Ladder ORAS Monotype Discussion

[Physical Tyranitar]

Shadow Tag is one of those abilities that are viable in some situations and utterly useless in others. If Gothitelle comes in at the right moment, and tricks a Choice Scarf onto a Pokemon with a boosting move being used or a wall, Gothitelle is going to sweep. But, as the standard Gothitelle set only has Psychic moves, this makes a Gothitelle surprisingly easy to kill. For instance, no Dark Team should have any trouble with Gothitelle, as they cannot be damaged by Psychic/shock, and shake off the uncommon HP Fire. Any physical attacker that outspeeds Gothitelle (which will be pretty easy) that is able to OHKO Gothitelle should be good to go. Think Bisharp, Weavile, Hoopa-Unbound, Heracross, Dragonite, the list goes on and on.

Wobbuffet isn't really as bulky as one would like to think, however it is pretty hard to deal with if you are a mono attacker. Any Mixed Attacker has a fighting chance against wobbuffet.

Shadow Tag is definitely a dangerous force in the metagame, but it isn't nearly as unstoppable as you would think. Gothitelle Psychic Cores are really cool and can break many Mono Teams, as PK-Kaiser said.

 

[Day Healer]

Suspect shadow tag? seriously guys? A strategy not used at all until 1 month ago, suddendly someone create a cool team with it (props to kaiser btw), people are butthurt because they lost to it and start calling for a suspect...

Yeah shadow tag is a strong strategy, I give you dat, but past the surprise factor you learn to play more cautiously again it, like it was in OU. To explain with better words I quote Gerard:

No, what I meant is that you should not put yourself in such a position where the shadow tag team can so easily set upon you, for example, when having a Skarmory against an opposing Shadow Tag mon then don't just mindlessly use Stealth Rock, any other move could have been better, use whirlwind, use brave bird, but don't use a move that allows Gothitelle to set up to +6 and get a sub up, that's just bad play. Without that sub Gothitelle can be revenged killed rather easily because it's nonexistent speed along it's bad defensive typing, in the first match for example, there was no reason for Dragonite to use ExtremeSpeed, if he had gone for the Outrage as he should then he wouldn't have been swiped right there and there

In any case, we are all just theorymoning here (even myself yep), becos lets say the truth, Gothitelle usage in ladder is so low and wobba is even worst (I literally have never seen a wobba in all my monotype battles at all). Show me first with other replays of yours which there is an issue with Shadow tag and I will believe you, not just jump the hype bantrain.

 

[Isza]

Suspect shadow tag? seriously guys? A strategy not used at all until 1 month ago, suddendly someone create a cool team with it (props to kaiser btw), people are butthurt because they lost to it and start calling for a suspect...

Yeah shadow tag is a strong strategy, I give you dat, but past the surprise factor you learn to play more cautiously again it, like it was in OU. To explain with better words I quote Gerard:



In any case, we are all just theorymoning here (even myself yep), becos lets say the truth, Gothitelle usage in ladder is so low and wobba is even worst (I literally have never seen a wobba in all my monotype battles at all). Show me first with other replays of yours which there is an issue with Shadow tag and I will believe you, not just jump the hype bantrain.

Who said anything about suspecting Shadow Tag? I think People were just trying to discuss the ways it could be used and how dangerous it could be. Sure you can use it to the best of it's ability to dismantle any type you wish, but I doubt anyone deems it broken.

 

[Day Healer]

Ah, in dat case is good, I got confused by the 1 True Lycan and Septicus comments, but if its only discussion about usage is ok

 

[1 True Lycan]

past the surprise factor you learn to play more cautiously against it, like it was in ou

Well shadow tag was banned in ou with a 90% majority so I'm not sure where you were going with this...

 

[DoW]

Frankly, while usage does have some factor in what we suspect, I'd still be happy to suspect something that gets almost no usage. For example, swagplay in OU wasn't exactly hugely common IIRC, but it was just so cancerous, unpopular and uncompetitive that it still made sense to ban it.

I'd also like to point out that, however you look at it, Shadow Tag is uncounterable, and that at the same time this doesn't necessarily mean it should be banned. Being able to counter something means being able to bring in a mon to beat the opposing mon, which clearly can't be done if you can't bring a mon in to start with. At the same time, ditto is clearly uncounterable as there is no mon in existence that will always beat ditto, but at the same time ditto isn't exactly broken.

What we should be looking at in this discussion is whether shadow tag is competitive. I'm not going to make a big post on whether it is or isn't right now, but I wanted to point out that both whether it's got high usage and whether it's counterable aren't necessarily very important in this discussion.

 

[Physical Tyranitar]

My opinion is that Shadow Tag isn't competitive, but there is a spectrum on my opinion. Not to mix different kinds of metagames, but let's take Overused for example. Shadow Tag was banned with 90% of the voters agreeing. Let's not forget that in the Overused tier, many Pokemon are allowed in competitive play, so logically it would be somewhat easier to deal with Shadow Tag. Now, in Monotype, a team has six of the same type, so potentially some types are more weak to Shadow Tag than others. There would be situations where an unprepared Monotype Team will be swept by a Gothitelle, because Gothitelle will switch into a wall, trick a Choice Scarf, and proceed to setup. However, I would say that most types have some ways to deal with Gothitelle, just as most types had a way to deal with Mega Sableye (when we were discussing pre-Sablenite Suspect).

In no way is Shadow Tag counterable. The only Pokemon that are immune to Shadow Tag shouldn't really be versing Gothitelle in the first place. But the point is, although certain types could use the fact that there are six of the same type to their advantage, like Dark, others are almost screwed if Gothitelle sets up, like Poison. But based on the very concept of Monotype, I believe that Shadow Tag is a potentially dangerous and centralizing strategy that shouldn't be in Monotype.

 

[Dece1t]

My opinion is that Shadow Tag isn't competitive, but there is a spectrum on my opinion. Not to mix different kinds of metagames, but let's take Overused for example. Shadow Tag was banned with 90% of the voters agreeing. Let's not forget that in the Overused tier, many Pokemon are allowed in competitive play, so logically it would be somewhat easier to deal with Shadow Tag. Now, in Monotype, a team has six of the same type, so potentially some types are more weak to Shadow Tag than others. There would be situations where an unprepared Monotype Team will be swept by a Gothitelle, because Gothitelle will switch into a wall, trick a Choice Scarf, and proceed to setup. However, I would say that most types have some ways to deal with Gothitelle, just as most types had a way to deal with Mega Sableye (when we were discussing pre-Sablenite Suspect).

In no way is Shadow Tag counterable. The only Pokemon that are immune to Shadow Tag shouldn't really be versing Gothitelle in the first place. But the point is, although certain types could use the fact that there are six of the same type to their advantage, like Dark, others are almost screwed if Gothitelle sets up, like Poison. But based on the very concept of Monotype, I believe that Shadow Tag is a potentially dangerous and centralizing strategy that shouldn't be in Monotype.

Your kinda forgetting the fact though with monotype, they could also be stronger with the 6 same mons. So for example, ghost probably wouldn't have a very hard time against it. Same for Dark I can imagine. So in that sense I can imagine it balancing, but we should honestly play around with it before we get hasty.

 

[Physical Tyranitar]

Your kinda forgetting the fact though with monotype, they could also be stronger with the 6 same mons. So for example, ghost probably wouldn't have a very hard time against it. Same for Dark I can imagine. So in that sense I can imagine it balancing, but we should honestly play around with it before we get hasty.

Actually, I mentioned that.
"In no way is Shadow Tag counterable. The only Pokemon that are immune to Shadow Tag shouldn't really be versing Gothitelle in the first place. But the point is, although certain types could use the fact that there are six of the same type to their advantage, like Dark, but there are others are almost screwed if Gothitelle sets up, like Poison."

I believe that the Matchup Factor plays really well for Shadow Tag, and the fact that Monotype teams almost always have some kind of major weakness also helps Gothitelle in sweeping.

 

[Isza]

So, remember how I said earlier everyone should try experimenting with this new toy in Monotype? So me and my friends decided to build a NEW team, more hyper offensive to see how goth could work on a more offensive team. Here is an example of when we tested
http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/monotype-311551246


The set we used (Credits to squad) is here:

Gothitelle @ Choice Specs
Ability: Shadow Tag
EVs: 248 HP / 252 SpA / 8 SpD
Modest Nature
- Psychic
- Hidden Power [Ground]
- Trick
- Energy Ball

After digging more into shadow tag, I have to say I'm having so much fun using these sets/cores. I promise you will see more of it from me in mono open, just don't get trapped!

 

[scpinion]

The December usage stats are up on the Monotype Website. Note that Smogon now tiers mega-evolutions separately from their base form.

Also, the metagame is really shaken up this go round. Flying has significantly dropped and Dragon is up at number 4 among other very interesting changes!

Pokemon usage stats and sprite gallery: http://monotypeps.weebly.com/sprite-gallery.html
Type Matchup Table and Imbalanced Matchups: http://monotypeps.weebly.com/matchup-tables.html
Metagame Trends/Type Analyses/Lead Information: http://monotypeps.weebly.com/type-analyses.html

As always, make sure to let me know if you need any help understanding something, or if you find any bugs!

Edit: Something is wrong with the stats for this month. For one, Mega-Aggron is showing up as a flying type, which is bad. I'm working on finding a solution.

Edit2: The stats problems come from tiering megas separately, and a small snippet of code I added a while ago b/c of an old bug in the monotype team detection on PS. For now, I'll rerun them w/ the small bug fix, which probably won't change much aside from not listing m-Aggron, TTar and Terrakion as Flying types.

Until Antar and/or I work out a fix for the mega-evo's that change typing upon mega-evolving just know that m-Gyara Flying and m-Aggron Rock teams aren't being counted correctly.

Edit3: The stats should be fixed to the best of my knowledge/ability. Any issues with this are upstream from me and Antar already knows about them.

 

[Dece1t]

The December usage stats are up on the Monotype Website. Note that Smogon now tiers mega-evolutions separately from their base form.

Also, the metagame is really shaken up this go round. Flying has significantly dropped and Dragon is up at number 4 among other very interesting changes!

Pokemon usage stats and sprite gallery: http://monotypeps.weebly.com/sprite-gallery.html
Type Matchup Table and Imbalanced Matchups: http://monotypeps.weebly.com/matchup-tables.html
Metagame Trends/Type Analyses/Lead Information: http://monotypeps.weebly.com/type-analyses.html

As always, make sure to let me know if you need any help understanding something, or if you find any bugs!

Edit: Something is wrong with the stats for this month. For one, Mega-Aggron is showing up as a flying type, which is bad. I'm working on finding a solution.

Edit2: The stats problems come from tiering megas separately, and a small snippet of code I added a while ago b/c of an old bug in the monotype team detection on PS. For now, I'll rerun them w/ the small bug fix, which probably won't change much aside from not listing m-Aggron, TTar and Terrakion as Flying types.

Until Antar and/or I work out a fix for the mega-evo's that change typing upon mega-evolving just know that m-Gyara Flying and m-Aggron Rock teams aren't being counted correctly.

Serperior under the grass sprite galery has a move option left blank, but it has a %, and Mega Gyarados has all of Char y's data.

 

[ed wins]

While I do believe that STAG has been a very underappreciated ability in Psychic monos until it received spotlight in the OU suspect test, I do not entirely believe it to be borked.

Among many things, Gothitelle is a wallbreaker. A very good one. With the ability to 1/2HKO the likes of Hippowdon, Venusaur, Skarmory, Gastrodon, Swampert, Venusaur, Slowbro, Ferrothorn - whatever it may be. If the wall is generally physically defensive orientated, Gothitelle can trap and destroy it. Other things to note is Gothitelle's ability to trap key threats or nuisances to your team, such as Heatran, Garchomp, Chansey, Porygon2, Zapdos, etc

Monotype is a tier where balance dominates. In such an environment, Gothitelle can thrive on paper. However, it is important to note that Gothitelle MUST HAVE A SPECIFIC moveset to completely put in work versus a specific type, which lead to similar discussions of the past in regards to Genesect.

While Trick-Rest-CM has the potential to break through types such as Water, Ground, and Flying, it leaves Gothitelle walled by any Dark type, gives it limited coverage(resisted by Psychic and Steel), and leaves it vulnerable, even in revenge killing attempts.

A Specs set has the capacity to run through specific teams, such as Ground, Water, and Flying ( Psychic, Energy Ball, and Thunderbolt), which in turn leaves it walled by Psychic, Steel, and Dark. Furthermore, its low speed tier means that it won't be doing too much outside of trapping walls.

While losing a wall, such as Heatran, can put the Psychic user in an advantageous position, it does not give the Psychic user an auto win versus the type. In this tier, counter playing threats is far more important than any other tier. Victini comes in and gets a kill. That then lets the Steel user bring in Bisharp or Doublade to counter play against the Victini. In the end, the user that made the best plays once the trapping had been done will result in the victor, as a trapped Heatran does not mean an automatic 6-0

Versus more offensive teams, Gothitelle won't really do much unless it is running a Scarf. I suppose that it can utilize its great bulk to put something like Thundurus in Medicham's Fake Out range, but I've yet to actually see any of those points arise.


Here is a replay versus my first Gothitelle encounter on the ladder versus someone you might all know. I came across him earlier today, so he even knew the set up to my team. The replay doesn't really showcase the brokenness of STAG whatsoever. In fact, it highlights Gothitellea very cripplying flaws. If not for two Stone Edge misses, Gothitelle wouldn't have even garnered a single kill.

If the replay shows anything, it shows that Mega-Latias is the real threat here, as that thing has the potential to bulk its way past Flying, Water, Electric, Grass, and Fire monos

http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/monotype-314044247

 

[Isza]

The only thing that replay proves is how awful Gothitelle is against offense which is clearly common knowledge, or so I hope. Goth is going to accomplish absolutely nothing against an offensive build due to it's lack of speed.
While the replay does showcase Goth's flaw, it is a very common 1. The point of the team is to utilize Stag to clear openings for The rest of the team, not use shadow tag to with against everyone.
Oh, and as for what you said about bisharp, Victini has sub and flame charge with heat plate. Once heatran is gone with shadow tag, It's basically 50/50's with Victini, assuming you know the set, if not you'd lose the steel match up all together. Flame charge Victini helps with the bug match up as well, which is also what this team struggles with.

 

[ed wins]

Gothitelle is used to open up holes, yes, which means that you have two dedicated mons to ct one type. Not long ago, you mentioned Gothitelle + Starmie to ct Ground. Gothitelle + heat Victini to ct Steel, which is not only dropping in usage, but in viability.

Quite frankly, this whole STAG thing is being over hyped. The pinnacle of mega sab usage was seen when these discussions were at their peak of activity near the time when the suspect was announced. People will spam what they think will get them free wins(look at how all of the hoopa hype has died down). If you dedicate two whole slots to ct one type, then Gothitelle isn't really the problem. Do you want to ct Steel as a psychic user? Use Sub/Fire Punch MegaChan or NP Flamethrower + Vacuum Wave Mew and laugh at the matchup as opposed to dedicating two slots in doing so.

If you're running a type that is hurt by having a key wall eliminated, then adapt. While i can agree that running shed shell Gastrodon is a bit centralizing, one can also argue that you just have to build teams to stand up to the current meta. When utilizing bulkier flying teams, my go to item on Skarmory is a shed shell because magnezone is a thing. Another neat alternative would be to carry Pursuit. Again, can one argue that that makes stag centralizing? Yes. However, Pursuit offers great utility that allows you to trap threats such as Victini, Gengar, BoltBeam/Eball Latios, CM Latias, etc while giving you great chip damage against powerful priority users such as Dragonite, Diggersby, and Mamoswine. In short, a dedicated slot for Gothitelle is not dead weight against other matchups(think of the Fighting users complaining that they were forced to carry a Keldeo to deal with sab) and allows you to apply equal pressure to stag reliant teams

 

[Dece1t]

Gothitelle is used to open up holes, yes, which means that you have two dedicated mons to ct one type. Not long ago, you mentioned Gothitelle + Starmie to ct Ground. Gothitelle + heat Victini to ct Steel, which is not only dropping in usage, but in viability.

Quite frankly, this whole STAG thing is being over hyped. The pinnacle of mega sab usage was seen when these discussions were at their peak of activity near the time when the suspect was announced. People will spam what they think will get them free wins(look at how all of the hoopa hype has died down). If you dedicate two whole slots to ct one type, then Gothitelle isn't really the problem. Do you want to ct Steel as a psychic user? Use Sub/Fire Punch MegaChan or NP Flamethrower + Vacuum Wave Mew and laugh at the matchup as opposed to dedicating two slots in doing so.

If you're running a type that is hurt by having a key wall eliminated, then adapt. While i can agree that running shed shell Gastrodon is a bit centralizing, one can also argue that you just have to build teams to stand up to the current meta. When utilizing bulkier flying teams, my go to item on Skarmory is a shed shell because magnezone is a thing. Another neat alternative would be to carry Pursuit. Again, can one argue that that makes stag centralizing? Yes. However, Pursuit offers great utility that allows you to trap threats such as Victini, Gengar, BoltBeam/Eball Latios, CM Latias, etc while giving you great chip damage against powerful priority users such as Dragonite, Diggersby, and Mamoswine. In short, a dedicated slot for Gothitelle is not dead weight against other matchups(think of the Fighting users complaining that they were forced to carry a Keldeo to deal with sab) and allows you to apply equal pressure to stag reliant teams

Pursuit Skarm is interesting....but first off, it won't do a lot bc it doesn't get STAB, and its attack isn't all that amazing either, and those threats you mentioned, especially if sturdy is broken, they can easily take you out, and you just wasted skarm for the match. It cant take all of the mons you mentioned head on.

Edit: STAG isn't rly being over hyped either, it did just get banned from OU, bit this is Monotype. A lot of the STAG abusers are on Psychic mostly. People are honestly just curious about it and want to see if it would or would not hurt the metagame.

 

[ed wins]

Pursuit Skarm is interesting....but first off, it won't do a lot bc it doesn't get STAB, and its attack isn't all that amazing either, and those threats you mentioned, especially if sturdy is broken, they can easily take you out, and you just wasted skarm for the match. It cant take all of the mons you mentioned head on.

Edit: STAG isn't rly being over hyped either, it did just get banned from OU, bit this is Monotype. A lot of the STAG abusers are on Psychic mostly. People are honestly just curious about it and want to see if it would or would not hurt the metagame.

I meant to say pursuit on ground, as in krook
Forgive anything that wasn't conveyed properly. It's almost five am and I'm just now going to bed

Good night

 

[Wanka]

I'd like to hear the fighting users who complained about using keldeo to check mega sab. Think about the context of what you just said, "man shit...I have to run arguably the best mon for a fighting mono to check sab." I don't think anyone would complain about that so lets not say they did.

It also seems that you interperate Goth as just an ordinary wall breaker which simply isn't the case. STAG puts goth into a whole different category as opposed to other wall breakers. I'd also be careful with your argument on that the tier can adapt to goth. Not saying you can't make the argument, but you talk about an example in using krookodile on ground. Yes I agree that krook has a nice niche on ground, but first things first, you didn't specify a set which kinda confuses everyone. You talk about pursuit trapping all of those mons so I assume you mean a scarf set? If thats the case than I'd say all of the mons except tini, gengar, and sometimes latios (if krook has some chip damage it just drops to the scarf sets coverage moves). There is no reason for a mega latias to switch out on a scarf krookodile. A bulky calm mind set can take under half from a knock off or even like a bolt beam roost set can just chew a hit and krook would proceed to just hold an ice beam. If you click pursuit then you're really fucked then. Band dragonite has no reason to switch out. If you're moxie, D nite chews a hit and ohkos you and even if you are intim scarf, you cant ohko it and take about 85% from outrage. Scarf super power cant ohko mamoswine so there's no reason to switch out there. Not sure why diggers would be locking itself into quick attack against ground but I guess it can happen? there are other things to combat the quicker mons on ground for normal so unless you're for some reason clicking quick attack on a gastrodon, then I don't see that either.

I know you said it was 5am and you may have messed up your argument a bit, but if thats the case, then I'd probably just wait until you think you can put out your more focused argument and better argument out there. It doesn't help your purpose to put sub par posts out there and I'm still trying to figure out goth so it would be nice if I could see a solid post about your side of the argument.

 

[The-Vale]

Although the tier adapts lot i can't see pursuit being a viable answer in the context you provided as wanka pointed out krook on ground doesnt help on those things, Also its worth mentioning that staristicaly psychic doesnt have any 1630 weighted poor matchups with its worst being steel just outside the <40% to become a bad matchup. On some of these worse matchups goth can be tailored to help deal with some of these problems whether its dealing with heatran to give garde a bit more health or on some of the rarer sets to spread burns or taking out skarm, while yes psychic doesnt have many good matchups there are a few that lean very close to the edge with normal dragon and electric just loitering on the edge winning jut less than 41% of the time vs psychic. Goth becomes useful for bolstering 2 of those 3, vs normal Porygon 2 can be neutered which can aid victini when it comes to cleaning up, and with electric tending to struggle when it comes to special set up sweepers a trick CM set can come in on a weakened zapdos and set up calm minds and rest off if the zapdos carries toxic and make a huge dent if not clean out the electric team. In short my views on goth right now are to see how it goes but if psychic begins to get itself much stronger with a rise in gothitelle usage then i believe STAG should be suspected

 

[Isza]

I Agree with what you said About Goth Helping with some bad match ups, such as steel. But I highly doubt it would rise in usage, too many players like to use their "Standard Six" and won't innovate.

 

[Thimo]

I'm innovative enough to make gothitelle a thing, I spam it, make a sample team. Watch as it rises in usage.

 

[locoghoul]

I wanted to ask how many of you guys actually play on cart? I know you mainly battle on PS but the reason I ask is because the WiFi subforum often hosts monotype tourneys and I think it would greatly benefit if people that actually play the meta could join on future tourneys. Thanks for your attention

 

[scpinion]

The December usage stats are up on the Monotype Website. Note that Smogon now tiers mega-evolutions separately from their base form.

Also, the metagame is really shaken up this go round. Flying has significantly dropped and Dragon is up at number 4 among other very interesting changes!

Pokemon usage stats and sprite gallery: http://monotypeps.weebly.com/sprite-gallery.html
Type Matchup Table and Imbalanced Matchups: http://monotypeps.weebly.com/matchup-tables.html
Metagame Trends/Type Analyses/Lead Information: http://monotypeps.weebly.com/type-analyses.html

As always, make sure to let me know if you need any help understanding something, or if you find any bugs!

Edit: Something is wrong with the stats for this month. For one, Mega-Aggron is showing up as a flying type, which is bad. I'm working on finding a solution.

Edit2: The stats problems come from tiering megas separately, and a small snippet of code I added a while ago b/c of an old bug in the monotype team detection on PS. For now, I'll rerun them w/ the small bug fix, which probably won't change much aside from not listing m-Aggron, TTar and Terrakion as Flying types.

Until Antar and/or I work out a fix for the mega-evo's that change typing upon mega-evolving just know that m-Gyara Flying and m-Aggron Rock teams aren't being counted correctly.

Edit3: The stats should be fixed to the best of my knowledge/ability. Any issues with this are upstream from me and Antar already knows about them.

The stats are fixed. Turns out Flying still rules the ladder...

 

[Azelea]

Since this thread is a bit dry at the moment i have decided to start a discussion.

Hoopa-U is something that was brought a lot in this thread earlier as a candidate for being suspected (By no means that's my final opinion at the moment so don't reply calling me ban hungry). At that time it was decided that it was too early to talk about Hoopa-U since it was just released and needed the meta needed time to get more stable. Well now a lot of time has passed and the meta has became more stable so now is a good time to discuss about this magnificent pokemon.

Why its so powerful?

The thing that makes Hoopa-U so powerful is its stats and movepool, which combined make it really unpredictable. There's no way predicting what set its running so there's never a safe switchin. The moveset can vary from Choice Scarf, Life Orb, Steel Breaker, Choice band, Choice Specs, Nasty Plot, etc.. You get the idea. This reminds me of Genesect which was banned for similar reasons. Hoopa-U's movepool is really wide and it can in theory cteam types such as Water, Ground, Flying etc.

Stats

Now lets look at its stats

HP:80

Attack:160

Defense:60

Sp. Atk:170

Sp. Def:130

Speed:80

The first thing that people usually notice is its monstrous Attack and Special Attack which make it a strong wallbreaker. The thing that most people don't notice though is its that nice Special Defense which again is a huge help
in crucial matches. Even though it's Speed and Defense kinda make it easier to kill its still a cannon with a nice special defense.
Few fun calcs about its bulk:

252+ Atk Choice Band Entei Extreme Speed vs. 0 HP / 0- Def Hoopa Unbound: 221-261 (73.4 - 86.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 SpA Gardevoir Moonblast vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Hoopa Unbound: 242-288 (80.3 - 95.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO


Psychic: Hoopa-U has had a huge effect on psychic. Since its release Psychic has gone up in the usage stats and why shouldn't it? Now with the addition of Hoopa-U psychic doesn't really have any outright bad match-ups. (Maybe dark if it has Mega Sharpedo/Mega Gyara and Bisharp but thats why Colbur Slowbro is invented c:) The offensive core of Hoopa-U, Victini and M-Gardevoir handle all the weaknesses well. Hoopa-U takes care of Ghost, Victini handles bug and M-Garde puts some great offensive pressure to dark. And if you dont use Hoopa-U, You will surely loose Psychic vs Psychic match-ups. I wouldn't be suprised if Psychic would overtake Flying as the most used type soon.

Dark: For Dark Hoopa-U brought huge amount of coverage. Gunk Shot makes the Dark vs Fairy match-ups a lot more easier and Psychic STAB can just almost walk through poison and makes battles against fighting a lot more easier. Also the addition of Energy Ball can ease up the Ground/Water match ups. If you aren't using this on your Dark team you're insane.


I don't have a clear opinion on Hoopa-U (Part of the reason why im bringing this discussion here). It's Typing, Movepool, Stats and Unpredictability make it a force to be reckon with and you can never have a safe switchin against it. On the other hand again, it's lack of speed and awful defense make it easier to be killed by faster pokemon and priority. Is it broken? i don't know to be honest. One thing is sure though.. its one of the best pokemon avaible to use in monotype at the moment.

 

[Subjugator]

In no way is Hoopa-Unbound a bad Pokemon. In fact, it's a top threat that shines in the Monotype metagame, a blessing to both of the types that use it. It's a bit of a chameleon, so you never really know what it can do, with a wide movepool. However, when you look past that you see a great deal of flaws. Yes, it has good Special Defense, but it's typing isn't very favorable for special attacks, with a grand total of zero resistances. It has sub par defense that makes it extremely vulnerable to physical attackers, being forced out by almost any physical attacker that outspeeds it, somewhat limiting its offensive capability. Hoopa-Unbound is in addition pretty slow, and a completely useless ability that serves no use in Competitive Pokemon. While it hits fast, is unpredictable, versatile, pretty specially bulky, Hoopa-U is pretty flawed. It's a groundbreaking Pokemon, but I have always felt that it had a fair share of weaknesses.