BW2 General Metagame Discussion Thread

[IstheCakeReallyaLie]

Genesect needs to be banned for the meta to stabilize and allow stall. It's obviously Uber material. Arceus-tier offenses, a great offensive type, a movepool wider than my mouth when Chomp was unbanned, and a ton of different sets.

Anyways, Chomp is back. Cool. Toasting to it right now. Our Chompshake brings the casuals to the yard, I guess.

 

[Lavos]

Genesect needs to be banned for the meta to stabilize and allow stall. It's obviously Uber material. Arceus-tier offenses, a great offensive type, a movepool wider than my mouth when Chomp was unbanned, and a ton of different sets.

Remove the first sentence of that post, and you could be referring to a plethora of OU Pokemon, including but not limited to Haxorus, Salamence, and Tyranitar. Arceus-tier offenses? Check. Big movepool? Check. Great offensive type(s)? Check. Going by your criteria, we should be banning about a third of the OU tier ASAP.

Genesect should not be leaving the party anytime soon. You remove it, and Haxorus is going to have a field day with this metagame. Same goes for Dragonite, Tornadus-T, and Hydreigon. Sure, the metagame is way too offensive for my liking right now, but at least there's offense to check offense. Remove Genesect, and the metagame degenerates into a clusterfuck of who can spam more strong attacks in as little turns as possible.

#chompfreed

 

[Kennen]

If are you afraid because Garchomp is unbanned, why not testing in PS and voting in the suspect thread? #fucklogic Stop crying pls, Tornadus-T, Thundurus-T are more dangerous than Chomp and both are OU.

 

[alexwolf]

Remove the first sentence of that post, and you could be referring to a plethora of OU Pokemon, including but not limited to Haxorus, Salamence, and Tyranitar. Arceus-tier offenses? Check. Big movepool? Check. Great offensive type(s)? Check. Going by your criteria, we should be banning about a third of the OU tier ASAP.

Genesect should not be leaving the party anytime soon. You remove it, and Haxorus is going to have a field day with this metagame. Same goes for Dragonite, Tornadus-T, and Hydreigon. Sure, the metagame is way too offensive for my liking right now, but at least there's offense to check offense. Remove Genesect, and the metagame degenerates into a clusterfuck of who can spam more strong attacks in as little turns as possible.

#chompfreed

Lavos how do you think OU handled those threats in BW1? Yeah Haxorus got Low Kick/Superpower and Aqua Tail, but how does this stop him from getting revenge killed? There are othere scarfers, i don't know why you are acting as there aren't. Just because Genesect can keep momentum, all other Scarf users cannot check the threats you mentioned? I still fail to get your logic...

 

[Tobes]

Hi I'm as happy as the next guy about Chomp's unban but could you guys please stop orgasming all over this thread?

Also lay off the "ban threat x" for a bit. Give the Council some time to decide their next course of action.

 

[IstheCakeReallyaLie]

Hi I'm as happy about the next guy about Chomp's unban but could you guys please stop orgasming all over this thread?

Also lay off the "ban threat x" for a bit. Give the Council some time to decide their next course of action.

Well, an orgasm could help the metagame, honestly. Seriously, the possibilities of it being introduced are interesting. It could really help shake it up, give stall a chance, counter Garchomp, invent another weakness for Bug/Steel, make CAPs official, and give Farfetch'd an Uber evolution.

In all seriousness, I think we'll see a rise in Ice Shard Cloyster and Mamoswine soon. Maybe something from N/R/UU rising into OU for its Chomp checking? Froslass?

 

[StairFall]

Joyous day everybody! The Chomper is back on the battlefield! Now that he's lost his niche as the sand dragon he can break up with his pseudo legendary BFF Ttar. I'm going to see how he chills with Ninetales, see how skarm likes a +1 fire fang.

 

[Lavos]

Lavos how do you think OU handled those threats in BW1? Yeah Haxorus got Low Kick/Superpower and Aqua Tail, but how does this stop him from getting revenge killed? There are othere scarfers, i don't know why you are acting as there aren't. Just because Genesect can keep momentum, all other Scarf users cannot check the threats you mentioned? I still fail to get your logic...

Uhhhh let's see...Tornadus-T didn't exist in BW1, Hydreigon didn't have Superpower to break through the pink blobs, and Haxorus didn't have access to Aqua Tail and Superpower, the moves that let it beat Ferrothorn and Skarmory. Not to mention, in BW1 the metagame was much more balanced, and teams generally had answers to sweepers outside of a Scarfed revenge killer. However, in BW2 the game has changed, and the vast majority of offensive teams rely on Scarf Genesect to take care of boosting sweepers in general. This means if the keystone (Genesect) is removed, the whole metagame will come tumbling down.

 

[alexwolf]

Again ignoring the fact that other scarfers exist, and that they aren't used as much because Genesect outclasses them...

 

[/B/utterfree]

I'm going to keep a closer eye on the OU Suspect Council. I am dismayed by Garchomp's return to OU. I'd compare it to Scott Pilgrim v. the World in a tier list of Things I Despise, but Garchomp does not give me nearly the same amount of mental outrage on-sight. Neither does anything else, quite frankly, but that isn't the point.

The serendipity of getting rid of two situational/borderline-worthless abilities will do stuff like force people to use the superior abilities on pretty much every Pokemon who had Sand Veil/Snow Cloak in the first place. It actually makes the Pokemon in each a little bit better by default, giving them more utilities in the lower tiers (as permanent weather didn't exist for a good while in UU, SV/SC did basically nothing there). Cacturne might have to compromise with its movepool, but the remaining other Pokes do not.

Hopefully the adolescent phase of "FREE EVERYTHING BANNED FROM A TIER PREVIOUSLY" ends here. The only part of this phase I will fully support is the "Free Permanent Weather in UU" portion of the phase. Odds of that occuring are very unlikely.

I call Garchomp in OU a mixed blessing for now. I will be watching OU like a hawk from here on out.

 

[G-Von]

Now that Garchomp is back in OU (FUCK YES), what dragon-type in OU will take the biggest drop in usage and possibly go down to UU, if any at all?

 

[PK Gaming]

Remove the first sentence of that post, and you could be referring to a plethora of OU Pokemon, including but not limited to Haxorus, Salamence, and Tyranitar. Arceus-tier offenses? Check. Big movepool? Check. Great offensive type(s)? Check. Going by your criteria, we should be banning about a third of the OU tier ASAP.

Genesect should not be leaving the party anytime soon. You remove it, and Haxorus is going to have a field day with this metagame. Same goes for Dragonite, Tornadus-T, and Hydreigon. Sure, the metagame is way too offensive for my liking right now, but at least there's offense to check offense. Remove Genesect, and the metagame degenerates into a clusterfuck of who can spam more strong attacks in as little turns as possible.

#chompfreed

I can agree with that.

Geneesect, although seen as unfair if you were on the receiving end of its onslaught, it's existence is what made it actually possible to check Pokemon like Tornadus-T and Dragon-types consistently without having resorting to half baked counters and shitty checks.

The only issue with Genesect is that it puts a damper on team building, is literally everywhere and is impossible to counter conventionally, I mean WOW FUCK.

---

Can't wait until Kyurem-B gets tested. Bring on the dragoooooooons.

 

[dragonuser]

Now that Garchomp is back in OU (FUCK YES), what dragon-type in OU will take the biggest drop in usage and possibly go down to UU, if any at all?

I would say that Haxorus is going to take the biggest drop in usage, but I don't see it going into UU. Garchomp can do most of what Haxorus can, as well as being much faster than it. Haxorus still has Superpower and a higher base Attack stat, which may be able to save it from falling into UU. Although if any dragon were to fall in usage heavily, and possibly into UU/BL, I would put my money on Haxorus being that dragon.

 

[bubbly]

Okay the reasoning I'm seeing is just bad. Yes, Genesect makes Tornadus-T manageable. That is not a viable argument for keeping it in OU. If (or when) after its banning Torn and co become utterly unstoppable, ban them. It takes work but it's the only way we're going to get a healthy meta out of the current clusterfuck.

 

[StairFall]

The arguments for and against genesect are perfectly fair and sound. Gene provides stability, it's a super popular scarfer that can wear a scarf and band/specs at the same time because of download. It allows weatherless teams to handle the therians much easier, weather teams to more easily win weather wars with u-turn + duggy spam and gave voltturn a new lease in the metagame.

The downsides are that it's essentially the only scarfer ever besides 100+ speed scarfers meant to counter it. Running scarfs on slower pokemon to buff their speed is futile and defunct in this meta because gene has emphasised the 100 speed baseline creating a huge divide between slow and fast pokemon.

TL:DR gene is bullshit, but it wouldn't be bad if he stays because it lets us handle a bunch of other equally bullshit pokemon.

 

[peng]

I don't really see how Genesect is being considered good for the metagame, considering it hasn't really brought anything new to it that other scarfers didn't already do in BW1. I see Genesect as a super pimped-out Scarf Jirachi, who was one of the better scarfers in BW1 due to its wide movepool, steel-typing and access to U-turn, just like Genesect.

People seem to be arguing that Genesect is needed in the metagame to keep Tornadus-T and Dragons in check. This is simply not true, as Scarf Jirachi is arguably better at both of these things already. It can actually switch-in on Tornadus thanks to the flying resistance and doesn't get instantly donked by Lati@s HP Fire. It speed ties with Scarfmence too! If you are relying on Genesect to keep Torn-T in check then you quite simply have a bad team. Its not like if we ban Genesect, Torn-T and Dragons instantly become difficult to handle, because every good scarfer in BW can handle them just as well as Genesect does (jirachi, terrakion, rotom-w, thund-t, maybe landorus etc etc etc)

I'm not a fan of Genesect at all, although I find its scarf set incredibly underwhelming to use and a relief to play against. I find the Rock Polish and Expert Belt sets infinitely more threatening; Expert Belt sets can just destroy balanced / stallier teams, whereas Rock Polish is nearly unhandleable for most offense teams.

The thing I find most ridiculous about Genesect is that you can literally look at any team and put together some kind of set that will flat-out 6-0 it. Every offense team in the game is weak to Rock Polish + 3 respective coverage moves (ice beam, flamethrower, bug buzz, thunderbolt, hidden power ground, iron head, flash cannon, etc) and every balanced team is weak to expert belt variants. It can be tailored to beat any team out there. Since 99% of Genesect at the moment are the incredibly overrated scarf set I'm not completely pro-ban, but once people catch on that Genesect has far better things to be doing than being a slightly above average scarfer, you can be sure I'll want this guy out.

tl;dr scarf gene is sooooo overrated, rock polish and ebelt are ridiculous.

 

[tehy]

So, question? What does scarf gene revenge that scarfrakion doesn't?

Just garchomp? Figured.

And it takes 6% from SR and can lategame sweep with its STABS, and it can SD as well as RP? Stop the presses.

I mean;theoretically, genesect can take an outrage better, but they can both take one and KO back. Maybe haxorus? Not even sure on that one. Meanwhile, scarfrakion revenges timid mence, scarfmence, and volcarona. AND scarfnesect 100% of the time.

 

[dragonuser]

So, question? What does scarf gene revenge that scarfrakion doesn't?

Just garchomp? Figured.

And it takes 6% from SR and can lategame sweep with its STABS, and it can SD as well as RP? Stop the presses.

How is that true at all. Scarf Terrakion can revenge/check so many more Pokemon in this metagame. It is pretty much one of the fastest scarfers in the metagame, speedtieing Keldeo, and losing to Scarf Lati@s and Gengar (which aren't very common). This means that Terrakion can outspeed and check the plethora of base 100's and stuff like Scarf Thundurus-T. Scarf Genesect sits at a pretty bad Speed stat, as it can't check base 100's like Salamence and it loses to a lot of scarfers. I don't really understand what you are trying to get at here. PenguinX was simply stating that Scarf Genesect is horribly overrated, which I agree with, and that his true merits lie elsewhere. If I happened to take your post the wrong way I'm sorry, but I really don't understand how you are arguing that Scarf Genesect and Scarf Terrakion are so "similar."

edit: didnt see your edit to your previous post/misread, nvm!

 

[Arcticblast]

I'm not sure what you guys are going on about saying that Genesect beats every team with the right set and coverage moves, because Chansey tanks a CB U-Turn and recovers it off... And if you run HP Ground you're either losing U-Turn or a valuable coverage move, so while Heatran no longer beats it something else will. Rotom-H resists everything it commonly uses but Zen Headbutt. Snorlax (not that I am advocating you use it) smacks it with Fire Punch while tanking its attacks. Anything with Substitute and a Fire move either forces your opponent to expose something else to the line of fire or breaks the Substitute and lets Genesect get OHKO'd.

It's annoying, sure, but not hard to beat.

 

[peng]

Chansey is 2HKOd by Choice Band Iron Head (another poor set imo but it beats Chansey at least!) If someone decides to go mixed on the RP set with Iron Head (which actually isn't that bad an option at all, it has decent neutral coverage and deals with stuff like Terrakion as well as being good against stall, one of RP genes downfalls), Chansey is 2HKOd with Rocks + 1 layer of spikes, or has a chance to be KOd with Rocks and a turn of sandstorm.
Both 252 HP / 252 SDef+ Snorlax and Rotom-H are 2HKOd by Specs Bug Buzz after Stealth Rock, and still have a chance to be 2HKOd by LO Modest Bug Buzz (i.e. rp gene)

 

[tehy]

How is that true at all. Scarf Terrakion can revenge/check so many more Pokemon in this metagame. It is pretty much one of the fastest scarfers in the metagame, speedtieing Keldeo, and losing to Scarf Lati@s and Gengar (which aren't very common). This means that Terrakion can outspeed and check the plethora of base 100's and stuff like Scarf Thundurus-T. Scarf Genesect sits at a pretty bad Speed stat, as it can't check base 100's like Salamence and it loses to a lot of scarfers. I don't really understand what you are trying to get at here. PenguinX was simply stating that Scarf Genesect is horribly overrated, which I agree with, and that his true merits lie elsewhere. If I happened to take your post the wrong way I'm sorry, but I really don't understand how you are arguing that Scarf Genesect and Scarf Terrakion are so "similar."

Well, that's actually what i said.

 

[Myzozoa]

I'd say Genesect is actually pretty healthy for the metagame. We ban that thing, and it's just gonna be Dragonite and Scizor all over again. BW1 was pretty bad, but I see potential in BW2. I don't think banning Genesect is the right move for the current meta. Once Tornadus-T is out of the way, I'll think about it.

So in your mind, Scizor and Dragonite is a bad metagame, but Genesect and Keldeo is a good metagame? I just don't see the logic, unless the premise is that Rain needs to be a lot better which is ridiculous.


As for Scarf Terrakion, it is a terrible pokemon. There is a reason why people started primarily using band and SD at the end of BW1. Firstly it doesn't need more speed at base 108. Secondly, it does literally nothing for a team, as a revenge killer, that Landorus doesn't do. Every pokemon with U-turn, Trick, or Pursuit is better at Scarf than Terrakion. Garchomp will be just as shitty a choice scarf user with the advantage of better bulk and not losing to +2 priority moves.

 

[Arcticblast]

The thing about Scarf Terrakion is that it's the strongest physical Scarf user outside of Sandstorm. It can also get away with using Rock Slide over Stone Edge (Landorus-I and Garchomp can actually fail to OHKO BulkyVolc with Rock Slide...). Fighting is a great STAB to have as well. I might just use it because I'm absolutely fucking terrified of Volcarona and intentionally dedicate at least a check and a half to it on every team I make. Either way, I'm using Scarf Garchomp over Terrakion asap.

PenguinX, if it runs Iron Head it's a similar situation as HP Ground except even worse. If it runs it on Rock Polish, it's either walled by Jirachi, Heatran or bulky Waters. If it runs CB Iron Head, sure it takes out Chansey but then it's hopeless against Tentacruel and Volcarona, or it loses necessary coverage with Special moves.

I just don't understand how people have trouble dealing with Genesect at all without having an all-around bad team.

 

[peng]

The popularity of Choice Band Terrakion and SD Terrakion has very little bearing on the viability of Scarf Terrakion. Saying "it does not need more speed at base 108" just makes me question if you even know what Scarf Terrakion is meant to do lol.

Terrakion has multiple advantages over Landorus. ExtremeSpeed resistance means its a better answer to DDnite. Fire-type resistance means its better vs Volcarona. The extra speed means it can outspeed Modest Venusaur (admittedly not as relevant anymore), Stoutland, and Scarf Garchomp. It has better coverage with its STABs: Stone Edge and Close Combat are both harder to set-up on than Hidden Power [Ice], which Landorus often relies on for much of its revenge-killing. The loss of U-Turn does suck, but not everyone is using Deoxys-D offense / volt-turn, myzozoa!

Also this has very little to do with scarfterrakion because you are referring to cb and sd sets, but in bw2 base 108 speed really isn't that impressive anymore. Tornadus-T outspeeds you by a lot, Lati@s seem to be more popular than ever and you speed tie at best with Keldeo. So yes, although the point means next to nothing in this context, Terrakion does appreciate the extra speed at base 108.

 

[PK Gaming]

I would say that Haxorus is going to take the biggest drop in usage, but I don't see it going into UU. Garchomp can do most of what Haxorus can, as well as being much faster than it. Haxorus still has Superpower and a higher base Attack stat, which may be able to save it from falling into UU. Although if any dragon were to fall in usage heavily, and possibly into UU/BL, I would put my money on Haxorus being that dragon.

Haxorus existed in a metagame where chomp was legal you know, just sayin' (which ironically, this was when Haxorus was highest in usage). If anything is going to cut into its usage, it's Genesect, and even then you can still feasibly use Haxorus with the existence of Genesect in BW2. If you want to use Haxorus in BW2 though, you're going to have to make a concerted effort to accommodate it on your team, because otherwise you're better using Garchomp since it's "easier, better on average AND IT AVOIDS THE OHKO FROM +2 MACH PUNCH WHAT NO FAIR :<." Haxorus still has its tiny niche in over Garchomp with Choice Band but really, the sets worth mentioning are the Sword Dance sets.


SD Rain Abuser Swords

SD Fight gem
Haxorus (M) @ Fighting Gem
Trait: Mold Breaker
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 36 HP / 252 Atk / 220 Spd
Adamant Nature
- Swords Dance
- Outrage
- Superpower
- Substitute / Earthquake

&&

SD Yache

Haxorus (M) @ Yache Berry
Trait: Mold Breaker
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 200 Atk / 88 SpD / 220 Spd
Adamant Nature
IVs: 11 Def
- Swords Dance
- Outrage
- Taunt / Aqua Tail / Earthquake
- Low Kick

&&

Haxorus (M) @ Lum Berry | Aqua Plate
Trait: Mold Breaker
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 36 HP / 252 Atk / 220 Spd
Adamant Nature
- Swords Dance
- Outrage
- Aqua Tail
- Low kick


The 1st SD set is the strongest one it can run in OU. It kind of plays like Double Dance by subbing or SDing depending on the situation and going from there. At +2 you are pretty beating every single wall in the game, including Skarmory (Superpower doles out: 271-319 81.13 - 95.5%and OHKOes SpD Skarmory,)The Choice between EQ and Substitute is a tough one, but ask yourself this: Does Jirachi fuck me? Should I not waste my fight gem on jirachi? If your answer is yes to either of these questions, go with EQ otherwise stick with Substitute since it's better against offensive teams. My favorite part about this set is OHKOing Genesect with 0+ Fight Gem Superpower, though only an idiot would do that. Right? Right???

The 2nd set is pretty decent against most teams, but has less of a payout if that makes any sense. Yache Berry Haxorus gets the jump on most Genesect since the natural impulse is to Ice Beam, which does like 40% to this set because it doesn't get a SpA boost. It's cool to avoid the OHKO from HP Thundurus-T, Starmie or getting slamed by Mamoswines Ice SHard. It's weaker than the 1st & 3rd set, but it's probably the most "consistent" one. Taunt let's you beat Skarmory (though you'll get crippled in the process) Aqua Tail invariably sees use on Rain Dance teams and Earthquake just smashes Jirachi. The drop in physical defense seems like a big deal, but its not. Haxorus is shockingly frail.

The 3rd set SD is predictable rain abuser, thought it was at its strongest when people were still attempting to use stall. It's still good; good against sun & balanced teams that utilize Skarmory, but kind of dead weight against heavy offense teams.

TL;DR

HAXORUS!
AWESOME!
THAT'S REALLY ALL THERE IS TO SAY ON THE MATTER

PS: For the love of god, don't use Dragon Dance tUmUt

PS2: Yes, the shiny trait is mandatory