np: OU Suspect Testing Round 4 - Blaze of Glory

[Mario With Lasers]

I think we should wait until the pokémon voting results until we get back to discuss Weather. If Garchomp and Thundurus get banned, half the complaints about weather and the metagame being a gigantic clusterfuck may disappear lol (ok not that much about Drizzle but still).


Besides, no one is saying you need X to beat A, but that you could use X to help dealing with A. Virizion is a pretty good pokémon against Rain and Sand and isn't useless outside of "countering" both weathers (because wtf you do not fucking counter a weather, you counter the pokémon); if anyone ever says they have a problem with either weather, I suggest using Virizion. I never mean "use Virizion or lose", but rather "well, Virizion beats non-Return Excadrill, is faster than Garchomp and Gliscor and has HP Ice for both of them, can do a fuckload of damage to Skarm and Ferrothorn, lols at Tyranitar and is kinda cute so it's an awesome pokémon against Sand, you should try it out, man". If you have a certain pokémon that gives massive problems to a team archetype, unless people start using that pokémon instead of saying they "have to use it or lose" so whatever it counters is "cheap", the archetype won't change a bit and shit will keep stale until Shadow Tag Chandelure is released.

 

[Ewil]

Drizzle remains a big threat even with the ban of Thund.
Drizzle have a lot of abusers to pay attention then, it must go.
Drought,same old story: is the new Drizzle, if drizzle go.
Sand Stream is fair once Garchomp go. Excadrill can be a threat too but not that much (i'm neutral to him)
Snow Warning can stays simply 'coz the only support that gives is passive damages and 100% Blizzard and the only real abusers is Kyurem (That have lot of common weakness and trolly speed) and Abomasnow.

 

[Tobes]

Now back to my second point. There is no effective way to stop weather and ALL of it's affects from the moment the weather inducer is switched in, and nor is there an effective way to get rid of it.

The problem about Drizzle is that there are so many Pokemon that can abuse it. You say use 'Kingdra' to counter rain, however this only deals with sweepers that abuse the water stab boost affect. Pokemon like Tornados and Thundurus are common on rain teams too, and therefore Kingdra isn't a reliable counter to drizzle as it can't be switch in to take either of those hits and counter the Pokemon back.

I agree that Heatran counters most sun teams but then again, I can imagen wanting to use it against a Drizzle or SS team if that be the case.

And anyway if you are suggesting I should always use "Kingdra, Heatran, Skamory/Brongzong" in my teams to counter all weather, then I think it is clear that weather is over centralizing.

By your logic I need to carry 4 (or 3) Pokemon indefinitely to counter all of weather's (sweeper) abusers effectively, however this does not change the inevitable fate that so many Pokemon will face in regards to the direct and indirect effects of weather.

Lay off the bolds and underlining. You're using them so much they do nothing at all to accentuate your points. ._.

Mario With Lasers understands what I meant. Those were suggestions for things that work for weather. I'm not saying run each of those on every single team, I'm saying there's more than one way to deal with weather, you just need to get creative.

As for the last paragraph, "hey I need to make sure 3+ of my Pokemon can handle stall, so stall must be broken. Let's ban that shit". See how silly that sounds? Teambuilding is all about using your slots as efficiently as possible, and that always requires checking multiple threats with one Pokemon. The Pokemon I suggested all can fill other roles besides helping to deal with weather.

Also you completely misunderstand how Kingdra beats rain. It isn't switching in on Thundurus or Tornadus, because that's just plain retarded. It's supposed to be outspeeding them with Swift Swim and OHKOing with boosted Hydro Pumps.

 

[GatoDelFuego]

Drizzle remains a big threat even with the ban of Thund.
Drizzle have a lot of abusers to pay attention then, it must go.
Drought,same old story: is the new Drizzle, if drizzle go.
Sand Stream is fair once Garchomp go. Excadrill can be a threat too but not that much (i'm neutral to him)
Snow Warning can stays simply 'coz the only support that gives is passive damages and 100% Blizzard and the only real abusers is Kyurem (That have lot of common weakness and trolly speed) and Abomasnow.

Keep in mind hail may become a problem as well when the dream world abilities come out. This gen, you're looking at 3 stallreins instead of just one.

 

[AlphaSpade]

Keep in mind hail may become a problem as well when the dream world abilities come out. This gen, you're looking at 3 stallreins instead of just one.

Except Regice and Dewgong can't phaze, and are both weaker offensively (ok maybe not Regice, but Walrein has access to STAB water moves for steels). They would just be sitting ducks.

 

[Xephyr]

Keep in mind hail may become a problem as well when the dream world abilities come out. This gen, you're looking at 3 stallreins instead of just one.

Regice and Dewgong? You honestly think they will do ANYTHING in this metagame?

 

[Katakiri]

Glaceon (F) @ Leftovers
Trait: Ice Body
EVs: 252 HP / 248 Def / 8 Spd
Bold Nature (+Def, -Atk)
- Blizzard
- Substitute
- Hidden Power [Fire]
- Protect

Ice-scor...Hail's hilarious.

 

[alphatron]

So I recently started using grass knot on specs latios. Tyranitar is not a 100% counter to this pokemon by any means, as you're looking at a solid 2HKO most of the time or guarenteed 2hko with rocks up. T-tar is the only reason why latios would ever use grass knot, yeah, but who cares?

The sandstorm boost is slightly annoying. In game, an aerodactyl tanked my timid max sp. atk life orb hydriegon draco meteor. Battle subway of course.

 

[Alice]

WEATHER



And anyway if you are suggesting I should always use "Kingdra, Heatran, Skamory/Brongzong" in my teams to counter all weather, then I think it is clear that weather is over centralizing.

It seems you really need an AZUMARRIL in your life! :D, it can deal with rain, sand and does fare ok against sun too (saur and sawsbuck must beware of ice punch/return).

You also have virizion, or even sweepers as TR reuniclus or Rock polish terrakion doesn't mind weather very much after they outspeed all the abusers.

Really, there are many posibilites, and it's a shame that people wants to stick to OU pokes only when things such as Azu shine in this metagame (how sad people forgot him after Blaziken's demise...)

 

[alexwolf]

WEATHER

In my opinion Drizzle and Drought are broken, whilst sandstorm is not. The only ones who break it (ability wise) are Garchomp and Excadrill. What makes Sandstorm different is the fact that it does not affect the outcome of so many Pokemon just by existing. Sandstorm does not boost the power of specific moves by 50%, nor does it it take super effective hits away from specific Pokemon, the only two Pokemon which gain the Sp.Def advantage boost of SS are Tyranitar and Terrakion.

To get to the point - Sandstorm is fair. It does not give such a large number of Pokemon the power to kill or live something else, which it wouldn't be able to do out with the weather. Call this a 'playstyle' if you want, but the fate for such a large number of Pokemon should not be decided on something that doesn't even require using a move.

Now back to my second point. There is no effective way to stop weather and ALL of it's affects from the moment the weather inducer is switched in, and nor is there an effective way to get rid of it.




The problem about Drizzle is that there are so many Pokemon that can abuse it. You say use 'Kingdra' to counter rain, however this only deals with sweepers that abuse the water stab boost affect. Pokemon like Tornados and Thundurus are common on rain teams too, and therefore Kingdra isn't a reliable counter to drizzle as it can't be switch in to take either of those hits and counter the Pokemon back.

I agree that Heatran counters most sun teams but then again, I can imagen wanting to use it against a Drizzle or SS team if that be the case.

And anyway if you are suggesting I should always use "Kingdra, Heatran, Skamory/Brongzong" in my teams to counter all weather, then I think it is clear that weather is over centralizing.



By your logic I need to carry 4 (or 3) Pokemon indefinitely to counter all of weather's (sweeper) abusers effectively, however this does not change the inevitable fate that so many Pokemon will face in regards to the direct and indirect effects of weather.

You don't need to carry 3 or 4 pokes to counter all weather...You need to run sand,or rain or,sun,or hail or a team with 3 pokes that deal effective with opposing weather...
see how many options there are???
of 'course if you build a weatherless team then you should put some more anti-weather pokes!But this doesn't mean that these pokes will only be good at dealing with weather...many of those pokes have multiple uses like as said before.So ,ferrothorn,dragoniteheatran,rotom-w,gliscor,bronzong,kingdra,virizion etc,are not only used because they fare well against opposing weather but because they have generally a lot of uses!!!

I wasn't expecting 1 poke to deal with each weather at all. I was saying that 1 poke WOULDN'T deal with each weather.


As for the roosting, that's completely my mistake.

If you weren't impying this then why are you asking these kind of questions???why are you asking :''how is kingdra supposed to get past ferrothron'' or ''is hetran able to take eqs'' or ''how is bronzong supposed to take reapeated assaults from landorus and terakion''?
why are you asking these questions???
a poke cannot defend on itself against every sand abuser!
a rain sweeper like kingdra cannot sweep on its own!is this so hard for you to understand???if you put kingdra in your team then make sure that you have plenty of ways to lure and kill ferrothorn...
or if you put heatran on your team and you face venusaur you can always lure an eq to see if it has it...or just pack a dragon!or put a ballon to heatran...or use a MH with rain dance!the options are plenty!

 

[chrisrandom9]

Ok so with all this talking I decided to go out and try and make a non-weather team that could do well in the metagame. It's actually quite easy to do well as your team is less dependent on one particular pokemon. It's a far more straightforward gameplan which I urge you to try out.

And for the record I made the team last night, made a few changes this morning and the team's gone from less than 1100 to 1324.

 

[Glen ^^]

What makes Sandstorm different is the fact that it does not affect the outcome of so many Pokemon just by existing. Sandstorm does not boost the power of specific moves by 50%, nor does it it take super effective hits away from specific Pokemon, the only two Pokemon which gain the Sp.Def advantage boost of SS are Tyranitar and Terrakion

And rips away 6% health every turn of every type besides Steel, Rock and Ground, which is the biggest selling point to Sandstream and makes the life of the likes of Tornadus, Thundurus and Latios miserable, unlike the everlasting beasts that are Gliscor, Scizor, Skarmory or Tyranitar.

 

[Buzzcut]

And rips away 6% health every turn of every type besides Steel, Rock and Ground, which is the biggest selling point to Sandstream and makes the life of the likes of Tornadus, Thundurus and Latios miserable, unlike the everlasting beasts that are Gliscor, Scizor, Skarmory or Tyranitar.

You're comparing bulky Pokes to frail sweepers. Obviously two of the best physical walls, one of the best special walls, and an above average bulky Poke all around will live longer than two sweepers, especially when all 4 of those tend to have recovery of some sort (lefties, poison heal, or roost). Compare Lucario to those previous Pokes and you can see that Sandstorm immunity isn't everything.

 

[Rosey Oak]

Sorry, maybe I hadn't made my argument clear enough.

I'm not trying to claim that 'one single' non weather team can't beat all 3 weather teams.
My point is, to run an effective anti-weather team you are forced to pick from a very narrow limited choice because nothing beats all weather effectively.

Bellow is the basic structure for a anti-weather team:

1. Drizzle counter1 (Water)/ 2. Drizzle counter2 (Electric)/ 3. Drizzle counter3 (Flying)/ 4. SS counter / 5. Drought counter. 6. Optional (Priority is maybe best though)

Although this team can now counter the common abusers of weather, it can not alter the affects already in play due to the existence of 'Drizzle' or Drought'.

Because of the existence of Drizzle, my Heatran will no longer be able to OHKO and beat Toxicroak with Fire Blast, my Conkledurr will be OHKO'd by Rotom-W's Hydro Pump, my Virzion will no longer be weak to fire, my Skarmory will now be 2 KO'd by 'that Pokemon' instead of three KO'd extra.

My point being, yes by making a good anti weather team you can now counter weather's abuser's but you can not stop or change the fate of every 1 vs 1 battle that weather has interchanged. The fate of so many Pokemon should not be decided before the battle has even begun.

 

[Mario With Lasers]

Tentacruel used Hail.

 

[Rosey Oak]

Tentacruel used Hail.

Ok fair enough. You could use a Pokemon with a weather inducing move but you would need to ensure your opponent's weather starter is KO'd first - i.e back to the common example of weather wars.

 

[Mario With Lasers]

Ok fair enough. You could use a Pokemon with Rapid Spin but you would need to ensure your opponent's SR user is KO'd first - i.e back to the common example of DPPt OU.

 

[Rosey Oak]

Ok fair enough. You could use a Pokemon with Rapid Spin but you would need to ensure your opponent's SR user is KO'd first - i.e back to the common example of DPPt OU.

Except that only a tiny fraction of OU are greatly effected by SR damage in comparison to the massive effects of Drizzle and Drought, which I have already explained in a past argument back when SlimMan was pro-weather.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"(Looking at OU)

Yes, stealth rocks also shares the same characteristics as this, however the damage of stealth rocks is greatly limited in comparison. Stealth Rocks only majorly effects 4 types – Fire, Ice, Bug and Flying (three of which’s pure typing isn’t used in the OU Metagame due to this heavy SR damage.) For the remaining types the damage of stealth rocks is limited to a small amount which only occurs on switching. Weather on the other hand, majorly affects the damage done to the majority of Pokemon. It has become too powerful in the sense that it completely changes the Metagame to favour specific Pokemon and put others at a major disadvantage. Such favourability for such a large number of Pokemon should not be brought on just by sending a Pokemon out without even using a move.

You say that Stealth Rock only affects certain Pokemon very much. The same applies to weather. Any Pokemon which is not weak to Fire gets no defensive benefit from Rain. Any Pokemon which doesn't use Fire moves isn't hampered by Rain. I could say that weather only affects certain things to a significant degree, just like Stealth Rock only affects certain things that much.

Through my argument I was trying to show how stealth Rocks does not greatly affect the majority of OU because the only pure typing to be hit hard and used in OU is flying. Weather on the other hand affects everything in OU. Yes the level of degree varies however the damage inflicted is of a much greater level than SR.

Pokemon which are not purely affected by the typing advantages and disadvantages of rain/sun are still victims of weather abuse. For example drizzle allows Rotom-W to OHKO Conkeldurr with hydro pump. In this case Conkeldurr’s typing damage is not altered, but none the less it is still a victim of weather abuse.

Anyway before I go off in a tangent, my point is that Conkeldurr and other specific Pokemon get no boost what so ever by rain, whilst other Pokemon are give some sort of statistical advantage, and even though Conkeldurr and others are not purely affected by rain, they still are victimised by those that do.

Additionally, as I have already stated such favourability for such a large number of Pokemon should not be brought on just by sending a Pokemon out without even using a move."

 

[Tobes]

Sorry, maybe I hadn't made my argument clear enough.

I'm not trying to claim that 'one single' non weather team can't beat all 3 weather teams.
My point is, to run an effective anti-weather team you are forced to pick from a very narrow limited choice because nothing beats all weather effectively.

Bellow is the basic structure for a anti-weather team:

1. Drizzle counter1 (Water)/ 2. Drizzle counter2 (Electric)/ 3. Drizzle counter3 (Flying)/ 4. SS counter / 5. Drought counter. 6. Optional (Priority is maybe best though)

Although this team can now counter the common abusers of weather, it can not alter the affects already in play due to the existence of 'Drizzle' or Drought'.

Because of the existence of Drizzle, my Heatran will no longer be able to OHKO and beat Toxicroak with Fire Blast, my Conkledurr will be OHKO'd by Rotom-W's Hydro Pump, my Virzion will no longer be weak to fire, my Skarmory will now be 2 KO'd by 'that Pokemon' instead of three KO'd extra.

My point being, yes by making a good anti weather team you can now counter weather's abuser's but you can not stop or change the fate of every 1 vs 1 battle that weather has interchanged. The fate of so many Pokemon should not be decided before the battle has even begun.

I'm puzzled by the fact that you think three slots must be given to deal with Drizzle. I mean seriously, a slot dedicated just for stopping Tornadus, who likely won't even be OU the next time tiers are updated?

As for the bolded: So you're main argument boils down to automatic field effects being bad for the metagame because they "decide 1 v 1's before they happen". What proof do you have that this is unhealthy for the metagame? Usage statistics certainly prove you wrong on the matter of metagame diversity, and nothing seems to indicate that weather is broken since not a single weather recieved a majority vote. And please don't try to bring up bias again. And besides that, battles are never decided solely in the context of 1 v 1 battles. It's always about the interactions between two teams, how you set up those advantageous 1 v 1s, and avoid the disadvantageous ones.

EDIT: Ok, please stop with the excessive bolding. It's really becoming an eyesore.

 

[Spork]

Ok fair enough. You could use a Pokemon with a weather inducing move but you would need to ensure your opponent's weather starter is KO'd first - i.e back to the common example of weather wars.

You wouldn't need to ensure that. Every time they bring their weather starter out they run a massive risk, because their "glue" is vulnerable to switch-in attacks / pursuit / hazards. Politoed and Ninetales are also not switching into Tentacruel with Hail very often, just to use that example :)

 

[Rosey Oak]

@Tobes

I have given 3 slots to Drizzle because it has more abusers. Correct me if I'm wrong, but there is not one single Pokemon that can counter all of the following: Hydro Pumps/ Thunder/ Hurricane. All of which can be expected on a typical Drizzle team. Yes Thundurus may leave, but another electric type can replace it: Zapdos, Jolteon, Rotom.

I meant a singles 6 vs 6 team, which will therefore have 1 vs 1. Yes it's a team effort but as I've said before, weather changes so many outcomes. If you decided to switch to a Grass type Pokemon like Virzion to take the Hydro Pump, the damage will still be a lot stronger than it would be without weather present. If it was let's say scarf Rotom-W in this situation, it would be able to 2KO and kill if Virizion tried to switch in, where as without weather Virzion would be able to beat Rotom. Of course, this is just one example out of many possibilities.

 

[chrisrandom9]

@Tobes

I have given 3 slots to Drizzle because it has more abusers. Correct me if I'm wrong, but there is not one single Pokemon that can counter all of the following: Hydro Pumps/ Thunder/ Hurricane. All of which can be expected on a typical Drizzle team. Yes Thundurus may leave, but another electric type can replace it: Zapdos, Jolteon, Rotom.

Lanturn? Gastrodon?

 

[Rosey Oak]

Lanturn? Gastrodon?

Ok. I'll give you Lanturn.

So basically I'll need to run this one reliable counter (to Drizzle only) on all my anti-weather teams.

 

[ginganinja]

ffs saying you need half your team to counter Drizzle is stupid. I personally don't run weather (not saying its anti weather cause that term is incorrect), don't have half my team countering Drizzle, and the team still works fine. Granted Thundurus is a broken piece of shit on Rain teams with that STAB Thunder but Thundurus is pretty much broken anyway even outside of rain so the point is moot.

EDIT

Actually nitpicking but CM Latias does a fairly good job at taking Hydro Pumps/Thunderbolts and even Hurricane I guess (though it needs a CM boost or two for that)

 

[Spork]

More importantly, Chansey.

It's fairly ridiculous that you want to counter three different pokemon with different typings and different offensive inclinations with just one pokemon, just because they all constitute "Drizzle" and you (wrongly) feel that there should be some single counter for "Drizzle" as a whole, which is a really vague term anyway, and it kinda implies bad teambuilding if that's your thought process ("This pokemon is for Drizzle, this one for Stall, this one for Baton Pass, because of course teams only consist of counters to certain threats and synergy is an accidental result"). Drizzle is perfectly counterable, the argument boils down to whether weather wars is "fun" over anything, which is ridiculously subjective anyway, and only implies that people are still stuck with a Gen IV mindset.