Other XY OU Viability Ranking Thread (V2) (Last update on post #5189)

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Nominating Zapdos for A- Rank.
I think it deserves A-Rank along with Skarmory, Chansey, and Breloom because of its niche of consistently checking bird offense, which is still a prominent playstyle to watch out for. I am aware that it may not have the best bulk in OU, but the amount of resists and that superb defensive typing is ridiculous, not to mention a massive 125 Special Attack, it's sure to dent almost any mon for good damage. It's also one of the Defoggers that decently match up against Defiant users, Bisharp is roasted by Heat Wave and Thundurus doesn't want to eat up a Thunderbolt either.
With all these qualities, I believe that Zapdos deserves A- Rank.

Nominating Sylveon for B+ Rank.
This cute fairy pal of ours certainly has quite a few viable niches in the meta too. First and foremost, it's the only cleric capable of running Heal Bell+Wishtect without being significantly worn down, it also packs quite a punch with Pixilate Hyper Voice, capable of denting a lot of mons for decent damage, and threaten almost every Dragon, Dark, and Fighting type in OU, it also boasts its capability for walling ALL of Kyurem-B's sets bar variants with Iron Head, a threat to watch out for in the meta atm.
It can also run a Choice Specs set, though admittedly outclassed by Gardevoir it still has the bulk to tank attacks and dish them out all throughout the match. It's also a godly addition to Baton Pass Teams, which is a very deadly strat atm.
With all these very good trais, Sylveon should be B+

Nominating Chansey for A Rank.
This thing is ridiculous atm, it walls a lot of prominent mons in the tier, and a Pokemon that boasts of standing its ground against Charizard Y, and to an extent the Lati Twins without beng 2hko'ed. It has outstanding support options too, even though it's reliant on its Eviolite and everything it still deserves A Rank.
This blob has been making Special Attackers cry since Gen 1, and weak Physical Attackers since Gen 5.

Subject 18 Edit: You can keep this in one post.
 
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I think it was Gary who said he likes to see comparisons between ranks, so lets do it for Chansey. The biggest thing that bugs me about Chansey's current position is that it's a whole 2 ranks below freaking Clefable. Clefable can be pretty good, but it's nowhere near good enough to be 2 whole ranks above the best mixed wall in the entire game. There's no question that Chansey should be A at the very least and Clefable, in my mind, should drop to A as well as I believe it isn't really up to A+ standards for the most part and that it certainly isn't more meta-defining than the almighty fat pink blob.
 
jbtc10 said:
I think it was Gary who said he likes to see comparisons between ranks, so lets do it for Chansey. The biggest thing that bugs me about Chansey's current position is that it's a whole 2 ranks below freaking Clefable. Clefable can be pretty good, but it's nowhere near good enough to be 2 whole ranks above the best mixed wall in the entire game. There's no question that Chansey should be A at the very least and Clefable, in my mind, should drop to A as well as I believe it isn't really up to A+ standards for the most part and that it certainly isn't more meta-defining than the almighty fat pink blob.
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Not that I disagree with Chansey going to A, but why are you comparing it to Clefable? Those two have nothing in common but the color. Chansey is a wall / cleric while Clef is a pivot / setup sweeper that can also run cleric sets (that are pretty much outclassed though imo). Clefable is scary man.
 
Sylveon and Clefable are generally better than Chansey in balanced teams. No matter what set she runs, Chansey ends up giving free switch-ins and become set up fodder for either ground (if she runs Thunder Wave) or steel types (if she runs Toxic).
Disregarding that Seismic Toss doesn't work on ghosts (Aegislash and Gengar), a 4- or even 5OHKO doesn't cut it when many powerful sweepers take one turn to set up and ravage entire teams.
A- is fine for her.
 
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You're up-playing way too many mons and way too quickly at that, Buzz Lux.

Sure, Chansey walls a lot, but it's also beaten or set up fodder by a lot too. You mentioned it beating Charizard Y, but that's unreliable when you consider Charizard Y being commonly paired with a Pursuit Trapper. And poor Chansey is ranked a lot lower than the top offensive mons, because the teams it fits in to, as a whole, are effectively worse than the top offensive teams. This is coming from a person that favors stall. Part of the issue with Chansey is that good players can easily exploit it, stall tends to react, not act, and because of that you can be forced into easily predictable situations. Now you can say prediction goes both ways, but that isn't so easy when you don't know your opponent's skill level and you lose on one or two mispredicts. Offensive teams have more room to shift the match into their favor vs. stall (assuming they prepare for it). Lastly, I saw Rhaegar mention teams with Chansey staying on top of ladder for longer periods, but that isn't hard to figure out - less people prepare for Chansey (pretty much goes hand in hand with slower matches) on ladder than in tours, because individual losses don't matter as much, quick wins are more meaningful, they raise you up faster.

Sylveon? I don't see why it should be moving up, I see it as a poor man's Clefable. Yeah, it works better than Clefable on some teams.. The key word being some. Unless you're counting its BP set, which you shouldn't, because that's being addressed right now.

And Zapdos has always been overrated imo. It isn't better than Skarmory vs Bird Offense, which is much worse than it used to be, so much so that I can't consider to use it myself. Anywho, unlike Skarmory, Zapdos is weak to Stealth Rock and is beaten by quite a few of its users. It doesn't want to stay in on TTar, Garchomp, Heatran, Hippowdon, Terrakion, etc. SpD Skarm loses to only a fraction of the mons Zapdos does. Zappy threatens a number of things, which is cool, but when you compare it to what's it at a disadvantage against - it's not all that.

tl;dr - these mons should be in their given ranks.
I'll likely make a post to drop Sylveon after BP is taken care of.
 
TFL said:
You're up-playing way too many mons and way too quickly at that, Buzz Lux.

Sure, Chansey walls a lot, but it's also beaten or set up fodder by a lot too. You mentioned it beating Charizard Y, but that's unreliable when you consider Charizard Y being commonly paired with a Pursuit Trapper. And poor Chansey is ranked a lot lower than the top offensive mons, because the teams it fits in to, as a whole, are effectively worse than the top offensive teams. This is coming from a person that favors stall. Part of the issue with Chansey is that good players can easily exploit it, stall tends to react, not act, and because of that you can be forced into easily predictable situations. Now you can say prediction goes both ways, but that isn't so easy when you don't know your opponent's skill level and you lose on one or two mispredicts. Offensive teams have more room to shift the match into their favor vs. stall (assuming they prepare for it). Lastly, I saw Rhaegar mention teams with Chansey staying on top of ladder for longer periods, but that isn't hard to figure out - less people prepare for Chansey (pretty much goes hand in hand with slower matches) on ladder than in tours, because individual losses don't matter as much, quick wins are more meaningful, they raise you up faster.

Sylveon? I don't see why it should be moving up, I see it as a poor man's Clefable. Yeah, it works better than Clefable on some teams.. The key word being some. Unless you're counting its BP set, which you shouldn't, because that's being addressed right now.

And Zapdos has always been overrated imo. It isn't better than Skarmory vs Bird Offense, which is much worse than it used to be, so much so that I can't consider to use it myself. Anywho, unlike Skarmory, Zapdos is weak to Stealth Rock and is beaten by quite a few of its users. It doesn't want to stay in on TTar, Garchomp, Heatran, Hippowdon, Terrakion, etc. SpD Skarm loses to only a fraction of the mons Zapdos does. Zappy threatens a number of things, which is cool, but when you compare it to what's it at a disadvantage against - it's not all that.

tl;dr - these mons should be in their given ranks.
I'll likely make a post to drop Sylveon after BP is taken care of.
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That's true about Chansey being less effective in tours but A- is still kind of harsh for the mon that holds stall together. It's probably the one mon that is a complete must on stall hence it's 'viability' is quite high since all stall teams end up running it. Offense can surely prepare for Chansey on stall, but Chansey on balance is another thing. Chansey on balance can sometimes even afford to be sacked after it sets rocks and paralyzes something. It is set up fodder for some things which is why it wouldn't deserve a rank as high as A+ but I surely believe it's as good as the mons in A viability-wise. Especially things like Ferrothorn and Hippowdown, Hippowdon itself being set-up fodder or walled by loads of things like MScizor, Gengar, Clefable, Balloon DrillSlashTran and Gliscor.
 
TFL said:
You're up-playing way too many mons and way too quickly at that, Buzz Lux.

Sure, Chansey walls a lot, but it's also beaten or set up fodder by a lot too. You mentioned it beating Charizard Y, but that's unreliable when you consider Charizard Y being commonly paired with a Pursuit Trapper. And poor Chansey is ranked a lot lower than the top offensive mons, because the teams it fits in to, as a whole, are effectively worse than the top offensive teams. This is coming from a person that favors stall. Part of the issue with Chansey is that good players can easily exploit it, stall tends to react, not act, and because of that you can be forced into easily predictable situations. Now you can say prediction goes both ways, but that isn't so easy when you don't know your opponent's skill level and you lose on one or two mispredicts. Offensive teams have more room to shift the match into their favor vs. stall (assuming they prepare for it). Lastly, I saw Rhaegar mention teams with Chansey staying on top of ladder for longer periods, but that isn't hard to figure out - less people prepare for Chansey (pretty much goes hand in hand with slower matches) on ladder than in tours, because individual losses don't matter as much, quick wins are more meaningful, they raise you up faster.

Sylveon? I don't see why it should be moving up, I see it as a poor man's Clefable. Yeah, it works better than Clefable on some teams.. The key word being some. Unless you're counting its BP set, which you shouldn't, because that's being addressed right now.

And Zapdos has always been overrated imo. It isn't better than Skarmory vs Bird Offense, which is much worse than it used to be, so much so that I can't consider to use it myself. Anywho, unlike Skarmory, Zapdos is weak to Stealth Rock and is beaten by quite a few of its users. It doesn't want to stay in on TTar, Garchomp, Heatran, Hippowdon, Terrakion, etc. SpD Skarm loses to only a fraction of the mons Zapdos does. Zappy threatens a number of things, which is cool, but when you compare it to what's it at a disadvantage against - it's not all that.

tl;dr - these mons should be in their given ranks.
I'll likely make a post to drop Sylveon after BP is taken care of.
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I agree with TFL tho.
But I still think that Zapdos deserves A- Rank, I handily know what it can do and what it CAN'T, and I've got to say Zapdos has more firepower than Skarm and is much easier to fit on balance teams or offensive minded teams that need a reliable defogger that can also dent stuff like Talonflame and Pinsir.
And Zapdos can hurt stuff, unlike Skarm who relies on passive damage and stalling shit to deal damage.
 
Rhaegar said:
That's true about Chansey being less effective in tours but A- is still kind of harsh for the mon that holds stall together. It's probably the one mon that is a complete must on stall hence it's 'viability' is quite high since all stall teams end up running it. Offense can surely prepare for Chansey on stall, but Chansey on balance is another thing. Chansey on balance can sometimes even afford to be sacked after it sets rocks and paralyzes something. It is set up fodder for some things which is why it wouldn't deserve a rank as high as A+ but I surely believe it's as good as the mons in A viability-wise. Especially things like Ferrothorn and Hippowdown, Hippowdon itself being set-up fodder or walled by loads of things like MScizor, Gengar, Clefable, Balloon DrillSlashTran and Gliscor.
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actually, a trend that has been going on in stall is using zard x as the mega and dropping chansey because A: it isnt complete setup fodder and B: its typing pretty much allows it to counter the same things chansey does.
 
TFL said:
You're up-playing way too many mons and way too quickly at that, Buzz Lux.

Sure, Chansey walls a lot, but it's also beaten or set up fodder by a lot too. You mentioned it beating Charizard Y, but that's unreliable when you consider Charizard Y being commonly paired with a Pursuit Trapper. And poor Chansey is ranked a lot lower than the top offensive mons, because the teams it fits in to, as a whole, are effectively worse than the top offensive teams. This is coming from a person that favors stall. Part of the issue with Chansey is that good players can easily exploit it, stall tends to react, not act, and because of that you can be forced into easily predictable situations. Now you can say prediction goes both ways, but that isn't so easy when you don't know your opponent's skill level and you lose on one or two mispredicts. Offensive teams have more room to shift the match into their favor vs. stall (assuming they prepare for it). Lastly, I saw Rhaegar mention teams with Chansey staying on top of ladder for longer periods, but that isn't hard to figure out - less people prepare for Chansey (pretty much goes hand in hand with slower matches) on ladder than in tours, because individual losses don't matter as much, quick wins are more meaningful, they raise you up faster.

Sylveon? I don't see why it should be moving up, I see it as a poor man's Clefable. Yeah, it works better than Clefable on some teams.. The key word being some. Unless you're counting its BP set, which you shouldn't, because that's being addressed right now.

And Zapdos has always been overrated imo. It isn't better than Skarmory vs Bird Offense, which is much worse than it used to be, so much so that I can't consider to use it myself. Anywho, unlike Skarmory, Zapdos is weak to Stealth Rock and is beaten by quite a few of its users. It doesn't want to stay in on TTar, Garchomp, Heatran, Hippowdon, Terrakion, etc. SpD Skarm loses to only a fraction of the mons Zapdos does. Zappy threatens a number of things, which is cool, but when you compare it to what's it at a disadvantage against - it's not all that.

tl;dr - these mons should be in their given ranks.
I'll likely make a post to drop Sylveon after BP is taken care of.
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I mean, this is also coming from the person who absolutely refuses to run any sort of cleric right now. Obviously yes those ranks are overrated but to be honest Sylvoen doesn't need to drop even outside of baton pass. One of the things alluded to was how easily it beat Kyub (and it can beat Iron Head sets if you run physical defense). Sylveon is the best Kyub stop in the game. Yes, sometimes unaware is nice but I still think Clefable is a terrible cleric. It gets hit too much to actually pass off wishes without having itself put into a situation of needing more health.


Lucario is out of place in B rank. It isn't as good as anything sitting in B rank currently (Amoongus, Tornadus-T, Sylveon, Kingra, Conk, Suicune). All these mons have incredible niches and are used often on very good teams for what they do. However Lucario is too slow to sweep, even with his priority he's greatly overrated. Dropping to UU shows that he certainly isn't trending in our metagame and to be honest I'm surprised it took so long. I might drop him to C+...

Also, is it just me or is all of B- worse than the majority of C+?
 
I agree Lucario needs to be moved way down. Volcarona is B- and it also dropped in UU and unlike Lucario it faces no competition for its role as a Quiver Dance sweeper. Lucario has a ton of competition in OU as a physical lategame sweeper and it is certainly not my first pick among them.
If Volcarona is B-, then Lucario can't be higher than C+.
 
The thing is though, Volcarona is worse overall than Lucario in OU imo. Sweeping with Lucario is much more plausible than sweeping with Volc. A +2 Adamant LO Extremespeed actually gives it a decent niche and makes it much more difficult to revenge. Between Stealth Rock, Chansey, Talonflame and Scarfers, Volcarona is pretty much never going to sweep a team, and in fact I rarely even see it manage a single KO in most games it's in. Volcarona might not face competition as a Quiver Dancer (hell, I might even rather use Venomoth to be honest), but that doesn't mean its niche is very good in the metagame. I'd propose a drop to C, it's pretty bad right now, finds it difficult to set-up, and can't do much against either Stall or Offense.
 
Rotosect said:
I agree Lucario needs to be moved way down. Volcarona is B- and it also dropped in UU and unlike Lucario it faces no competition for its role as a Quiver Dance sweeper. Lucario has a ton of competition in OU as a physical lategame sweeper and it is certainly not my first pick among them.
If Volcarona is B-, then Lucario can't be higher than C+.
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While Lucario faces stiff competition as a swords dance sweeper, It is still the only swords dance sweeper capable of reliably beating both skarmory and talonflame without sustaining massive damage from either of them. Also, can extremespeed priority really be called overrated? It's not KOing everything to be sure, But it does KO some very important pokemon at +2, which would allow a parallel sweeper with it's best checks either removed or heavily weakened to clean up a team.
 
Sergeant Spooky said:
Yeah but nearly everything can hit Skarm neutrally/SE anyway, and unlike Mandibuzz its only means of retaliation is pretty much Whirlwind. Don't get me wrong, Steel/Flying is really good and makes it easier to switch in to stuff, but in practice those dozen resists or whatever it is are not that hard for the opponent to handle, especially since it does not have good special bulk.



252 Atk Garchomp Stone Edge vs. 248 HP / 136+ Def Mandibuzz: 168-198 (39.7 - 46.8%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
252 Atk Garchomp Stone Edge vs. 248 HP / 252+ Def Mandibuzz: 152-180 (35.9 - 42.5%) -- 93.5% chance to 3HKO after Leftovers recovery

252+ Atk Life Orb Mold Breaker Excadrill Rock Slide vs. 252 HP / 136+ Def Mandibuzz: 185-218 (43.6 - 51.4%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ Atk Life Orb Mold Breaker Excadrill Rock Slide vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Mandibuzz: 169-200 (39.8 - 47.1%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery

??? All things considered that's not a huge difference. 110/105 bulk is great, it's not that big of an issue to not fully invest in it.

Your entire argument here is that Mandibuzz isn't so good because it can't switch into powerful attacks against an opponent with perfect prediction when rocks are up. Yes this sucks, but a few things:
-Mandibuzz is only threatened by a handful of hazard setters. Excadrill, lead Chomp, Ferrothorn, Hippo, etc; you can switch in and do stuff. Heatran (Wisp,) Terrakion, Deo's (Taunt,) T-tar (you can't switch in to Stone Edge) are all the common ones you can lose against.
-If you're using Mandibuzz, you don't need to use it as a defogger. The set I run is Foul/Knock Off/Roost/Taunt, cause it's so good. So if you have some other thing for hazard control, it's not so hard to keep Mandi healthy and keep rocks off the field.
-When there aren't rocks up, the stuff Mandibuzz can switch in to and win against is actually really impressive: like, Landorus. It can switch into Focus Blast, avoid the 2HKO and win by just Roosting because lol Focus Blast. It beats all Landorus without CM, while Chansey loses to both CM and Knock Off sets. That's really good. And also pretty much every physical attacker that's not Rock or Fairy type, it can switch into without much issue.
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Its true that Skarm is far less of a threat than Mandibuzz but that doesnt change that he does the job of taking physical hits and removing rocks better than Mandibuzz.

The difference between full def and mixed is this:

252 Atk Garchomp Stone Edge vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Mandibuzz: 152-180 (35.8 - 42.4%) -- 17.6% chance to 2HKO after Stealth Rock and Leftovers recovery

252 Atk Garchomp Stone Edge vs. 252 HP / 136+ Def Mandibuzz: 168-198 (39.6 - 46.6%) -- 96.1% chance to 2HKO after Stealth Rock and Leftovers recovery

Thats quite a big difference, the Excadrill calc doesnt realy matter as LO Rockslides 2hkoes even full def Mandibuzz after rocks. My argument is that my physical wall aka Mandibuzz cant switch into common physical threats once rocks are up and to make it worse he is also my defogger. There isnt much prediction needed to expect a Mandi switch when Mandi is the only physical wall on the opponents team and you have Excadrill out. He fullfills 2 roles and both of them are far more difficult for him to accomplish once rocks are up. As the calcs above show Mandibuzz cant just switch into Excadrill or Lead Chomp once rocks are up. Well it can switch into Exca sets without LO so thats not the biggest issue but still.

I agree that Mandibuzz can take on tons of stuff without rocks on the field, thats not my problem, my problem is that the things he checks are halfed with rocks up, not a good thing imo.
 
No I think Lucario is fine where it's at. Remember, usage is a terrible argument in wanting to drop or raise a Pokemon, and Lucario's current UU status means absolutely nothing. I don't know why someone said it's overrated, because quite the contrary it's pretty underrated. It's not as easy to revenge kill as some of you are saying it is, because a +2 LO Extremespeed can beat Talonflame, Deo-S, Greninja, Zard-Y with very little residual damage, and Thundurus alone, without even Stealth Rock, while others such as Latios are dealt with after SR. It's powerful enough to OHKO Skarm after Stealth Rock at +2 with Close Combat, so it's not like Skarm can try to prevent it from sweeping. With Iron Tail it can break through Clefable and OHKO Azumarill before it picks it off with Play Rough. Both Landorus-T and Gliscor can't take repeated Iron Tails either, as it's an easy 2HKO even at +1.

On top of its sweeping capabilities, it's also a solid check to Excadrill outside of the Sand, Bisharp, Tyranitar, Heatran, Adamant Mamo, Mega Scizor lacking Superpower, and Chansey. It's biggest flaw is that it's walled by Aegislash, but with a bit of support it's not much of a problem. I don't think it's really comparable to Volcarona in B- rank, who I would argue is pretty bad in this metagame because of how easy it is to revenge kill it at +1, as well as how common its best counters are such as Heatran and Chansey. I don't care if nothing directly outclasses it, that argument could be used for many other Pokemon that aren't currently ranked, AKA it's a bad argument.

So yeah, SD Lucario is an underrated sweeper that people seem to really overlook. It's a lot more successful at sweeping then most of the people found in B- rank, and it can sweep a lot of weakened offensive teams with just E-Speed alone. I want to see it stay in B rank.
 
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Another thing about Lucario is that it doesn't even have to set up to be useful or threatening to offense. I just played a game (using my UU team since I don't have an OU one with Luke on it atm), and he was easily MVP by being able to pick off or outright kill almost everything on my opponents offense team just with ExtremeSpeed alone (I literally didn't use any other move). http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/ou-127589599
 
jbtc10 said:
Another thing about Lucario is that it doesn't even have to set up to be useful or threatening to offense. I just played a game (using my UU team since I don't have an OU one with Luke on it atm), and he was easily MVP by being able to pick off or outright kill almost everything on my opponents offense team just with ExtremeSpeed alone (I literally didn't use any other move). http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/ou-127589599
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Lucario is too strong in UU, and you know it. I'm sure it would do well in Little Cup too, if it were allowed, but it doesn't really help.
 
sogneh said:
Lucario is too strong in UU, and you know it. I'm sure it would do well in Little Cup too, if it were allowed, but it doesn't really help.
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yea about this maybe if u had actually watched the replay he was using it in OU, granted it was rather pretty low ranked but sowhat, even tho hi ranked replays are desired it still showed that lucario was easily able to pick off faster weakened foes...honestly hes pretty great imo ive been using him on a straight up HO team and he revenges the shit out of shit, and after a swords dance can really destroy. honestly he gets walled p hard by choosing coverage, hes frail, slow for a sweeper, but if u use him to do what he does which is break huge holes with his stab close combat, wreck faster mons with a v powerful extreme speed, and nail fairies with iron tail, dragons with ice punch, or aegi with crunch...fuk aegi with king shield tho. iron tail is pretty great doing huge damage to clef and azu...hes pretty good, not A or whatever but hes not shit at least. fuk
 
Lucario is pretty solidly B rank IMO. On the one hand, access to Extremespeed gives him a definite niche over most over sweepers in OU, given that can stops it from being revenge killed from Talonflame and Mega-Pinsir after one turn of setup. The only other good user of Extremespeed is Dragonite, and Dragonite at +1 cannot OHKO Standard Talonflame or Mega-Pinsir after Rocks (assuming it didn't mega-evolve before and only took 25% damage from Rocks). That's a solid niche. However, Lucario's 4MSS is horrendous, and he basically has to choose between hitting Aegislash, Fairies, or Landorus-T/Gliscor/Zapdos/basically anything that flies. Most of the time, there are better options, but Lucario is pretty much the only win condition that doesn't care about either priority or rocks, so its seems perfectly at home in B.
 
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jbtc10 said:
Another thing about Lucario is that it doesn't even have to set up to be useful or threatening to offense. I just played a game (using my UU team since I don't have an OU one with Luke on it atm), and he was easily MVP by being able to pick off or outright kill almost everything on my opponents offense team just with ExtremeSpeed alone (I literally didn't use any other move). http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/ou-127589599
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Are you saying that we should be impressed of Lucario being able to revenge a team mostly made of pokemon with garbage physical bulk?
Post a replay of Lucario doing the same against bulky offense and then we'll talk.
 
Rotosect said:
Are you saying that we should be impressed of Lucario being able to revenge a team mostly made of pokemon with garbage physical bulk?
Post a replay of Lucario doing the same against bulky offense and then we'll talk.
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No, he is saying that a reason you would use lucario as a sweeper is because it has a very powerful extreme speed aswell as powerful stabs which let it clean more offencive teams with extreme speed withought worrying about priority such as a tflames brave bird and it can clean more defencive team with a ridiculously strong close combat. Lucario may be outclassed by most sweepers but it definately has a good niche, B rank is fine IMO.
 
jbtc10 said:
Another thing about Lucario is that it doesn't even have to set up to be useful or threatening to offense. I just played a game (using my UU team since I don't have an OU one with Luke on it atm), and he was easily MVP by being able to pick off or outright kill almost everything on my opponents offense team just with ExtremeSpeed alone (I literally didn't use any other move). http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/ou-127589599
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Although this wasn't a very good match (with a large amount of misplays on the Talon user), it shows how good Lucario can be. However, it relies on Extremepeed way too much and anything even remotely bulky shits on its unboosted life. I agree that it deserves a bump but not for the fact that it can beat a bunch of weakened mons that shouldn't be weakened because of poor plays but because of the fact that it dismantles stall at +2 after Quagsires weakened (seriously though, Skarm, the best answer to it on stall, gets fucked by +2 CC).
 
Rotosect said:
Are you saying that we should be impressed of Lucario being able to revenge a team mostly made of pokemon with garbage physical bulk?
Post a replay of Lucario doing the same against bulky offense and then we'll talk.
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Against bulky offense, 90 base speed is no so bad so Luke can just use CC which is quite a lot more powerful.

Fact is that a lot of top threats are very frail and Luke can pick them off with Extremespeed. B is a pretty modest ranking and I think Luke is good enough for it.
 
What in the metagame lets Lucario boost so easily? With weaknesses to fire, fight and ground, as well as garbage bulk, he kinda has an issue surviving through his boost turn. Even against neutrals, he isn't boosting easily.

252 SpA Thundurus Thunderbolt vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Lucario: 192-226 (68.3 - 80.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
+2 252 Atk Life Orb Lucario Extreme Speed vs. 4 HP / 0 Def Thundurus: 270-318 (90 - 106%) -- 37.5% chance to OHKO

Better hope for an OHKO, or thundy not to have focus blast. Azumarill can OHKO with waterfall and avoids OHKO back. Lando... well, that's obvious. Charizard. Can't set up on either. Even LO latios will OHKO 100% of the time with Psychic, latias has a chance to do so. Obviously Aegi is a hard stop. He'll never boost on Keldeo or Terrakion. Can't set up on Talonflame lol. Gliscor, Scarf Exca both win with ease. In fact, those two should win after the boost. Gyardos blocks him off with intimidate and if that's a mega, he'll counter sweep. Greninja...

252 SpA Life Orb Greninja Hydro Pump vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Lucario: 265-313 (94.3 - 111.3%) -- 68.8% chance to OHKO

Limits him to only killing Greninja at best... Garchomp kills him before boost, Deo-S kills him before boost. Mamo, Loom... Same story. Mega Alakazam kills him before boost with focus blast, can nearly kill with psychic, and reg Zam will revenge kill after LO. Where does he get this boost? The only two I see are TTar and Heatran, and I'm not sure setting up against heatran is going to prove a consistently good play. Perhaps Mandibuzz? Vs Skarm, you risk WW and then accomplishing nothing but we should focus on offense for lucario because stall doesn't fear that base form much.

I just don't see it. We talk about some pokemon being given magical boosts, and how many boosts a pokemon deserves for the switches in creates. As far as I'm concerned, Lucario doesn't get a boost in theory because there's not much he can come in on and set up on. All the opponent has to do is attack.
 
can't calc because fuck phones, because, but a lot of people are saying lucario can't espeed sweep bulky offensive times, but why would he want to even? Luc can have plenty of opportunities to SD on stuff like blissey, and then with a combination of iron tail espeed and close combat I can't think of much that can take that combination on bulky teams besides aegislash, non mega gyarados (still hates espeed tho) and maybe like 3 other things I can't remember. The point is lucario isn't deadweight against either archetype, and can espeed fast frail threats, and Cc and iron tail slower ones. I think it should be B+ actually and I always thought it was crimininally underused
 
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