Metagame SS OU Metagame Discussion Thread v7 (Usage Stats in post #3539)

*Also, quick note on unaware clef since I saw something about it above, I love using it, but I don’t think it is broken at all, especially because clef isn’t terribly bulky honestly. Jolly life orb garchomp has about a 28% chance to 2ko max hp max phys def clefable with a boosting nature and leftovers with earthquake, and adamant life orb rillaboom can deal a hefty amount with grassy glide as well. If they are unaware, then either they choose to run leftovers, in which case hazards hurt clef a lot, or they run boots, in which case they miss out on the leftovers recovery. If an HO player sees a clefable on an opposing team, and plays smartly with the knowledge that the clef may be unaware, they can beat it without drastically altering their team, even if it is a hard mon to get through. It’s happened to me a lot (I mean, I’m not the best player in the world or anything but I don’t totally suck either so I don’t think it’s just my fault lololol).
I know this was an adendum to your main post, but I'm pretty sick of reading pages, and quite frankly walls and walls of text on Futureport. There are a lot of well made points, and you have made some very good ones in your post too, and I very much agree that Regenerator is extremely stupid. I would however like to see discussion on Unaware Clefable if anyone is willing, so I will address your points on Clefable rather than the Futureport content.

Both of the mons you mention, Life Orb Chomper and Adamant Rillaboom lose to Unaware Clef, as any user will sit spamming Softboiled, either stalling out the Terrain or watching you slowly kill yourself to Life Orb recoil. This is really the crux of the matter. If you don't crit Clef with your setup mon it will beat you. I've actually often lost to Unaware Clef even when I have crit it. This is why I was referring to the necessity of strong choiced users who can 2hko it or Trick it. I've played a lot of high ladder games where cores of Slowbro, Chansey, and Pex are just nigh unbreakable when played by someone competent. It's extremely difficult to break these with any form of setup sweeper.

Am I overselling it, am I just bad? Does nobody else have problems beating it consistently?
 
I know this was an adendum to your main post, but I'm pretty sick of reading pages, and quite frankly walls and walls of text on Futureport. There are a lot of well made points, and you have made some very good ones in your post too, and I very much agree that Regenerator is extremely stupid. I would however like to see discussion on Unaware Clefable if anyone is willing, so I will address your points on Clefable rather than the Futureport content.

Both of the mons you mention, Life Orb Chomper and Adamant Rillaboom lose to Unaware Clef, as any user will sit spamming Softboiled, either stalling out the Terrain or watching you slowly kill yourself to Life Orb recoil. This is really the crux of the matter. If you don't crit Clef with your setup mon it will beat you. I've actually often lost to Unaware Clef even when I have crit it. This is why I was referring to the necessity of strong choiced users who can 2hko it or Trick it. I've played a lot of high ladder games where cores of Slowbro, Chansey, and Pex are just nigh unbreakable when played by someone competent. It's extremely difficult to break these with any form of setup sweeper.

Am I overselling it, am I just bad? Does nobody else have problems beating it consistently?
I wouldn't say it's about being bad, it just seems to me that you are fixating a bit on using set up sweepers to 1v1 clefable. Taking a step back does it seem reasonable to you that a set up sweeper should be able to beat a mon specifically designed to stop set up sweepers using unboosted non super effective attacks? And even as you said, there are some set up sweepers that can break through such as bisharp and kartana.

Unaware clefable does have a lot of ways to be exploited. You also have to remember that every time it switches into your set up sweeper, if you pressed an attacking move, it has to press soft boiled after, as it's ability to stop set up sweepers diminishes rapidly if it isn't in almost pristine health, so you can use that to your advantage to get a good switch while clef is forced to heal up. What I'm recommending is that if you expect a clef switch in just press an attack and don't try to set up and just switch out, as pressing an attack is most often a low risk, medium reward move here.

Some more specific ways to deal with it are taunt, which removes 1/2 to 3/4 of its set with just one button. There is also heavy slam heatran that just, well, slams clefable with no counterplay if you trap it, and heatran is in general an amazing stallbreaker(cough cough here comes my shameless defensive dragonite with EQ on stall plug cough cough). Nidoking that you mentioned easily wins the 1v1 even if clefable gets a free CM up(and every time nido gets a free switch into something like a clefable there is a good chance you are losing a mon on stall, especially if it has superpower), and gengar can be kitted out to be a massive stallbreaker between tricking choice items and taunt.

Clef also can't take a FS well at all, it takes almost half from it, which can enable a lot of different threats to muscle past it, and a lot of choiced breakers can just straight break through.

unaware clef is definitely a good mon, but it has some very exploitable weaknesses that make it checkable. That said, I do certainly feel that it is possible by chance to make teams that are quite weak to it if you are not keeping it specifically in mind, as CM unaware is both a defensive measure and a win condition by itself.
 
Corumba said:
I know this was an adendum to your main post, but I'm pretty sick of reading pages, and quite frankly walls and walls of text on Futureport. There are a lot of well made points, and you have made some very good ones in your post too, and I very much agree that Regenerator is extremely stupid. I would however like to see discussion on Unaware Clefable if anyone is willing, so I will address your points on Clefable rather than the Futureport content.

Both of the mons you mention, Life Orb Chomper and Adamant Rillaboom lose to Unaware Clef, as any user will sit spamming Softboiled, either stalling out the Terrain or watching you slowly kill yourself to Life Orb recoil. This is really the crux of the matter. If you don't crit Clef with your setup mon it will beat you. I've actually often lost to Unaware Clef even when I have crit it. This is why I was referring to the necessity of strong choiced users who can 2hko it or Trick it. I've played a lot of high ladder games where cores of Slowbro, Chansey, and Pex are just nigh unbreakable when played by someone competent. It's extremely difficult to break these with any form of setup sweeper.

Am I overselling it, am I just bad? Does nobody else have problems beating it consistently?
I think there’s a reason that Clef is decline at the moment and most Clef are Magic Guard. Unaware Clef just isn’t that good. You need Wish/Softboiled, you need Heal Bell, and it can’t do anything offensively if you don’t run CM. That leaves you with one or maybe two slots for attacking moves, usually Moonblast/Flamethrower, which makes Unaware Clef easy to wall. Combine this with the fact that a lot of popular offensive mons can beat it (Rilla, Lele, Kyurem just to name three) and you can see why it isn’t particularly good. Taunt has obviously been mentioned, but Toxic can be another good way to beat it, especially with more defensive teams, since you can just stall it out of Heal Bells. Besides this, Heatran hard counters it and is everywhere right now, meaning Unaware Clef is matchup fishy at best.

Just to add my thoughts on the Slowtwins discussion: I don’t think they’re broken. Futureport+Regenerator is for sure good, but they aren’t nearly as omnipresent as things like Magearna or Spectrier were. They don’t quite have enough bulk to hardwall everything they want to, and Teleport giving you a turn to hit them means they’re often forced to hard switch to avoid being KOed by Rillaboom or Koko or something, so it’s quite easy to break up their rhythm and pressure your opponent if they get greedy with Futureport shenanigans.
 
I know this was an adendum to your main post, but I'm pretty sick of reading pages, and quite frankly walls and walls of text on Futureport. There are a lot of well made points, and you have made some very good ones in your post too, and I very much agree that Regenerator is extremely stupid. I would however like to see discussion on Unaware Clefable if anyone is willing, so I will address your points on Clefable rather than the Futureport content.

Both of the mons you mention, Life Orb Chomper and Adamant Rillaboom lose to Unaware Clef, as any user will sit spamming Softboiled, either stalling out the Terrain or watching you slowly kill yourself to Life Orb recoil. This is really the crux of the matter. If you don't crit Clef with your setup mon it will beat you. I've actually often lost to Unaware Clef even when I have crit it. This is why I was referring to the necessity of strong choiced users who can 2hko it or Trick it. I've played a lot of high ladder games where cores of Slowbro, Chansey, and Pex are just nigh unbreakable when played by someone competent. It's extremely difficult to break these with any form of setup sweeper.

Am I overselling it, am I just bad? Does nobody else have problems beating it consistently?
I get the point of this post but for me at least is incredibly weird, setup sweepers can't get past a mon designated to stop setup sweepers therefore its broken? Even though some setup sweepers can actually get past it and it is in general a mon with exploitable weaknesses as it can be easily overwhelmed, it is forced to constantly heal or it will no longer be able to check the things it is supposed to beat and that it also gives free switches to metagame staples like Heatran and Toxapex. Yeah definetively not broken.

Also to drop my two cents on the futureport discussion, imo if something were to be banned it should be the slowtwins as they are the only ones with the combination of regen, Fsight and teleport. Banning one of the moves would needlessly cripple the viability of some mons and lower tiers for no reason but to preserve the slowtwins, slowking-g and reuniclus are fine with regenerator and future sight, mew and alakazam are fine with future sight and teleport, and hell even slowpoke is fine with regenerator, teleport and F sight. If the moves were truly a problem then we should be seeing slowpoke doing things in OU like we've seen LC mons do in OU when they have acces to a broken ability/move (see trapinch)
 
Who said Unaware Clefable was broken? I don't necessarily think it is. I was simply raising points that it's incredibly problematic to beat, and strikes me as uncompetitive. I wanted to hear some discussion to come to a conclusion. The lack of support for my position so far strikes me that I'm in the minority however.

Unaware Clefable isn't in decline either, I face it very commonly, and I don't see why the set needs Wish. glava222 did a good job at addressing some of my points. You are certainly right that Taunt stops it completely, I have no argument there. No good player is allowing Clef to come in on a Future Sight though, and similarly no good player is leaving Clef in against any Heatran. Once the Heatran is eliminated, Clef often wins. If only it was so simple to just not lose your Heatran against mega stall teams... and to not lose your Steel types to Helmet chip + hazards until such a point as they can no longer hold Clef back.

So long as Clefable exists, a huge number of setup sweepers lose a lot of viability due to the opportunity cost of being a passenger against Unaware Clefable teams. It's a similar scenario to Pinkacross' Rillaboom argument, where the opportunity cost of using a setup sweeper that gets KOed by Grassy Glide is also too high, and so not worth a slot. Pulling off a well timed setup sweep has never been more difficult than it is now, and that's a real shame.
 
Sorry Corumba, I also have felt quite annoyed at unaware walls myself so I understand your frustration, and since it wasn't my main focus in the post there, my response about clef was not as thorough as it ought to have been.

The point of bringing up garchomp and rilla was not to point out that they would beat clef in the 1-v-1, but to show that in practice, unaware clef is often more of a check than a true counter. What I mean here is that it's actually somewhat risky to swap unaware clef into a strong set up sweeper directly. Obviously if they boost on the switch, clef is safe, but if you switch in on a life orb-boosted attack directly, it's gonna sting, especially if there are rocks/spikes up. Beyond this, your point about softboiled stalling is valid, as an unaware clef user I have done it many a time myself lol, but when you do this continuously over and over, the chance of a crit often becomes non-negligible, and if not a crit, often other rarer move sideffects, things like stat drops (which do affect unaware pokemon) and rare burn/para/freeze chances start to build. I mean clef runs heal bell a lot, but you only get 8 of them. if you keep your set up sweepers in the wings, it is feasible, if time consuming, to force an opponent to run out of heal bells with a consistent status spreader, many of whom can switch into clef. When I have played against strong HO players with unaware clef, I have seen many examples where even if they don't have an outright counter, they will essentially sac a strong wallbreaker like garchomp to get clef down to ~50%, and then they can manage to apply enough offensive pressure make it quite difficult for it to get a free switch in to heal, since it lacks regen and is punished by hazards. And that is to say nothing of steel set-up sweepers like scizor, bisharp, and the rarer SD iron head aegislash that outright beat it.

One thing I will sympathize with, and offer a solution to, is your complaint about bulky Clef/Slowtwin/Blissey/Metal Bird/Toxapex teams. Are these a pain? Absolutely. Let me share some non-choice mons that I have used or have seen others use on the high ladder to break through stall teams, including unaware clef. My disclaimer for all of these mons is that I do not think that I am giving you the overall best set to use, and a couple of these mons themselves are on the fringes of general viability, but if you have 5 mons on a team that synergize well, and you really need to murder stall, you can try these out in your last slot.

:Victini:
Victini @ Heavy-Duty Boots/Expert Belt
Ability: Victory Star
EVs: 252 Atk / 16 SpD / 240 Spe
Adamant Nature
- V-create
- Bolt Strike
- Glaciate/Toxic/Energy Ball/Grass Knot
- Power-Up Punch

This one is pretty fun, I used it to get reqs and break into the top 50 in this test (with boots and glaciate), but it can be a little hard to use and kind of daunting because you have so many options for your moves. I am gonna talk about this one the most because it is the most versatile, so you can customize a lot to suit your needs. If you want to kill defensive cores run expert belt (also lets you bluff jolly band on a supereff hit and adamant scarf on a neutral hit), but I prefer Boots in general right now, since it gives you more health versus Zamazenta. Speed is just to outspeed stuff like max speed Nidoking, you can run jolly if you want to outspeed Urshifu (aqua jet deals a lot but won’t kill) and timid kyurem, I like the power though. You can usually power up punch on a switch to something like toxapex or slowbro. At +1, adamant expert belt victini does 82-97% to pex with bolt strike, and 79.6-94.4% to slowbro. If they want to switch around, once you get to +1 stuff like hippowdon gets cleanly 2ko by v-create. For the record, unaware clef gets two shotted by unboosted v-create, and it’s moonblast won’t do much to you because unaware prevents your sp def drops from v-create from taking effect.

The third slot is a flex slot for a special move or status. I like having a grass move here for the rare but still present gastrodon/quagsire stall on the ladder, not to mention it can be a decent move to midground slowbro just because bolt strike and vcreate pp can become a problem in a longer game. Energy ball is better in general, grass knot is to hit phys def hippowdon the hardest. Glaciate isn’t useful for stall, but you can use it to hit lando, garchomp, or dragapult on the switch and then outspeed them next turn (remember that if it is scarf lando and you are adamant, even after a speed drop they will outspeed you though). Toxic another good option and can be useful to weaken a lot of would be switch-ins, as can will-o-wisp, but since stall runs clerics usually it may not be optimal for that matchup.

Some people like scorching sands, but it doesn’t do that much to sp def heatran, and if you power up punch on the switch to tran, you outspeed and bolt strike will 2KO from there (you live one earth power at full always). You benefit a lot with wish support or slow pivots to keep victini healthy after stomaching a hit or rocky helmet and bring him in safely, and a cleric to cure status from contact can be nice. Be wary of helmet pex with baneful bunker though, I think Ruft screwed me over with his stall team when I played him in a 200+ turn game, setting my req process back like 10 million games >~>

:Conkeldurr:
Conkeldurr @ Flame Orb
Ability: Guts
EVs: 252 Atk / 76 Def / 180 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Mach Punch/Drain Punch
- Close Combat/Drain Punch
- Knock Off
- Facade

Prior to the zama test I got a fresh alt to the top 150 on the ladder, with ~81% gxe solely using a team with this mon (if you want the full team check out nyembyuy's post in the RMT forums, it got overlooked but I think it is pretty cool, I modified his evs on Dragapult and Conk a bit but otherwise it's the same, that said I don't recommend it anymore without modification unless Zama stays uber since it gets crushed by zama hard lol), and I've used it on a couple other teams as well.
If you just want to take on walls, drop mach punch, but in the general matchup I don’t recommend it. Even with drain punch, you’re gonna run light on HP fast with this thing so here I highly recommend wish support. Assuming you are burned, facade hits like a truck (98% chance to 2KO max phys def Pex with black sludge if it switches in on Rocks, and a 38% chance to 2KO slowbro by itself, without resorting to Knock Off). CC 2KOs max def tangrowth always (97% chance if it has leftovers), and Knock off into CC always deals 91% minimum to max phys def corviknight (with the standard 168 def spread it is 97.9% minimum, I run enough speed to outrun neutral uninvested corv but watchout for brave bird obviously, even before you get a defense drop). This guy is super volatile so I understand why he isn’t an OU staple lol but bring this in on stall at the right time and it can smash holes.

:Nidoking:
Nidoking (M) @ Life Orb
Ability: Sheer Force
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Hasty Nature
- Earth Power
- Sludge Wave
- Flamethrower/Thunderbolt/Ice Beam
- Superpower/Taunt

Either just before or just after the mag/ace ban I got 2000+ elo with this set (using flamethrower and superpower). Generally, flamethrower is better in the third slot, but thunderbolt is good for slowking while still hitting birds (Although you lose a neutral move to hit incoming Lando), ice beam hits grounds and zapdos but is very rarely useful vs stall except if its hippo stall. Superpower deals 57.8% min to blissey, and 42.9% min to eviolite chansey, so I recommend bluffing that you don’t have it unless you are sure you are gonna get the kill, people tend to play recklessly with HP on these fat blobs when you hold it back long enough. Hasy Nature is +speed, -def, I prefer that because you want to stomach at least one from slowtwins (and galar slowking) and clef, and I have switched into stuff like Fini moonblast and koko dazzling gleam. Running Mild nature (+sp att, minus def) is viable but I don't generally recommend it unless you really want to dedicate to killing defense with this guy. You can switch freely into clefable lacking knock off (it really sucks to lose orb though so scout for it first, and with toxapex I also recommend scouting it's spread and only using earth power on it when you have a good chance to KO because you don't want to lose orb or get burned when you need superpower). Worth noting that sp def gastrodon and sp def hippowdon (if you don't have ice beam) wall this and are sometimes seen on stall, which is why taunt can be viable over superpower, but often times with a mon as frail as nidoking, if they attack on your taunt it can be a pain, so I usually opt for the attacking move or I will switch out.

:Rillaboom:
Rillaboom @ Life Orb
Ability: Grassy Surge
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Swords Dance
- Superpower
- Grassy Glide
- Taunt

Haven't used this one much myself, but I stole this after Storm Zone beat me with it high in the ladder lol and even with just a few games it has worked well, absolutely monstrous set, I think this one is best suited to hyper offense. You need a bit of prediction here, especially versus corv since he always kills with brave bird after a superpower def drop, but at +2 you deal 68-80% to the standard corv spread, and at +4 you always kill it. Taunt in general is very underexplored in the meta, as okispokis pointed out earlier in the thread. You can choose to either sacrifice this guy in the early game to break big holes or keep it in the back as a grassy glide sweeper like with standard SD rilla once your opponent's defensive mons are weakened a little.

:Alakazam:
Alakazam @ Life Orb
Ability: Magic Guard
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Nasty Plot
- Psyshock
- Focus Blast
- Encore/Taunt/Thunder Wave

I put this last because out of these 5 I am the least sure about this guy, although I have lost to this unexpectedly before. Alakazam is not super viable in this meta but he is a strong stallbreaker. Having to rely on Focus blast sucks, you can swap for dazzling gleam or maybe shadow ball, but against stall but you want to hit the metal birds really hard. At +2 psyshock always 2KOs kanto slowking (EDIT: earlier I had a typo implying +2 psyshock would one shot slowking, that's not true obviously lol), unless it is AV(EDIT2:AV doesn't matter for psyshock lol I'm an idiot). Encore is my best recommendation to beat stall. Catching a corv on a roost is absurd, you basically get a free +2, and for Clef you can encore a calm mind and then spam psyshock. Taunt and T-wave have applications too though. Try this with psychic terrain like in gen 7 to really pump up the body count (specs lele is also a stall murderer but since it is choiced I am not listing it here, and I didn't post taunt magma storm heatran because everyone is aware of that already).

Hopefully this helps you with stall issues, and good luck.
 
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In regards to clefable, it isnt broken. So much so it isnt even it's best ability most of the time. Clefable although now ignoring boosts, is prone to status. And if it's running heal bell that takes up a move slot, further increasing counterplay. There are tons of strong breakers and steels with the likes of tran and magnezone. Unaware clef should never be an issue unless you have nothing to break fat mons, which isnt clefs problem, that's a problem with a team.
 
I disagree with this point, as I feel that FuturePort is most abusable on bulky offense structures, particularly with the duo of Slowking and Urshifu.

We have already established what the Slowtwins do in OU - click Future Sight, then teleport out to bring in a breaker safely and regenerate health back. While this strategy has been seen in previous generations with the "slow u-turn" concept, Teleport takes this further, as even the slowest Pokemon cannot attempt to punish this switch with a status ailment, knock off, or strong attack onto the breaker. Slowking is a great partner for Urshifu, who can tank strong special hits that threaten the bear, and is the most popular Slowtwin variant in OU as a result.

Once the breaker is actually in, it is very difficult for the opponent to position themselves favorably. One strategy I have seen employed to counteract Future Sight is with Protect - while FS does hit through protect, bulky Psychic resists and Dark types take little to no damage from the move, and Protect allows you to avoid taking damage from the breaker's attack. This is useful when paired with a defensive pivot like Toxapex, who does not take FS well but can switch in and check most of the physical metagame with Rocky Helmet the following turn.

Slowking + Urshifu nullifies this, as Unseen Fist causes contact moves to hit through Protect, forcing the target to always take an attack from (usually Choice Banded) Urshifu in addition to a 120 BP Future Sight. This has led to the increased centralization of the defensive metagame towards the Slowtwins themselves, as the only viable Pokemon that can realistically stomach this combination are Slowbro, physically defensive Slowking, and physically defensive Dragonite with Multiscale intact. When you factor in how hard it is to actually punish this sequence of plays (good luck actually Knocking Off Slowking's boots against a competent player), it is unsurprising to me that people are looking at Teleport as the issue.
what part of my statement do you disagree with, I agree that’s it’s certainly abused. It’s certainly hard to play around for sure, I was stating that from a defensive standpoint, teleport alone is a very easy way to re position yourself. On the offensive, fs teleport into shifu is insane. If you’re smart enough to knock the helmets first there’s not a lot that can take a fs and 2 cc or ss
 
The simplest and most effective thing to do is to keep it the way it is without banning fs/teleport/regenerator/slowtwins, just keep the op breakers banned (and perhaps ban zamazenta too).

The metagame post cinderace/magearna ban was really fun, plus slowking is finally viable in ou, if you ban future sight or teleport the slowtwins will be useless again and I don't want to see toxapex as the premier OU's wall for another generation (will be the time that I stop playing showdown definitely and as me many others).
 
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The simplest and most effective thing to do is to keep it the way it is without banning fs/teleport/regenerator/slowtwins, just keep the op breakers banned (and perhaps ban zamazenta too).

The metagame post cinderace/magearna ban was really fun, plus slowking is finally viable in ou, if you ban future sight or teleport the slowtwins will be useless again and I don't want to see toxapex as the premier OU's wall for another generation (will be the time that I stop playing showdown definitely and as me many others).
Slowking and Slowbro are still bulky regenerators who spam Scald on their switchins. Not really that different from Toxapex.
Anyway, Smogon is in the business of preserving a healthy meta, not necessarily a diverse meta or a meta filled with Pokemon you like.
 
I think the single most pressing issue in the meta rn is Slowking and Slowbro. The sheer degeneracy of teams that stack kanto bro + galar king can't be overstated enough. Can you beat them? Sure, but they severely limit builds. I remember old meme stall teams with Chansey + Blissey but this is way worse. These mons encourage completely brainless, low risk linear play that makes games take an eternity.
 
I posted a topic about potentially banning King’s Rock in Policy Review as a topic that pertains to various generations, including SS. If anyone has thoughts about this in the SS metagame in particular, we can discuss the topic here. The main focus will be on that thread of course, but it’s always good to engage in community discussions nevertheless.
Can we throw weather evasion in there too? Let's just get rid of all the shenanigans in one shot
 

Red Raven

I COULD BE BANNED!
The slowtwins aren't exactly that much of an issue. If we ban them, chances are you suddenly finding yourself putting Toxapex and Scizor every single team just so you can have a switch in to Tapu Lele when regular Slowking could have saved you a slot. What I'm saying is the slow twins are basically a necessary evil to at least make the monsters in the tier somewhat manageable. The problem is teleport and future sight. Teleport is just brainless that actually rewards you for being passive or lagging behind while future sight just adds a new level of irritation. Although Slowbro does have a massive issue rn in the form of Rillaboom. I still think that slowtwins are okay but the teleport and future sight is just plain ridiculous. Teleport might not be broken but it sure as hell doesn't encourage you to use your brain, at least when compared to previous generations

On the topic of luck based stuff, can we please just get rid of sand veil. I know that weather teams, and not just sand, aren't that common but for the love of Satan, Garchomp getting a lucky dodge under sand is just devastating. This ability just adds unnecessary rng to a game that is already filled with unnecessary rng
 
I wanted to briefly weigh in on the King's Rock topic of discussion. Although I am typically more of a preservationist when it comes to bans and eliminating intended game elements, I have thought for a while now that King's Rock should be removed from the OU tier.

To put it simply, King's Rock is too effective at doing its job in the context of its most frequent application in SS OU. Skill Link + King's Rock is not necessarily a new phenomenon novel to Gen 8, but this strategy alone has grown from an inconsistent gimmick to a legitimate, and arguably reasonably consistent option for hyper offensive teams. There is almost always an opportunity cost involved in running RNG based items like Quick Claw, Brightpowder or King's Rock, due to the average holder of the item almost always preferring something better, coupled with the low chance that the item will work to begin with. Skill Link Cloyster + King's Rock circumvents both of these elements. After a Shell Smash boost, Cloyster typically only needs this gimmick to activate about ~twice consecutively to break through its would-be checks in something like Skarmory or Toxapex. This sets it apart from something like Iron Head Jirachi trying to flinch down a Zapdos or Heatran, which would take many turns of consecutive activation and also exposes it to Rocky Helmet/residual contact damage in the process. Having tested it personally in over two dozen games recently, this ability+item combination forces the literal definition of 50/50 turns when it is employed, and punishes players for doing everything right except for winning a coin flip. This is uncompetitive and I struggle to see this as anything less.

While there will be some who argue that all RNG-inducing items and strategies should be removed from competitive play, I am not ready to go that far yet. Strictly on the issue of King's Rock, I would support its removal.
 

Martin

A monoid in the category of endofunctors
is a Smogon Discord Contributoris a Forum Moderator Alumnusis a Community Contributor Alumnusis a Contributor Alumnus
Hello, I've been putting off posting about this for a few months, but I finally have some time in my life and feel now is a good time to bring this up. You probably know which Pokemon this post is going to be about already if you've talked to me in the OU discord at any point over the past four months or so, and I think action needs to be taken on it regardless of whether Zamazenta gets unbanned.


:ss/dragapult:
I think Dragapult is broken and overbearing, and I think it makes trying to build and play this format a complete nightmare. This is the single biggest problem in the format right now in my opinion, and I think that removing it would help to free up building quite a lot for both offensive and balanced teams.

To be blunt, I do not think we have adequate counterplay to Dragapult. Ghost resists are extremely rare and most viable options do not reliably switch in on Draco Meteor, and out of what's left, not one has a means of punishing it for using U-turn (not to mention every single one is an exploitable POS that can be very easily turned into dead weight). It is so goddamn fast that you also can't reliably punish it short of using Zeraora or making a heavy commitment either at builder level or in-game, and its ability to just U-turn out of all of its responses with exactly zero repercussions makes the inadequacy of available offensive counterplay that much more apparent. It is next to impossible to make progress versus a Dragapult player because there is no reliable way to force it to take damage short of entry hazards, which conveniently get shut down by its Boots set. (No viable Rocky Helmet, Iron Barbs, or Rough Skin users switch into Dragapult.) Every Pokemon that can switch into it short of SpD Toxapex is heavily exploitable when down on tempo, and any widely viable neutral defensive responses stop working once statused because of the nonsense that is Hex. In terms of ghost resistant responses: Tyranitar takes a chunk from U-turn, which means it can only switch in so many times when combined with its lack of reliable recovery; Mandibuzz hates being down on tempo and also stops being a good Pokemon the moment it gets knocked off, which is shockingly easy if you have something like Rillaboom/Kartana (both click it for free/force Mandi in regularly, and let's be real: there isn't much consistent defensive counterplay to Kart anyway) or Ferrothorn (can very easily pressure it to come in and use Defog); Blissey is kinda shit either way but it stalemates Dragapult at best and arguably hates being down on tempo more than anything else in the game.

One of the biggest complaints I have seen about SS OU is just that there are so few viable ways to enforce progress, and Dragapult is one of the biggest offenders in this regard. Sure, it can't heal off damage with Regenerator like the Slowtwins, Tornadus-T, or Toxapex can, but (at the risk of repeating myself) it makes up for this with a near-unique ability to completely avoid taking direct damage under any circumstances beyond its players control that, when combined with there being next to no scenario where it would actually have its Boots knocked off in the hands of a competent player, makes it borderline impossible to pressure and leaves it in a state of having no real competitive flaws—anything that comes close to constituting one can be circumvented without making a single compromise either at builder level or gameplay level all while being dirt easy to use. Its offensive typing doesn't have any gaping holes like with Zeraora, which can similarly avoid ever taking any damage once Volt Switch sponges have been Toxic'd and/or had their items knocked off, and its team matchup spread is among the most positively polarising in the game (it's competent in basically every matchup and has completely dominating positive matchups, especially versus offence) and is arguably the most constrictive offensive threat in the format, with the only really debatable competition coming from Pokemon like Garchomp, Kartana, Shifu-R, Lele, and Kyurem, which (aside from maybe Kartana) all have more readily-exploitable flaws such as… not outpacing the whole unboosted metagame.

====================

I'll leave this post here, but for what it's worth I think this metagame is held together by selotape and, while I won't go into more detail as this isn't the right thread for it, I think Zamazenta does nothing but exacerbate that issue. I won't go into more detail now because I can't be arsed and don't want to distract from the elephant in the room above, but I think we need to seriously take a look at the metagame we have and ask ourselves whether this power level is ideal and whether we are happy to continue playing a metagame that, while stable, I don't think is in a healthy state. The key presences that I, personally, think we need to step back and ask serious questions about are as follows:
  • Dragapult (obviously)
  • Toxapex
  • Kartana
This list is not an exhaustive list of metagame threats, and I realise that their removal will shift the power level that feels overbearing, but I think that at the very least these three warp the metagame's power level upwards to an unhealthy degree. I don't personally have any issue with the Slowtwins and think they are a product of their surroundings rather than the reverse, but at the very least I think it is a good discussion to have.
 
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Hello, I've been putting off posting about this for a few months, but I finally have some time in my life and feel now is a good time to bring this up. You probably know which Pokemon this post is going to be about already if you've talked to me in the OU discord at any point over the past four months or so, and I think action needs to be taken on it regardless of whether Zamazenta gets unbanned.


:ss/dragapult:
I think Dragapult is broken and overbearing, and I think it makes trying to build and play this format a complete nightmare. This is the single biggest problem in the format right now in my opinion, and I think that removing it would help to free up building quite a lot for both offensive and balanced teams.

To be blunt, I do not think we have adequate counterplay to Dragapult. Ghost resists are extremely rare and most viable options do not reliably switch in on Draco Meteor, and out of what's left, not one has a means of punishing it for using U-turn (not to mention every single one is an exploitable POS that can be very easily turned into dead weight). It is so goddamn fast that you also can't reliably punish it short of using Zeraora or making a heavy commitment either at builder level or in-game, and its ability to just U-turn out of all of its responses with exactly zero repercussions makes the inadequacy of available offensive counterplay that much more apparent. It is next to impossible to make progress versus a Dragapult player because there is no reliable way to force it to take damage short of entry hazards, which conveniently get shut down by its Boots set. (No viable Rocky Helmet, Iron Barbs, or Rough Skin users switch into Dragapult.) Every Pokemon that can switch into it short of SpD Toxapex is heavily exploitable when down on tempo, and any widely viable neutral defensive responses stop working once statused because of the nonsense that is Hex. In terms of ghost resistant responses: Tyranitar takes a chunk from U-turn, which means it can only switch in so many times when combined with its lack of reliable recovery; Mandibuzz hates being down on tempo and also stops being a good Pokemon the moment it gets knocked off, which is shockingly easy if you have something like Rillaboom/Kartana (both click it for free/force Mandi in regularly, and let's be real: there isn't much consistent defensive counterplay to Kart anyway) or Ferrothorn (can very easily pressure it to come in and use Defog); Blissey is kinda shit either way but it stalemates Dragapult at best and arguably hates being down on tempo more than anything else in the game.

One of the biggest complaints I have seen about SS OU is just that there are so few viable ways to enforce progress, and Dragapult is one of the biggest offenders in this regard. Sure, it can't heal off damage with Regenerator like the Slowtwins, Tornadus-T, or Toxapex can, but (at the risk of repeating myself) it makes up for this with a near-unique ability to completely avoid taking direct damage under any circumstances beyond its players control that, when combined with there being next to no scenario where it would actually have its Boots knocked off in the hands of a competent player, makes it borderline impossible to pressure and leaves it in a state of having no real competitive flaws—anything that comes close to constituting one can be circumvented without making a single compromise either at builder level or gameplay level all while being dirt easy to use. Its offensive typing doesn't have any gaping holes like with Zeraora, which can similarly avoid ever taking any damage once Volt Switch sponges have been Toxic'd and/or had their items knocked off, and its team matchup spread is among the most positively polarising in the game (it's competent in basically every matchup and has completely dominating positive matchups, especially versus offence) and is arguably the most constrictive offensive threat in the format, with the only really debatable competition coming from Pokemon like Garchomp, Kartana, Shifu-R, Lele, and Kyurem, which (aside from maybe Kartana) all have more readily-exploitable flaws such as… not outpacing the whole unboosted metagame.

====================

I'll leave this post here, but for what it's worth I think this metagame is held together by selotape and, while I won't go into more detail as this isn't the right thread for it, I think Zamazenta does nothing but exacerbate that issue. I won't go into more detail now because I can't be arsed and don't want to distract from the elephant in the room above, but I think we need to seriously take a look at the metagame we have and ask ourselves whether this power level is ideal and whether we are happy to continue playing a metagame that, while stable, I don't think is in a healthy state. The key presences that I, personally, think we need to step back and ask serious questions about are as follows:
  • Dragapult (obviously)
  • Toxapex
  • Kartana
This list is not an exhaustive list of metagame threats, and I realise that their removal will shift the power level that feels overbearing, but I think that at the very least these three warp the metagame's power level upwards to an unhealthy degree. I don't personally have any issue with the Slowtwins and think they are a product of their surroundings rather than the reverse, but at the very least I think it is a good discussion to have.
You make a well thought out argument. On one hand, every meta going back forever has a best offensive mon. It's undoubtedly Dragapult this gen and it really can do anything. There are games when I just lose something every time specs Dragapult comes in and I have to go rebuild. I think there are certain aspects of Dragapult that are very healthy - having a strong and fast Infiltrator is really a net positive for the tier imo. On the other hand, SpD Heatran isn't really much of a long term check and SpD Clef is always one special defense drop away from your whole team collapsing. Physical sets are also scary and prey on meta trends and while you can kind of guess what they are running based on how weak their team is to Volcorona, it's always a toss up.
 

Finchinator

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I do not view Dragapult as currently broken, but the Specs variant has limited offensive counterplay and it may grow even thinner if Zamazenta-Crowned is unbanned. It may be a Pokemon to keep on our radar as the tier continues to evolve, but I do not currently view it as suspect worthy. That is absolutely subject to change though.

Also, physical sets are poor, in my opinion.
 
I do not view Dragapult as currently broken, but the Specs variant has limited offensive counterplay and it may grow even thinner if Zamazenta-Crowned is unbanned. It may be a Pokemon to keep on our radar as the tier continues to evolve, but I do not currently view it as suspect worthy. That is absolutely subject to change though.

Also, physical sets are poor, in my opinion.
Can I ask why exactly you think pult isn't 'suspect worthy'? As you said specs has limited offensive counterplay. And Martin quite clearly outlined in his post that pult's defensive counterplay is limited as well. And most of the stuff that is reliable e.g. mandibuzz is easily exploited with team support.

I mean, you read the post and he makes a lot of valid points imo, so like, what exactly makes you disagree? And if you don't disagree, how is what Martin stated not suspect worthy?
 
I strongly agree that King's Rock should be banned. It makes the game less competitive, since it's pure RNG, and has no real counterplay, especially for slow teams that cannot hope to outspeed the opposing King's Rock user. For example, here's a replay of me using it against stall. I turned my brain off and hoped for good RNG, and eventually I got it.

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1327609999-a44pc6qn5yjehikrb20518s4m6lu83vpw
 

pulsar512b

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I agree that king's rock should be banned. As mentioned elsewhere (in this thread and the other one), other similar RNG-based aspects with similar preventions of opponent action, such as Sand Veil, Bright Powder, and Lax Incense (and similar) deserve a good ban as well. Serene Grace is a bit trickier, but I would be ok with both keeping and removing it. My main concern with that is that pokemon with only Serene Grace as possible abilities (as of present, Meloetta, Jirachi, and Shaymin-Sky) would be collateral, which.. yeah. Not good. Probably just based on that, Serene Grace shouldn't be banned.
 
Feeling pretty mixed on banning King's Rock, honestly. I agree that the item is uncompetitive in nature, but the issue is that I find it a bit inconsistent to ban King's Rock while keeping moves that can cause flinch, such as Rock Slide and Iron Head, still in the game. Just to go over some math, King's Rock grants each hit of Cloyster's attacks a 10% chance to flinch. In total, this gives Cloyster roughly a 41% chance to cause the opposing mon to flinch. What exactly warrants a 41% chance to cause the opposing mon to flinch to be banned, but a 30% chance to do the same to be left alone? Just to give a comparable situation, say instead of Cloyster, we are looking at Rock Slide Barbaracle. When faced against common checks, both Cloyster and Barbaracle would need to get a flinch in order to muscle their way through. Is a 41% chance to overbearing, but a 30% chance is just fine? Let us also consider the scenarios where 2 consecutive flinches would be required to muscle their way through even sturdier walls. Cloyster, relying on a 41% chance to flinch per turn, would have a ~17% chance to achieve two consecutive flinches. To compare, Rock Slide Barbaracle, relying on a 30% chance to flinch per turn, would have a 9% chance to do the same. Overall, this is a difference of 8%, and it is difficult for me to consider Skill Link + King's Rock too uncompetitive for the tier when there are still other moves and items that can be deemed as uncompetitive. Essentially, where does one draw the line? I am of the opinion that it would make more sense to address RNG-reliant items, moves, and strategies collectively. Banning King's Rock by itself and then potentially looking at other related issues just seems inefficient and even a tad arbitrary to me.

Edit: In hindsight, using Barbaracle as a comparison probably isn't the best way to get my point across, but there are still a plethora of other, more relevant examples that could be used as comparisons. Just to give one that makes more sense in the context of OU, Swords Dance Bisharp is able to fish for flinches with Iron Head against common switch-ins hoping to check Bisharp, such as Hippowdon, Tangrowth, and Mandibuzz, beating them in the process.
 
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Feeling pretty mixed on banning King's Rock, honestly. I agree that the item is uncompetitive in nature, but the issue is that I find it a bit inconsistent to ban King's Rock while keeping moves that can cause flinch, such as Rock Slide and Iron Head, still in the game. Just to go over some math, King's Rock grants each hit of Cloyster's attacks a 10% chance to flinch. In total, this gives Cloyster roughly a 41% chance to cause the opposing mon to flinch. What exactly warrants a 41% chance to cause the opposing mon to flinch to be banned, but a 30% chance to do the same to be left alone? Just to give a comparable situation, say instead of Cloyster, we are looking at Rock Slide Barbaracle. When faced against common checks, both Cloyster and Barbaracle would need to get a flinch in order to muscle their way through. Is a 41% chance to overbearing, but a 30% chance is just fine? Let us also consider the scenarios where 2 consecutive flinches would be required to muscle their way through even sturdier walls. Cloyster, relying on a 41% chance to flinch per turn, would have a ~17% chance to achieve two consecutive flinches. To compare, Rock Slide Barbaracle, relying on a 30% chance to flinch per turn, would have a 9% chance to do the same. Overall, this is a difference of 8%, and it is difficult for me to consider Skill Link + King's Rock too uncompetitive for the tier when there are still other moves and items that can be deemed as uncompetitive. Essentially, where does one draw the line? I am of the opinion that it would make more sense to address RNG-reliant items, moves, and strategies collectively. Banning King's Rock by itself and then potentially looking at other related issues just seems inefficient and even a tad arbitrary to me.
I agree to some extent, although 11% is still a nominal increase in flinch chance, which should be noted. You fail to mention, also, that barbaracle has a lot less bulk, making it easier to take out, has a lot worse typing, and that rock slide is a lot less powerful than icicle spear. Even so, I think you make a valid argument that it should be more consistent. No one likes to get flinch haxed, and taking away one item and not others such as serene grace or rock slide is annoying and inconsistent.
 

Any real defense of Kings Rock has to use a slippery slope fallacy to bring up Togekiss and Jirachi and other softer hax. Any line that is drawn is ultimately arbitrary, such is tiering. Why is the speed limit 65 and not 66? If at a later date much of the player base hates those elements too, they can be acted upon. You know bullshit when you see it - Kings Rock is peak bullshit. It's more consistent than clicking a single double team which is also banned. This is the most bipartisan issue in Smogon history, everyone hates kings rock.
 

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