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

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Celebi's just a response to the resurgence of bulky Waters into the metagame. We all know that if your Ferro is down, Gastrodon is just the stupidest thing ever.

What I don't understand about Celebi right now is that while the most used set seems to be Nasty Plot, I've never seen one running Baton Pass. It's always NP, Giga Drain, HP Fire, Recover. Celebi's one of the hardest to shut down Baton Passers in the game and it has access to both Swords Dance & Nasty Plot yet no one's ever passing their boosts instead of having Celebi try to take down that Tyranitar by itself. I'll tell you right now that nothing strikes fear into the hearts of men quite like a Rotom-W or Starmie at +2 Sp.Atk or Volcarona for that matter since it's better at dealing with the Pokemon that scare out Celebi.

The resurgence of bulky Waters make Virizion better than ever, so I still don't know why Virizion is getting ditched. Many of the Celebis I see these days are Nasty Plotters as well, so running Recover means it is walled so hard it's not funny. Giga Drain is good enough recovery as it is.
 
Make no mistake, when I posted that paragraph about Amoonguss, I was only saying it would be worth trying if it had Regenerator. Without that sturdy recovery, it has no niche over Tangrowth.

Synthesis/Moonlight/Morning Sun on any pokemon in the ubiquitous sandstorm OU environment is NEVER worth it.... except sometimes on Volcarona >____>
 
Celebi's just a response to the resurgence of bulky Waters into the metagame. We all know that if your Ferro is down, Gastrodon is just the stupidest thing ever.

What I don't understand about Celebi right now is that while the most used set seems to be Nasty Plot, I've never seen one running Baton Pass. It's always NP, Giga Drain, HP Fire, Recover. Celebi's one of the hardest to shut down Baton Passers in the game and it has access to both Swords Dance & Nasty Plot yet no one's ever passing their boosts instead of having Celebi try to take down that Tyranitar by itself. I'll tell you right now that nothing strikes fear into the hearts of men quite like a Rotom-W or Starmie at +2 Sp.Atk or Volcarona for that matter since it's better at dealing with the Pokemon that scare out Celebi.

Giga Drain and Recover is somehow redundant. +2 Giga Drain is enough to heal Celebi's HP, so you can run something useful over Recover, like STAB Psychic.

Well, 5th gen is a different metagame dude. Shit changes.
 
Nasty Plot Celebi with 36 Speed EVs and only two coverage moves is fairly easy to stop, so catch on (I mean, come on. At least use 64 EVs...).

I prefer to use Earth Power or Psychic on a Life Orb Nasty Plot Celebi instead of Recover, since you can always get decent recovery with Giga Drain.
 
Virizion is one of the most amazing pokemon to be introduced in 5th Gen, hands down. It's up there with Thundurus, and Terrakoin honestly. Grass- and Fighting-type STABes are amazing, getting neutral coverage on almost everything, and if it doesn't get neutral damage Hidden Power Ice will fill in all the holes. Immunity to Leech Seed, Calm Mind, pretty fucking sweet defenses, and base 108 Speed? Grass-types have always had it pretty sweet as a defensive type, despite Fire- and Ice-type moves being everywhere. It's one of the three types that resist Water-type attacks. It can stave off Electric-type attacks too.

So that pretty sweet defensive typing (which shuts down most rain teams bar ones that abuse Hurricane) is only coupled by the glory that is the Fighting-type. Fighting has always been an amazing offensive and defensive typing. If you beg to differ look at the CAPs from last gen, there's quite a number which are Fighting-typed (and they were some of the best). It handles Rock- and Dark-type attacks, getting rid of the threat that is Tyranitar completely. STAB Fighting attacks too are something a lot of pokemon which they could use. Hitting SE on Steel-, Rock-, and Dark-type pokemon is a fucking God-send. Especially with the bitch Ferrothorn on every other team.

What can Celebi do that Virizion can't? Natural Cure? Sure. But honestly that's about it. Nasty Plot Celebi can't really do much if you're running recover (hint you shouldn't), and it's complete Pursuit bait. Or it's going to get outpaced considering base 100 Speed isn't that fast anymore (oh how things have changed). Psychic-type STAB is pretty cool, I'll admit, with the musketeers everywhere and conkeldurr showing its ugly mug on most offensive teams STAB Psychic is pretty awesome to have. But STAB Giga Drain is just as effective in most cases (not against opposing Virizion, I guess); and a non-boosted Conkeldurr isn't too much of a threat in all honesty.

Basically TL;DR Celebi shouldn't be used more than Virizion, that makes no sense.
 
Virizion is one of the most amazing pokemon to be introduced in 5th Gen, hands down. It's up there with Thundurus, and Terrakoin honestly. Grass- and Fighting-type STABes are amazing, getting neutral coverage on almost everything, and if it doesn't get neutral damage Hidden Power Ice will fill in all the holes. Immunity to Leech Seed, Calm Mind, pretty fucking sweet defenses, and base 108 Speed? Grass-types have always had it pretty sweet as a defensive type, despite Fire- and Ice-type moves being everywhere. It's one of the three types that resist Water-type attacks. It can stave off Electric-type attacks too.

So that pretty sweet defensive typing (which shuts down most rain teams bar ones that abuse Hurricane) is only coupled by the glory that is the Fighting-type. Fighting has always been an amazing offensive and defensive typing. If you beg to differ look at the CAPs from last gen, there's quite a number which are Fighting-typed (and they were some of the best). It handles Rock- and Dark-type attacks, getting rid of the threat that is Tyranitar completely. STAB Fighting attacks too are something a lot of pokemon which they could use. Hitting SE on Steel-, Rock-, and Dark-type pokemon is a fucking God-send. Especially with the bitch Ferrothorn on every other team.

What can Celebi do that Virizion can't? Natural Cure? Sure. But honestly that's about it. Nasty Plot Celebi can't really do much if you're running recover (hint you shouldn't), and it's complete Pursuit bait. Or it's going to get outpaced considering base 100 Speed isn't that fast anymore (oh how things have changed). Psychic-type STAB is pretty cool, I'll admit, with the musketeers everywhere and conkeldurr showing its ugly mug on most offensive teams STAB Psychic is pretty awesome to have. But STAB Giga Drain is just as effective in most cases (not against opposing Virizion, I guess); and a non-boosted Conkeldurr isn't too much of a threat in all honesty.

Basically TL;DR Celebi shouldn't be used more than Virizion, that makes no sense.

I'd have to say that i disagree. Usually, beating a virizion involves putting it to sleep by me; with celebi, i can do that maybe once AND it'll switch out. Zero times if it has psychic. Seriously, NP celebi is an amazing stallbreaker, CM virizion is amazingly stallbroken.(At least, by stall teams with a skarmory). I'll admit that not being pursuit bait is nice, but who in the hell is pursuiting you exactly? Only scarftar can and if he does you giga drain him.(Of course, then he can crunch. But you get the point.) Weavile and krookodile can, but nobody uses them enough to justify that point.
Seriously; you might outspeed things with virizion, but then you fail to kill them. (Note:If virizion had nasty plot i'd probably think it was better.)
 
Virizion is one of the most amazing pokemon to be introduced in 5th Gen, hands down. It's up there with Thundurus, and Terrakoin honestly.

That's not really a very good statement, considering Thunderus is a suspect, and Terrakion is good at best.

Virizion is better than Terrakion, if only because of the metagame. Its far below Thunderus, Renkulus, Excadrill, Volcarona and Conkeldurr, however.

Seriously, Terrakion is underwhelming. After all the hype given to it in the Smogcasts...

Let's list what beats Terrakion:

Gliscor walks all over any set.
Skarmory walks all over Rock Polish, and can WW out Swords Dance.
Jirachi can Thunder Wave and then Flinchax
Azumarill can Aqua Jet
Conkeldurr can Mach Punch
Scizor can Bullet Punch
Rock Polish loses to Rotom-W, and Swords Dance can't set up on it for Hydro Pump or Will-O-Wisp
Renkulus can tank a hit and Psychic
Dragonite can tank a hit and retaliate with Superpower, Earthquake, or a Dragon STAB
Latios outspeeds and can use a Psychic attack, Surf, or Meteor
Politoad can tank a hit from Rock Polish and then KO
Jellicent handles Terrakion easily
Excadrill outspeeds in the sand and OHKO's.

And that's off the top of my head... and most of those pokemon are common.

Terrakion also can't set up on Ferrothorn, due to T-Wave, Power Whip, and Gyro Ball all murdering it
I know there's also a lot of other stuff Terrakion can't set up on, or can revenge it if it hasn't set up [Which is a LOT harder than it's made out to be]

Terrakion is good, but weaknesses to Water, Grass, Psychic, Steel, Ground and Fighting absolutely murders it, and lack of immunities to switch in on, and no immunity to any status on a sweeper weak to literally every common priority move except ExtremeSpeed...
 
ummm... thats not how terrakion works.

you are supposed to use the double dance set, force a switch and set up witht the apporpriate move for the team.

+2 stone edge 2hkoes gliscors.
+2 close combat 2hkoes skarmories.
exadrill is outsped after a rock polish

i dont think azumarill can OHKO. if excadrill can live an aquajet, so can terrakion.
 
That's not really a very good statement, considering Thunderus is a suspect, and Terrakion is good at best.

Virizion is better than Terrakion, if only because of the metagame. Its far below Thunderus, Renkulus, Excadrill, Volcarona and Conkeldurr, however.

Seriously, Terrakion is underwhelming. After all the hype given to it in the Smogcasts...

Let's list what beats Terrakion:

Gliscor walks all over any set.
Skarmory walks all over Rock Polish, and can WW out Swords Dance.
Jirachi can Thunder Wave and then Flinchax
Azumarill can Aqua Jet
Conkeldurr can Mach Punch
Scizor can Bullet Punch
Rock Polish loses to Rotom-W, and Swords Dance can't set up on it for Hydro Pump or Will-O-Wisp
Renkulus can tank a hit and Psychic
Dragonite can tank a hit and retaliate with Superpower, Earthquake, or a Dragon STAB
Latios outspeeds and can use a Psychic attack, Surf, or Meteor
Politoad can tank a hit from Rock Polish and then KO
Jellicent handles Terrakion easily
Excadrill outspeeds in the sand and OHKO's.

And that's off the top of my head... and most of those pokemon are common.

Terrakion also can't set up on Ferrothorn, due to T-Wave, Power Whip, and Gyro Ball all murdering it
I know there's also a lot of other stuff Terrakion can't set up on, or can revenge it if it hasn't set up [Which is a LOT harder than it's made out to be]

Terrakion is good, but weaknesses to Water, Grass, Psychic, Steel, Ground and Fighting absolutely murders it, and lack of immunities to switch in on, and no immunity to any status on a sweeper weak to literally every common priority move except ExtremeSpeed...

This makes me want to use choice band Terrakion so much, as it destroys 90% of these pokemon. I think the only pokemon listed here, that still counters it, is Gliscor.
 
Woah woah woah woah woah woah.........

Terrakoin overrated? There's almost nothing that can come in on Terrakoin and not be threatened out. You have to predict around Terra super carefully, or run a toxicroak or claydol or nidoqueen on your team, because otherwise you're fucked. Double Dance (SD, RP, CC, SE) is its best set, easily. Ask anyone and they will say Double Dance Balloon Terrakion (adamant or jolly depending on what you like) can easily sweep teams.

Gliscor is 2HKOed by +2 Stone Edge / CC, and you have Balloon so those two hits are pretty easy to get. Skarmory is also 2HKOed, but you only get Whirlwinded out, meaning your Balloon is still intact for later so you can just set up again and again Jirachi is hardly a safe switch-in, considering the standard SpDef set 252HP/224SpD takes 96.5% - 113.6% off of a Jolly Terra's +2 CC and on top of that you outpace Jirachi, by the way that's a OHKO with SR. Azumarill cannot switch in, it has to come in on a revenge or get murdered by SE or CC. Same with Conkeldurr but it can actually come in on SE, so Conkel is a p. awesome switch-in. Scizor, like the previous two, can only revenge, switching in more than once onto CC or SE will mean it's a KO.

For Rotom what kind of person is going to willingly set up on a Rotom? You find out whether it's scarf or specs and play accordingly, if it's Scarf then it's going to take 76% - 89.7% off of a non-boosted Jolly Close Combat, meaning it cannot come in as there is a chance to OHKO with SR down. If you're running a specs set with max HP and SpA then you're taking: 60.5% - 71.4%, uh oh! Doesn't look like Rotom actually wants to come into Terra in the slightest. Reuncleus cannot tank a +2 Stone Edge, there is no way it can, especially if it's adamant, if it's jolly there's a small chance iirc. Dragonite takes 68.85% MINIMUM (with multiscale intact) against a +2 Stone Edge, once again, jolly. Latios can tank a +0 Stone Edge, yes and it outpaces, so Latios is a pretty /decent/ answer. But that's about it since it's still taking 64.9% - 76.8% from +0 Stone Edge. Politoed with Scarf wins, but Politoed without Scarf loses horribly. Jellicent is OHKOed by +2 Stone Edge with SR (assuming 252/0 or 79.5% - 93.6% with 252/252 which is a solid OHKO with SR most of the time). and Excadrill needs to make damn sure that Terra doesn't have its balloon intact, otherwise you're out an Excadrill which is a damn shame.
 
Genny, you're aboslutely right about Virizion being amazing. It's late and I'm tired so I'll do my big post on it tomorrow, but I'll leave y'all with this:

I run Calm Mind / Giga Drain / Focus Blast / Taunt. It consistently beats Blissey without a second thought.
 
Woah woah woah woah woah woah.........

Terrakoin overrated? There's almost nothing that can come in on Terrakoin and not be threatened out. You have to predict around Terra super carefully, or run a toxicroak or claydol or nidoqueen on your team, because otherwise you're fucked. Double Dance (SD, RP, CC, SE) is its best set, easily. Ask anyone and they will say Double Dance Balloon Terrakion (adamant or jolly depending on what you like) can easily sweep teams.

Gliscor is 2HKOed by +2 Stone Edge / CC, and you have Balloon so those two hits are pretty easy to get. Skarmory is also 2HKOed, but you only get Whirlwinded out, meaning your Balloon is still intact for later so you can just set up again and again Jirachi is hardly a safe switch-in, considering the standard SpDef set 252HP/224SpD takes 96.5% - 113.6% off of a Jolly Terra's +2 CC and on top of that you outpace Jirachi, by the way that's a OHKO with SR. Azumarill cannot switch in, it has to come in on a revenge or get murdered by SE or CC. Same with Conkeldurr but it can actually come in on SE, so Conkel is a p. awesome switch-in. Scizor, like the previous two, can only revenge, switching in more than once onto CC or SE will mean it's a KO.

For Rotom what kind of person is going to willingly set up on a Rotom? You find out whether it's scarf or specs and play accordingly, if it's Scarf then it's going to take 76% - 89.7% off of a non-boosted Jolly Close Combat, meaning it cannot come in as there is a chance to OHKO with SR down. If you're running a specs set with max HP and SpA then you're taking: 60.5% - 71.4%, uh oh! Doesn't look like Rotom actually wants to come into Terra in the slightest. Reuncleus cannot tank a +2 Stone Edge, there is no way it can, especially if it's adamant, if it's jolly there's a small chance iirc. Dragonite takes 68.85% MINIMUM (with multiscale intact) against a +2 Stone Edge, once again, jolly. Latios can tank a +0 Stone Edge, yes and it outpaces, so Latios is a pretty /decent/ answer. But that's about it since it's still taking 64.9% - 76.8% from +0 Stone Edge. Politoed with Scarf wins, but Politoed without Scarf loses horribly. Jellicent is OHKOed by +2 Stone Edge with SR (assuming 252/0 or 79.5% - 93.6% with 252/252 which is a solid OHKO with SR most of the time). and Excadrill needs to make damn sure that Terra doesn't have its balloon intact, otherwise you're out an Excadrill which is a damn shame.

I second this. As Empoleon said, this guy can safe switch in to a good matchup and then just Rock Polish or Sword Dance (depends on what u think that the opponent might switch into). Then, u just own crap. And about those counters: Yeah; with the right amount of prediction, u can beat those. For me, it's like a physical Thundurus. Probably the most underrated threat.

Genny, you're aboslutely right about Virizion being amazing. It's late and I'm tired so I'll do my big post on it tomorrow, but I'll leave y'all with this:

I run Calm Mind / Giga Drain / Focus Blast / Taunt. It consistently beats Blissey without a second thought.

Nice set :D, but Dragonite completely destroys it (it's only one pokemon, right?)
 
Nice set :D, but Dragonite completely destroys it (it's only one pokemon, right?)

Volcarona is another stopper, but you can taunt him predicting a quiver dance, then switch without the fear of a setup.
Idk how much an unboosted Flamethrower/Fire Blast/Flame Dance does to Virizion, then, if she can take it well, maybe he can beat it with Focus Blast.
 
The problem with Virizion is that its lack of reliable recovery, vulnerability to sandstorm as well as status makes it too easy to wear down. Celebi is far sturdier and has natural cure to rid itself of burn status, making it the perfect Rotom-W and Jellicent switch in.

But yea, Virizion is still good (not being Pursuit weak is clutch).


yes but Virizion has a niche of not being countered by the second to first most used pokemon in OU, tyranitar so that's something.
 
yes but Virizion has a niche of not being countered by the second to first most used pokemon in OU, tyranitar so that's something.

Celebi isn't countered by Tyranitar either.

P.S. everyone seems to have forgotten that Celebi can escape Pursuit with Baton Pass. This is a very good move on both its defensive sets as well as its NP/CM sets, which have trouble dealing with CB Tar. It outclasses U-Turn almost completely.
 
Terrakion is like the most tailor-made sweeper ever made. Powerful attacking stat, high speed, powerful and nearly unresisted STAB attacks and pretty bulky (its bulk is similar to that of Dusknoir's). It just has a relatively bad defensive typing, being weak to the ever present Bullet Punch as well as water/grass/fighting/etc.
 
Late but amoongus is indeed lackluster without regeneration. I'm sticking with bulky parasect for now, who has been working rather well for me.
 
Terrakion underrated? I fucking hate terrakion. Fuck that thing. The choice scarf set is just cheap IMO, it outspeeds basically anything except other scarfers that are already faster (of which I looked at and they all mostly suck with scarf locked moves) and deoxys/ninjask/excadrill. And it still can OHKO just about my whole party. Fuck him, I don't even get to fight back. Oh and thanks to sandstorm I can't even OHKO him with an occasional special move that might have been my only chance.

Any sort of "dancing" terrakion is IMO the easiest and most comfortable match up to fight against. They have to use a turn to do anything, as without a RP they are outsped and KO'd, and without an SD they can't hit hard enough. I always feel like I have the most favorable match up when I see a terrakion using boosting moves. Fuck scarf terra.
 
Throwing this in here again, but I friggin love Moltres on my hail team. The number of things that switch into most of the main hail pokemon who Moltres can switch into for free are everywhere. There's rotom-W, but that's easy to pack an answer to.
 
That's not really a very good statement, considering Thunderus is a suspect, and Terrakion is good at best.

Virizion is better than Terrakion, if only because of the metagame. Its far below Thunderus, Renkulus, Excadrill, Volcarona and Conkeldurr, however.

Seriously, Terrakion is underwhelming. After all the hype given to it in the Smogcasts...

Let's list what beats Terrakion:

Gliscor walks all over any set.
Skarmory walks all over Rock Polish, and can WW out Swords Dance.
Jirachi can Thunder Wave and then Flinchax
Azumarill can Aqua Jet
Conkeldurr can Mach Punch
Scizor can Bullet Punch
Rock Polish loses to Rotom-W, and Swords Dance can't set up on it for Hydro Pump or Will-O-Wisp
Renkulus can tank a hit and Psychic
Dragonite can tank a hit and retaliate with Superpower, Earthquake, or a Dragon STAB
Latios outspeeds and can use a Psychic attack, Surf, or Meteor
Politoad can tank a hit from Rock Polish and then KO
Jellicent handles Terrakion easily
Excadrill outspeeds in the sand and OHKO's.

And that's off the top of my head... and most of those pokemon are common.

Not to belabor the point... but saying Skarmory can tank a hit after a Rock Polish, or Excadrill can outspeed after a Swords Dance doesn't mean much when you factor in Team Preview and Double Dance being the standard set. Even with no boosts many of those mons are wrecked by one of his dual-Stabs, severely limiting their switch ins or relegating them to revenge killing him. Terakkion's hype is well-deserved.
 
Shouldn't voting have started like a month ago? lol. I been missing in action since like June, and it's still Round 5. Not being a prick or anything, just asking.
 
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