np: OU Suspect Testing Round 5 - Sandstorm (Excadrill/Thundurus Banned)

[abnegation]

Banning is based on what is horrible and detrimental to the meta and what can score a 4hko without ever getting hit about one in four times while being faster than all of OU and able to drop your SpDef by two stages nearly two in three times it uses its base 120 power STAB move off of the same base SpA.

EDIT: When you're making a good point, abnegation, don't ruin it by making a wrong claim that Terrakion is outsped by Excadrill at +2 spe.

My bad,took a look at my previous post where I calc'd Scarf Terrakion.

Originally Posted by Fat JT Swift
Excadrill makes scarfers obsolete? Really? What if I need different resistances to switch into something for the revenge kill? What if I need to use a different type of attack? What if I need to use a special move? Scarf terrakion still outspeeds everything regardless of excadrill's existance.


Scarf Terrakion - 519 Speed
Excadrill in the Sand - 604
So no Scarf Terrakion does not outspeed.

 

[XienZo]

EDIT: That's not true, XienZo. I once beat a Skarm (Skarm!) with a Chomp. Why? Because whirlwind missed four times in a row and I was able to get some parahax set by my ferrothorn to kick in the one time he tried to roost. And that was with Sand Veil, the equivalent of one evasion boost. IMO, the less bs hax in this meta, the better.

Yes, sometimes the hax gods will hate you, but that doesn't change the fact that phazer will win a LOT more often than the evasion booster will.

Also, Double Team is LESS effective then Sand Veil, at least initially, because you "waste" a turn using Double Team, and you don't get that turn back until the opponent misses.

That means that if you used Double Team ONCE, you're only even after the opponent misses once, and you're only ahead(that is, DT actually did something) if the opponent misses twice.

If you use DT TWICE, you're only even after 2 misses, and ahead after 3, and so on.

In contrast, with Sword Dance, you're even after 1 hit, and ahead on subsequent ones.

The difference is, with Sword Dance, you can hit pretty much 100% of the time. With Double Team, you get a miss much less often, and you generally lose out more often then not.

Just to confirm though, smogon tiering is now based solely on what we like or dislike, correct? If I had known this beforehand I never would have bothered with skymin.

Dunno if this is sarcastic or not, but that's actually true to an extent; if we're the players in the metagame, we definitely have the right to determine what it looks like.

 

[Nkululeko]

Still you're right skill and prediction are your best friends against terrakion, but people keep thinking everything needs like 20 surefire counters or otherwise something is broken (or overcentralizing lol).

QFT. Some people act as if for a pokemon to be OU it has to be completely and utterly useless against some pokemon. That's ridiculous. Just because a pokemon isn't walled and instantly KOed by a pokemon in OU doesn't make it broken, it makes it good. What really matters is that pokemon have a good number of competitively viable checks, not 10 or so counters.

And on the topic of over-centralization. Over-centralization is something I don't think we've ever seen outside of Garchomp in Gen 4, and certainly not in Gen 5. For something to be over-centralizing, it has to be so powerful that players are forced to play around it in the clear majority of matches. That pokemon, its counters, and its counters' counters would be on nearly every team and nothing in BW is like that.

On the topic of Terrakion, come on. It has a good number of both checks and counters, not to mention priority which overrides the massive speed.

 

[Stratos]

Yes, sometimes the hax gods will hate you, but that doesn't change the fact that phazer will win a LOT more often than the evasion booster will.

Also, Double Team is LESS effective then Sand Veil, at least initially, because you "waste" a turn using Double Team, and you don't get that turn back until the opponent misses.

That means that if you used Double Team ONCE, you're only even after the opponent misses once, and you're only ahead(that is, DT actually did something) if the opponent misses twice.

If you use DT TWICE, you're only even after 2 misses, and ahead after 3, and so on.

In contrast, with Sword Dance, you're even after 1 hit, and ahead on subsequent ones.

The difference is, with Sword Dance, you can hit pretty much 100% of the time. With Double Team, you get a miss much less often, and you generally lose out more often then not.

While technically you're right, I see no reason to let evasion back into the metagame, as it's only detrimental: serious players will never use it for the reasons listed above, and the people who do are the ones at +3 -30 splits who make you look at the sky and scream "WHY?" the one in five times they win.

 

[XienZo]

While technically you're right, I see no reason to let evasion back into the metagame, as it's only detrimental: serious players will never use it for the reasons listed above, and the people who do are the ones at +3 -30 splits who make you look at the sky and scream "WHY?" the one in five times they win.

Well, it's the same thing as BrightPowder; no serious player's going to use it, but at the same time, it doesn't really help anything either.

This is where the ban minimalists say unban, and people like you say ban, and it doesn't really matter either way, because it's not going to show up anyway.

 

[Mario With Lasers]

Well, if we should keep BrightPowder banned even though it's useless, how about we ban Fire Stone too...

 

[PttP]

your argument in inconceivable and folly, i suggest you think with utmost care next time you post, sir.

and i am still a supporter of a >1500 rating (actually >1550 but that was seen as "impossible")

 

[Nkululeko]

Oh no! I'm a troll because I have a differing opinion!

I would venture a guess and say people are calling you a troll because you want to bring Rayquaza, Lugia, and now Shaymin-S down to OU without clearly stating any facts showing that they have reliable checks or counters of any sort and failing to prove that those pokemon aren't overpowered. Just guessing.

It's about time my posts were deleted. I was beginning to make a dangerous amount of sense.

Unless you want to be labeled a banned deucer, I suggest you stop. Every time you suggest bringing down Ubers, you get informed and strong counter-arguments and you get a range of slightly harsh to downright pissed off trolls. One of them gets far more attention and it makes it seem like you don't have a good argument if you don't debate with the strong counterarguments.

For example, PK Gaming ranted here a while back about Skymin I believe. A good number of us responded saying he might've been a bit harsh but more importantly he had a point in how Skymin had the Speed, Sp Atk, and STABs to abuse substantial hax and how that was overpowering seeing as few things actually could check it and how it can beat it's so-called counters. You ignored our responses and immediately went for those who flamed you. That rises doubt in the strength of your arguments.

Just to confirm though, smogon tiering is now based solely on what we like or dislike, correct? If I had known this beforehand I never would have bothered with skymin.

Here you're actually 100% correct. Smogon tiering is based solely on what we all like or dislike. Collectively, we all agree that we dislike a single element of the metagame dominating all the other ones while the opponent can't do anything about it without tailoring their team to beat one pokemon. And all of us like having a variety of pokemon in individual tiers that can compete on an even footing in their respective metagames.

Well, if we should keep BrightPowder banned even though it's useless, how about we ban Fire Stone too...

Now on to something serious. Both are gonna end up used about the same amount of times anyway so why not? Tbh, the Brightpowder/Lax Incense ban eliminates a borderline non-existant portion of the metagame because it's bad or detrimental to the metagame. How harmful to the metagame could it be if nobody uses it and even when they do it has nearly no bearing on the match anyway. Let's be real, Brightpowder got banned because it gave another reason to hate seeing Garchomp in Team Preview, same way over-centralization as an argument gained more value after the rampage of Garchomp in Gen 4. Whenever Garchomp gets banned it can't just go alone, something big has to happen.

 

[Glen ^^]

Realisitically, if you let a Terrakion set up both Rock Polish and Swords Dance, you DESERVE to lose, becaude if you've not hit it with a Super Effective move by then, well...

That's what I thought when reading through damage calcs on +2 speed +2 atk Blaziken under the sun as an argument to ban him. Blaziken.
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As for Thundurus... with Tornadus running around and outclassing him in rain teams and Ferro/TTar everywhere is he really a problem?
Sure the guy can stop a sweep with Prankster and deal awesome damage with Focus Blast (if it hits) but that's it. Thundurus is underwhelming compared to Deoxys and Latios last round.

 

[Stratos]

That's what I thought when reading through damage calcs on +2 speed +2 atk Blaziken under the sun as an argument to ban him. Blaziken.

The difference is Blaziken requires one turn of setup. Come in on something, force it out, SD. Protect on new guy, congrats, you just go to +2+2 without any potential risk or way to be countered. Terra requires two turns of setup, which is much easier to stop.

 

[November Blue]

I would venture a guess and say people are calling you a troll because you want to bring Rayquaza, Lugia, and now Shaymin-S down to OU without clearly stating any facts showing that they have reliable checks or counters of any sort and failing to prove that those pokemon aren't overpowered. Just guessing.

Well, rayquaza was ages ago. That was nothing more than a theory I suggested to everyone. It never really took off. I'll admit that I went a little too far with giratina, ho-oh and lugia. In hindsight it would have been a good idea to do my homework and quit while I was ahead.

You can't deny me skymin though. I have enough experience with it to form an opinion.

Unless you want to be labeled a banned deucer, I suggest you stop. Every time you suggest bringing down Ubers, you get informed and strong counter-arguments and you get a range of slightly harsh to downright pissed off trolls. One of them gets far more attention and it makes it seem like you don't have a good argument if you don't debate with the strong counterarguments.

For example, PK Gaming ranted here a while back about Skymin I believe. A good number of us responded saying he might've been a bit harsh but more importantly he had a point in how Skymin had the Speed, Sp Atk, and STABs to abuse substantial hax and how that was overpowering seeing as few things actually could check it and how it can beat it's so-called counters. You ignored our responses and immediately went for those who flamed you. That rises doubt in the strength of your arguments.

Yes, people don't take it well. I can't help that. It's a shame that nobody shares my curiosity. I guess curiosity is for noobs and trolls though. If you want to be recognized here you agree with everyone else.

Honestly though, I think that some of you take this far too seriously. It's unnecessary to be bitchy towards someone in a thread like this. And why do some of you have fits when I suggest changing the tiers? Will latios remaining OU for another round give you cancer? Is shaymin going to give you a brain tumor? This game is supposed to be lighthearted fun. Serious and cometitive, but still lighthearted fun. If we let down an uber, so what? Does your life end? Does laddering become excruciatingly painful?

I don't get it.

 

[Nkululeko]

The difference is Blaziken requires one turn of setup. Come in on something, force it out, SD. Protect on new guy, congrats, you just go to +2+2 without any potential risk or way to be countered. Terra requires two turns of setup, which is much easier to stop.

True. Blaziken was almost always coming in with boosted Speed and firing back with powerful STABs(even though one was suicide if it missed). Sounds a lot like Excadrill if you ask me.

PS I don't think either is Uber and..
Edit:

You can't deny me skymin though. I have enough experience with it to form an opinion.

I never doubted your experience with it. I just never thought it should be OU and your calcs kinda supported it. The case was made that nothing in OU could handle it and that's pretty much required when trying to convince most people on Smogon that a pokemon that got a 100% vote for Ubers should come back to OU.

Yes, people don't take it well. I can't help that. It's a shame that nobody shares my curiosity. I guess curiosity is for noobs and trolls though. If you want to be recognized here you agree with everyone else.

Your talking to a guy who campaigned to ban Politoed and Drizzle. People never reacted badly to your curiosity. It was the lack of substantial proof that anything could fare better against Skymin this Round and a general lack of substantial debate. Even now you're highlighting how you have been wronged and how Smogon is against you. Some people here agree with you, but playing the victim isn't helping the cause especially when the opposition thinks you can't make a concrete argument.

Will latios remaining OU for another round give you cancer?

Latios isn't broken this Gen.

Is shaymin going to give you a brain tumor?

I wouldn't say tumor but you gotta admit that Shaymin-S did give more than a few headaches

This game is supposed to be lighthearted fun. Serious and cometitive, but still lighthearted fun. If we let down an uber, so what? Does your life end? Does laddering become excruciatingly painful?

If an Uber is OU viable without being broken, then why not? My life isn't gonna end because I can't counter Shaymin-S, but nobody's gonna support bringing it down unless they have reason to believe it won't be broken.

 

[Stratos]

Yes, people don't take it well. I can't help that. It's a shame that nobody shares my lack of experience with suspect testing round 1. I guess curiosity is for noobs and trolls though. If you want to be recognized here you agree with everyone else.

Honestly though, I think that some of you take this far too seriously. It's unnecessary to be bitchy towards someone in a thread like this. And why do some of you have fits when I suggest changing the tiers? Will latios remaining OU for another round give you cancer? Is shaymin going to give you a brain tumor? This game is supposed to be lighthearted fun. Serious and cometitive, but still lighthearted fun. If we let down an uber, so what? Does your life end? Does laddering become excruciatingly painful?

I don't get it.

To answer all your questions: 1) because it gets old after a while dealing with someone who clearly wants to retry EVERY SINGLE UBER in the OU meta. 2) No, or he wouldn't have lasted 4 (most likely 5) rounds of testing. 3) No but he'll hax my pokemon to death. 4) He disrupts the meta, and unless it's Blaziken, it's definitely bound to be in a bad way (Still on the fence about Blazy though). 5) No. 6) Yes.

 

[Glen ^^]

The difference is Blaziken requires one turn of setup. Come in on something, force it out, SD. Protect on new guy, congrats, you just go to +2+2 without any potential risk or way to be countered. Terra requires two turns of setup, which is much easier to stop.

Blaziken without Stone Edge (Protect + SD) is easily walled. Without Protect he's easy to stop at +1 speed/+2 atk and without SD he lacks power.

Since his better sweeping set was SD + three attacks he still needed two turns to be "ready to sweep" (even then, Chlorophyl and Sand Rush forced him out).

But Terrakion has much better "off the bat" usability. Now that I think about it, the comparison isn't that far fetched.

If there's anything deserving a second chance in OU that's Blaziken. To hell with Skymin and Manaphy, no one misses them. But Blaziken, damn, that thing made Drought teams on par with Sandstream and Drizzle.
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Anyway, I don't even get what's the point of suspect tests anymore. Sandstorm? What?
OU is stable enough for us to say "fuck it" and just play the game. I don't see why mess with weathers and Thundurus at a point like this.

 

[alphatron]

The difference is Blaziken requires one turn of setup. Come in on something, force it out, SD. Protect on new guy, congrats, you just go to +2+2 without any potential risk or way to be countered. Terra requires two turns of setup, which is much easier to stop.

Well, terrakion can just use Sword's Dance and call it a day. He has a naturally high base speed already...and better defenses too.

Latios isn't broken because already effective pokemon naturally counter him, furthering their usage and populartity.

Edit: Can we unban Latios in fourth gen please? He isn't broken there either. Most of the counters he has in fifth gen exist in fourth gen. He doesn't have psyshock to break through blissey. The -2 special attack can still be taken advantage of with setup pokes the same way it currently is in fifth gen. Latios isn't broken in fourth gen either and deserves a proper test.

 

[Wastum]

Well, terrakion can just use Sword's Dance and call it a day. He has a naturally high base speed already...and better defenses too.

Latios isn't broken because already effective pokemon naturally counter him, furthering their usage and populartity.

Edit: Can we unban Latios in fourth gen please? He isn't broken there either. Most of the counters he has in fifth gen exist in fourth gen. He doesn't have psyshock to break through blissey. The -2 special attack can still be taken advantage of with setup pokes the same way it currently is in fifth gen. Latios isn't broken in fourth gen either and deserves a proper test.

Soul Dew.

 

[Fawfulmk-II]

Soul Dew.

I thought Soul Dew was banned in gen 4?

and if not, why the hell not?

 

[Mr_br_kill]

Blaziken without Stone Edge (Protect + SD) is easily walled. Without Protect he's easy to stop at +1 speed/+2 atk and without swords dance he lacks alot of power.

Blazikin doesn't really need stone edge for a resisted high jump kick is 97.5 base power after STAB if my calculations are correct and resited flare blize is 90 base power (in the sun it's 135 base power)

(my formula was move base power x STAB (1.5)/ 2)

 

[SJCrew]

Will you guys shut up about unbanning things already? Even though we're at odds about what to do with the current metagame, adding more shit to it before we have everything fully sorted out is definitely not the answer. The Ubers we've already tested are gone and are not coming back, and it'll be a snowball's chance in hell before we get something as retarded as Lugia in OU. We need to finish what's on our plate first before we start clamoring for seconds.

 

[Mr_br_kill]

^ agreed. Can we please start talking about something that could be considered broken like

•Drizzle
•Excadrill
•Latios
•Thunderus
•Sand storm
• drought
• Ect.

Thanks

 

[Nkululeko]

Will you guys shut up about unbanning things already? Even though we're at odds about what to do with the current metagame, adding more shit to it before we have everything fully sorted out is definitely not the answer. The Ubers we've already tested are gone and are not coming back, and it'll be a snowball's chance in hell before we get something as retarded as Lugia in OU. We need to finish what's on our plate first before we start clamoring for seconds.

What is there to sort out? Excadrill? After about 4 Rounds of testing it's not going Uber unless we ban Skarm or Gliscor (which will never happen). Lugia? Hasn't been discussed for a few pages now, that episode's done. Latios? Nowhere near broken this Gen. Drizzle? I think it should go but voters keep saying no. All we really have left is Thundurus, which isn't broken but annoying and requires scouting to really identify the set and the danger it poses. The only thing stopping us from calling this metagame settled, is reaching a final decision on weather and even though I still think Drizzle's broken I'm willing to give up on it just so we can stop acting like the metagame's in chaos.

Edit: Drought? Look at the usage stats, nobody's acknowledgin it if it's so broken and Ninetails is pretty bad as a weather inducer. Sandstorm? Arguable, but most pokemon on Sand teams (bar Rotom-W) fall to about 3 or 4 fairly common types. Since nothing is really broken, how about No Suspect?

 

[Ewil]

For the sandstorm, just ban excadrill and is pretty manageble.
For Drizzle, ban it.
Drought be the new drizzle.

Thundurus can be broken since he can 2HKO Blissey after a Nasty Plot.

 

[tomtom5858]

And OHKO without one :P (Hammer Arm)
Quite frankly, brokenmon is broken.

 

[Tobes]

4 Attack Naive LO Thundurus Hammer Arm vs 252/252 Bold Blissey: 53.8% - 63.3%

ummmm

Also Thundurus has only a 49% chance to survive killing Blissey if Stealth Rock is in play, factoring in accuracy. 2 Seismic Tosses + 2 turns of LO recoil + SR = dead Thundurus. (200 + 58 + 74 > 299)

 

[Kefka Palazzo™]

Thundurus can be broken since he can 2HKO Blissey after a Nasty Plot.

Porygon-Z can do this too...*gets shot*

I don't Thundy is broken, just very very annoying with priority T-wave making any scarfers/revenge killers useless after he dies....