That's a lot more than Sand Rush and Chlorophyll abusers.
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np: OU Suspect Testing Round 3 - So Long and Thanks for all the Fish
- Thread starter reachzero
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Yes rain is better, but I am talking about the total ban of swiftswim+drizzle on all pokemon. But the battle ground for that now it mainly in the other thread.
It'd be interesting to see some statistics on how some of these bans are effecting the game, since far as I know even though DW Blaziken is legal on the PO server they still see a near oversaturation of Ferrothorn dominating their environment despite it being weak to nearly everything in their top 20. But with that said, rain is surprisingly little used too most players preferring to stick to T-tar and sand teams.
On the other hand on Smogon's server even with the SS/Rain ban I see nearly every team being Sun or Rain oriented towards brute force with Sand teams becoming rarer now. At the moment the most devastating rain abusers I'm regularly seeing are the likes of Dragonite, Rotom-W, Tornadus, Latios and Gyarados usually with token Ferrothorn support. Extra emphasis on Latios, Tornadus and Dragonite, they are absolutely insane within the rain.
On the other hand on Smogon's server even with the SS/Rain ban I see nearly every team being Sun or Rain oriented towards brute force with Sand teams becoming rarer now. At the moment the most devastating rain abusers I'm regularly seeing are the likes of Dragonite, Rotom-W, Tornadus, Latios and Gyarados usually with token Ferrothorn support. Extra emphasis on Latios, Tornadus and Dragonite, they are absolutely insane within the rain.
I'd also like to see such statistics. I wonder, is such a difference due to general player skill, attitude, or the established rules? I wouldn't think it'd be the first one (Smogon server has a ton of shitty players too), and it would be weird if it's the last one given the fact that all the things not banned there would make one assume the contrary to the actual evidence, so I guess that leaves attitudes, maybe?
Another facet of Drizzle+SS people are forgetting about is just how centralizing (over-centralization is redundant, if it is centralizing it is too prevalent) it was. You literally had to run some form of weather for yourself either pro-rain or anti-rain; and to be honest, that was dumb. Not to mention the fact that rain was broken in general, swift swim being such a useful ability that many pokemon with swift swim are still used in Ubers.
This is true on the other servers still, if you get on the PO server or Mysidia nearly every single team is weather based because it has to be (Although, as previously mentioned blaziken is still legal there so Ninetails show up almost as often as Politoeds). It isn't a good metagame. I didn't initially support the ban of Blaziken but after being around in the current metagame allows neither blaziken nor drizzle+swift swim I wholeheartedly approve of both moves. It is a much better game as far as competitive spirit goes.
If I wanted to play an incredibly centralized tier (and sometimes I do) I go to Ubers. Plenty of Drizzle and even some swift swim there too.
This is true on the other servers still, if you get on the PO server or Mysidia nearly every single team is weather based because it has to be (Although, as previously mentioned blaziken is still legal there so Ninetails show up almost as often as Politoeds). It isn't a good metagame. I didn't initially support the ban of Blaziken but after being around in the current metagame allows neither blaziken nor drizzle+swift swim I wholeheartedly approve of both moves. It is a much better game as far as competitive spirit goes.
If I wanted to play an incredibly centralized tier (and sometimes I do) I go to Ubers. Plenty of Drizzle and even some swift swim there too.
That's a pretty big number when you really only have 1 or 2 abusers of the other two weathers!
It's pretty true on smogon still. Tyranitar's everywhere in fifth gen... If you can run a decent/good Pokémon who gives a lot of your other Pokémon a free boost and injures the enemy team just from switching in, why wouldn't you?
Be interesting to see what a metagame without any of the auto weather starters would be like.
I know it might be a bit too soon, but I would like to start talking about Speed Boost Sharpedo, which was just recently released (I think, I know it's usable at least.)
Sharpedo is a lot like Blaziken in that it's a speed boost abuser with great STAB coverage that functions even better under the weather. However, there are several differences that I will attempt to highlight.
Advantages over Blaziken:
-Higher base speed means that it's harder to outspeed with a scarfer after one boost
-Being "forced" to use protect means that it is guaranteed a boost, unlike SDkin, where the opponent can stay in and just attack
-Waterfall's 30% flinch chance means it's able to occasionally get past it's counters, much like Excadrill
-Synergizes well with Drizzle teams (which I consider easier to use and more effective than Drought teams, but that's my opinion), allowing it to spam double STAB Waterfall with no drawbacks, unlike Flare Blitz. Even Blaze Kick has questionable accuracy.
-Crunch is a great secondary move that offers no redundant coverage, unlike fire/fighting and hits key threats such as Slowbro, Jellicent, and Latios.
-Aqua Jet lets it revenge threats such as RP Terakion and BD Volcarona
-Able to utilize Life Orb, while Blazekin is typically saddled with Balloon
Disadvantages over Blaziken
-Terrible coverage moves outside main STAB. Only Ice Fang, Return, Earthquake, and Poison Jab are usable, since Zen Headbutt (what it would like) and Bounce aren't compatible with Speed Boost.
-Piss poor defenses. At least Blaziken could set up on unSTABed neutral hits
-Lack of boosting moves and low base power of offensive moves means that Sharpedo is a cleaner, not a wall breaker.
-Weak to Mach Punch
So Sharpedo something like a watered-down Blazekin. Given the fact that we banned Blazekin for being "uncounterable" what does everyone think about Sharpedo. I used it for quiet a few battles with a standard Drizzle team and it's pretty good. To me, the main thing that people would consider "broken" is Waterfall's 30% flinch rate. Remember all that QQ over Excadrill's Rock Slide? The same arguments apply here. Only that the said flinching move is double STAB.
Anyways, discuss
Sharpedo is a lot like Blaziken in that it's a speed boost abuser with great STAB coverage that functions even better under the weather. However, there are several differences that I will attempt to highlight.
Advantages over Blaziken:
-Higher base speed means that it's harder to outspeed with a scarfer after one boost
-Being "forced" to use protect means that it is guaranteed a boost, unlike SDkin, where the opponent can stay in and just attack
-Waterfall's 30% flinch chance means it's able to occasionally get past it's counters, much like Excadrill
-Synergizes well with Drizzle teams (which I consider easier to use and more effective than Drought teams, but that's my opinion), allowing it to spam double STAB Waterfall with no drawbacks, unlike Flare Blitz. Even Blaze Kick has questionable accuracy.
-Crunch is a great secondary move that offers no redundant coverage, unlike fire/fighting and hits key threats such as Slowbro, Jellicent, and Latios.
-Aqua Jet lets it revenge threats such as RP Terakion and BD Volcarona
-Able to utilize Life Orb, while Blazekin is typically saddled with Balloon
Disadvantages over Blaziken
-Terrible coverage moves outside main STAB. Only Ice Fang, Return, Earthquake, and Poison Jab are usable, since Zen Headbutt (what it would like) and Bounce aren't compatible with Speed Boost.
-Piss poor defenses. At least Blaziken could set up on unSTABed neutral hits
-Lack of boosting moves and low base power of offensive moves means that Sharpedo is a cleaner, not a wall breaker.
-Weak to Mach Punch
So Sharpedo something like a watered-down Blazekin. Given the fact that we banned Blazekin for being "uncounterable" what does everyone think about Sharpedo. I used it for quiet a few battles with a standard Drizzle team and it's pretty good. To me, the main thing that people would consider "broken" is Waterfall's 30% flinch rate. Remember all that QQ over Excadrill's Rock Slide? The same arguments apply here. Only that the said flinching move is double STAB.
Anyways, discuss
Sharpedo is a lot like banned......
EDIT: Joke.
I've been using one of these on PO it is certainly a viable pokemon will be good to see what other people have to say about it.
It is definitely a cleaner and not a wall breaker.
It's Dragon Dance Gyrados all over again.. The amount of times I've flinched people to death with this guy is remarkable. So yes I can see that the waterfall flinch is probably going to be the biggest problem with this set.
If you lack Earthquake, SHarpedo is hard countered by Sub/Bulk Up Toxicroak (or any Toxicroak with Dry Skin) who imo is one of the easiest rain pokemon to set up pand sweep with.
Come to think of it I did use Speedpedo on a gimmick team and while it was the best member of the team (no surprise) it really wasn't powerful enough to 2 or even 3KO most things. To me it is more of a nerfed Excadrill, not a great sweeper but a great cleaner.
The lack of boosting moves is a rather big one. In one turn of vulnerability (on the switch) Blaziken was able to get the equivalent of 2 dragon dances. That coupled with amazing STAB coverage and the base power of the moves, made Blaziken broken.
Sharpedo cannot boost, has poor base power on its STAB moves, and does not have great coverage.
I calced a Sharpedo Crunch on a Shaymin (just picked something random TBH) and it did a max of 61% if Sharpedo is Adamant with Life Orb. That's horrendous for a main STAB on a neutral target.
Is it useless? No. Is it broken? No.
With those defences, lack of powerful stabs and no way to boost its attack Sharpedo is rarely worth a slot on a rain team. It dies to pretty much every priority move in the game (even a resisted AJ from Azumarill can 2hko) and is completely walled by Ferrothorn. I would not even compare Sharpedo with Blaziken tbh.
He has absolutely awful defenses, has NOTHING whatsoever to deal with Ferrothorn, his best STABs are around 80 BP and he has base 120 attack, which is hardly anything to write home about. Seriously, use LO Deoxys-S if you want a cleaner, at least it has coverage
Besides the obvious Sharpedo has piss poor defenses he also has a bad defensive typing and only usuable offenses and coverage, nothing special. His only safe switch in ever being Psychic and with how powerful some water attacks are now he could probably get OHKO'd even with resist. Blaziken on the other hand has slightly more defenses and a actual 4x resist to switch into along with multiple 2x resists. Considering that Scizor is still possibly one of the most destructive team pivots in the current metagame this gives Blaziken a brilliant opportunity to get in.
lol banning sand veil is the stupidest shit ive ever heard. Drizzle + Swiftswim should only ban putting the most broken pokemon on the drizzle team that would break the meta like Kingdra/Ludicolo on drizzle starter teams
Im a professional Yu-gi-oh player, and we get a Ban list every March and September. The bans/limitations have VERY huge outcomes and rewrite the meta every 6 months and in my opinion AND knowledge, they ban what MAKES an ability broken. The top deck IN THE WORLD had ONE card banned, and the deck became unusable. Ban Drizzle, not swift swimmers
Im a professional Yu-gi-oh player, and we get a Ban list every March and September. The bans/limitations have VERY huge outcomes and rewrite the meta every 6 months and in my opinion AND knowledge, they ban what MAKES an ability broken. The top deck IN THE WORLD had ONE card banned, and the deck became unusable. Ban Drizzle, not swift swimmers
That card was probably different from Drizzle in that the card was probably broken in too many situations. Drizzle is not broken in rain stall, rain balance, or rain offense. Drizzle was only broken with swift swimmers. Drizzle is doing fine right now, being top tier, but not broken.
And this is coming from someone who has never had a Politoed on his team.
Erm...Blaziken ALSO has "only" 120 attack, he just spams high BP moves. Also, when did 120 become a low stat? For christ's sake...
Also, on the basis of I didn't make a detailed response to the Deoxys-S discussion I started a while back because I suspect my own arguments wouldn't hold up before the battlers much higher on the food chain with me, I should also add posts like these are why I ****ing hate Deoxys-S right now. Not everyone wants to use Ex-Uber legendaries when there's new things to try, you know.
I'm predicting once there is a UU this gen it's going to be fairly gigantic compared to OU. :/
Not only are Blaziken's STAB attacks very useful, they also are a lot higher BP (120 vs 80). 120 is only a low stat if you don't have good moves to pair it with (see: Electivire).
As far as Deoxys-S, by your logic, it is a "new" toy for OU, as it was Uber for the vast majority of last generation. So I kind of fail to see your point.
(Somewhat off topic)
E-vire got Wild Bolt. Is it still really that bad? I haven't gotten around to testing it like I've wanted to (and some other stuff I've wanted to test, but whatever).
Blaziken was not spamming HJK, dude. Blaziken had the magical benefit of being a Ninjask with a 130 BP STAB move, a 120 BP STAB move, coverage, ACCESS TO SD, and good attack. Sharpedo has crap coverage and no way to boost attacks. Explain how that's broken.
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