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

[iSkittles]

I've been using a team without any weather inducers (link in sig) and to great success, staying in the top 300 easily. And can also deal with weather sweepers/abusers.

On topic, I have to say that this whole swift swim argument that been a great read and a very interesting concept.

What would you say gives you the most trouble in the current meta?

The most viable nonweather is probably full stall. I've been using nonweather hyper off. mostly this round and it works alright, but it is extremely difficult to play around dory. Personally, I don't find dory broken at all given counter-weather, hard defensive checks like gli and tang, super effective priority, and ballooners like Terak (I'm pretty sure the majority of the voting pool feels the same way), but his presence in OU severely limits the offensive playstyle.

Haha I'm not patient enough for stall sorry. It's annoying for me to play against and use. x3 I was thinking hyper off with something like Prankster + weather move/Thunder Wave to help me out. I don't find Dory an issue at all tbh, sure he has to be played around or you have to sac something, but Hitmontop/Conkeldurr checks him really well.

I'm doing reasonably well with Bulk Up+Dragon Dance Scrafty and Conkeldurr as Sand checks, SpDef Rachi as my main check with Salamence and Rotom-W as secondary as back up against Rain and a Latios meant to abuse Rain while also killing T-Tar with Conk to check Sun.

I really like the sound of this team, I think I'll try something like this out but change it up a bit to suit me more. Thanks for the suggestions! :)

For one, Aldaron never intended for his proposal to be permanent - it was meant as a stop to the "ban all weather" floodgates that would have inevitably opened at the time. You can read the thread in PR if you don't believe me.

Second, who says we would be banning a ridiculous number of pokemon? Kingdra is the only absolutely broken one, IMO. Kabutops has its fair list of checks (Ferrothorn, Skarmory, Suicune, Conkeldurr, etc), as do Ludicolo and the rest. I don't think the likes of Armaldo would even be considered for common use, let alone a ban.

Or, if they all end up broken, we ban Drizzle itself. It isn't even an additional ban, because in exchange for the ability/DrizzleToed we would get Manaphy.

Tbh, I don't find swift swimmers to even be the worst of Drizzle. It's stuff like the two genie bros with nuke spam that are scary and things like Steel types becoming neutral to fire moves. @,@

Drizzle should be banned imo, because it's hypocritical to try and nerf it since some feel it "belongs" in OU or gen 5 is weather centralized and we should deal with it. :I I'd rather ban Drizzle and see what the meta is like instead of having to suffer through people using the argument "well if Drizzle is banned all weather should be banned/ Sand and Sun will dominate."

If that mindset keeps up, we'll get nowhere. : / Nerfing Drizzle with AP was good for it's time since it gave us time to think of counter stats, but I feel it's time is up and the full power of Drizzle should be allowed on the ladder so that the true Drizzle can be seen instead of this nerfed version.

Broken is broken, even if it adds diversity, we can't start tailoring things to OU simply because we like it. Drizzle simply gives far too many advantages for very minimal effort, SwSw is only one part of the bigger picture and I think some of us have lost sight of that in their mindset of "Drizzle is absolutely not broken and will be OU forever."

 

[Kefka Palazzo™]

@ Burning Man: Venusaur (and most Chlorophyl users) however can do something about his offenses (Growth). Most Swift Swimmers have to deal with their crappy stats, even those who can boost are stopped cold by Ferrothorn/grassers with decent spcl def or are so fragile they'll get one shotted on spot.

+2 LO Modest Venusaur Solar Beam vs max/min Blissey: 50.4% - 59.4%
Specs Modest Kingdra Hydro Pump vs max/min Blissey: 42% - 49.6%

But Venusaur isn't walled by the #2 top OU and doesn't have to risk a miss.

Pseudo STAB under rain is over rated. Not even Kingdra is broken under it. I don't even know from where the common sense that Kingdra, Kabutops and Ludicolo were defaults ubers should Swift Swim be OU again.

1.Specs Kingdra 3HKOs Ferrothorn in the Rain.

2. Did you even play in that suspect test? I personally didn't find it fun to run things like Hail tentacruel just to stand a chance.

3.Oh, +2 Venusaur can hit slightly harder? Specs Kingdra doesn't need a turn to set up to hit that hard.

4.Growth Venusaur is ALWAYS walled by something. Grass + Fire + Poison/Ground isn't always great coverage.
Not to mention he gets no boost to his STAB and has to use a turn to set up.
Kingdra was set up by just having Rain.

 

[Razza]

I think that once thundurus is banned rain will be a little more balanced. To be honest if drizzle becomes banned then drought and most likely sandstream will have to be banned. After the drizzle ban many will jump into the drought bandwagon and when people learn how to use drought properly they will realise it too is just as/ almost as powerful as drizzle. When drought is banned people will tire of having to carry an excadrill counter to avoid being swept an either it or sandstream will be banned.
Fifth gen metagame is weather wars, and drizzle
Is not very much more powerful than the others in fact near the top of the ladder you find that most of the teams there are sun or sand and not sonmany rain teams. Anyways that is my two cents on drizzle.

 

[Rosey Oak]

@Alexwolf

Ok, you're right I did miss one realiable counter for all my agruments - Toxicroak, sorry that it slipped my mind. But even so, the one or two counter's that I did miss does not change the basis of my argument. i.e

"Excadrill is priority weak to two moves whereas Swift swimmers (with the exception of Armaldo) are resistant to both Aqua Jet and Bullet Punch, whilst also taking neutral damage from Mach Punch and Extreme Speed.

Now that it’s established we won’t be easily killing swift swimmers by priority, let’s take a look at our other options. Nothing (except Deoxy-s) will be out speeding Drizzle Swift swimmers, therefore we can’t outrun and revenge kill them easily either. I guess we’re only left with one option – to counter wall them."


As for checks (which don't involve the Prankster Ability) - it would A. need to be faster and/or B. have enough HP left to live the switch in damage.

No Pokemon will be faster than Drizzle Swift swimers unless you count 'Scarf Tyranitar' and 'Scarf Ninetales' like you said. Therefore we can only rely on option B. which requires a Pokemon to take the switch in damage and live another attack since it will be slower. If you think that many Pokemon meet this requirement please give me a list of examples because nothing springs to my mind at the moment.


@Everyone in general

Lastly, some people seem to be under the impression that in order for something to be broken, it must have no realible counters what so ever. I particularly blame Thundurus for the misinterpretation of the word.

Please keep an open mind on the true definition of the word 'broken' before drawing conclusions, and if you honesty still want Swift Swimmers back in OU after taking everything into account, then make a decent argument as to why this would benefit OU instead of justifying it with the opinionated comment which I have seen so far i.e because it sounds like a good idea.

 

[iSkittles]

I think that once thundurus is banned rain will be a little more balanced. To be honest if drizzle becomes banned then drought and most likely sandstream will have to be banned. After the drizzle ban many will jump into the drought bandwagon and when people learn how to use drought properly they will realise it too is just as/ almost as powerful as drizzle. When drought is banned people will tire of having to carry an excadrill counter to avoid being swept an either it or sandstream will be banned.
Fifth gen metagame is weather wars, and drizzle
Is not very much more powerful than the others in fact near the top of the ladder you find that most of the teams there are sun or sand and not sonmany rain teams. Anyways that is my two cents on drizzle.

That's pure theroymon at this point. Why would we not ban something that's broken on the assumptions of the future? Have you played in that meta where Drizzle is gone and can prove that Sand/Sun are broken in this hypothetical meta that only you have knowledge of?

Arguments like this aren't really arguments at all. Sorry if I came off as harsh, but seriously, until the actual sand/sun "dominated" meta is here, why even comment on it since it's only a possibility and not a confirmed fact? Also, do you even know why sand is run so much? It's pretty much the "anti weather" and it's risen in popularity to combat Drizzle teams.

@Alexwolf

Ok, you're right I did miss one realiable counter for all my agruments - Toxicroak, sorry that it slipped my mind. But even so, the one or two counter's that I did miss does not change the basis of my argument. i.e

"Excadrill is priority weak to two moves whereas Swift swimmers (with the exception of Armaldo) are resistant to both Aqua Jet and Bullet Punch, whilst also taking neutral damage from Mach Punch and Extreme Speed.

Now that it’s established we won’t be easily killing swift swimmers by priority, let’s take a look at our other options. Nothing (except Deoxy-s) will be out speeding Drizzle Swift swimmers, therefore we can’t outrun and revenge kill them easily either. I guess we’re only left with one option – to counter wall them."


As for checks (which don't involve the Prankster Ability) - it would A. need to be faster and/or B. have enough HP left to live the switch in damage.

No Pokemon will be faster than Drizzle Swift swimers unless you count 'Scarf Tyranitar' and 'Scarf Ninetales' like you said. Therefore we can only rely on option B. which requires a Pokemon to take the switch in damage and live another attack since it will be slower. If you think that many Pokemon meet this requirement please give me a list of examples because nothing springs to my mind at the moment.


@Everyone in general

Lastly, some people seem to be under the impression that in order for something to be broken, it must have no realible counters what so ever. I particularly blame Thundurus for the misinterpretation of the word.

Please keep an open mind on the true definition of the word 'broken' before drawing conclusions, and if you honesty still want Swift Swimmers back in OU after taking everything into account, then make a decent argument as to why this would benefit OU instead of justifying it with the opinionated comment which I have seen so far i.e because it sounds like a good idea.

Why wouldn't Prankster or Scarf inducers be taken into consideration? It's a legitimate check to SwSw and by choosing to not use them, it's your own fault for not selecting that option. I want SwSw back with Drizzle because it was only a temporary measure to remove them in the first place to determine the cause of Drizzle's overpowering presence at the beginning of the meta. We don't nerf things that "belong" in OU, and Drizzle should be no exception. We don't keep things that we like in OU or tailor them to fit, they are kept or banned by their best set, and with Drizzle's case, it's "best set" includes SwSw, which isn't being taken into consideration during the suspect tests. It's past due for it to be tested again with no restrictions placed upon it.

 

[Glen ^^]

1.Specs Kingdra 3HKOs Ferrothorn in the Rain.

2. Did you even play in that suspect test? I personally didn't find it fun to run things like Hail tentacruel just to stand a chance.

3.Oh, +2 Venusaur can hit slightly harder? Specs Kingdra doesn't need a turn to set up to hit that hard.

4.Growth Venusaur is ALWAYS walled by something. Grass + Fire + Poison/Ground isn't always great coverage.
Not to mention he gets no boost to his STAB and has to use a turn to set up.
Kingdra was set up by just having Rain.

1 - You think it's not "good enough" a 3HKO on a move double STABed and Speced?
I'm actually pretty amazed that something in BW doesn't get one/two-shotted on the minute it switch in on a "so obvious uber". See: Latios 2HKOing everything but Blissey.

2 - I did. I don't know how you got so far from your way just to counter Kingdra, honestly I expected something like "having to run Ludicolo is boring".

3 - In the long run you'll find that being able to set up, not relying so much on prediction and not missing is well worth the turn spent.

4 - The something that always counters Venusaur is far from the #2 most used Pokemon in OU. People actually have to go out of their way if they mind for Venusaur - while you can throw in Ferrothorn on any team and you're done with most of rain.

 

[Kefka Palazzo™]

1 - You think it's not "good enough" a 3HKO on a move double STABed and Speced?
I'm actually pretty amazed that something in BW doesn't get one/two-shotted on the minute it switch in on a "so obvious uber". See: Latios 2HKOing everything but Blissey.

2 - I did. I don't know how you got so far from your way just to counter Kingdra, honestly I expected something like "having to run Ludicolo is boring".

3 - In the long run you'll find that being able to set up, not relying so much on prediction and not missing is well worth the turn spent.

4 - The something that always counters Venusaur is far from the #2 most used Pokemon in OU. People actually have to go out of their way if they mind for Venusaur - while you can throw in Ferrothorn on any team and you're done with most of rain.

1.What? Anything not named Ferrothorn/Blissey gets OHKO'd/2HKo'd by that thing. And then both those things get 3HKO'd so they can't even switch in.

2. How did you counter it? There wasn't many viable ways unless you carried your own weather.

3.In the long run, I found out that not needing that turn of set up was well worth it especially when I could run more than one super sweeper on my team which also didn't need set up.

4.Ferrothorn cannot counter Specs Kingdra unless it carries both Leech Seed and Protect.

 

[Glen ^^]

1.What? Anything not named Ferrothorn/Blissey gets OHKO'd/2HKo'd by that thing. And then both those things get 3HKO'd so they can't even switch in.

2. How did you counter it? There wasn't many viable ways unless you carried your own weather.

3.In the long run, I found out that not needing that turn of set up was well worth it especially when I could run more than one super sweeper on my team which also didn't need set up.

4.Ferrothorn cannot counter Specs Kingdra unless it carries both Leech Seed and Protect.

1 - For something that depends on weather to do anything, it's still awesome. There's worse stuff there that couldn't care less about the weather.

2 - You could either have your own weather, Prankster Sunny Day, Prankster Thunder Wave in a pinch, Ludicolo, Vaporeon, Empoleon.....
sure they aren't 100% counters, only checks, but that's BW for you.

3 - Well, personally I'd rather set up something and sweep well than just spam the opponent and hope they can't answer.

4 - When you consider that this Ferro stops almost all of the Swift Swimmers, this could very well be his regular set. Doesn't TTar and Jirachi started to go spcl just to deal with Latios?

 

[Mario With Lasers]

Shuckle: Read what I said re: Aldaron's Proposal. Banning a ridiculous number of Pokemon just to remove the Proposal is counter-productive. We should do what we can to create an enjoyable and variety-filled metagame, and if that means having a complex ban, then fine, as long as it can be justified.

Kingdra, the best Swift Swimmer, is UU.


It doesn't matter whether we complex ban or outright ban them, they will not be used in OU either way. This is like banning Shadow Tag Wobbuffet (or Shadow Tag) instead of Wobbuffet.

 

[Kefka Palazzo™]

1 - For something that depends on weather to do anything, it's still awesome. There's worse stuff there that couldn't care less about the weather.

2 - You could either have your own weather, Prankster Sunny Day, Prankster Thunder Wave in a pinch, Ludicolo, Vaporeon, Empoleon.....
sure they aren't 100% counters, only checks, but that's BW for you.

3 - Well, personally I'd rather set up something and sweep well than just spam the opponent and hope they can't answer.

4 - When you consider that this Ferro stops almost all of the Swift Swimmers, this could very well be his regular set. Doesn't TTar and Jirachi started to go spcl just to deal with Latios?

1.Okay?

2.So fun, right?
Here were the options:

A.Run your own weather team.
B.Use your own Swift Swimmer which would be useless otherwise
C.Run Whimsicott/Thundurus/Tornadus and use a move slot for a weather move. Fun.
D.Use a bulky pokemon that isn't weak to Grass/Dragon/Rock and can take a Specs Hydro pump in the Rain and then use a weather move.
E.Use a bulky pokemon that can cripple the Rain sweepers whilst surviving the above attacks from 3 different pokemon + a possible 4th.

So fun, right?
So diverse, so entertaining, so. much. fun.

T_T

3.I'd rather just spam super-powered Attack that kill even resists.
Oh, my first spammer died? That's fine I'll just send in my second spammer.

4.Ferro stops all the swift swimmers?

Ludicolo 2HKOs with LO Focus Blast.
Kabutops 2HKOs with LO Low Kick
Kingdra 3HKO's with Specs Hydro pump.

How is he stopping all the swift swimmers? Once the land mine drops, your whole team does too. They didn't even need to set up.

 

[Rosey Oak]

Why wouldn't Prankster or Scarf inducers be taken into consideration? It's a legitimate check to SwSw and by choosing to not use them, it's your own fault for not selecting that option.

The 3 Pokemon with Prankster at the moment are Whimsicott, Tornados, Thundurus. Tornados doesn't have any moves to cripple swift swimmers. Whismsciott needs to rely on a 75% accuracy move (Stun Spore) and therefore I wouldn't classify it as a reliable counter. Thundurus can cripple swift swimmers with prankster t-wave if it remains in OU.

I never said scarf inducer's can't be consider as a counter. I said "No Pokemon will be faster than Drizzle Swift swimers unless you count 'Scarf Tyranitar' and 'Scarf Ninetales'."

Therefore in reality the only reliable counters to swift swimmers as a whole are: resistant walls, Toxicroak, Thundurus (if it's still around), Scarf Tyranitar and Scarf Ninetales.

On the bright side though, I'm glad you have written a decent argument as to why Drizzle should be considered for OU, but now we should also consider what impact swift swimmers would have on the Metagame.

 

[XienZo]

On the bright side though, I'm glad you have written a decent argument as to why Drizzle should be considered for OU, but now we should also consider what impact swift swimmers would have on the Metagame.

I really don't see why we're still theorymonning when we can use results from the previous Drizzle tests, which are far more concrete than any theorymon we could ever have.

And ultimately, that testing period showed that Kingdra was dominating everything, but also that Kabutops and Ludicolo were used mainly just to counter Kingdra's counters, not as stand-alone sweepers.

Given that Kabutops and Ludicolo, the 2nd/3rd best SwSw abusers, were simply playing a supporting role, it seems unlikely that the inferior SwSw abusers would somehow exceed Kabutops and Ludicolo and somehow become dangerous stand-alone threats.

 

[TheTraininator]

The 3 Pokemon with Prankster at the moment are Whimsicott, Tornados, Thundurus.

Murkrow as well, but we don't even need to discuss him.

Edit: He gets T-Wave, so he CAN cripple them and has no fear of getting banned, unlike Thundurus, but who would run Prankster Murkrow in OU just to counter Swift Swimmers?

 

[Lirg]

A question for the ones who want to retest the swift swimmers : Why do you want so much test these swift swimmers ? What can it bring to the metagame ?

Only two things can happen :
1) Drizzle will be more powerful (and may be banned in the next round with people sick to deal with it).
2) Or we let useless (or near) swift swimmers in OU and ban a bunch of pokemon to uber.

For me, the speed tiers is already screwed by Excadrill, no need to add something up

 

[XienZo]

A question for the ones who want to retest the swift swimmers : Why do you want so much test these swift swimmers ? What can it bring to the metagame ?

Only two things can happen :
1) Drizzle will be more powerful (and may be banned in the next round with people sick to deal with it).
2) Or we let useless (or near) swift swimmers in OU and ban a bunch of pokemon to uber.

3) It lets the Swift Swimmers that aren't useless and don't break the game (yes, there are actually SwSw pokemon besides Kingdra and Luvdisc) into OU.

4) Gets rid of complex bans and their infinite (read: time consuming) possibilities.

For me, the speed tiers is already screwed by Excadrill, no need to add something up

That's Excadrill's problem. There's absolutely no point keeping non-broken pokemon out of OU just because there's other unrelated pokemon that are potentially breaking OU.

Murkrow as well, but we don't even need to discuss him.

Edit: He gets T-Wave, so he CAN cripple them and has no fear of getting banned, unlike Thundurus, but who would run Prankster Murkrow in OU just to counter Swift Swimmers?

FYI, Murkrow can pull of PerishTrapping relatively well with Evolite, FeatherDance, and Roost.

I think he does it well in RU, but I can't see it in OU. His defenses are in the base 40s. Even with Eviolite, it seems he would be easily killed.

That's why I said relatively well.

 

[TheTraininator]

FYI, Murkrow can pull of PerishTrapping relatively well with Evolite, FeatherDance, and Roost.

I think he does it well in RU, but I can't see it in OU. His defenses are in the base 40s. Even with Eviolite, it seems he would be easily killed.

 

[Lirg]

@xienzo

For the excadrill problem you're right. But deal with only one (3/4 if you count drought) pokemon with insane speed is easier than 15 (I say a number at random) unless you run weather yourself. I'm not against weather wars as long as I don't have to run weather myself to do something and participate to this war.

About your solution 3, give me an example where a swsw don't give more power (I don't say overpower) to drizzle without being useless ?

Drizzle for me is fine as it is now. But some people argue that even in this state drizzle is overpowered. So, if we add more power, it'll be the straw that breaks the camel's back. It's clear for me that Armaldo wouldn't be broken and may be interesting to play, but with other non-swsw pokemon who also abuse rain, it's too much.

 

[XienZo]

@xienzo

For the excadrill problem you're right. But deal with only one (3/4 if you count drought) pokemon with insane speed is easier than 15 (I say a number at random) unless you run weather yourself. I'm not against weather wars as long as I don't have to run weather myself to do something and participate to this war.

Except 10~12 of those 15 aren't nearly as difficult to deal with as the 1 that we have. Not to mention that whenever they use up a slot to put in something like Huntail, that's a slot they aren't using on something like Thunderous or Starmie or Ferrothorn.

About your solution 3, give me an example where a swsw don't give more power (I don't say overpower) to drizzle without being useless ?

To clarify, the individual suspect testing solution states that we drop Alderon's Proposal and just individually test the potentially broken weather abusers, which include both SwSw pokemon and non SwSw pokemon.

What does this mean?

It means that while stuff like Huntail and Floatzel would be allowed back into OU, overpowered threats like Kingdra, Thunderous, Starmie, and etc. could potentially end up in Ubers instead.

Thus, while rain teams gain some SwSw pokemon, the broken ones like Kingdra will likely return to Ubers, along with other broken rain abusers like Thunderous and Rotom-W which were never touched by Alderon's proposal in the first place.

Thus, they'll end up losing their broken abusers, SwSw or not, while gaining weaker non-broken SwSw in their place, effectively making sure rain offense become more balanced, not more broken.

Drizzle for me is fine as it is now. But some people argue that even in this state drizzle is overpowered. So, if we add more power, it'll be the straw that breaks the camel's back. It's clear for me that Armaldo wouldn't be broken and may be interesting to play, but with other non-swsw pokemon who also abuse rain, it's too much.

As I said before, the main selling point is that since we're not using a blanket ban, we CAN target those "other non-swsw pokemon" as well, and send the broken ones to Ubers. After all, Thunderous has clearly demonstrated that non-SwSw weather threats are just as deserving of suspect tests as the SwSw themselves.

 

[Joel]

Here's a hought.

I have seen mention of banning all weathers in OU (and under) with no regaurd as to what is and isn't "broken". SwSwers, Excadrill, 'Chomp (though potentially irrelivant now) ect, would be pleanty nerffed enough to either stay, or get back into OU again.

On the other hand, I have seen going through and testing individual, potentially broken Pokes while weather still exists.

I can see both sides to both arguments, and I both agree, and disagree on the arguments made in both cases, depending on how well people sold them (i.e, depending on their knowlege of the metagame).

We already have 4 tiers, and are most likely going to have a 5th tier with this (RU) rounds testing + usage.

Really, that already is alot to try and remember, which means every once in a while, even though I am playing/battling nearly everyday, I have to use a wonderful tool called the internet to look stuff up to see either if it's legal, it's competitive viability, or whatever. 646 Pokes (or 649 if you count the unreleased Pokes) are already a lot to rememebr, and anyone that really cares to battle competitively is bound to need to look at least one thing about them up at some point. (If you honestly don't have to look some of the stuff up still, and you have that good of a memory, you should probably be out bettering the world, instead of playing Pokemon, because you would be more intelligent than most of us here...no offence.)

There is abosolutely no harm in making one tier with bans on specific Pokes, and one tier for complexe bans. Being too much for the average person to remember about Pokemon already exists, and it really does seem to be split 50/50 here at Smogon as to have complexe bans or individual bans.

We should have OU, UU, RU, NU, and LC tiers with both complexe bans, and non-complexe bans. (Ubers will always just be the place for everything else.)

 

[Lirg]

@ xienzo

Your argument is totally logical. It's true that we could make a lot of bans to balance the power of Drizzle. But I prefer in this case banning drizzle. One ban is better than a lot of them. At least, in this case, people wanting to abuse of it can still use the move rain dance (who have a time limit and can be stopped by taunt)

 

[SHUCKLE MAN]

Shuckle: Read what I said re: Aldaron's Proposal. Banning a ridiculous number of Pokemon just to remove the Proposal is counter-productive. We should do what we can to create an enjoyable and variety-filled metagame, and if that means having a complex ban, then fine, as long as it can be justified.

Is banning, say, 6 Pokemon a "ridiculous number"?

 

[iSkittles]

I think keeping the AP at this point is more counter productive than allowing the swift swimmers back, since even with Drizzle's most poetent ability removed from play, it's still suspect. That should pretty much spell out how overpowered the weather is. Now maybe I'm missing something, but when something in it's nerfed form is still causing problems, I'd assume we'd get rid of it instead entirely, instead of trying to nerf it more to fit OU.

I really don't feel Drizzle should be getting this much special treatment. I mean, we didn't say Garchomp can stay in OU if it doesn't run Sub SD set in Sand, so we shouldn't weaken rain to stay either. From what I'm reading, the people that generally don't want to repeal AP are wanting to keep rain OU no matter what, instead of simply getting rid of what's broken. Last time I checked, things got banned by their best capabilities instead of tailor made to fit.

So, if things like Kingdra or Gene Bro end up in ubers and Rain is balanced after that, so be it, I'd much prefer that than outright banning the weather. But, at the same, if nearly every Swift Swimmer + other weather abusing things (like Dragonite and Gene Bro just for example) ends up banned, I think it would be better for Rain to get the boot instead, since that's proof to me that the weather is breaking them and not the other way around. This is all my personal opinion though, so take it with a grain of salt.

 

[alphatron]

The swift swimmers and drizzle teams all have ways to beat ferrothorn. Much like how any good drought team has ways to beat heatran and the blissey/slowbro defensive core. Ferrothorn isn't the end all be all to rain at all. I believe it was shrang who caused the toxicroak and virizion boom during round 2?

I'm fine with testing a few swift swimmers but I really don't see the point. Pretty much every swift swimmer is better off than the chlorophyll pokemon except for obvious stuff like magikarp and surskit. I've already spoken my piece against theorymon, but it has already been shown during round two just how devastating they can be together. For one thing, unlike with drought, multiple swift swimmers can be safely used on the same team.

 

[Pocket]

For one, Aldaron never intended for his proposal to be permanent - it was meant as a stop to the "ban all weather" floodgates that would have inevitably opened at the time. You can read the thread in PR if you don't believe me.

I am sorry, IcyMan, but that is plainly false. There is nowhere on Aldaron's thread that states that his proposal was intended to be temporary. Specifically, he mentions how something as influential as weather should be treated differently than our usual suspects, thus recommending his proposal. No where in the thread hinted at this proposal being temporary. Aldaron Proposal is indefinite as any other ban we have made. Of course that doesn't prevent us to test individual Swift Swimmers, if it offers more to the metagame.

However, why are you guys even talking about bringing back Swift Swimmers now? This is only exacerbating the pro-Drizzle / anti-Drizzle argument that clutters almost every Suspect Thread. I believe the next course of action before testing Swift Swimmers or what not is to have a Drizzle-less Suspect Ladder to compare the 2 metagames and decide once and for all which metagame we find more desirable (balanced and varied). We can leave the Swift Swimmers debate for another round.

PS - capefeather should really introduce the Drizzle-less Suspect Ladder to the PR forum, since it has garnered legitimate support here.

 

[iSkittles]

That's the problem though, weather shouldn't be treated differently. In all honesty, accepting that proposal was a mistake in the long run. I stand firm in that belief. I do acknowledge that it gave everyone time to prepare, but it set a horrible precedent. Things absolutely should not be tailor made to fit. They either do or don't. When the rules start to flex, look how many problems it causes down the road.