SilentVerse
Into the New World
Ok, since Nidoqueen has been deemed the suspect for this round, this thread will officially be the Nidoqueen Suspect Discussion. Any posts not relevant to whether or not Nidoqueen is broken will be deleted.
And if that is too much, give me a team that can handle every single threat in RU (including notable NU pokemon) bar Nidoqueen to an extent without being run over by too many threats, since you guys are saying that Nidoqueen strains teambuilding.
I really don't get how Nidoqueen can "come in pretty much for free" against something that has STAB Earthquake, maybe you meant Spiritomb ? It's true that if it gets in while you Stealth Rock or something your team is in deep trouble. Still, I don't think Nidoqueen is to blame here, with 3 weaknesses to Ground and no resists, your team is weak to pretty much anything with STAB Ground moves. Let's take the on-site Eviolite Rhydon, he outspeeds your entire team bar Entei and Kabutops, Entei can't touch it and Waterfall-less Kabutops loses one on one. The rest of your team is 2HKOd.nidoqueen outspeeds all but two mons and 2hkoes the entire team, it can come in pretty much for free against steelix and earth power results in a free kill (unless you want to pivot around three times which requires perfect prediction and forces you to take a ton of hazards damage as well as powerful earth powers). and again, "sub queen".
yes all of the pokemon can do something bad to nidoqueen but it will do way more to them in return.
With all due respect, this is a hilarious comment, since Nidoqueen aint breaking any Speed tiers, haha. It's average Speed is one of the main shortcomings that makes her so perfectly manageable. Outrunning Nidoqueen to check it is a non-issue. Not to mention there are handful of slow mons that can tank a hit from Nidoqueen and KO back, too.Nidoqueen centralizes the metagame around fast sweepers who outspeed it
-_-Outrunning Nidoqueen to check it is a non-issue.
Because simply checking Nidoqueen with faster offensive threats is exponentially easier than trying to counter it with bulky slow pokemon, it centralizes the metagame to one around fast sweepers that outspeed it.offensive Pokemon have the best chance against it without having to slap Uxie on your team or devoting half of your team or more to fast mons who resist some of Nidoqueen's coverage. And, in this way, Nidoqueen basically completely invalidates any slow team that isn't ridiculously offensively oriented that could potentially viable in this metagame
There's already been plenty of discussion about this. Slow mons may be able to take one hit from Nidoqueen but very few can take more than that therefore the "handful" you talk about is unable to safely switch into Nidoqueen. Realistically, this either means that those pokes you're referring to are only safely coming in after Nidoqueen has already taken something out (which is the method that offensive teams use to check queen) or on a predicted double switch (keyword predict. The presence of queen forces you to gamble on predictions that are higher risk than the queen user's). This is just assuming slow pokes with enough offensive presence to OHKO Nidoqueen (i.e not common on stall teams). If discussing defensive pokes that do not have the ability to OHKO queen,Not to mention there are handful of slow mons that can tank a hit from Nidoqueen and KO back, too.
Like SV said it's not just stall pokes that are adversely affected, it's 90% of the pokes under Nidoqueen's speed tier whether offensive or defensive.The thing about Nidoqueen though is that while these Pokemon can hit Nidoqueen somewhat hard, if they even give Nidoqueen the slightest chance to switch in for free, whether as they set up hazards or recover (which is why defensive Pokemon are at a significant disadvantage against Nidoqueen), they immediately become liabilities against Nidoqueen; after all, who cares if you can switch these Pokemon in on a resisted coverage attack when they get boned the next turn by another of Nidoqueen's attacks and can't even outspeed it?
Nidoqueen's difference is that it has extremely good defenses unlike every other pokemon you listed. RU has no special walls and so there is no good switch into it; i'd debate your assertion that there are no good switches for those other mons, but that's not really the point. Every other pokemon there is easily worn down by stall tactics, such as toxic poison... wait a sec. This is feeling like deja vu all over again. I could've sworn I've made this same argument before. Wait a sec...I really don't see why powerful but slow wallbreakers that are hard to switch into and beat are being suspected in one tier but not another. I don't see queen as being any different to Hydreigon really, in that it is slow, and has very few counters. There are powerful slow wallbreakers with very few counters in all tiers, such as Emboar before it moved up, Zangoose and CB Sawk in NU, and SD Heracross, NP Togekiss in UU. All of these mons have incredibly few hard counters, in some cases none at all(zangoose and hydreigon namely). Nidoqueen is no different from any of these, as they either have no counters whatsoever and are therefore better wallbreakers, or have reliable recovery and are resistant to hazards(Hydreigon+togekiss, sawk).
To add something productive to the discussion, Drapion has been nowhere to be found in a metagame filled with bulky psychic types, doesn't that strike you guys as odd?It doesn't take much from residual damage and is immune to thunder wave and toxic, the two most common status moves, and it does not take life orb recoil so you are forced to kill it with attacks; stalling out nidoqueen is not an option,and you cannot switch around before revenge killing it as with other attackers like moltres, galvantula, and accelgor. It is bulky enough to live supereffective attacks from defensive pokemon that it can 2hko and strong enough to one shot basically everything that is faster than it. Its speed is not incredible but defensive pokemon have no shot at outspeeding it, or must sacrifice large amounts of bulk in cases like uxie. Resistance to rock, bug (uturn), fighting, and neutrality to many other common types (and outspeeding most water, ground, and psychic types while having SE coverage on most as well), and its electric immunity give it many chances to switch in, and if offensive teams give it a sliver of an opening, it's bulky enough to switch in and score a free kill, possibly while absorbing a hit. It happens to be the best user of SR and toxic spikes in this metagame as well, but that's not even really that relevant other than just a display of its versatility. If pokes like clefable and lickilicky were an issue it could run focus blast (which is boosted by sheer force) to completely crush what are considered its best checks, but no one uses focus blast nidoqueen because the checks that focus blast beats are easily dealt with through team support and it would rather run other coverage moves.
Individual pokemon can beat nidoqueen 1 v 1. But it will score a kill if you have a single pokemon that it can get in on, and it doesn't even have to predict much to do it since it is so obscenely powerful.
A small nitpick here, but I've seen arguments like this a lot. The issue with Nidoqueen is not her "Sheer Force" (although I do appreciate the pun). 95 BP STABs off of an adjusted 112 Special Attack, while good, does not match the power of Moltres or Magmortar, who boast 120 BP STABs off of a base 125 Special Attack (which is only slightly lower in the whole Timid vs. Modest thing).This is unlike Nidoqueen, who is not fueled by unpredictability, but instead, is fueled by sheer force.
It was implied that I was talking about her coverage, seeing as how Sheer Force is usually associated with good coverage.A small nitpick here, but I've seen arguments like this a lot. The issue with Nidoqueen is not her "Sheer Force" (although I do appreciate the pun). 95 BP STABs off of an adjusted 112 Special Attack, while good, does not match the power of Moltres or Magmortar, who boast 120 BP STABs off of a base 125 Special Attack (which is only slightly lower in the whole Timid vs. Modest thing).
Where she does excel though, is in her coverage. She can 2HKO so many of her checks with the appropriate coverage move (Cryogonal? Fire Blast; on-site Slowking? Tbolt). She also has just enough of everything else (Speed, bulk, resistance to residual damage, etc) to make checking her much more difficult.
I'm running a hail team right now that happens to have a couple solid checks for her, so I don't mind her too much (everything on my team 3HKOs at worst, the rare problems come when I try and lay Spikes). However, I've heard non-hail teams have a harder time, and since they are a significant majority, I don't feel like I have the expertise necessary to dictate a ban/no-ban.