Current council is
InfernapeTropius11 and
unfixable. Hoping to get two more people beyond that, get some more diversity in the council.
Two quick questions:
1. Are the viability rankings
here going to replace the ones in the second post? They're more recent, after all.
2. Why are there a couple of Mega Stones listed out of alphabetical order at the beginning and end of the list? It's really annoying me.
Would've done it yesterday, got distracted by the drama. Done. (Also finally updated bans/current suspect)
Yeah that annoys me too, but I never remember to fix it when I have the time. :(
The calc I'm referencing isn't Pinsirite- you didn't have a chance to ohko it w/ Pinsirite. It was aerodactylite, specifically, which is what made it a lure. Lures in MnM aren't necessarily the same as in standard play (they can be, obviously, but not necessarily). The damage output was way greater w/ Tough Claws CC, and even it couldn't completely reliably ohko cobalion. Say you do predict wrong (this is against Pinsirite Luc), admittedly your cobalion will probably die, but worst case scenario, you use aerilate Quick Attack and deal up to 75% to their lucario. Both of these calcs use 252 HP /200 Def+, as opposed to the spread you used, as it allows you to deal more damage while still tanking a close combat pre mega and an Espeed after. I don't think it's even the best spread tho, I think you could even take more from its bulk, but calculating the exact number is really time consuming when you have to take mega evolution into account.
252+ Atk Lucario (Altariaite) Close Combat vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Cobalion (Nothing yet): 288-342 (74.6 - 88.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
Followed by
252+ Atk Pixilate Lucario (Altarianite) Extreme Speed vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Cobalion (Pinsirite): 56-66 (14.5 - 17%) -- possible 6HKO
has good odds of being a kill. If you are any less bulky, it just gets worse. (The second one's low roll is a kill on the first one's high roll)
No, the described scenario does not remotely guarantee that you'll even get that Quick Attack in.
I stand by my statement that the lure set was secondary to my point.
That's exactly my point. It actually has trouble breaking walls anyways, so the ability to set up on them doesn't help it when they don't even care if it has set up. Again, 140 Atk is really unimpressive, so it really only has the power it needs to break offense. Walls tend to be very well specialized in this meta, meaning that things w/ anything less than absolutely insane power has difficulty beating them. Even Hyper Offense teams are bulkier here than they usually are just by virtue of mega evolution almost always boosting defenses somewhat, so unboosted it can't beat most hyper offense teams, at least, it can't early on. So it's inability to set up against offense really hurts it, as that's what it's good against. Actually, it is probably best against balance, as that provides it more chances to set up while lacking the bulk of full stall, but even then it doesn't work that well until late game.
It can still come in on things like Lucarionite Terrakion and place them in switch-or-die situations against hyper offense. I've gotten a lot more utility out of that kind of pressure than on the pressure provided by Swords Dance. Swords Dance is, in my experience, useful more for putting intense pressure on stallmons/stall teams, and can additionally be used, with gutsy moves, to secure a sweep against hyper offense... but I don't think it's remotely reliable for that particular purpose. It's sufficiently narrow I've toyed with the idea of replacing it with a second coverage move. Main reason I haven't is that it cripples its utility against an entire style for a small improvement against another style.
You kind of answered your own question, but I'd like to point out some major details that you missed. First of all, the SR weakness isn't as big as you might think. Rocks are hard to constantly maintain in MnM, as magic bounce is so common. As such, I've seen many teams that choose to forego stealth rocks entirely, especially on hyper offense. This helps fire types immensely, as they are much more free to come and go as they please. We've seen how omnipresent Pdon is, and it takes no crap from altarianite luc, especially if you aren't running EQ, which leaves you hard walked by flying types that resist fairy. Ho-oh is a good example. It has the ability to spread around burns w/ sacred fire while dealing awesome damage, and walls altarianite luc to no end. Pixispeed doesn't really have that great nuetral coverage, honestly. And that speed is absolutely crucial when you only have 70/90/70 bulk.
252+ Atk Lucario Stone Edge vs. 248 HP / 252+ Def Ho-Oh: 332-392 (80 - 94.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
... um, that's a regular Lucario using one of its preferred coverage moves against a Physically Defensive Ho-Oh, and it's almost a OHKO. And if Ho-Oh is that tough, it's going to lose the Speed game. If it's fast enough to get a Speed tie (Or, since I'm calcing Adamant here, win Speed reliably) then it goes pop to one Stone Edge.
252+ Atk Lucario (Altarianite) Stone Edge vs. 248 HP / 252+ Def Ho-Oh: 412-488 (99.2 - 117.5%) -- 93.8% chance to OHKO
Yeah, even if it does survive, you just Extreme Speed it. Hell...
252+ Atk Pixilate Lucario (Altarianite) Extreme Speed vs. 248 HP / 252+ Def Ho-Oh: 80-95 (19.2 - 22.8%) -- possible 6HKO after Leftovers recovery
.... it has good odds of finishing off Ho-Oh if for some ungodly reason Lucario opened with an un-Mega-ed Stone Edge. Not a reliable switchin to Altarianite Lucario, in short.
My own experience is that Stealth Rock is basically omnipresent and not that hard to get up unless you're facing a team with a double Magic Bounce core, which is usually full-on stall, which isn't that impressed with Extreme Speed shenanigans.
Not gonna argue the Primal Groudon point, except to the extent of pointing out that Red Orb is beautiful on multiple other Pokémon and so Primal Groudon isn't as universal as you might expect. It's one case where Pinsirite has the advantage, hands-down, between the neutral Extreme Speed and the improved Speed ensuring Primal Groudon will never have a Speed tie to try to win.
Let's not forget that salamencite gives it 85/130/90 defenses. If you want to hit it for super effective damage, you have to run ice punch/thunder punch or stone edge, and then you lose out on that super effective damage that makes altarianite good. I already touched on stealth rock, and even w/ only 100 Atk, it still actually has decent offensive presence, despite being far better suited for a support role. It has super fang for softening fat stuff that threatens you otherwise, defog, roost, u-turn, etc., making it a valuable member for many teams.
Um, running a coverage move doesn't take away your primary STABs. Lucario has four moveslots, not two.
I'm not saying Crobat isn't valuable, I'm saying it's not prone to forcing Lucario into "switch or die and also your buddy is going to be at risk of dying to the right prediction". Crobat is an amazing support pivot and has enough offensive presence to not be completely passive in the process, but it has trouble being sufficiently threatening that there's no safe switch-in on your team, even if you're a hyper offense team.
That means absolutely nothing. Just because they aren't on the rankings doesn't mean they aren't good. Poison is a very overlooked type for some reason, as its obvious weaknesses (offensively) repel people away. The nidos probably aren't great, but they're an option, I've seen multiple drapion, there's also toxicroak, dragalge, and, as stated, there's always Crobat. All these have many unique tools that are hard to otherwise provide. Oh yeah, you can't forget about scolipede. It's fully viable and very much underrated.
It's not just that Poison is an awful offensive type, it's that defensively it has painful overlap with Steel. (They both laugh at Poison, Bug, Grass, and Fairy, and are both vulnerable to Ground) It's primary advantage over Steel, in practice, is that it resists Fighting instead of being vulnerable, which in practice is usually overshadowed by the fact that Skarmory exists. And in Mix and Mega, as you yourself have pointed out, any primary Steel can use Pinsirite to reinforce the problem.
I'm honestly not seeing how Dragalge would be more viable in Mix and Mega than in Standard. Or Toxicroak. Drapion's offense is lacking, though I will admit I may be overlooking something.
I'll give you Scolipede, kind of. Note that it's Bug/Poison, not Poison/Bug.
I'm not, actually. As a matter of fact, it's not even that it would be bad, but it's just outclassed. Inferape is a much better fighting special attacker, despite having lower SpA, for many reasons. 1, It's harder to wall, 2, It's way faster, 3, in spite of this, it actually has slightly more bulk (not noticeably so, but it proves a point), 4, it's fire blast is stronger than Lucarios flash cannon, and 5, it has a more useful movepool, beit support or offensive. As for prankster copycat, that's not that useful anymore (it can't call phazing moves). Infernape would be better for banettite too, as it gets prankster WoW, slack off, stealth rocks, I think encore, and idk what else.
Yeah, but you don't get the advantage that the enemy assumes Infernape is Extreme Speed. Nor can it run Mega Launcher, which gives Lucario not only a powerful STAB but unusually strong coverage. (I'll give you Infernape is probably far and away the superior banettite user) A big part of my point, and I should note I seem to be unusual in this perspective, is that Lucario brings to the table a mindgame. Yeah, you're not going to look at Lucario if you're saying "what's the fastest, strongest, most versatile Special-capable Fighting type I can equip with Pidgeotite?" But if you
do run Lucario with Pidgeotite, it brings the "invisible" advantage that people are keenly aware of and threatened by its -atespeed sets, and will almost certainly respond to that, even if they are aware of the possibility of other sets. But it's
not a lure set, because Lucario is one of the most competent examples of the idea out there, even if it's not the
most competent one.
Special Lucario is also, incidentally, in a better position than Special Infernape to punch through certain Dragons, such as Giratina. I don't think it really works to say Lucario is outclassed by Infernape in the role of Special Fighting type. Infernape has advantages, and maybe they're more
useful against most teams, but Lucario does things Infernape does not, and they
matter.
Prediction though is a really poor argument. And this specific example is only true for cobalion, and only if it hasn't mega evolved yet, which is easier than you might guess, as it actually gets volt switch to screw you over. And it actually can't effortlessly destroy its check, as the defensive cobalion spread you mentioned can guaranteed survive pinsirites CC once, doesn't take crap from Espeed after it has mega evolved, than, w/ the spread I mentioned at the beginning of this post, does 65-75% w/ quick attack, so worst case scenario, your main check to it is gone, but lucario is basically done for. That's with a just slightly more optimized set than you gave.
I already covered why the prediction scenario completely screws over Cobalion, period. The main thing I want to add here is: prediction is highly relevant when talking about "can it switch in reliably?" It just does
not work to say "it can always switch in reliably because the enemy will never use prediction". Some Pokémon can switch in on literally anything another Pokémon does, no matter what set it's running. Others demand the enemy not do X, or that the enemy set is incapable of doing X. (That is, that it lacks a specific coverage move or something) The first of these is
tangibly better as a check or counter -it will
always be able to get in and drive the enemy out or kill it or PP stall it or whatever. The latter demands they don't engage in good prediction, nor that they engage in
bad prediction that happens to work out, nor that they misclick and it kills you, nor that they simply go with a lazy answer that works out, nor that they decide to "scout" by tossing out a Close Combat... there's any number of potential reasons for Lucario to choose to use a Close Combat the turn Cobalion is switching in. It doesn't even demand that Lucario anticipated Cobalion. It just demands that, for
any reason, Lucario did so on that turn.
I think I've already covered why I disagree in a general sense with defining a check or counter with the assumption that Mega Evolution has already occurred (Barring Orbs), but to re-iterate in Cobalion's case: it has no recovery. The time taken to Mega Evolve prior to Lucario coming out is unlikely to leave it completely unharmed. This matters.
That is true, I suppose, however, as stated, that is honestly true for a huge portion of the meta, only they do it better (aside from not having access to Espeed). Thunderus is a good example; it can run its standard pidgeotite set, or you can slap lopunnite on it and turn it into a ridiculous physical/mixed sweeper/wallbreaker and blow up its normal checks (if they exist). And the opportunity cost is far higher than you are suggesting, because of, as you mentioned yourself, the species clause. Lucarios lure megas are all inferior to atespeeds and really don't excel in anything except beating the checks to atespeed lucario, which, you don't have. So, these surprise sets really aren't relevant, as they can do one thing and one thing only, then after that it's really good for nothing. Honestly, if lucario didn't have access to Espeed, it would be completely outclassed in general in any role it could fill. It would hardly require scouting, since it's so slow and pretty weak.
I already covered what I'm talking about in responding to something earlier in this post, but the short version is: no, I'm not talking about "lure" sets (I'm talking about valid sets that
double as lures), no Lucario is not invalidated in every way by everything else ever in these other roles, and no, Lucario isn't weak. Just the fact that it has both Swords Dance and Nasty Plot, plus the stats to use either is unusual, it's one of a limited pool of Mega Launcher-viable Pokémon and arguably one of the best possible abusers, its base typing is completely unique and meshes nicely with type-changing Mega Stones (eg Fighting is super effective on it, until it Mega Evolves with Altarianite. Ground is super effective on it, until it Mega Evolves with Pinsirite), etc.
Lucario can't break skarm either, or at least, not w/o Tpunch (the only move in its arsenal that can consistently let it hit skarm for SE damage), and Tpunch sucks.
Kind of missing my point that Lucario can do this at all and Zygarde can't. That, more generally, it's possible to produce Zygarde counters that nothing it has can get around, and this isn't possible with Lucario. Lucario can break Skarmory, the fact that it requires the right coverage move doesn't somehow detract from the core point: you can
reliably hard-counter Zygarde but not Lucario.
And you are implicitly ignoring my explicitly stated point that Special Lucario
is a viable option that, of course, casually breaks Skarmory (And myriad other possible Physical walls), where no such thing is even imaginable for Zygarde.
There is a tangible difference between "has absolute, 100%, always and forever hard counters, no matter what it tries to do" and "every build can be countered by something, but nothing can counter every build".
Also, zygarde has that one set that I shared w/ you that I'm not going to post here because it is literally cancer, so there's that, too. It is the defenition of uncompetitive, though I know there are other ways to recreate it, it's just the only one that I've seen actually develop, as of yet.
Honestly I've thought about the possibility of complex banning Sleep Talk+Banettite. It's the core of the issue.
