Metagame np: PU Stage 2 - Let's Go Crazy (Crown Tundra is out)

[Ktütverde]

Hello PU!! Since PU is the tier I care the most for, I decided it was time for me to share my thoughts on current PU. I also want to write it because I feel like the vast majority of the posts here are posts to: request a ban on something, voice concerns about something, support the two previous kind of posts. I think I can safely describe myself as an anti-ban person in swshPU (although I'm very strongly proban in swshOU, and was mostly on the fence with a ban tendency in SMPU so dont judge my takes as too biased, my mind isnt set in stone at all).

I'll first talk about brokenness today. It's going to be a bit long, read what you want, only the TLDR, whatever. If you read one word I'll be happy.



1) About the concept of "broken"/"broke"

The problem with the adjective "broke" is, it is applied way too often (or "too much for the tier", "problematic"). Here are the different cases where "broke" (or these adjectives) is often applied:

a) The true broken. You just need to try it out for 5 games before having a definitive opinion on it. It is literally busted, OP, dumb as f***, you cant do anything vs it but using it too. Players dont give a damn about its role in the tier, they just use it because it's too good, period.

b) Broken on paper. Described as problematic when it has near 0 results in tournaments, or no convincing results yet. Except for theorymonning or judging it on an early impression, you can't justify banning it.

c) Good mons. Described as broken mostly because they are super hyped and aren't prepped for despite being threats to always consider, which ends up in painful losses. Usually this good mons were underrated shortly ago, and not taken too seriously.

d) Excellent mons. Described as broken because they require a certain amount of preparation, and it ends up being simplified as over-centralizing. Sometimes they are very (near too much) strong at one point in the meta, and despite getting worse due to meta adaptation, this past impression remains in the mind.


2) What is broken in the current metagame (according to me/ktut/the guy with long af posts)?

Let me share my opinion on the meta by applying what I just defined:


a) True broken. Lurantis (Superpower+Leafstorm+Synthesis+Aromatherapy/Knock Off). Probably Liepard (Choice Band set)

Lurantis. Except for roselia, it's impossible to switch into. You can't revenge kill it except by getting your Unfezant, Mr rime, Heatmor, Flareon or Drifblim seriously weakened. It can also abuse staples like Stunfisk and Sandslash and just snowball from there. I have no clue out to check this thing except pack Icebeam/Fireblast/Bird moves everywhere or pretend that it's not an issue by using roselia. You never know if it's PhysDef or SpDef, so you can't really hard Unfezant since +1 PhysDef Lurantis sure as hell doesnt care too much about Brave Bird. Once I tried Specs Apple to check it and it turned out to be AV with leechlife. Maybe not the best set though.
252 Atk Unfezant Brave Bird vs. +1 248 HP / 252+ Def Lurantis: 186-222 (54.2 - 64.7%)

Liepard is too fast (faster than Rapidash/Manectric=too fast), has an absurdly powerful, spammable stab Knock off, and ability Limber to ignore Stunfisk's Static. It can revengekill anything after some chip damage, U-Turn if it needs the chip damage, and has Playrough for Throh. Switchins just dont exist, only scarfers outspeed... It's dumb.


b) Broken on paper. Lilligant (QuiverDance+GigaDrain+SleepPower+Pollen Puff) and Bouffalant (SD+BodySlam+Earthquake/Throat Chop+Substitute).

-Lilligant: 0 results in tours, barely used on the ladder. Not used much at all. Sweeps at times.
-Bouffalant. I called it "broken af" when it was released. But in practice it was disappointing. So slow, hurt by the helmets, and with 4MSS (needs sub or EQ for stunfisk, needs sub for gourgeists, needs sub AND throat chop for drifblim. Needs EQ for Klinklang). It's super hard to kill though, but the 4MSS problem is quite an issue. I could be wrong ofc, but right now it doesnt impress me too much, especially because of throh's surge in popularity (Physically Defensive). If you dont run sub, Gourgeists just burn you, too.


c) Good mons. RapidashG (Swords Dance/Calm Mind+PlayRough/Psychic+High Horsepower/Mystical Fire+Morning Sun) and Throh (Rest+Sleeptalk+Circle Throw+Knock Off).

-Rapidash is annoying vs teams without scarfers/Liepard/Boltund that also have something that lets it setup like Appletun or Throh. It is pressured by most threats and the ever-so-common Stunfisk/Sandslash/Klinklang. CM Sets bypass the Sandslash issue but struggle vs Klinklang and have 0 firepower without CM and LifeOrb. Any random scarfer beats it easily. You mostly justify using it because it is fast AND checks throh. Competes with Liepard, Manectric and Boltund otherwise.
-Offensive throh can't setup on much and loses to the ubiquitous Gourgeists and Rapidash, as well as unfezant. Physical Def Resttalk is a very useful
to check Liepard, Klinklang and Bouffalant.
Are they problematic?
If you ask me, not at all. Not only because I never particularly prep or struggle vs them, but on top of that you never see them wrecking a team. They probably seem "too strong" because on paper nothing beats them, but in practice, the usual offensive pressure is enough to handle them.

d) Excellent mons. Klinklang (Gear Grind+Shift Gear+Toxic+Protect).

Broken? Well let's look at it.
-What kind of pokemon is it: mostly defensive with a setup move.
-So, does it often sweep? Almost never, except vs teams lacking: both Stunfisk/Throh, steel resists, and that let Klinklang in too easily (which is absurd, because in that case you add a hard check to it like fisk): so nowadays, no real team.
-Is it difficult to wear down? Not that much, it relies on leftovers+protect recovery and is hurt by the rockyhelmets badly. Most toptiers can dent it without a problem (Rapidash, Golduck, Rime/Mime etc all pressure it a lot for instance).
-Is it hard to pivot on it? Well, yes that's the problem, since Toxic absorbers are scarce. However Rest Stunfisk is probably the best mon in the tier and literally invalidates Klinklang. Throh is also a counter and prevents Klink from making any progress.
-But then (the forgotten question), is it able to switchin easily in the current meta? Not really. Only unfezant, defensive Mr Rime, and Choice Locked mr Rime give it opportunities to switchin. It loses to Stunfisk, Sandslash, Throh, Rapidash, Golduck, Drednaw, Lurantis, Bouffalant, Heatmor, Focusblast Mime Galar, Manectric. It gets bodypressed by the apple, burned/tricked by the gourgs, Knocked by mawile. Knocked hard by Liepard.
-Is it splashable? Yes as one of the few Bird and Ice resists in the tier.

Thus, I think that overall, Klinklang does more good than bad. Next time you think about Klinklang pros and cons, keep in mind all the mons that dont let it switchin vs those who do: not in Klink's favor. I know ToxicTect+Shiftgear can be problematic late game, but it is, imo, sufficiently pressured (or literally countered in many teams by Stunfisk and Throh). Don't get me wrong, ToxicTect Klink is very hard to deal with: it's just a matter of having a counter (fisk throh) or pressuring it enough.

I understand the pro-Klink-ban stance, because I shared it in the past, and may share it again soon, who knows. But right now, there's too much against Klink; especially, that the ratio what-klink-checks/what-it-doesnt is not in its favor at all. And I think that its ability to check Unfezant/Rime/Gmime/CM rapidash is really useful (you're gonna tell me "use stunfisk everywhere for unfezant": eh). Mawile even spdef is too frail to really take on offensive Rime and Rapidash.

edit: in case you believe using Rest on Stunfisk proves that Klink is unhealthy, Resttalk throh and now Liepard give you a true reason to use Rest. Overall Rest is great on a mon that doesnt need a 4th move with Helmet and Static: asleep but not passive.


3) Talking about the past a bit to further explain my stance

I am pretty sure many of you won't agree with my detailed opinion above. I just tried to be as unbiased as possible, and based what I said on watching PU games and playing PU seriously every week. In case it nuances my view, here are my past opinions (like 3 weeks ago or more):

-in the past I thought Klinklang was too annoying but nowadays, I find it annoying not in the same sense, but because it doesnt really check what it is supposed to check and I cant send it on anything without being punished (focusblast MimeG and rime, Lurantis/Bouff/Liepard dent it hard, Gourgs run wisp more often etc)
-throh is something I sincerely have no clue about why it was used (except for checking Klinklang) until Liepard and Bouff were freed. Now it is good, but nothing crazy if you ask me. Very useful to check Liepard/Bouff/Klink right now though.
-rapidash, i barely used it, but now with all the throhs around, I like it more. Hard to switchin though, but if you manage to SD and not get staticed, good output. CM is good too but weak and sort of walled by Liepard...



TL;DR: My opinion on the metagame.

In my opinion, the current metagame is in a very good and enjoyable place except for Lurantis (hate that thing). I havent enjoyed PU like that for months and I'm glad it is as it is. As far as I'm concerned, I really like how Throh and Klinklang balance the metagame by role compressing the defensive utility of taking on Klink/Liepard/Bouff and Unfezant/Mr Rime/Gmime/Drifblim which are hard to check otherwise. I used to find Klinklang cancerous but the current meta isnt kind to it and it is not very splashable anymore, especially with Lurantis and Bouff which give it a hard time. Also I don't like how dumb Liepard is, which absolutely requires using Rest Throh or Rest Stunfisk.



Final Words

I think that's all I had to say. I hope my post was enjoyable, disgusting, boring and interesting: as long as you read some of it, I'm happy. I like to share my thoughts on the tier even though it's long and weird sometimes. Feel free to reply, keep the discussion up and... bye!!


-ktut

edit: oh my god, I put Klinklang in the good mons and rapidash/throh in excellent, which isnt what I meant, as you can see if you read their respective parts. Sorry I got confused and didnt notice it even after re-reading it. My bad, I just exchanged them back to their right place.

 

[Leni]

Bonjour,

Wanted to give my few cents about the meta and upcoming voting slate for Sunday. Been a while I last time posted too. Ktut already pointed it out, but I agree with him about Liepard to certain point. Spoke about it earlier yesterday with Tap while had discussion about meta.

Liepard is getting in my opinion over the line and seems to be quite hard to tackle. What makes it hard to play around is the fact it cant be revenge killed with priority moves thanks to its copycat+prankster combination. Hazard chip can be dodged with boots or minimized with lefties and you play funny guessing games if its physical or special liepard on preview. Not to mention banded set rips the soul out of most mons with its base 88 attack while it gets to land 2 moves always while its faster, unless you sack something.

Knock off in general is superior move and strong stab paired to its u-turn + speed tier is overwhelming. Physical Liepard has its coverage for fighting types and special Liepard uses them as set up fodders.

But how does special Liepard abuse fighting types? Welp, with attract. Fighting checks aka throh+chan are always male and if they see Liepard coming on the field, they are rushing to counter them most of the time, meanwhile you are comfortably sitting behind the sub. Setting liepard to be female locks them always, because Throh+Hitmonchan are always 100% male. This can be argued as "hey, lets set every mon to be female, so it cant trap us" - well, must be funny to be caught by male liepard trapping all 6 of ur mons then and play this type of coin flip games.

This was used in my last weeks snake team regardless it never entered the field. As far as i know Soulgazer used it too vs. Tjay. Never needed to actually reveal it. So heres few replay to show how stupid this attract-np-sub-darkpulse set actually can be in practice.


https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8pu-1186759987-3krwiutt32o09mta2wn67vxuqzy4getpw
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8pu-1185346625-1rq6cfuvtxh6l7ydetr1iy6ibkbehowpw
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8pu-1184539733-2hkly3iray2junahlxn8aisang7j8ycpw
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8pu-1182808788-rpfbpjb2r8p5mvuh2mbkkoa1l5nc7ywpw
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8pu-1182669698-8fel6gms42kmkgflwhlj7d0gcsh8cq9pw

So, heres my few cents about Liepard and would love to hear your opinions about it as well :>

 

[Monky25]

Wassup PU, I've been looking at this tier for a while now so I'd like to give my thoughts about the upcoming votes. From what I've heard for much more experienced players in this thread, there seems to be a divide between klinklang's presence in the tier, making it arguably the perfect suspect mon. Klinklang looks to be keeping multiple pokemon in check, and if it goes multiple others are likely to go. I'm not advocating for a broken checks broken scenario, but since a major tier shift is coming down to PU in about 2 weeks, I'd hold off banning anything since nothing really seems to major at the moment except klinklang, and even then there are good arguments on both sides. I'd wait to see which mons NU gives us before banning anything for now, and if any of the problematic stuff is still problematic then they should definitely be looked at.

 

[gum]

hey, i've been wanting to make a post about the meta for a while but was too lazy and i ended up getting peer pressured by users i will not name so hf

before i dwell on some of the pokémon considered broken / unhealthy or that were mentioned in this thread, i want to say that a vast portion of the community has been unhappy with council's recent decisions; since suspect testing anything is gonna be hard for a while, we expect council to at least take our (the community) opinion into account when voting on certain pokémon. the lack thereof has led to a lot of people complaining and also, for a lot of people, an unhealthy metagame.

--


i won't waste much time explaining why this pokémon is unhealthy due to multiple people already doing that. yeah, klinklang, as a pokémon, isn't broken. however, i think that what the no ban side of the argument often tend to overlook is the impact it has on building; it pretty much forces one of stunfisk or throh on every build. sure, there's other walls that can switch into klinklang, like sandslash or lurantis, but these are very easy to overwhelm with toxic -- toxic also being the reason stunfisk has to run rest over otherwise superior options like toxic, thunder wave, and foul play, leaving it considerably easier to take advantage of. other than these, you have to rely on offensive checks that are even easier to overwhelm with toxic (golduck, heatmor) and / or lose to offensive sets (alolan dugtrio), pokémon that struggle in the current meta (dubwool, mareanie), or are usually only used on certain playstyles (pyukumuku)


i know that a lot of people think that bouffalant is only broken on paper, but i think that's just people overprepping, which isn't a good sign of a pokémon being healthy. very similarly to klinklang, it forces similar team structures and doesn't have a lot of reliable defensive answers that don't lose to (a) certain set(s). what i mean by this is that pokémon that can take on swords dance sets (supergourg being the main one) happen to struggle against choice band and subtox sets, and vice-versa. i don't think this would be much of an issue if those sets weren't already so good by themselves, and guessing wrong usually leads to a huge momentum loss and can usually end up costing you a couple of pokémon. going back to the impact it has on teambuilding, it invalidates a lot of pokémon just by existing. lilligant is a prime example, with gourgeist forms and roselia also being worse / having to run explosion or foul play in gourg's case.


liepard's obviously an incredible pokemon, but i wouldn't call it broken or unhealthy. physical sets struggle against most physical walls, like stunfisk, sandslash, throh (although play rough hurts), and tangela, and are often very prediction reliant. on the other hand, special sets have very lacklustre coverage and liepard's very average special attack leaves it unable to get past most of the tier's specially defensive walls, like throh or hitmonchan. i'm bringing up these two because, while yes, liepard can get past them via attract luck and random flinches, i don't know why the ability to get past your switchins with luck is now considered uncompetitive when lilligant does the same thing yet isn't banned. outside of these two (throh and chan), there's other spdef walls like type: null, lickilicky, and mawile that can deal with liepard just fine; the reason they aren't seen as much as the fighter walls is klink's prominence, which just adds on to klinklang's impact on teambuilding. liepard can't always fit attract, either, with substitute, burning jealousy, and copycat all being very solid options. if it's running copycat, liepard usually ends up losing to throh / chan, while, if it's running attract, it ends up being vulnerable to faster threats, like alolan dugtrio. there's even some faster pokémon that can beat copycat + attract sets, like galarian linoone, choice scarf morpeko, and choice scarf liepard. i just think that this is one of those sets that the tier will eventually adapt to - we have enough answers, both defensive and offensive.

--

a lot of pokémon that some consider broken / unhealthy only are because klinklang, throh, and bouffalant all restrict building a ton, which usually leaves considerably less room to prep for other threats.

lastly, i don't think that us getting a really big tier shift in a couple of weeks should be used to justify not banning unhealthy mons, when it's actually something that should incentive banning stuff; the tier is gonna look completely different in a couple of weeks, and some council members already said that council is gonna take a look at the publ mons after the tier shifts. there's no harm in banning a, or multiple pokemon, just to unban it / them a couple of weeks later.

ty for reading!!

 

[MZ]

Klinklang and Bouffalant have been banned.

 

[TheShowdownHoedown]

Well, I should save seen this coming. Although and may have been slightly on the unhealthy side, they kept the grasses in line from becoming monsters. With them gone, the likes of , , , , and maybe even could have the seeds of brokenness germinate within the PU tier unless we find the appropriate checks.

 

[Pabloaram]

Well, I should save seen this coming. Although and may have been slightly on the unhealthy side, they kept the grasses in line from becoming monsters. With them gone, the likes of , , , , and maybe even could have the seeds of brokenness germinate within the PU tier unless we find the appropriate checks.

This mon look insane... like most Grasstype doesnt like steel type but he has option like spikes to weaken this in the long run

 

[PlusC]

Wild suggestion which honestly isn't awful;

Sliggoo @ Eviolite
Ability: Sap Sipper
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SpA / 4 SpD
Modest Nature
- Draco Meteor
- Thunderbolt
- Ice Beam/ Fire Blast
- Sludge Bomb

Obvs immune to Grass and quite strong/bulky.

Calcs

Vs Roselia
252 SpA Roselia Sludge Bomb vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Eviolite Sliggoo: 75-88 (22 - 25.8%) -- 2.8% chance to 4HKO
252+ SpA Sliggoo Ice Beam vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Eviolite Roselia: 128-152 (53.1 - 63%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

Vs Appletun
252+ SpA Choice Specs Appletun Dragon Pulse vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Eviolite Sliggoo: 230-272 (67.6 - 80%) -- guaranteed 2HKO (Meteor is a OHKO though)
252+ SpA Sliggoo Draco Meteor vs. 20 HP / 0 SpD Appletun: 416-492 (113.6 - 134.4%) -- guaranteed OHKO (Outspeed by 1 lol)

Vs Lurantis
252+ Atk Lurantis Superpower vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Eviolite Sliggoo: 137-162 (40.2 - 47.6%) -- guaranteed 3HKO (Knock Off sucks though)
252+ SpA Sliggoo Ice Beam vs. 248 HP / 8 SpD Lurantis: 172-204 (50.1 - 59.4%) -- 78.5% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

Vs Leafeon
+2 252 Atk Life Orb Leafeon Knock Off (97.5 BP) vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Eviolite Sliggoo: 272-320 (80 - 94.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252+ SpA Sliggoo Fire Blast vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Leafeon: 276-326 (101.8 - 120.2%) -- guaranteed OHKO (DM has a chance to OHKO as well)

 

[MZ]

Hey guys let's try to avoid a bunch of single line back and forth posts just meant for each other please.

 

[PurpleEchoes]

Sliggoo does not get fire blast, so its not getting a guaranteed OHKO from full but it does still ohko with draco after rocks. Spdef Apple can only ever 3hko while Sliggoo 2hkos it with Draco.

As for a leafeon answer, its not an answer at all. +2 knock has a 43% chance to OHKO after rocks, but it can take on all the grass type special attackers, except for defensive Roselia where it needs to sacrifice coverage to run Rest + Infestation to beat it 1v1. Doing this means you need to give up T bolt and Sludge Bomb which means you end up losing to CM Gorse and cant punish water types as hard. On the other hand you likely lose to CM Gorse anyways thanks to morning sun, and waters cant do much to you, not to mention the longevity Rest allows and the removal of spdef roselia giving your grass types a chance to setup and sweep. Theres also an added issue of Spdef Lurantis beating non toxic varients every time thanks to synthesis Superpower.

Overall Sliggoo loses to Spdef Lurantis 1v1, full physical Lurantis 2hkos it with super power, and it cant beat Leafeon, but it can trap Roselia and Tangela, counter Apple and Lilligant, and I think outside of the grasses it beats every special attacker (that's not an ice type). Its not a be all end all answer to the grass types of the tier, but trapping Tangela and Roselia, and beating Lilli and Apple can take off a lot of pressure in teambuilding. You can also play with physdef sets but I think those would be largely inferior to Spdef or offensive.

 

[2xTheTap]

Hi all, I'm back from some long hours at work and being trapped and tortured in tlenit's basement deep building sessions with tlenit in the Taipans' disc to bring you the Council Minutes for this week! Please enjoy.

Council Minutes​

Meta Discussion:

• There was a lot of good discussion this week on Liepard in Council chat and on the forums, with both pro-ban and dnb sentiments being shared. One of the biggest problems with building this gen has been how over-saturated the meta is with offensive threats and that many of these Pokemon show strong variability in moveset, which compounds this issue to the point that building for these aforementioned threats while covering the rest of the meta just isn't feasible sometimes and you're consequently forced to concede weakness to one of these threats.
  For me and other players like TJ, Ktütverde, and tlenit, Liepard very much fits this bill. As I said in my pro-ban vote, it's got a myriad of sets you have to keep in the back of your mind when prepping for it, ex. SubCopycat NP, SubAttract NP, HDB Encore, Black Glasses Copycat, CB, etc., with counterplay for physically and specially offensive sets varying significantly. Ktütverde also noted how potent Liepard is (read his post here), with its amazing Speed stat, spammable Knock Off, ability to freely pivot out of unfavorable match-ups (or just for chip), and its lack of real switch-ins before its set has been scouted. For the checks that it does have, Fairies often struggle with CB Gunk Shot (and Burning Jealousy in Mawile's case); Scarfers are mostly effective against it but are still in danger of being dispatched by Copycat sets; and, Fighting-types like Throh and Hitmonchan really don't like eating CB Play Rough and may be hard pressed to switch in reliably.
  tlenit also made a great post on a relatively new set, Attract Liepard, which can be found here. It's an oddly effective set in practice, and if nothing else, its success highlights how few checks we actually have for this (mainly Throh and Hitmonchan, which are always male and are therefore vulnerable to Attract from Female Liepard). The last thing that I can say for this set is to test it for yourself if you haven't yet; you might find the same success I did playing with it: me vs TJ testing for Snake with Attract Liepard.
• Not all council members agreed that Liepard was bannable, however, as they felt its offensive potential was balanced by its frailty, it is weak before a boost (on NP sets), and that good teams should naturally contain 1-2 checks for each variant of Liepard without really going out of your way to account for it. Interesting sidenote, but MZ noted that many of the players who were in favor of not banning Klinklang or Bouffalant felt like Liepard was worthy of a ban, and in reverse, those who were pro-ban on Klinklang and Bouffalant did not want to ban Liepard. The diagnosis that this meta isn't the easiest to build for seems to be a commonality among council members, but we've simply been split recently on which Pokemon we tend to blame for this being the case.
• Players who wanted to ban Klinklang who have been posting here, bringing it up in their Snake disc, PMing tier leadership, and talking about it in side servers were very vocal about wanting Klinklang out of the meta these past couple of weeks. With it not being banned in previous weeks, some community members became unhappy with recent council decisions, especially those from the DNB side as the DNB side was quieter by contrast. We talked about this in council chat a fair bit and I noted that a large sample size of players entering the room did not share this point of view, and so I thought it best to repost the results from one of our room polls as a discussion point:
  
  
  
  
• I'm going to echo Akir's stance from last week - the domino has been knocked, and now that Klinklang is gone (and Bouffalant in Lilligant's case), there's concern among council that these Pokemon will have to banned as a result of their defensive counterplay being absent from the meta. While Lilligant in particular may be broken without these balancing factors, there are still Lilligant checks with high usage like Unfezant and Mr. Mime-G and others like Roselia and Raboot that could afford more, but we'll be watching to see how the meta develops around Lilligant.
  
  Cute meme of tlenit / soulgazer discussing potential Lilligant checks

  
• I've found this Pokemon to be very potent; its Speed and access to Focus Blast enable it to be more effective than its fellow Ice-types, Mr. Rime and Glaceon. With Klinklang being everyone's go-to Ice-check before it was banned, slower teams were pretty much steamrolled by Mr. Mime-G, assuming Focus Blast hit (see Snake W1: keppy vs tlenit and imagine if that Focus Blast had hit). For me, Mr. Mime-G's Speed is what often compels me to use Liepard over Morpeko on teams that can afford it, as unboosted Morpeko is slower (CS Morpeko is therefore another option for checking Mr. Mime-G). I advocated to put Mr. Mime-G on our most recent voting slate, as it simply rips through these very standard Ground / Grass / Steel cores that many players have been relying on since PUPL, but we ended up saving it for next time. For now, I feel defensive counterplay to this is very limited. Here's a good replay of Specs Mr. Mime-G in action (again, testing with TJ for Snake).
• There wasn't much traction among council to ban Lurantis or Throh. Throh checks that were much more difficult to use in a meta with Klinklang like Musharna and Shiinotic (against non-Poison Jab sets) should be easier to build with now. Regarding Lurantis, I spoke about how there is some overlap between Lurantis' and Throh's checks, ex. Skill Swap Gourgeist can be used to beat each, with Lurantis' Contrary-induced boosts now becoming drops and Guts Flame Orb Throh being neutered / RestTalk Throh being unable to Rest after Guts is replaced with Gourgeist's Insomnia. There are other Pokemon with high usage that are great for checking each, ex. Unfezant and Drifblim. Council will continue to keep an eye on both Lurantis and Throh going forward.

VR and Other Votes:

• Specs has been promoted to forum mod. Go congratulate him on his wall!
• Big welcome to soulgazer, who joined the PU council just in time to participate in the most recent council vote.
• The council voted on 6 Pokemon: Klinklang, Bouffalant, Throh, Lilligant, Liepard, and Lurantis. Bouffalant and Klinklang were banned! See the reasoning for each vote here.
• After some discussion among forum mods and polling Discord, we decided to change the way council voting slates are displayed. Rather than posting a link to a sheet like we've been doing, we'll instead be moving to a format that looks more like this for the next vote. Reading and responding to council votes should become more convenient this way.

Forum Happenings:

• Grand Slam IX Playoffs: Semifinals are happening. Check out the thread for some high level PU replays.
• Smogon Snake Draft IV: Week 3 has concluded with some interesting analysis from avarice - check out that post here. Additionally, week 4 match-ups have been announced.
• ADV PU Tournament: We're into round 4; see the top 8 duke it out here.
• Official Room Tournaments are in full swing; see the schedule for when these are being held here.
• uhuhuhu7 is now updating our role compendium. Check out this page and other resources for help with teambuilding.
• Next Best Thing has a new subject - go post new Lickilicky sets you think are effective in the current meta!

For potential discussion points, we'd like to hear what you think about this new meta without Klinklang and Bouffalant. With a meta staple like Klinklang leaving, we are bound to see Pokemon that enjoy its absence like Lilligant, Mr. Rime, Rapidash-Galar, and many others increase in potency and in usage, or maybe even become banworthy in certain cases. Feel free too to document these meta trends in our VR thread and post about which Pokemon have become more (or less) viable in this new meta.

Previous week's Council Minutes

 

[Hera]

Hello there! I've noticed a few trends shortly after the banning of both Klingklang and Bouffalant, both on ladder and in room tours. I wanted to talk about the trends I saw and how a few of them might be problematic if they stay in the tier.


Flowers In Bloom


Unsurprisingly, after the ban of both a resistance and an immunity that, combined, ended up on almost every team, offensive Grass types have seen a bloom in usage, as teams are struggling to either replace one of the two on their teams or build a new one entirely. Lilligant seems to be #1 in everyone's minds as the most problematic of these Grass types, abusing RNG to cripple and eventually break through its checks, and I'm inclined to agree that this is quite stupid. However, these bans have given it more flexibility in its offensive prowess, as Specs sets have been rediscovered to tear through even resists at a stunning rate. What's even better is the fact that it can run Modest as there are only a couple of mons that outspeed and threaten Modest Specs (Lycanroc-M and Pinsir), which turns your 16% chance to 2HKO Mawlie after Rocks into a 94% chance. Typical Grass-type checks such as Appletun and Unfezant are either 2HKOed by a coverage move or simply can't switch in, and only Roselia can reliably switch into all variants of Lilligant and not be threatened. I fear it is too much for the tier and should at least be looked at. Lurantis is not as problematic as Lilligant is, but is still a very good mon thanks to its bulk, Contrary, and ability to abuse the tier's most common defensive mons as setup fodder. Superpower and Leaf Storm provide near-perfect coverage between each other, and either Synthesis or Aromatherapy improves its longevity, which leaves it with a free moveslot for either a coverage move for those it can't hit normally or some role compression (I've been using Knock Off). However, I think it's better for the tier because of its ability to easily be pressured by most offensive mons with a SE special STAB, especially in a tier where Ice-types dominate. Appletun is worth a mention, as it's great bulk and Thick Fat combined with Apple Acid already made it a fearsome breaker or tank, however, it is now less constrained and can now look deeper into its movepool since Body Press isn't as mandatory. Already, I've seen physical attackers or mostly special with Sucker Punch to revenge kill. And as the Grass-types rise, the most popular check to these has been Roselia, which tanks even a +6 Lurantis Leaf Storm like nothing while either setting hazards or Sludge Bombing the opposition. I can see Roselia as a solid defensive threat and a mildly potent offensive one, being immune to Toxic while not caring about Burn or Paralysis while having access to powerful STABs and a wide utility movepool.

Ice Ice, Baby


With the rise of Grass-types combined with the ban of Klingklang, Ice-types have seen a resurgence similar to the rise of Grass-types, except the purpose of Ice-types rising is to check the aforementioned Grass-types combined with taking advantage of the Klingklang ban. Galarian Mr. Mime has risen in popularity after being previously overshadowed by its evolution, Mr. Rime. While it has a lower Special Attack and worse bulk, it makes up for it by having a great Speed tier, as Base 100 lets it outspeed the Grass-types it looks to check. Access to Focus Blast creates unresisted coverage and lets it use its 4th moveslot freely, whether it be Shadow Ball to hit Ghost-types, Rapid Spin to provide utility in a pinch, or Trick to cripple defensive switchins. Mr. Rime functions similarly, except running either a HDB set to provide utility and check certain special threats while making use of its firepower to deal with bulkier teams or a Scarf set to handle its middling speed tier and deal with offensive teams. While neither of them are big problems at the moment, both are devastating wallbreakers that can dismantle common cores with the right prediction and fill a myriad of roles for a team. Glaceon is currently overshadowed by its miming counterparts, however, we can't forget how strong Glaceon is, packing the strongest Special Attack stat in the tier and a potent STAB. With access to Wish, Heal Bell, and decent bulk, it can run a cleric set if it's unique qualities are needed over Flareon. Finally, we have Silvally-Ice. While Silvallys haven't been as popular recently, for the first time in a while, teams are asking themselves whether the Silvally on team preview is Rock or Ice (even though their checks tend to overlap). And since it's an Ice-type with solid bulk, it's invaluable to teams needing a physical Grass check. I'm much less worried about the Ice-types than I am the Grass-types since they're much more straightforward, however, they're still worth keeping an eye on as the meta may evolve to centralize around them.

Nya~


Liepard is a mon that the PU community as a whole seems very on the fence about. Pro-banners have cited its great offensive power as the reason it should be banned. Both physical and special sets can be run, each with spammable STABs, solid coverage options, and a blistering Speed tier that leaves revenge killing it to Scarfs and a few naturally faster mons such as Alolan Dugtrio. It also has the option of U-Turn to chip its checks and pivot out, Copycat + Prankster to outspeed standard revenge killers, Limber to ignore Stunfisk's Static, and apparently some weird Attract tech to get past Throh and Hitmonchan. Anti-banners have said that it's extreme fragility and ease to build for keeps it in check. While the checks to each set vary, it's not hard to slap mons like Throh on a team to deal with standard sets. Without Copycat, it's very susceptible to Scarfers, without Attract, it struggles against Throh and Hitmonchan, and without a boost, it heavily lacks in terms of damage output. Personally, I think CB is the best set and is pretty stupid, but I'm not sure if it's legitimately broken or just standard levels of dumb. Either way, Liepard seems to warrant a further look at it considered how split people are over it.

Miscellaneous Meta Musings (MMM)


-Something that surprises me is how consistent Mawile has been in Gen 8 PU. While it's not an S tier mon or anything, every time I use or see it, it's made a meaningful impact in a match. Either it set up Rocks, got some important chip on a sweeper, statused an opposing defensive mon, crippled something with Knock Off, or set up and swept itself. Usually, a mon that's lasted so long in the meta would either be pushed down by power creep or deemed outclassed. But no matter what changes have happened in the tier, Mawile has always stayed a good mon. It's almost crazy how much it has endured, yet it still has a viable niche within the tier. I wonder why?

-Behind Lilligant, I think Throh is the most pressing issue in the tier right now. Anyone who's had solid experience with the tier knows why; it's very overcentralizing. Either a team has Throh and a Throh check, or 2 Throh checks. And while, yes, Throh does have a good amount of viable checks, it beats all of them in the long run with its sheer bulk, power, and versatility. RestTalk sets have always been great, AV sets are solid defensive glue, Sub BU is the ultimate stallbreaker, CB sets, while uncommon, have an extremely limited amount of switchins, and to top it all off, it has a plethora of coverage moves at its disposal that lets it basically choose its checks. The metagame has started to become warped around it in a weird sense, and I don't believe that's particularly healthy moving into the future. However, with drops only a bit more than a week away, maybe that will change.

-Sticky Webs has surfaced as a unique form of speed control. This is very interesting as much of the tier sits at around the base 70-90 benchmark, and many wallbreakers hover around 40-60. This means Pokemon such as Lurantis, Heatmor, Glaceon, and Grapploct, once hindered by subpar speed tiers, can now deal with offensive mons much easier, as many are frail and fall to even neutral hits. However, HDB has always been present on mons like Raboot that have a weakness to Rocks, pivots such as Unfezant who don't care about Webs anyway, or spinners like Mr. Rime. Defog is also prevalent on many teams, and with the only viable Defog deterrents being Falinks, Lurantis, and Paniward (Competitive Boltund exists if you're crazy, and 2 out of 3 of those are weak to Flying), Sticky Webs might be hard to keep up for long periods.

-Golduck is very interesting. I feel like it's been overshadowed by the recent bans of the gears and the bison, however, this does very little to impact Golduck's viability. Klingklang was taken down by Specs Hydro Pump, and Bouffalant fears a Scald burn. I feel like Golduck could be further explored, as it has a very deep movepool with options such as Yawn, Hone Claws + a solid physical movepool, Seismic Toss, and Clear Smog. I can see physically offensive, defensive, or stallbreaker sets being viable because of its movepool and well-balanced stats. Basically, don't slap Specs on Golduck and call it a day.

-While Mareanie isn't as omnipresent as it's evolution is in its tier, it still ends up being extremely annoying for teams not packing the mimes or a SE STAB user. Toxic Spikes is an extremely underrated hazard as it and Roselia are the only two viable Poisons in the tier, an unmissable Toxic lets it cripple switchins, and combined with the threat of a Scald burn or a Knock Off, it becomes very hard to switch into. Combining it with Stunfisk creates a solid defensive core where only Ice-types can break through it. What doesn't help are the rumors that Ferroseed might drop, which covers Mareanie's weakness and also has Knock Off, Toxic, and Stealth Rock to further capitalize on Mareanie switchins.


tl;dr (you really should read though)

-Lilligant and Throh are dumb, stupid, dumb, problematic, and need to be looked at
-Grass- and Ice-types are looking to dominate the meta unless a new Steel steps up
-Liepard probably needs to be discussed more, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was banned
-Lurantis is super good and probably not broken
-Roselia is a great glue mon
-Experiment more with previously unviable mons or mons with only one viable set, you may be surprised

Thanks for reading!

 

[AllTerrainVen0moth]

To be honest, we should free everything from PUBL once the shifts drop. Maybe things wont be broken once the drops come in. I can see certain silvallies not being broken, such as Grass.

 

[Oathkeeper]

To be honest, we should free everything from PUBL once the shifts drop. Maybe things wont be broken once the drops come in. I can see certain silvallies not being broken, such as Grass.

I believe this is possibly or definitely going to happen. NU did the same thing back on the 1st and I felt it was a good idea. Throwing all the mons into the mix and seeing how it all plays out. It'll be nice to see all those Silvallys being back and figuring out what is still too OP for PU and what's hot and what's not.

 

[termi]

not to be a killjoy or anything but the odds that come october we're going to free all the vally forms that aren't NU or above by usage is pretty low. several council members (including me) are doubtful that the vallies won't end up dominating the meta again, given that despite the influx of new mons their power level and offensive versatility is still well above the norm for this gen's PU. it's not unlikely that some of the less controversial forms will get unbanned alongside a bunch of other PUBL mons, but given how much the vallies warped the meta around themselves before, it may be better to exercise due caution and wait until the post-shifts meta has stabilized enough to where we can assess how some of the more potentially problematic vally forms might fit into it

 

[MZ]

We're going to be introducing a rotating PU council for council votes after the first October slate.

Why now? Since the start of gen 8 we've been running frequent council votes as expected. However we did not anticipate how long this was going to take, fitting in a suspect before at least Crown Tundra doesn't seem especially likely. We'd like to get some way for non-council members to vote before regular suspects are up, it's certainly not the same thing but it's still another way for more than just the council to have a say on the tier.

When will this start? We're still going to do a normal council vote like, the day of/after our major October shift to handle immediately broken things and PUBL unbans. After that, for our normal ban slates for the foreseeable future until suspects start again, we'll be inviting a few non-council members to also get a vote on the slate.

Who gets to be on the rotating council? This will be people active and engaged with the meta as shown off by NP posts, discord discussion, etc. Who exactly we choose will change each time too, giving more people the opportunity to vote. Each slate should include ~2-3 new people, chosen by the council.

 

[wooper]

Lurantis is not as problematic as Lilligant is, but is still a very good mon thanks to its bulk, Contrary, and ability to abuse the tier's most common defensive mons as setup fodder. Superpower and Leaf Storm provide near-perfect coverage between each other, and either Synthesis or Aromatherapy improves its longevity, which leaves it with a free moveslot for either a coverage move for those it can't hit normally or some role compression (I've been using Knock Off). However, I think it's better for the tier because of its ability to easily be pressured by most offensive mons with a SE special STAB, especially in a tier where Ice-types dominate.

really wanted to say that lurantis is very, very scary to me in the tier at the moment. its ability to absolutely just steamroll through teams is quite ridiculous imo. all it needs is contrary leaf storm + superpower, but has great options in knock, defog, synthesis, and aromatherapy. while yes, faster threats with stab super effective coverage exists, im finding it very hard to adequately deal with lurantis in ways that arent roselia. am i alone here?

Something that surprises me is how consistent Mawile has been in Gen 8 PU. While it's not an S tier mon or anything, every time I use or see it, it's made a meaningful impact in a match. Either it set up Rocks, got some important chip on a sweeper, statused an opposing defensive mon, crippled something with Knock Off, or set up and swept itself. Usually, a mon that's lasted so long in the meta would either be pushed down by power creep or deemed outclassed. But no matter what changes have happened in the tier, Mawile has always stayed a good mon. It's almost crazy how much it has endured, yet it still has a viable niche within the tier. I wonder why?

from day 1, mawile has been a staple in gen 8 pu imo. i think that her unique typing, great abilities, and excellent offensive and defensive movepool are what have really cemented her viability after all this time

 

[Specs]

I had voted do not ban on Lurantis in the most recent slate and still feel the same way now. It's one of the most snowbally mons in the tier for sure, only rivaled by Lilligant and maybe Drifblim. The reason I do think it's in a fine spot though is how pressured it is a lot of time, and because of that, struggles to become this unkillable machine that on paper it should be.

Lurantis needs a good amount of turns to get out of hand. You wanna click Leaf Storm a lot of the time but you also want those Superpower boosts in order to bulk up and get more Synthesis's off to stay healthy to come in again later. In my experience it has been somewhat tough to be able to become this unkillable threatening breaker. Especially with things like Roselia, Heatmor, Flareon (for the ices), and Drifblim all becoming more popular thanks to either Klinklang being gone or just general meta trends. They all don't switch in extremely comfortably (mainly looking at Heatmor and Flareon), however them becoming more popular really limits the amount of games you can just hard in on the bulky ground/grass and start pounding away freely. Even the water types that we're seeing don't allow Lurantis to come in whenever it wants, Politoed and Golduck both run offensive sets with Ice Beam and do easily over 50% to any non AV (lol) set. Switching into the bulky grounds like Sandslash and Stunfisk is also tough. You really want to run Aromatherapy to stop Toxic from crippling you, however on most builds Lurantis is your defogger because of how often it can switch into the rockers, so it becomes a huge choice. From my experience you more often choose the Defog route and just try to Synth up whenever you can so Toxic damage doesn't rack up. Which opens up free switches to said fire types or ice types, though this is all case by case so I won't go any deeper into that point.

Lurantis is imo one of the best mons atm and very splashable on builds, because of how much it gives defensively in one slot + the utility it provides. Is it annoying to kill sometimes? Yes. Is it one of the scariest mons? Yes. Do I think it's broken or bad for the tier? Nah, it could be in the future and I'll be keeping my eye on snake. But for now that's how I see Lurantis

 

[Sam I Yam]

Throh is easily the best mon in the tier as far as I am concerned. The departure of klink and bouff has given throh freedom to cater its defensive EV's to patch team weaknesses on the special attacking side of the spectrum. Spikes being relatively easy to set in this meta turn what would normally be a passive defensive phaser into a massive threat capable of indirectly forcing damage upon an entire team. I find it very hard to find a good reason NOT to use throh on almost every team.

Klink leaving the tier has been fantastic for bird, particularly the toxic variants. Besides having 1 less steel type to worry about, stunfisk rarely carries rest now. Additionally, mawile carries les phys bulk now making it much easier to muscle through.

SpDef Mr. Rime is crazy reliable. Ice beam/tox/spin/slack off provides insane role compression and hits multiple defensive checkboxes. Ice check, rose check, stunfisk check, and lilli check (not 100% due to sleep powder)

 

[DC]

Been playing a bit of PU and wanted to share some trends that didnt appear in this thread. I will try to not make this very long to read.


I found it surprising that Fire-types were not discussed in this thread. They have been fairly good recently with the prominence of Grass- and Ice-types and the general lack of Water-types in the tier (outside of Toad and Mare). Raboot is a great offensive pivot, possessing the coverage necessary to severely dent most defensive cores with Blitz / U-turn / Sucker / HJK. Flareon is an underrated SpD wall with good utility between Heal Bell / Wish / Toxic and also being one of the best Lilligant and Rime check in PU. I haven't really experimented with Heatmor, but being able to nuke stuff with Fire Blast is not that bad :)


Seemed wrong to discuss Pokemon that got better and not mention these two. Offensive Drifblim has one of the biggest potential to snowball in PU, rivaled by only Lilligant and Lurantis. Sub + Strength Sap gives it status immunity and longevity which only adds to its ability to terrorize teams that are expecting a defensive variant. It is not overly broken since stuff like Liepard and Morpeko exists, but nonetheless a very good mon. Galardash / gorse is very neat, especially special variants that have been better since Klang ban. Future Sight is difficult to play around and pairs extremely well with stuff like Liepard and Morpeko that would like Throh gone while also forcing walls like Stunfisk and Tangela to switch out.

 

[Monky25]

Hey all, It's Monky25. Like I've been doing these past few months, I've been following the DLC wave down to the lower tiers and offer my thoughts about which mons are likely to drop for the tier that's about to get nuked, being PU tis time. These are all my opinion of what is likely to drop, I'm going off what isn't viable in NU based on the VR list as well as conversations with more experienced NU players about what is good in the tier and what isn't. Anyone is welcome to respond to my post, adding on to what I believe might drop or disagreeing with one of my opinions. Anyway, here are the pokemon most likely to drop from Nu to PU these upcoming shifts.

Solid Additions:

(pretend there is a pincurchin sprite here)
All of these pokemon are very likely to drop from NU (OU in ditto's case but it'll fall to PU). Most of these have competition that outclasses them: rhydon and mudsdale outclasses sandaconda as a rocker, ninetales beats rapidash for an offensive fire type, aromatisse is a better alcremie. I feel that all of these will be solid additions to the tier. Avalugg can act as a physical wall and spinner, cramorant can function as a defogger, skunktank can go either physical or special and check the grasses that rule this tier, qwilfish can be a decently bulk water, alcremie provides the tier with another fairy, rapidash will function as an offensive check to liiligant, lurantis, and the galar mimes, sandaconda looks to be one of the best in the tier if it drops with it's SR set, ditto does ditto things, and while cursola hits stupidly hard, it'll die to a physicals breeze, as many pokemon like duskinoir, unfezant, and liepard can easily kill it with their physical attacks. Froslass can act as an offensive spiker, physicals ice with poltergeist, or a suicide lead, giving offense another tool while quagsire can do the same thing it does in every tier. Pretty solid group of drops, but wait, there's more.
Back to PUBL/Potentially Banworthy Mons:

These pokemon are either PUBL and wont drop directly to PU should they get unbanned or can be banworthy from PU in the case of rotom fan and malamar. While it is up to the council to make these decisions, I think that hitmontop and perrserker should be unbanned from PUBL. Both can gain new checks in qwilfish and sandaconda while already being checked by other mons in the tier. Hitmontop gets offensively checked by unfezant, the mimes if they have a psychic move, and galarian rapidash while perrseker has a hard time breaking through mons that can take a few iron heads while kanto rapidash, raboot, flareon, hitmonchan, heatmor, and sandslash can deal with it. I'm not too sure about the rotoms, while I think that basculin is likely to stay banned and malamar might be too much as it can gain contrary boosts and kill everything. there might be more PUBLs that can be looked at, but I clearly believe that perrserker and hitmontop are fine for the tier now.

Can we please get them?

(insert Jolteon sprite)
Both mons are pretty dogshit in NU, and while we deserve to be getting them, I'm afraid low ladder will keep them. It would be nice if we got thwackey, as it provides a supportive presence and acts very similar to Rillaboom in OU. Jolteon would be meh if it dropped, as it faces competition from manectric and boltund due to their better coverage, but I really want a tier I can use jolteon in and not handicap myself.

Overall, here are my thoughts about which drops from NU PU could get. The tier will be shaken up a bit and we are very likely to gain some solid additions to the tier while also potentially regaining pokemon that were too much for the tier at one point. As always, feel free to respond to my thoughts and add on or respectfully disagree with one of my opinions. See you when the shifts come!

 

[zS]

Hello everyone! Klinklang and Bouffalant being banned affected the metagame more than what I thought, so I’m here to deliver my opinion on how the metagame is without them and which mons benefited the most from their bans.
1- Mr. Rime and M. Mime-Galar
was already one of the best sweepers in the tier thanks to it’s amazing speedtier, nice special attack and access to both Nasty Plot and Rapid Spin. But while M. Mime-Galar was one of the best sweepers in the tier, was simply one of the best mons around, but it’s defensive role and choice specs set struggled a bit when Klinklang was around. Being locked on ice beam or Psychic wasn’t risk free cuz as we all know Klinklang was the best sweeper in the tier and giving it free turns was usually a synonym of loss. Now that it’s gone, the choice specs set and rime’s dual stab is absolutely deadly and it’s low speed tier is a lot harder to punish because our best glue being gone made a lot of teams slower, since people rely on slower and bulkier mons to switch into it (, , ). The fact that those mons are less reliant on hitting focus blasts to be efficient in games make them a lot better and in my opinion Mr. Rime became the best mon in the tier.
2- Lilligant and Drifblim
and both lost their 2 best offensive answers in the tier, which made them super hard to deal with. Drifblim especially has been making waves recently. Sub cm, Physically offensive, Mixed Attacker, Defensive, every single Drifblim set is awesomely good atm, due to Klinklang and Bouff’s ban. It’s just too good and restricts teambuilding quite a lot. Speaking of teambuilding restrictions, Lilligant completely blossomed after Klinkang and Bouffalant’s ban, forcing teams to run either and or a sleep absorber + a faster choice user. Flareon is forced to run Flare Blitz to be sure to deal with it, and even with that if it took a few chip damage, it can lose to it 1v1 if Lilligant gets good sleep rolls. Definitely keeping an eye on those 2, although Lilligant lacks representation in major tournaments to be considered as broken already.
3- Metagame Trends
Right after Klinklang and Bouffalant’s ban, became super popular, it being the only fully evolved steel type left ( isn’t a steel type -_-) and it’s ability to check a lot of the top threats such as while providing stealth rock support is super good right now. Speaking of I feel like the mon is absolutely great right now, thanks to what defensive cores tend to look like. Flareon, Roselia and Mawile becoming super popular made Dugtrio-Alola awesomely good. and became super popular due to their ability of checking Ice, Grass and Fire types for the first one and Lurantis and Lilligant for the second one. Ofc, Roselia isn’t only good at checking those two, it can also provide Spikes and Tspikes to the table, while being able to absorb Toxic Spikes which is some nice role compress. dropped a bit in usage and nearly came back to his early gen spot, being one of the best defensive glues in the tier. as expected is still everywhere, but I really think those bans made it step back from being the best mon in the tier. It’s obviously super good, but since psychic types like and are way more popular right now, I feel like it lost its first spot. also has been a huge threat to teams, it’s really bulky and one of the most potent snowball sweepers in the tier.

4- Conclusion
I feel like those bans really helped the metagame, we finally get some fresh air although teambuilding is still super hard, we can use more diverse archetypes and try some mons that were completely unusable in the previous metagame. I have high expectation for Thursday’s drops and I hope they will make the tier even better. That’s all for my post, cya!

Bonus

 

[SergioRules]

Crown Tundra has been confirmed to release on October 22nd, so I'm back with my list of potentially PU Pokemon that are returning and getting new moves.
After the October shifts on Thursday, the next big shift we'll get is the NFEs and LC mons that drop on the 22nd, followed by whatever tiering process they do for the rest.

NFE lists aren't 100% certain because the only IoA move tutor list I could find was for only FE mons but I'll assume they'll mostly be the same
Some spoilers below

Crown Tundra mons and their new moves (if applicable)

Dual Wingbeat (?)
Future Sight, Stored Power, Expanding Force, Triple Axel
Meteor Beam
Rock Blast, Psycho Cut, Cross Poison, Razor Shell, Meteor Beam
Weather Ball, Icicle Spear, Brave Bird, Dual Wingbeat, Triple Axel
Scale Shot (?)
Coaching, Scorching Sands (?)
Rock Blast, Body Press, Meteor Beam, Steel Roller
Dual Wingbeat
Rock Blast, Power Whip, Grassy Glide, Meteor Beam
Meteor Beam
Close Combat
Swords Dance, Icicle Spear, Hydro Pump, Heavy Slam, Liquidation, Body Press, Steel Roller
Rock Blast, Liquidation, Body Press, Meteor Beam, Scale Shot
Cosmic Power, Expanding Force, Meteor Beam, Steel Roller (?)
Rock Blast, Body Press, Meteor Beam

Hex, Phantom Force, Lash Out, Poltergeist
Scale Shot, Scorching Sands (?)
Weather Ball, Darkest Lariat, Rising Voltage
Mystical Fire, Weather Ball, Burning Jealousy, Scorching Sands
Drain Punch, Draining Kiss, Encore, Nasty Plot, Stored Power, Play Rough, Expanding Force
Protect, Rest, Darkest Lariat, Heat Crash, Body Press, Terrain Pulse
Body Slam
Rock Blast, Razor Shell, Meteor Beam
Dual Wingbeat, Lash Out, Meteor Beam
Self-Destruct, Triple Axel
Weather Ball, Rock Blast, Icicle Spear, Body Slam, Meteor Beam
Charm, Body Press, Meteor Beam, Misty Explosion
Body Slam, Heat Crash, Body Press, Lash Out, Steel Roller

 

[termi]

Council Minutes​

Meta Discussion:

• In the wake of the bans on Klinklang and Bouffalant, several council members think the meta has improved quite noticeably. It is not quite in an ideal state yet, but it has become easier to build teams that do not have overly noticeable weaknesses now that teams do not have account for Klinklang and Bouffalant anymore. Nevertheless, some concerns remained, and several council members felt another vote was in order. Ultimately though, there was not enough consensus on what was broken, and with a big shift ahead of us, the push for another council vote was ultimately not strong enough. Still, it's worth briefly going over the things that have been on our radar.
• Ice types were probably the biggest source of discontent this week, with some council members wondering what checks these Pokemon now that Klinklang is gone. Other council members pointed out that Klinklang never was that reliable of an Ice check, with NP Mime-Galar and Specs Rime being able to Focus Blast their way past it quite easily with a correct prediction. Furthermore, Klinklang's ban gave a boost in viability to several Ice checks, like Sdef Rime, Mawile, and Type: Null. It was also suggested that carrying several "soft checks" on a team, like AV Dusknoir, Eviolite Raboot, and Pawniard, can also help. While this counterplay is not ideal, it'll have to do for now.
• was a potential concern for us, since losing two of its checks meant that it could've gotten out of control, but its reliance on catching good matchups and lack of defensive utility compared to other Grass types made it a rather rare sight, only being used once in SSD last week (and it was not even a Quiver Dance set). Its presence remains noticeable though, the high usage of Scarf Unfezant in SSD last week undoubtedly being partly caused by the threat Lilligant poses on paper. Nevertheless, being broken on paper was not enough to warrant an 11th-hour council vote.
• was briefly mentioned, but to my recollection there was no new argument for its ban and the people who voted DNB on it last week did not change their mind.
• Potential brokens aside, a few previous top threats that had fallen out of favor since the Perrserker meta have made something of a return. Mawile is back to being a top tier SR setter that compresses many roles with its great amount of resistances; Psychic types like Kadabra, Musharna, and Beheeyem have become easier to fit on teams in Klinklang's absence; and Type: Null seems to be back in action as a fantastic defensive glue.

VR and Other Votes:

• As mentioned above, there was no council vote and with a great amount of drops ahead of us there will likely not be any VR votes for a while either, given that there's a good chance we'll have to completely redo the VR.
• That being said, we do plan on voting on all PUBL Pokemon when the new drops come around, since a lot of them are likely not gonna be as problematic as they used to be.

Forum Happenings:

• September's Official Room Tournmanets are drawing to a close. With only one day left, it looks like Ambipom Unviable and Procopius are the two users fighting for the honor of finishing #1 on the leaderboard. Good luck to everyone competing in the final couple of room tours!
• Snake week 5 is also happening, featuring several exciting matches.

For discussion points, a revamp of the SM PU Sample Teams is in order. Please submit any teams you deem worthy of being added and discuss which submissions are good enough to make it into the sample teams. Also discuss which teams may be outdated and could be removed.

 

[MZ]

Tier shifts!
+ -Dark
-
To PUBL:
Stay tuned for PUBL unban shenanigans and potential quickbans, haven't had time to discuss this much yet but Sawk, Corsola-G, and Silvally-Dark are immediately pretty concerning.
e: To be even more specific, expect unbans today and initial bans by Sunday