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np: UU - Rain Drops Keep Falling on my Head

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Apples to oranges. Leafeon and Venusaur both have their pros and cons as straight up Swords Dancers.

For example: Leafeon is quite fast, and actually beats Moltres if it switches in on Swords Dance. Venusaur has access to the ever useful Sleep powder. Leafeon can take on physical hits better, (can set up on Torterra) while Venusaur has good special defense. Often surviving a non-stabbed Super effective hit.

There's more but that's the gist of it.



 
@ Bluewind: Not to be a Captain Obvious, but Cress is a defensive Pokemon, so attack, speed, priority, and coverage really don't mean shit to her. She got banned by walling everything (EVERYTHING), sweeping offensive teams, and dicking around with almost any playstyle you can think of.

Raikou has more than its fair share of problems in UU and I'd actually be willing to say that it's outright worse than any of the other BLs we've had so far. Of course, I still do think it's BL material, but mostly for the reason that it's just plain better than the vast majority of UU as it stands now and has horribly inconsistent checks with only one full-blown counter.
 
About grasses: i like Exeggutor myself.

This one has the best damage potential of all grass pokes from both sides (sorry Cacturne, but you lack stronger STAB moves...). It's also surprisingly bulky from the physical side (around as bulky as Milotic). And watching coconuts go boom is another nice thing going for it.

Eggy happens to be versatile.

But yeah: it's slow. And it's weak to almost anything out there.

Exeggutor is so cool that it even has 2 exclusive moves! (ok, one is semi exclusive).
 
@ Bluewind: Not to be a Captain Obvious, but Cress is a defensive Pokemon, so attack, speed, priority, and coverage really don't mean shit to her. She got banned by walling everything (EVERYTHING), sweeping offensive teams, and dicking around with almost any playstyle you can think of.

I'm well aware of that fact (actually I knew someone would say that anyway, and her offensive set was deemed to be the most broken, falling into the same categories that he stated why Raikou wasn't truly BL), and that's why I have put on my post the "explain your point better" part. The way he puts it makes it looks like every poké that does not have those attributes are automatically not broken.
 
You guys all of this talk about Sub Charge Manetric's compels me to talk about some underrated threats.

In order
#3: Raichu.
Not just the standard Nasty plot 3 attacks set, but Nasty plot/T-bolt/Hp Ice/Encore. You've got loads more of enemies to take on.

You know how Clefable can stop Raikou from setting up? Yeah kinda like that but shittier. This is assuming Raikou switches in on YOU.
and you aren't hard stomped by Quagsire who isn't overly common in UU.

Raichu's boah set (yeah I just said that lawl) is actually pretty neat.

-Hasty
-Expert Belt/Leftovers
~Volt Tackle/T-bolt
~Grass Knot/Hp Ice
~Focus Punch
~Substitute/Encore (For the ballsy)
EVs: 252 Atk / 80 SpA / 176 Spe

(If you use Grass Knot, you may as well dump those SpA EV's into speed because GK reliably 2HKO's all of the common ground types in UU)

This moveset can give you some pretty decent coverage, and you don't have to worry about being walled by tough ground types.


#2: Floatzel.
People talked about using Kabutops out of rain. I've got the perfect alternative. Bulk Up Floatzel is actually pretty awesome. It's extremely fast (Raikou's speed) and you can outright sweep. (1+ Ice punch OHKO's most Venusaur with SR) Kabutops is a lot stronger, but has an awful typing (equal unboosted power) AND is a lot slower.
-Jolly
-Life orb
~Bulk Up
~Waterfall
~Ice Punch / Aqua Jet
~Return
EVs: 32 Hp/ 252 Atk / 48 Def / 176 Spe

Boosted Aqua jets can be pretty useful against priority users, and you can use it as a last resort against Raikou himself if you don't want to **** around.



And the #1 most underrated sweeper in ALL of UU...

#1:Magmortar!!!

Seriously, this thing ROCKS and I love using it on most of my teams. LO Magmortar is a MONSTER, and you should be very afraid when it safely gets in. T-bolt 2HKO's Milotic and Slowking WITHOUT entry hazards and Fire Blast decimates. Say goodbye to the wall breakers of yesteryear (coughBlazikencough) when you can wall break right on your own with Cross Chop. (Mainly only for Chansey) as it easily 2HKO's.
Do NOT underestimate this thing or you WILL wind up getting destroyed. It's got decent speed, (easily outspeeds opposing Blaziken and Venusaur with base 83 speed)

TL:DR) T-bolt and Cross chop on a fire type special sweeper is too awesome. Use it for it's strengths over Moltres, namely it's ability to beat Chansey and bulky Waters reliably. (Moltres is still better)


 
#3 = Raikou
#2 = Feraligatr
# 1 = Moltres

Those are the problems of those threats.

Easily workable around though:

Raichu: Nasty Plot, Encore, physical attacks
Floatzel: Taunt, Baton Pass, Rain Dance. I guess setting up Bulk Up on something that can't break Substitues after some BU too (if the enemy is just dumb).
Magmortar: Thunderbolt, Cross Chop.
 
#3 = Raikou
#2 = Feraligatr
# 1 = Moltres

Those are the problems of those threats.

Easily workable around though:

Raichu: Nasty Plot, Encore, physical attacks
Floatzel: Taunt, Baton Pass, Rain Dance. I guess setting up Bulk Up on something that can't break Substitues after some BU too (if the enemy is just dumb).
Magmortar: Thunderbolt, Cross Chop.


Ah that's what I was going for. NU parallels for those UU pokemon. Although, Magmortar's T-bolt/Cross Chop should NOT be underestimated. I can't believe I'm saying this but he should be UU.
 
Ah that's what I was going for. NU parallels for those UU pokemon. Although, Magmortar's T-bolt/Cross Chop should NOT be underestimated. I can't believe I'm saying this but he should be UU.

I believe he should be UU as well, just his usage says otherwise :( I think ppl look at him more of a choiced pokemon and stick to the smogon sets instead of really expirementing with him... The sub+Torterra you guys were talking about works extremely well...and I remember back EARLY EARLY right when DP came out, i ran a sub Magmortar with focus punch...lol almost nothing was able to safely switch into that and blissey would always status or heal instead of attacking right away so it gave me a free sub and blissey got a focus punch to the face...the same can be said now about Magmortar, i believe that it would do great success in UU if people started using it more...lol i'll aid in its usages if anyone else wants to participate :)
 
Magmortar is most definitely underrated and worthy of UU. Its so much better than Blaziken I dont know why people still use Ken's wallbreaker set (especially the slow one). Its only issue is switching in, since everything hurts it (best chance is coming in on Stealth Rock or maybe SD from a Venusaur).
 
Not everything hurts it that badly. Magmortar has a good 95 sp.def stat.

About Sub pokes: i found out Marowak to be a rather dangerous one. Sub/EQ/Rock Slide/ Fire Punch can do some holes on the opponent team.

Of course, it needs Wish support, because it has no Leftovers.

And about leads: i still think that my good old Muk lead is a cool one. Shadow Sneak + Trick immunity + powerful attack in Gunk Shot + Explosion... pairing up with Torterra, and you can pwn those Registeel/Aggron switches.
 
I'm well aware of that fact (actually I knew someone would say that anyway, and her offensive set was deemed to be the most broken, falling into the same categories that he stated why Raikou wasn't truly BL), and that's why I have put on my post the "explain your point better" part. The way he puts it makes it looks like every poké that does not have those attributes are automatically not broken.

Er Cresselia relies on bulk and Moonlight to set up; SubCM Cress pretty much expects to take hits while sweeping but it's bulky enough to absorb them and retaliate. Raikou can't count on getting more than one Calm Mind more often than not, and it can't take hits nearly as well as Cresselia either.
 
I once thought Frosslass was UU. THEN I realised the potential it had outside of the lead position. :/

No, I don't have "OMG Super effective hits!" syndrome. Raikou has 2 MASSIVE, glaring problems.

1: It cannot raise it's speed. It IS fast from the get-go, but anything that outspeeds can deal some good damage. Well, it CAN raise it's speed, but running a Scarf on Raikou is a bad idea, as it allows Duggy to walk all over it.

2: It has no priority moves. Unless it Mimics something, but... no, I shouldn't have to point out the problem here.

It also has coverage problems, but it can run weaker moves and HP to hit a lot of stuff, so that isn't as bad.

Is it good? Yes. Is it broken? ...not in my opinion.

Do you realize that those make Raikou actually appear better than Cresselia?

Raikou is faster than Cresselia, and by your logic, better.

I would actually agree with you about Raikou being better than Cresselia but I am definitely under the impression that you don't think so and accidentally made these implications.

@ Bluewind: Not to be a Captain Obvious, but Cress is a defensive Pokemon, so attack, speed, priority, and coverage really don't mean shit to her. She got banned by walling everything (EVERYTHING), sweeping offensive teams, and dicking around with almost any playstyle you can think of.

Raikou has more than its fair share of problems in UU and I'd actually be willing to say that it's outright worse than any of the other BLs we've had so far. Of course, I still do think it's BL material, but mostly for the reason that it's just plain better than the vast majority of UU as it stands now and has horribly inconsistent checks with only one full-blown counter.

Raikou, again by those reasons, is better than Cresselia. Once we establish that SubCM Cresselia didn't wall shit, Raikou appears to be, well, THAT much better. Raikou has inconsistent checks? Cresselia has all of those checks and other fast hard-hitters like Houndoom, Drapion, and Scyther.

This is why I have been saying how horribly hypocritical it is to ban Cresselia for a SubCM set and not Raikou. It literally makes no sense when you dialectically compare the two sets.

Magmortar is most definitely underrated and worthy of UU. Its so much better than Blaziken I dont know why people still use Ken's wallbreaker set (especially the slow one). Its only issue is switching in, since everything hurts it (best chance is coming in on Stealth Rock or maybe SD from a Venusaur).

Fine I'll respond to this.

"Blaziken can use Superpower and STAB Vacuum Wave to take out Pokemon like Arcanine, Azumarill, SpD Milotic, Lanturn, and the like. Magmortar cannot do anything mixed Blaziken can't from a wall breaking standpoint".

Magmortar is a much better Life Orb sweeper with Fire Blast, Thunderbolt, and HP something due to its better coverage, but if you're beating stall teams mixed Blaziken is probably second-to-none.

Plus I have it in my signature so it is therefore better and I know more about it.

Er Cresselia relies on bulk and Moonlight to set up; SubCM Cress pretty much expects to take hits while sweeping but it's bulky enough to absorb them and retaliate. Raikou can't count on getting more than one Calm Mind more often than not, and it can't take hits nearly as well as Cresselia either.

It wasn't banned for Moonlight; It was banned for SubCM. I will give you that it can't take hits like Cresselia, but it has one weakness that is absolutely absurd to run on any Choiced Pokemon and is thus less exploitable.

Seriously, dialectically compare their relevant traits and you'll see what I mean when I call it a hypocrisy to ban one and not the other. If Cresselia was banned for another set, it would make sense.
 
It wasn't banned for Moonlight; It was banned for SubCM. I will give you that it can't take hits like Cresselia, but it has one weakness that is absolutely absurd to run on any Choiced Pokemon and is thus less exploitable.

Seriously, dialectically compare their relevant traits and you'll see what I mean when I call it a hypocrisy to ban one and not the other. If Cresselia was banned for another set, it would make sense.

There are many reasons why Cresselia was banned, SubCM was but one of them. I bet the fact that Cresselia could very well be running Moonlight contributed to it being voted BL.
 
Heysup, I'm not sure what your argument was for Cresselia being banned, but I'm pretty sure my essay and a number of others concluded that BOTH sets are what made it broken. You either abuse her walling capabilities to come in on almost any sweeper and set up, or come in on something that can't touch you no matter what, like Dugtrio or Hitmontop, then sub to safeguard it from Chansey, Toxic, and Trick.

The only real difference is ease of use. Sub gets past some of its counters and needs to be brought in carefully for maximum setup potential, while standard CM walls/sweeps the entire tier and has innumerable switch-in opportunities.

Now, if we were to consider the simple fact that Cress can take both physical and special hits with ease, that already gives it a pretty big edge over Raikou. Then you factor in recovery, immunity to the ever omnipresent Spikes, no auto-counter button in the form of Dugtrio...it's not even a contest, Cresselia wins.

To be perfectly honest, I'm not even sure why we're having this argument, since it doesn't matter that much in the grand scheme of things. Cresselia was broken then, Raikou is broken now. Raikou abuses its speed, power, and coverage to force out Pokemon and beat its checks with the proper set, Cress gets by walling everything and setting up 5x easier with only two sets. We're talking about two different Pokemon here.

The most important thing here is that Raikou can do what the majority of the tier's sweepers can't: get past its checks/counters and actually sweep. That's why I plan to vote it BL.
 
The most important thing here is that Raikou can do what the majority of the tier's sweepers can't: get past its checks/counters and actually sweep.

This is probably the one reason that I'm not fully inclined to say that Raikou is UU. It can run sets that completely walk over its designated counters, making them unreliable at best. Of course, Chansey and Registeel pretty much still hard counter him, which is why I don't think that he is outrightly broken.
 
Ahhh I've nearly met voting requirements, but I just looked at the round end date lol.

I've been using Scarf Tauros today and damn is it a good revenge killer. Enough speed to outrun shitloads and enough attack to deal shitloads of damage. Sadly I can't predict quite well enough with Pursuit. >.>;
 
I like Tauros too, it is such an awesome Pokemon. LO + 4 Attacks is probably my favourite (Return/EQ/Stone Edge/Zen Headbutt). It's like a UU physical Starmie.
 
There are many reasons why Cresselia was banned, SubCM was but one of them. I bet the fact that Cresselia could very well be running Moonlight contributed to it being voted BL.

Pick your poison: Cresselia was either banned because of the "main" set (ie the set that was talked about the most) SubCM, or it was banned because it beat most Pokemon in the tier when it uses the following set: 252 HP / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD / 252 Spe with Timid, Bold, and Modest natures, and a moveset of Substitute / Moonlight / Calm Mind / Psychic / Hidden Power Ground / Hidden Power Fighting / Signal Beam / Charge Beam / Ice Beam / Rest / Sleep Talk / Thunder Wave.

Note: both of these arguments apply to Raikou but by a greater extent.

Just hypocrisy (banned for SubCM) or hypocrisy + fallacy (banned for the latter "argument")? I may be exaggerating a bit (but really, not much), but the point still stands that if Cresselia was banned for having "so many good sets that can beat many different Pokemon" then it was indeed the same argument I stated above.

Heysup, I'm not sure what your argument was for Cresselia being banned, but I'm pretty sure my essay and a number of others concluded that BOTH sets are what made it broken. You either abuse her walling capabilities to come in on almost any sweeper and set up, or come in on something that can't touch you no matter what, like Dugtrio or Hitmontop, then sub to safeguard it from Chansey, Toxic, and Trick.

The only real difference is ease of use. Sub gets past some of its counters and needs to be brought in carefully for maximum setup potential, while standard CM walls/sweeps the entire tier and has innumerable switch-in opportunities.

This sort of thing is the exact thing I was saying in my response to Banedon. You are inventing one "Super" Cresselia that can actually switch in super easily, use Sub, wall, recover, set up Calm Mind, etc. Raikou did the same thing (but more so, Restalk beats Chansey and Registeel, SubCM with "every move" combination beats everything else) and it wasn't banned. It is just fallacious no matter how you look at it; So if it was a valid argument, why wasn't Raikou banned too? If the fact that SubCM was such an unstoppable sweeper was a valid argument, why wasn't Raikou banned too? It is simply fallacious and/or hypocritical no matter how you slice it.
This is probably the one reason that I'm not fully inclined to say that Raikou is UU. It can run sets that completely walk over its designated counters, making them unreliable at best. Of course, Chansey and Registeel pretty much still hard counter him, which is why I don't think that he is outrightly broken.

I just wanted to say that Registeel should not remotely be considered a hard counter. It's 3-4HKOed by +1 Thunderbolt from the Leftovers set, and has no recovery.
 
I just wanted to say that Registeel should not remotely be considered a hard counter. It's 3-4HKOed by +1 Thunderbolt from the Leftovers set, and has no recovery.

So?? It still forces Raikou out unless he's down to about 25%. If that's not a hard counter, I don't know what is. Yes, he isn't going to be walling him for too long, but as long as he's at good health, he can pretty much come into Raikou with impunity. Chansey is 4HKO'd with Leftovers too (By +1 Life Orb Thunderbolt).
 
@Heysup - I don't understand both what you're talking about and what that has got to do with Bluewind's original point.

On a different topic I agree with shrang's post above. Do you think the same Registeel that has no reliable recovery is a hard counter to Swellow?
 
Pick your poison: Cresselia was either banned because of the "main" set (ie the set that was talked about the most) SubCM, or it was banned because it beat most Pokemon in the tier when it uses the following set: 252 HP / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD / 252 Spe with Timid, Bold, and Modest natures, and a moveset of Substitute / Moonlight / Calm Mind / Psychic / Hidden Power Ground / Hidden Power Fighting / Signal Beam / Charge Beam / Ice Beam / Rest / Sleep Talk / Thunder Wave.

That's not only rediculous, but reprehensible and a terrible attempt at strawmanning.

Nobody ran max speed!
 
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