I know. that because most people just look at the stats and don't look at the move pool. does it have sweeping potential? possibly. i have to double check to see if it can learn any of the set up moves that most sweepers run. however, once you start analyzing its move pool, that when it's role becomes clear. it has access to all of the best non-healing support moves, and an offensive move pool that can hit all but two or three types for super effective. at that point, it should be obvious what it does: take out problem pokemon.
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Gengarite Tiering Discussion [read post #383]
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I know. that because most people just look at the stats and don't look at the move pool. does it have sweeping potential? possibly. i have to double check to see if it can learn any of the set up moves that most sweepers run. however, once you start analyzing its move pool, that when it's role becomes clear. it has access to all of the best non-healing support moves, and an offensive move pool that can hit all but two or three types for super effective. at that point, it should be obvious what it does: take out problem pokemon.
Well, yes, obviously. I was not implying anyone would do that. Running Lando-T and Gyarados, or Dragonite or Celebi or whatever on the other hand is reasonable though. That is what I am talking about. Just because two things can counter the same Pokemon does not mean they necessarily overlap too much to be useful together.
Well, first off, I know you said not to quote you on it, but just to clarify, both Gyarados and Dragonite can outspeed it at +1 with a Jolly nature. Also both resist U-Turn, so that is not exactly scaring either of them away from DDing. It might break Dragonite's multiscale, but if it is outspeeding, that's kinda irrelevant. Another problem in that situation is that you talk about assuming destiny bond, but the set that I was referring to before was very specific. With Destiny Bond it has to give up one of the other moves and suddenly doesn't "counter" all those different things anymore.
More importantly though you can't just say "I'm not gonna switch in unless I know I win" when a bunch of the things you are trying to counter can just set up such that you no longer can beat them. Slow pivots are great when things are not setting up (or are not slower), but they are not a catch-all solution to everything. And double switches help every single Pokemon in the game and are hugely prediction based. Yeah, prediction is part of the game, and simply needing some does not mean not broken. But, double switches are something completely different from other predictions in that they are not really Pokemon reliant at all. There is a big difference between the prediction of not choosing one specific move and the prediction of switching twice and not having the opponent outswitch you.
Finally, all I can say here is I disagree. It can counter a lot, but there are very few things it can straight up remove with no risk. It is a wonderful Pokemon, and yes, it can remove and beat a lot of stuff, but no, it is definitely not an auto-kill button. Yes, I acknowledge Shadow Tag is powerful. Yes, it gets rid of the traditional idea of countering. But that is it. Yeah, its a scary Pokemon to face. There are a lot of those in OU.
For what its worth I have never once said I don't think Mega Gengar is broken. I'm not arguing that Mega Gengar is not broken. What I am arguing is that Mega Gengar is nowhere near broken to the extent that would require a quick-ban. All I am saying is that it deserves a test and that, at this point, I am not convinced that such a test would definitely go one way or the other.
Hold up! Gengar can't get Sludge Wave! I recently got the TM from the Battle Maison and it wasn't compatible, nor did I see it as a breeding move.
Anyway, MegaGengar deserves some more tests first imo. Everyone is still fairly new to this paradigm shift regardless of how experienced we are. Don't get me wrong, I understand what you are saying and in truth, there is no need to get Adamant if others don't agree with you but as daunting as this monster is, Suspect Voting with the players that can achieve the highest ranking should ultimately decide something like that.
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can we please get rid of the idea that 4mss is something inherently bad? 4mss is something fucking good, it means that a pokemon has a shitton of viable options which adds to its unpredictability. i have no clue why people consider 4mss something bad
edit: at below, i dont think that description fits gengar at all, then. theres been several posts here that demonstrate how gengar doesnt need 7 moves together to do its job. one user already posted a scenario in which gengar supports a lucario and it does so with only the need of 3 moves.
edit: at below, i dont think that description fits gengar at all, then. theres been several posts here that demonstrate how gengar doesnt need 7 moves together to do its job. one user already posted a scenario in which gengar supports a lucario and it does so with only the need of 3 moves.
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Well I quickly voted no, I run offense and thought wtf kangashkan sweeps like half the time and we have fucking genesect running around, who got two new op move in shift gear and e speed. Then I read the thread (yeah I was a dumbass and voted before reading), and I realized how ridiculous this thing is. There is a bunch of specific theory morning that can be done with specific mons at specific percentages, but it really comes down to two things. One is the nature of a competitive pokemon battle. Let's say player 1 has a good matchup vs player 2. That is obviously a good thing for player 1, as he can use the turn to set up, attack, heal, set hazards, etc. player two will switch to something with a good matchup, and have his turn to do the same. Now obviously, there are double switches, predictions, and volt turn (which is kinda stupid too IMO) that mess with this, but it is still the basic structure. Gengar (and all shadow taggers) break this fundamental way of battling by instead of forcing switches, forcing the pokemon at hand to deal with it. This makes the reward for a bad matchup against it far greAter than that of a bad matchup against a pokemon like heatRan (a random example). The other thing is the move pool which allows gengar to almost gaurAuntee a kill against ANY pokemon. Now, of course no set beats everything, but it can beat everything due to 3 moves, taunt, dbond, and perish song. So let's assume its a one to one trade, which is generous as gengar often takes more. Against offense, that is a draw, but against stall, the first kill is so important, as offense is fine without a member or 2, but stall needs to have the defensive core to work. Once one thing goes down, a key set of resistances is lost, and that is enough for an offensive team to break through. And I'm not saying stall teams should be 6 0 ing everyone, just that gengar makes that first kill so easy. Similarly, gengar pairs well with (and this is not name exaggeration) every sweeper in the game. Most good sweepers have only a few checks and counters, and gengar can be customized to beat any of them, and in its sacrifice allows the sweeper to sweep. If only I could take my vote back.
Ps. Note I didn't mention base 170 spatk. That is an afterthought, showing just how op it really is.
Ps. Note I didn't mention base 170 spatk. That is an afterthought, showing just how op it really is.
Gengar can specialize its own movepool to deal with those threats. Celebi's specially defensive set doesn't run Psychic a lot of the time anyways, and if they have to do so just to beat Mega Gengar it's a sign of how good it is. Also Celebi is taking 70-83% from a Sludge BOMB, and more from Sludge Wave, so it's going to be useless even if it takes out Mega Gengar.
reyscarface listed lots of things you can just come in and kill. Granted you have to be specialized to kill some of them but with your standard Taunt/Shadow Ball/Sludge Bomb/Focus Blast you can use slow pivots to come in on at least 40-50% of the meta. That's a large amount considering it has Shadow Tag. Also prediction goes both ways--you need prediction to use Mega Gengar and you need prediction to try to beat it.
If you use a slow pivot with Volt/Turn, or come in to revenge kill, it can remove the aforementioned 40% of the meta with zero risk (and revenging something like Scarf Terrakion gets you a free Sub too!). Also it doesn't even need to do that much, just eliminate what you need to set up one of your mons for a sweep. So what if it can't beat Rotom-W unscathed, what if that was your opponent's only Talonflame check? Now you sac Mega Gengar and go to Talonflame and set up and sweep. It's not an auto-kill button, but then again pretty much only stuff like Kyogre and Xerneas are auto-kill buttons.
Using the word scary to describe Gengar is understating it. Using terrifying is understating it.
There's lots of differing opinions on this, but it's a good thing we all agree it at least needs to be tested.
It gets Sludge Wave from DW.
That is a formidable list. You forgot Togekiss, who can be beaten with Taunt or Substitute (= no T-Wave), then RIP in pieces Togekiss.
By and by, these are surprisingly not hard to come into, because M-Gengar slightly has more defences than regular Gengar. Most priority outside Sucker Punch can't OHKO, and that you can play around quite easily.
EDIT: Besides HP Ice, one really overlooked tool Gengar has is Will-o'-wisp, which means that even things that can otherwise beat it, like
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Pretty sure the main difference is Sludge Wave one shots bulletproof chesnaught, while sludge bomb bounces off harmlessly.
Also, with a bit of hax, gengar does make a stupid hypnosis user, since, when you trap and kill the stuff you hypnotize, sleep clause never takes effect and you can do it again and again until it misses.
Except this is flat out not true. It does exactly what people are ascribing it to do - eliminate threats to and completely facilitate a lategame clean from pretty much any other significant pokemon.
It needs to take out the specific things it needs to take out to facilitate a sweep for a central member of your team. Don't just slap four moves at random onto Gar, pick four moves that actually eliminate things that your team needs eliminated. If you need fairies gone, use Sludge Wave. If you don't, don't. If you need Blissey gone then use Taunt. If you don't, don't. If you need defensive Gyara gone, use Tbolt. If you don't, then don't. It's certainly got the ability to take out a huge number of things, but it doesn't even remotely need to do everything. All it needs to do is take out what your central team members need taken out. 4MSS is barely a problem for it at all -- it's fully capable of completely eliminating almost all the counters to certain things (Lucario, for example, was brought up) without even using all four moves.
The fact that it's capable of individually performing better than much of the tier as an offensive threat is all any arguments relating to 4MSS prove. It's biggest utility is not purely as this catch all offensive threat, and the fact that it can even be considered as such an individually powerful offensive force is just the icing on the cake for MGar.
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Well I think it was brought up because Chesnaught is immune to Sludge Bomb, but is KO'd by Wave. Not that it really matters in the grand scheme of things, considering it's just 1 Pokemon on a list of 60 that Mega Gengar can dispose of.
MegaGar's Sludge Wave is a guaranteed OHKO on 0/4 Togekiss, and Togekiss must be running Calm with 248/108+ SpD to even have a *chance* to survive after SR, so yeah, another target.
Anyway, I just think it's funny that people are arguing that MegaGar is underwhelming, or too weak. What, trapping and killing over half of OU isn't scary enough for you? Stop thinking about raw numbers and think about how Shadow Tag allows it to pick and choose what -and when- to kill, with no possible counterplay, and can choose its targets based on your own needs.
Something something conflict of interest...
Anyways, I think reyscarface won this thread, don't think there's too much to say after that. Really though, if you're still arguing that Gengarite isn't broken at this point, you should go read that comment.
Another thing that pushes Gengarite to brokeness that I don't think has been mentioned yet is how regular Gengar is buffed as well, just because of it. If you see Gengar in Team Preview, you must immediately assume its MegaGar and play appropriately, switching your 'mon out only to find that, fantastic, its a freaking SubDisable Leftovers Gengar that just got a free sub because you can't take that risk of switching in. Also, people predicting a Mega Evo and Earthquaking on Gengar. Yeah. I thought Gengar was pretty nasty last gen, we don't need to be giving it free turns.
Nit-picking here, but MAbsol has Magic Bounce, which completely neuters any attemps MGengar does to try and status it. However, Mabsol has the defenses of a wet paper towel, so a Dazzling Gleam or even a Thunderbolt will own MAbsol.
Also, I hear some people talk about 4MSS. MGengar doesn't really have 4MSS. It can tailor its moveset to deal with whatever the team it's on has problems with. Physical walls a pain? Grab a Thunderbolt to deal with Skarmory if no one else on your team can. Other walls or mons a pain for your team? MGengar has your back. It has a ton of different options to run depending on what you need it to do.
4MSS is for mons like MKangaskhan, who needs a ton of coverage moves to deal with every threat that can check it, but it just can't.
Ill give my two cents on this. M-gengar in my opinion is not broken. It is very powerful yes it can check many threats yes but not broken. This is because m-gengar just doesnt have enough power in my opinion and was overhyped. Moreso i would actualy rather ban regular gengar then m-gengar just because of the presence of m-gengar. Why you may ask because now gengar is the Single most versatile pokemon in the game. M-gengar is a s rank pokemon for sure but its not broken. Especialy with the trapping nerf and the rise of priority users such as m-khan and m-mawile (both of these in my opinion are better uses of the mega stone) further more he can be easily trapped by pokemon such as av snorlax and tyranitar weavile and mega scizor/mega scizor all this leads to him ultimately not broken especially with a weakness to earthquake after the mega evo. In conclusion mega-gar aint broken and we should put our resources into banning something worthwile right now such as genesect instead. Thank you for reading this and have a nicd day
As has been stated several times in this thread every single person is aware that Gengar will be Ko'd by several Pokemon. Unfortunately due to Shadow Tag the opponent has no way of getting these "checks" into battle until after Gengar has done its job. The player, under most circumstances, cannot switch them in until after Gengar's target has been knocked out. This is Gengar's true power. No one cares that it cannot sweep an entire team, it doesn't need to.
Completely forgot about that, sorry. Still, M-Absol's a 50/50 situation, since you would have to predict a Substitute and try to break it, or Sucker Punch if you think it's about to Focus Blast you to oblivion. Also, a burned M-Mawile can't OHKO with Sucker Punch, which is worse.
Can people stop advocating a suspect test on the grounds that we 'may as well' or 'just in case.' A quickban is not done solely because a Pokemon is so overwhelmingly powerful that it needs to be removed from the metagame with immediate effect.
It's done because the powers-that-be are utterly confident that a suspect test would only give the exact same result. Trust me when I say that suspect tests require an immense amount of time, effort, energy and man-hours and cause considerable disruption across the whole community.
I've actively participated in or closely followed (as a moderator) almost every suspect test that Smogon has ever organised and I can say from the reactions in this thread that the writing is most certainly on the wall; a suspect test at this stage will end in a Mega-Gengar ban. I imagine the Council, in their infinite wisdom, are similarly sure and would rather not go through the hassle of a tedious suspect test unless they absolutely have to. Don't advocate a test 'just because.'
It's done because the powers-that-be are utterly confident that a suspect test would only give the exact same result. Trust me when I say that suspect tests require an immense amount of time, effort, energy and man-hours and cause considerable disruption across the whole community.
I've actively participated in or closely followed (as a moderator) almost every suspect test that Smogon has ever organised and I can say from the reactions in this thread that the writing is most certainly on the wall; a suspect test at this stage will end in a Mega-Gengar ban. I imagine the Council, in their infinite wisdom, are similarly sure and would rather not go through the hassle of a tedious suspect test unless they absolutely have to. Don't advocate a test 'just because.'
Ohhhh! ....Damn, that kinda sucks!
It's not worth it then. IV breeding knowing that you are going to get a favorable nature from the eggs with Sludge Bomb is better than having some Quirky Gastly with 4 Speed IVs for instance with Sludge Wave BUT ANYWAY I'm a little iffy about MegaGengar (more leaning to the ban hammer) because with further testing, I've concluded that this thing is the equivalent of a free green mushroom in Mario. I've won battles that I think I shouldn't have because of this thing.
Some are mentioning things like Wobbuffet & Gothitelle but they aren't as fast and can be dealt with in more creative ways than MegaGengar can. In example, let's say that you switch in a TechniLoom into a Wobbuffet, you'll be free to use Spore and set up on it where as MegaGengar more than likely won't have to deal with Loom putting it to sleep.
Not only that but even if you wanna be gimmicky with MegaGengar...you could run that old Gen 1-2 Hypnosis / Dream Eater combo without worrying about violating sleep clause or having your target switch out. To tell you the truth, when Pokemon X & Y first came out and I saw this thing, that is the first thing I thought about doing with MegaGengar.
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This is actually the best possible argument in favor of holding off until a suspect test: that, in the event that such a test finds Gengarite in need of a ban, it would result in clear, decisive evidence that a Pokemon has no place in OU. Shaymin-S's unanimous ban vote settled any possible dispute as to its OU status, perhaps for multiple generations looking forward.
Look at all the arguing here. Wouldn't it be nice if we had a clear, evidence-backed answer anywhere near as solid as the answer we got for Shaymin-S? If you really believe we'd get such a decisive vote from a suspect test, why not take the chance to prove it and kill off this controversy for good?
Haven't read all the posts, don't plan to read all the posts right now, but from what I've seen people are basically saying "MeGar counters this thing he's broken"..? Sure, Shadow Tag is annoying, but it's not like he is without common counters. I thought I'd open up my teams so far and on the first one it has MegaBlastoise with Dark Pulse... that kills it. Oddly enough Dragonite counters it most of the time just by Dragon Dancing and then having strong attacks with Multiscale. Starmie scarf Psychic after a switch in does the trick, and IDK how to run a calc but I have a feeling specs might too. Houndoom pretty much wrecks MeGar - especially megahoundoom - with Pursuit, Taunt and Sucker Punch. Yes, the guy's countered by substitute but then again the guy's also got enough bulk to survive the Perish Song set "the best one". That's just my teams (Funnily enough I listed two spinners, I thought he was supposed to be able to block spins?) and I've honestly never needed to use anything more than a few strong hits, residual damage etc.. Ghost-Type Pokemon can switch out on Shadow Tag now - this means that he can't trap at least one Pokemon on your team most of the time. Pivots can switch out with Volt Switch/U-TUrn/Baton Pass. Bearing this in mind this makes him completely useless against two playstyles - Baton Pass and VolTurn - meaning that it is not exactly anti-meta with many common counters and two playstyles that outright wreck him. Do Not Ban.
1) Mega Gengar isn't a sweeper. It's a trapper that does its job rather too well, clearing the way for other sweepers like Salamence.
2) Please read a few pages before this. Most priority cannot OHKO outside Sucker Punch, which can easily be played around.
3) If it was as limited as Gothitelle I could give you this, but Gengar has countless ways to exploit Shadow Tag to the fullest extent possible. Taunt, Substitute, Will-o'-wisp, Destiny Bond, and when Pokébank opens, the infamous Perish Song. How is that not "making full use of its abilities"?
4) Gengar is one of those megas that can choose not to mega-evolve on the first turn. It's really not that hard to trick something into Earthquake, taking it out with the appropriate attack.
5) Gengar is apparently nowadays predictable. Okay.
6) See above.
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