Hi all, hope everyone's doing all right. Here's some observations on the current state of the metagame — a lot has changed since I last did a post like this!
Weird to think that this guy used to be arguably the best Pokemon in the tier. As of this writing, it has only 5 uses in OMPL with a 0% winrate and its usage on ladder has similarly tanked. What changed for it? It's a bunch of little things: the mons that it used to wall like Zekrom and Zacian-C now commonly run sets that can take advantage of Melmetal or just beat it 1v1. Increased usage of Teleport and defensive Reshiram makes its Anchor Shot sets far less threatening offensively. Fur Coat Eternatus and Zamazenta-C do a lot of what Melmetal does better, eating into its metagame share. The increased popularity of Fur Coat Eternatus has pushed Pokemon like Barraskewda and Zeraora — which Melmetal used to abuse — out of the metagame. All together, Melmetal now doesn't actually provide much utility to teams, either defensively or offensively. It's quite a fall from grace.
Eternatus on the other hand is only getting better and more prominent as the generation wears on. Recently, its defensive sets, especially Prankster and Fur Coat, have really stood out. What makes Eternatus so good isn't just that it's really bulky and has a bunch of very useful resistances, it's also really obnoxious to get momentum against due to its speed and power. Most of the mons that are faster than it struggle to threaten it, and most of the stuff that does threaten it is slower than it and weak to Dynamax Cannon. Pokemon that can switch into Eternatus and actually force it out are hard to come by: I've been running a lot of Ice Scales Photon Geyser Darmanitan-Z, PH Snorlax and PH Mewtwo lately to fill this role. Eternatus' offensive sets haven't been doing quite so well however: the increased popularity of Pokemon like Snorlax and random Ice Scales guys like Zamazenta-C and Umbreon give sets like Sheer Force a really hard time. I think offensive Eternatus is still worth running, but I like to run stuff like Spikes or Taunt or Spore to give it a way to make headway against these Pokemon.
Reshiram has also really had a glow-up lately, and I now feel that its one of the best Pokemon in the metagame. Defensive sets like Fur Coat match up really well against the metagame while still being really hard to switch into, and it's just so versatile. I've found myself slapping a Reshiram onto all kinds of teams recently. Of course, offensive sets like Shell Smash and PH are still great as well, particularly now that a lot of teams are leaning hard on Ice Scales Zamazenta-C to handle special attackers. Specs sets aren't quite what they used to be now that not every team has a Melmetal to abuse, but they're still solid.
Snorlax capitalises on all of these trends. The PH set is a strong offensive check to most Reshiram and Eternatus sets, and the reduced usage of Melmetal leaves a lot of teams less prepared to switch into it. Strictly defensive Snorlax sets like Prankster, Ice Scales, and Teleport PH are ok, but I really love offensive PH. The specific set I've been using a lot lately runs Shift Gear, Facade, Earthquake, King's Shield. Lots of common Pranksters at the moment get heavily pressured by Facade's 32 PP, and with so many teams relying on Spectral Thief + Prankster to deal with PH setup they often will just have no way to stop Snorlax from getting 3 boosts and cleaning house. It's a nice lure for Ice Scales Zamazenta-C too: you boost on the switch, then live a Body Press and boost again, then Dynamax and kill them with +2 Max Quake. Really cool mon.
Zacian is still a pretty niche Pokemon, but it has found a real place for itself in the metagame with its Primordial Sea set. This set completely bricks Reshiram and usually counters DGZ while also being fast and strong enough (taking advantage of boosted Fishious Rends) to force switches and get kills late in the game.
I've come to the conclusion that a lot of these randy defensive Pokemon that seem good at first, because they have decent bulk and their typing matches up well against a few common offensive threats, are actually quite bad. They just mostly aren't threatening enough and don't do enough outside of the specific matchups they're intended for. Being forced to run Fur Coat/Ice Scales/an immunity ability to actually do what you want them to do defensively makes them so painfully predictable and inflexible and inevitably makes them prone to being worn down over the course of the game. The mons pictured here are just examples, I think this applies to a whole bunch of Pokemon.
A few cool sets I've been using lately:
oceanic operatta (Primarina) @ Choice Specs
Ability: Pixilate
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Boomburst
- Surf
- Volt Switch
- Trick
Surprisingly few teams right now are prepared to deal with very powerful special Fairy moves. Specs Primarina is really well-positioned at the moment, not only because it's really hard for a lot of teams to switch into, but also because it takes advantage of the increasingly common defensive Eternatus and Reshiram sets, which often can't do anything to stop Primarina from coming in and clicking the funny Boomburst button. It's also decent as a check for Kyurem-White and more offensive Reshiram sets. It definitely benefits a lot from the element of surprise — people keep doing things against it like leaving Golisopod in to U-turn or fishing for Lava Plume burns, and they just absolutely cop it from Boomburst. I've found Surf to actually be pretty situational, there's definitely an argument for replacing that move, maybe with something that does more to Melmetal. Here's a replay of Specs Primarina putting in work against dimrah in the BH Seasonal:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8balancedhackmons-1112053339
Kommo-o @ Leftovers
Ability: Fur Coat
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Def / 252 SpD / 252 Spe
Impish Nature
- Body Press
- Recover
- Filler
- Filler
The advantage of Kommo-o over other Fur Coat Dragons (Zekrom, Reshiram, Eternatus) is that it isn't weak to ground, resists rock and dark so it's harder to wear down and consistently checks Obstagoon, and has a strong STAB Body Press. Super niche Pokemon, but if you've built a team that needs a Zeraora improof, but you've already got 4 guys weak to ground and you struggle to threaten Umbreon, Kommo-o might be your guy.
Zekrom @ Life Orb
Ability: Adaptability
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD / 252 Spe
Naughty Nature
- Bolt Beak
- Dynamax Cannon
- Shell Smash
- Spore / Fusion Flare
I legitimately think this is the most broken Shell Smasher in the tier. Really easy to find opportunities to set up because it forces so much stuff out, super threatening even unboosted, lures in a lot of common Zekrom checks, hard to stop with Dynamax, really good at Dynamaxing itself, etc. So many teams just get cleanly 6-0'd by this once it boosts, it's pretty gross.
Something I've been thinking about lately: I've seen a lot of people make the point that tiering BH this gen is somewhat futile, that the reduced pool of Pokemon (particularly defensive Pokemon) makes it so that the tier is just always going to be unbalanced. To an extent I agree with this. In previous generations, BH has retained a semblance of balance by its incredible ability to self-regulate. Being able to run anything on everything means that we don't have to find counterplay to broken threats, we get to
make counterplay. This means that the metagame can easily adapt to otherwise overbearing threats. In this generation, the pool of available Pokemon is so shrunken that this is no longer really the case. Stuff like DGZ, Bolt Beak, and even maybe Zac-C, Octolock, and Shell Smash would be so much easier to manage and work around if introduced into a metagame with a wider range of viable Pokemon. I'm really trying to innovate, and you certainly can innovate on the level of a single set, but I think at a higher level the range of viable team structures this generation is just really limited. Compared to last gen, where even at the end it felt like there was so much still to explore, this is pretty disappointing. Really looking forward to the DLC.