considering counters or checks for Salamence, all of them almost certainly have some use on an offensive or balanced team besides countering Salamence. I don't know enough about how stall teams operate to pass any judgement regarding them.

To say counters aren't of significance is ridiculous. Without counters the game would be merely revenging Pokemon or seeing if you can set up and sweep first. The game wouldn't be the game. Counters balance out the game, providing a way to stop Pokemon from sweeping or doing damage to your team. If counters weren't of significance that wouldn't have been in argument in the threads about Garchomp being Uber.

Your point about checks for Salamence having other uses, that's valid. I guess the way I thought about it was when building a team, I don't want to stop to say "Oh jeez I don't have a way to check Salamence yet" and then stick a Scarfer or Priority user on my team. I do wonder how Stall does it, though. I've never played with it but it seems like Stall is threatened by Salamence. Oh well, I'll stop there as it's irrelevant.

 

[Senzairu]

Look at what you just said though. You were saying this in response to "Switch in counter, but watch a Dragon Dance." None of those priority users can switch into Salamence with any remote semblance of safety. If it's a MixMence and it uses Fire Blast on the Switch, all three of those pokemon are absolutely cooked. Earthquake hits all but Scizor extremely hard, as well.

And then there's Draco Meteor - against max HP Scizor, the "New MixMence" build does about 50% of Scizor's health on the switch in, and Scizor has only a ~50% chance of KOing it back with Bullet Punch (though if it fails to KO, Mence still dies to LO recoil on the next attack).

Metagross may be a strong priority user, but even a CB 252-attack Adamant Metagross does all of

607 Atk vs 196 Def & 331 HP (40 Base Power): 135 - 159 (40.79% - 48.04%)

with Bullet Punch to a 0/0 Salamence. If Mence has only taken SR damage, Metagross is dead and there went your "counter" to Mence.

Scizor fares much better - again, CB 252-attack Adamant

591 Atk vs 196 Def & 331 HP (60 Base Power): 195 - 229 (58.91% - 69.18%)

which means Scizor is dead if Mence has only taken SR damage, and a low enough damage roll (65% or less, which has about a ~60% chance of occurring) means Mence won't die to Life Orb recoil, leaving Mence one more turn to smash something before dying. Unless your team is carrying a second priority user... and God forbid you don't have SR up because if it's not, Mence can repeat this process even with another priority user on your team.

This also disregards the clear issue of your opponent pulling Mence out of the fray temporarily to bring in Magnezone on your Choice Band-locked Bullet Punch and laughing its way to the bank. So much for your Sally checks.

Also, Ice Shard users have it even worse. The only move any of those can come in on is Earthquake (Mamoswine and Donphan), anything else is pretty much dead on the switch in.

I like how you didn't quote the whole statement and only picked out one little part to argue against. But you're still missing the whole point. Prediction is a part of the game. If you can't predict well, then of course you're not going to succeed against ANY versatile Pokemon, not just Salamence.

 

[Game Freak201]

I find it quite interesting that no one commented on this post. I find that Salamence being even suspect worthy to be quite ludicrous due to its frailty, inherent ice weakness, ease of revenge killing, and smart playing to determine its set. And if you're running a team that can't directly outspeed Salamence, Toxic, Will-o-Wisp, and Thunder Wave will easily cripple/reduce the time he could sweep.

To say counters aren't of significance is ridiculous. Without counters the game would be merely revenging Pokemon or seeing if you can set up and sweep first. The game wouldn't be the game. Counters balance out the game, providing a way to stop Pokemon from sweeping or doing damage to your team. If counters weren't of significance that wouldn't have been in argument in the threads about Garchomp being Uber.

This quote just wants to make me bang my head against the wall. In case you haven't noticed, even the DP metagame was all about checking and not as concerned about countering. Just look at most of the teams in the RMT archive and you'll notice that most of them don't go out of the way of countering a specific pokemon; instead, they use various checks and smart playing to get around problem pokemon. Also, Objection is right in that fact that you should only run a check/counter to a pokemon if it's doing more than just checking/countering or else it would result in bad synergy. Take for example Swampert. He makes a good DDMence check, but he would completely ruin my momentum if I were running a HO team. If he was being used as a lead in a BO team to set-up SR, counter some leads, and check DDMence; then he would make for a much better teammate. In addition, Garchomp originally became Uber due to its Yache set overcentralizing the metagame.

 

[pmjc]

The problem with Salamence is that even with pokemon that are set up to blockade it, whatever Salamence comes in on, if you aren't already carrying priority or a fast hard attack (in which case the Salamence player screwed up anyway), you're going to HAVE to switch and whatever you switch to is guaranteed to lose far too much health.

You can't switch in anything safely at all since there's such an incredibly limited array of pokemon that can survive any attack from Salamence, let alone if they predict correctly and nail you with a super effective attack. Sure you brought in your physically bulky Porygon2 and Traced Intimidate, but you just got hit by a Fire Blast or Draco Meteor. Specially Bulky Porygon2 instead? Well you just ate an EQ or Outrage. Porygon2 is the single best-equipped pokemon for switching in on Salamence, and even then there's a good chance Sally will still crush the poor duck instantly because of P2's disappointing lack of resistances.

And that's even before bringing up that P2 can't do anything back to Salamence once it's in. If Sally Danced, even a Scarf can't make P2 outspeed it, and if it didn't dance, P2 got hit for at least 50% of its health and will die next turn before making a move.

I don't think it's all that important that "no one" can switch "safely" into Salamence's moves. The fact of the matter is, no matter what Salamence does, every single one of those choices is very easily punished.

If, suppose by chance, you slipped and let Salamence Dragon Dance, it's still vulnerable to priority attacks, scarfed pokemon with a base speed stat greater than 100, and bulky Pokemon such as Cresselia.

Now, suppose your opposing Salamence user out-predicts you and chooses Fire Blast/Draco Meteor, and you had your Scizor/Porygon2 killed. However, by it choosing that, it's vulnerable to getting tricked by a Rotom-A form, killed by any non-scarfed pokemon with a speed greater than 100, or having an opposing Latias kill your Salamence and get an opportunity to set up. Of course, this isn't an exhaustive list.

However, looking at only these points, it could be argued that this isn't enough; Salamence is still over-centralizing because it's an excellent wall-breaker and can hit very hard from both spectra, and will (for the sake of argument) always take out one or more pokemon. However, you have to realize that Salamence can't do all of this stuff without any consequences. If the ever-common scenario of Stealth Rocks and Standstorm are on, it's going to take a lot of damage just switching in, even if we factor out Life Orb recoil (which, might I add, is essential for it to do serious damage). If Salamence, realizing that it could be easily killed, flees for any reason, there's a good chance it won't have enough HP left to survive next time it comes back in.

Basically, the argument against Salamence is much the same as the problem with Garchomp - that it can too easily tear down at least one pokemon per battle, and there's really not a whole lot you can do about it unless you, effectively, get lucky and out-guess your opponent. Salamence doesn't have Garchomp's bulk or Swords Dance, but it uses Life Orb instead, a different set of resistances (including Ground immunity), is faster after a Dragon Dance, and trades the raw power on the physical spectrum for an extremely capable Mixed variety that makes it even harder to come in on. Not only that but even with Mence's lower attack, Life Orb + Dragon Dance is VERY close in power to Chomp's SD. the only thing Mence is really missing is STAB on Earthquake.

You're dismissing just how negative the effects of Life Orb are on a pokemon like Salamence. First, you have to realize that if you want to have Salamence be somewhat close in power to Garchomp, you need a Life Orb and a Dragon Dance, while Garchomp just needs a Swords Dance (which, might I emphasize, gives it more offensive power than a Salamence with +1 attack and a Life Orb). The fact that Garchomp does not need Life Orb, has both a Stealth Rock resistance and a sandstorm immunity, in addition to having more bulk in general makes it much more potent for its sheer survivability. As for Salamence, having it switch more than once is more or less implausible once you factor in all the residual damage.

The rational you use to justify Salamence being "more capable" of sweeping than Garchomp seems shaky at best, and thus isn't compelling enough to warrant its banning.

In fact, that there is so much dispute at all means that a Suspect test is appropriate.

Dispute? You do realize that there are almost 100 more votes in favor of it being not banned than it being banned?

 

[cantab]

I find it quite interesting that no one commented on this post. I find that Salamence being even suspect worthy to be quite ludicrous due to its frailty, inherent ice weakness, ease of revenge killing, and smart playing to determine its set.

If you focus on the negatives of anything you'll find the idea that it's Uber ludicrous. Replace 'ice weakness' with 'bug, dark, and ghost weaknesses', and everything you said above applies to Deoxys-A and -N.

 

[Tagrineth]

I'd like to reiterate a few things that people seem to be missing here:

1. Centralization is not a characteristic required for a pokemon to be Uber.

Wobbuffett is a huge example of a pokemon banished to Ubers that wasn't even used heavily before being banned.

2. This is not a "Should Salamence be banished to Ubers?" thread. This is a "Should Salamence get a Suspect test?" thread.

It's not getting banned here, people. This is proposing that Salamence get tested, and notice that Latias has "survived" almost four rounds of Suspect testing now, with Manaphy probably dropping to OU too. Salamence getting a round of suspect testing doesn't mean it automatically gets banned to Ubers.

And YES, THERE IS A DISPUTE. 31% of votes say it should be tested, I'd hardly call that insignificant.

 

[Nida]

I don't play on Shoddy often, and when I do, it's a casual affair. I toss together teams of critters I like with half-ass lip service paid to team synergy and threat checking. Even so, I don't think I've ever - ever - lost more than one critter to Salamence, and usually I lose nothing. It doesn't matter who's using the Mence, or what the set is; generally, a Wish/Protect/Ice Beam Vaporeon will handle it nicely, with CB Metagross for priority, power, or explosiveness as a backup in case Vaporeon gets trashed. And I know that's hardly the end-all of Salamence counters.

I've assembled a couple of decent Mences on the Wifi forums for the sake of future trading, but I'm not going to put one on an actual team anytime soon. It's strong as hell, but it requires a buttload of support to make sure it can actually pull off anything other than a single KO. Magnezone support is almost a given with that thing these days, and that's a minimum. That's at least two spaces on my team to be filled with Pokemon I don't even like that much, with little return to justify it.

It's a terrifying Pokemon if you don't have anything that can take a hit from it - and if you let it psych you out. People see Salamence and panic. I think it'd be hilarious for it to be put to a suspect test; maybe I'd actually join in the test instead of lurking it. Somehow I doubt that putting Mence on my team would seriously improve my ladder score. :P

 

[pmjc]

If you focus on the negatives of anything you'll find the idea that it's Uber ludicrous. Replace 'ice weakness' with 'bug, dark, and ghost weaknesses', and everything you said above applies to Deoxys-A and -N.

Regarding Deoxys-A and Deoxys, I think that's a broken analogy because both do not need to set up in order to do a similar amount of damage.

 

[Eternal]

I can say the Salamence will never be OU.

Fine, we can all see that Salamence is extremely difficult to counter after a Dragon Dance. But look at it this way, you need 1 turn in order to use Dragon Dance. You're weak to SR, meaning your HP is down by 25% when switching in (while this also limits Salamence from switching out, such a harsh restriction). Not only that, in order for Salamence to be at its fullest power, it needs Life Orb (which also weakens it). Salamence usually helps battling against stall teams. Without Salamence stall teams will increase for sure. And I'm not saying stall teams are "too good," all I'm saying is that if you're limiting Pokemon that can help ease you in combatting against stall, then how likely is it that the metagame will not revolve around stall? It is very logical.

While Dragon Dance Salamence can be stopped by many Scarf Pokemon and even Bulky Pokemon. You even have Pokemon like Choice Band Scizor (30% usage) to revenge kill that thing with ease (with SR up).

While the mix version also carries the same weaknesses. Along with a Base 100 speed limit. There are widespread revenge killers.

When making a suggestion of whether Salamence is truly overpowered in OU, you should compare it with other Pokemon. Look at Scizor for instance. How many Pokemon can actually resist CB U-turn well? It has priority, Swords Dance sweeper, so many resistances, etc. Look at Gyarados. Gyarados is one of those Pokemon that limit what you can use in your team. Wouldn't you love to get rid of Gyarados so you don't need a HP Elec Suicune/Vaporeon, Scarf Jirachi Tbolt, I can't even think of other counters except Scarfers. What about Rotom-A? It is just like Salamence. What can you use to stop SubCharge Rotom-A from inflicting massive damage to your team? While Rotom-A comes in many different sets, it's just as impossible to tell which set the opponent is using like Salamence. I can go on and name many more, but as you can see the metagame is actually unstable. And since there isn't any other Pokemon that would made a good candidate for Suspect, I guess we should just go with Salamence just for the hell of it.

 

[MrIndigo]

People saying "Salamence can't broken because 30% of teams run Scizor" miss the point that Bullet Punch is only useful against Salamence, of the Top 10 OU pokemon. That's evidence in favour of Salamence's brokenness, that it pulls a pokemon who is otherwise below the top 10 to the number one position.

 

[Chinese Dood]

First, you have to realize that if you want to have Salamence be somewhat close in power to Garchomp, you need a Life Orb and a Dragon Dance, while Garchomp just needs a Swords Dance (which, might I emphasize, gives it more offensive power than a Salamence with +1 attack and a Life Orb).

Just something minor:
Adamant Garchomp's attack after 1 SD is:
394 x 2 = 788.

Adamant LO Salamence's attack after 1 DD is:
405 x 1.5 x 1.3 = 789.

Plus, back when Garchomp's OU, many Garchomps were Jolly to outspeed +base 100s anyway, which would actually mean 359 x 2 = 718. Garchomp does have a stronger Earthquake though, of course.

 

[Eternal]

People saying "Salamence can't broken because 30% of teams run Scizor" miss the point that Bullet Punch is only useful against Salamence, of the Top 10 OU pokemon. That's evidence in favour of Salamence's brokenness, that it pulls a pokemon who is otherwise below the top 10 to the number one position.

I think you need to go back and check the Top 10 OU Pokemon are. Not to mention the power and flexibility of Choice Band STAB Technician Bullet Punch and priority.

Just something minor:
Adamant Garchomp's attack after 1 SD is:
394 x 2 = 788.

Adamant LO Salamence's attack after 1 DD is:
405 x 1.5 x 1.3 = 789.

Plus, back when Garchomp's OU, many Garchomps were Jolly to outspeed +base 100s anyway, which would actually mean 359 x 2 = 718. Garchomp does have a stronger Earthquake though, of course.

Not only that Garchomp resists Stealth Rock (it is not limited to switching out, nor losing valuable HP). Garchomp, with its power, can carry Yache Berry and still be able to sweep with massive power (unlike Salamence). While Garchomp is is much more bulkier than Salamence, along with STAB Earthquake and Sand Veil evasion. Salamence can be a successful mix variant (unlike ChainChomp), but Garchomp with SD does statistically better at sweeping stall teams than Mixmence.

 

[Staraptor Call]

I don't think it's all that important that "no one" can switch "safely" into Salamence's moves. The fact of the matter is, no matter what Salamence does, every single one of those choices is very easily punished.

If, suppose by chance, you slipped and let Salamence Dragon Dance, it's still vulnerable to priority attacks, scarfed pokemon with a base speed stat greater than 100, and bulky Pokemon such as Cresselia.

Now, suppose your opposing Salamence user out-predicts you and chooses Fire Blast/Draco Meteor, and you had your Scizor/Porygon2 killed. However, by it choosing that, it's vulnerable to getting tricked by a Rotom-A form, killed by any non-scarfed pokemon with a speed greater than 100, or having an opposing Latias kill your Salamence and get an opportunity to set up. Of course, this isn't an exhaustive list.

However, looking at only these points, it could be argued that this isn't enough; Salamence is still over-centralizing because it's an excellent wall-breaker and can hit very hard from both spectra, and will (for the sake of argument) always take out one or more pokemon. However, you have to realize that Salamence can't do all of this stuff without any consequences. If the ever-common scenario of Stealth Rocks and Standstorm are on, it's going to take a lot of damage just switching in, even if we factor out Life Orb recoil (which, might I add, is essential for it to do serious damage). If Salamence, realizing that it could be easily killed, flees for any reason, there's a good chance it won't have enough HP left to survive next time it comes back in.



You're dismissing just how negative the effects of Life Orb are on a pokemon like Salamence. First, you have to realize that if you want to have Salamence be somewhat close in power to Garchomp, you need a Life Orb and a Dragon Dance, while Garchomp just needs a Swords Dance (which, might I emphasize, gives it more offensive power than a Salamence with +1 attack and a Life Orb). The fact that Garchomp does not need Life Orb, has both a Stealth Rock resistance and a sandstorm immunity, in addition to having more bulk in general makes it much more potent for its sheer survivability. As for Salamence, having it switch more than once is more or less implausible once you factor in all the residual damage.

The rational you use to justify Salamence being "more capable" of sweeping than Garchomp seems shaky at best, and thus isn't compelling enough to warrant its banning.



Dispute? You do realize that there are almost 100 more votes in favor of it being not banned than it being banned?

Everything in this post concerning Salamence could apply just as easily to Rayquaza. Just like Salamence, Rayquaza is easily revenge killed. Just like Salamence, Rayquaza can be predicted around. But these things obviously don't make Rayquaza OU. Salamence is similar to Rayquaza that it is versatilite, can OHKO or 2HKO everything in OU, and that it has no completely safe switch-in. Salamence is not even very far behind Rayquaza in how good it is at sweeping, because although it does not have as much attack power as Rayquaza, has no priority, and takes damage from Sandstorm, it has a significant amount more speed and the very useful Intimidate ability.

And the argument that many things can revenge-kill Salamence is not a valid argument either. If Salamence needs to be revenge-killed, it has already fulfilled its purpose of KOing at least one Pokemon and of giving the game a faster, more offensive pace. The Salamence user also gets to switch in one Pokemon for free after the revenge-kill, letting Salamence user keep the pressure on with the threat of another sweep.

Even though Salamence takes large amounts of damage from Stealth Rock, Sandstorm, and Life Orb, all three of these will not usually be on the field. A good Salamence user would not use Tyranitar on the same team, so Sandstorm would not be active more than around eighteen percent of the time. The Salamence user could also use an Aerodactyl or a similar Stealth Rock-preventing lead. Starmie is a very viable partner for Salamence, and can Rapid Spin away Stealth Rock. And the assumption of Life Orb damage ignores that the Salamence user could be using a Leftovers Salamence, a very viable, broadly useful set that makes DDMence's most common check, Scizor, not useful anymore. When determining how Salamence does against certain Pokemon, don't assume that Sandstorm, Stealth Rock, and Life Orb are all in play.

 

[cantab]

I've assembled a couple of decent Mences on the Wifi forums for the sake of future trading, but I'm not going to put one on an actual team anytime soon. It's strong as hell, but it requires a buttload of support to make sure it can actually pull off anything other than a single KO. Magnezone support is almost a given with that thing these days, and that's a minimum. That's at least two spaces on my team to be filled with Pokemon I don't even like that much, with little return to justify it.

One key KO could be enough to win. It's probably not enough in and of itself to call Mence Uber though, since it's not the Mence player that decides what it KOs.
If you don't like Salamence, or any other Pokemon, that's fine. I think there's a place for personal preference in competitive Pokemon. But it's not too relevant to this discussion. For someone who DOES like Magnezone, Zone + Mence is an obvious and powerful combination.

EDIT: @ Staraptor Call. Life Orb is I think one thing that can generally be assumed. Sure, Mence can run Leftovers, Lum Berry, even Yache Berry and work quite well. (Personally I like using Lum Berry; it lets me set up on status moves, or else lets me carry on after an Outrage.) But without LO it lacks the raw offensive power, giving it more safe switch ins. Choice items have their own drawbacks of course. Draco Plate might be a nice option, but it's no help against steels. I'm fairly confident the most threatening Salamence sets are Orbed.