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Metagame SV OU Metagame Discussion
- Thread starter TPP
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As of right now (post-Palafin/Mega Delibird ban), with Terastall being the next big topic on the radar, should we expect future tiering actions to be based on suspect tests?
Of course, any future decisions will be significantly impacted by whatever happens with Terastall, but I'd be interested to know whether there are current plans for any additional waves of quickban voting in the coming weeks or if the council feels that banning Palafin/Iron Bundle takes care of any egregiously broken mons.
Of course, any future decisions will be significantly impacted by whatever happens with Terastall, but I'd be interested to know whether there are current plans for any additional waves of quickban voting in the coming weeks or if the council feels that banning Palafin/Iron Bundle takes care of any egregiously broken mons.
Can replays be provided of Eviolite Primeape doing the same / similar things that Annihilape? This will be very important to prove that Rage Fist, and not Annihilape is a problem.
with Pala and Bundle gone, who do people think are the biggest winners and the biggest losers? Stall and fat genuinely takes a bit of a hit, it loses two very good wincons and a lot of stallier mons are going to be threatened by the uptick of fire types and sweepers. Garganacl and Amoonguss also both lost a big reason to be ran in Palafin.
As for winners, I gotta say, it's the teambuilder. There isn't really anything else that demands as much extensive prep as those two did, even things that can blow you the fuck up like Dragonite, Roaring Moon, Gholdengo, Annihilape, etc can be mostly countered by good teambuilding and don't require specific checks. Non meme answer, Chi Yu and Great Tusk, which were already great, just lost two things that beat the shit out of them, and seem poised to become the two major offensive mons. Tusk in particular I am very excited to try in a metagame without Jet Punch.
Good bans! Get their broken asses outta here
I wonder if they will also test the Terastal of some Pokémon. Although, the only Pokémon with two 4x weaknesses that is currently available is Frosmoth. Maybe Home will bring more of them.
Now it's the Duck's time to shine
One of my team's has Palafin on it. Which Water-type should I replace him with? Azumarill?
Moxie quaquaval is looking really good now
Quaquaval, is my opinion. Serves a pretty similar function.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but does't Quaquaval get Jet Punch too correct?
It gets Aqua Jet. A little weaker, but the priority is still there and is always useful.
Is this set good?
Quaquaval @ Leftovers
Ability: Moxie
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Aqua Step
- Bulk Up
- Close Combat
- Ice Spinner
Don't have much to post but here is a slightly rushed list of winners of recent actions:
Again, im surprised on why not a single council member voted on this mon. It is arguably more stupid than every other mon other than the water type bros with its high speed tier and ability to eviserate teams, and bulky mons just get stomped on by terastal. This guy is very likely the next to go, one of its biggest hurdles in Palafin is gone and not having to deal with the other ice type faster than it is also nice, which makes counterplay to it become more limited.
No more water type competition means this fella becomes the premier offensive water type in the tier. Is is quite solid in its ability to steamroll teams especially with tera but should in theory be somewhat easier to deal with.
This is a image representation of what happens when this thing outspeeds your mons:
Not having the 2 most concerning water types that outspeed and kill it makes choiced sets way stronger, definitely a guy that is going a bit under the radar.
does similarly enjoys that water types that outspeed it are becoming rarer.
Less offensive water types means less things these things ever need to worry about.
Again, im surprised on why not a single council member voted on this mon. It is arguably more stupid than every other mon other than the water type bros with its high speed tier and ability to eviserate teams, and bulky mons just get stomped on by terastal. This guy is very likely the next to go, one of its biggest hurdles in Palafin is gone and not having to deal with the other ice type faster than it is also nice, which makes counterplay to it become more limited. No more water type competition means this fella becomes the premier offensive water type in the tier. Is is quite solid in its ability to steamroll teams especially with tera but should in theory be somewhat easier to deal with.This is a image representation of what happens when this thing outspeeds your mons:Not having the 2 most concerning water types that outspeed and kill it makes choiced sets way stronger, definitely a guy that is going a bit under the radar.
does similarly enjoys that water types that outspeed it are becoming rarer. Less offensive water types means less things these things ever need to worry about.
Very happy to see Palafin go. That thing was not OK.
I'm shocked at the push to ban the ape though. I don't know, maybe it's my team counters it or something, but I'm never really worried about it.
It has no priority moves, so there's always a chance to revenge it with a strong enough attacker. For example, Choice Band Meowscarada can one shot it if you Tera Grass Flower Trick. It can do 70-80% without the tera no matter how many bulk up boosts it got up first. It straight up dies if it already became a water type. You can get a fast Choice Specs holder to crush it every time too, doing 70-80% even with its great bulk.
It can get worn down with statuses too now that we know that it doesn't trigger Rage Fist, and yes it can rest the damage off, but that only works once and forces it to waste a turn where it can get pressured down into death. The thing to remember about it is that its physically not THAT bulky until it starts stacking Bulk Ups.
I've also heard complaints that it severely hurts the effectiveness of stall and makes that set up unviable, and to that I say GOOD. Weakening Stall makes the meta healthier, and is unambiguously a good thing.
I think we need a bit more time with it before we decide to dump this monkey.
I'm shocked at the push to ban the ape though. I don't know, maybe it's my team counters it or something, but I'm never really worried about it.
It has no priority moves, so there's always a chance to revenge it with a strong enough attacker. For example, Choice Band Meowscarada can one shot it if you Tera Grass Flower Trick. It can do 70-80% without the tera no matter how many bulk up boosts it got up first. It straight up dies if it already became a water type. You can get a fast Choice Specs holder to crush it every time too, doing 70-80% even with its great bulk.
It can get worn down with statuses too now that we know that it doesn't trigger Rage Fist, and yes it can rest the damage off, but that only works once and forces it to waste a turn where it can get pressured down into death. The thing to remember about it is that its physically not THAT bulky until it starts stacking Bulk Ups.
I've also heard complaints that it severely hurts the effectiveness of stall and makes that set up unviable, and to that I say GOOD. Weakening Stall makes the meta healthier, and is unambiguously a good thing.
I think we need a bit more time with it before we decide to dump this monkey.
Since we're approaching the end of the month, are we getting usage stats in early December? If so, does that mean we'll have the rough OU/UU cutoff then?
Which Pokémon do well with a Weakness Policy?
So
The winners I'd say are quaquaval, chien-pao (new fastest non-pult viable mon), and glimmora (pala taunt lead hurts glim). Weed Cat loses something it can counter, but also loses a mon that outspeeds it, so I'd say it's neutral. Losers I'd say include dondozo, bonnet (which was practically nonexistant already), tera water / grass mons, and clodsire. Also, lots of other mons would be able to work without bundle existing so that's nice.
It gets moxie, it doesn't need bulk up.
See ya, Palafin and Iron Bundle.
These two just got a whole lot better.
Let's start with Chi-Yu. With Iron Bundle and Palafin around, most Chi-Yu had to run Scarf and Tera Water/Grass. Even then, both had their ways around Scarf Chi-Yu - Jet Punch always does a lot, even resisted, and speed boosting IB with Scarf or Agility was easy enough for some teams. The hazard vulnerability was also a huge problem in a hazard-centric metagame. Scarf Chi-Yu will still have a place with its insane power and good speed, but now it can more comfortably run Specs and HDB sets with offensive Tera types. I've seen the latter with Taunt + 3 attacks or dual STAB + NP recently, and it can just demolish unprepared slower teams. Chi-Yu is one to watch.
Chien-Pao faced a lot of opportunity cost with IB in the tier, as IB outspeeds it and achieves neutral coverage with its STABs, which are coming off the special side in a mostly physical metagame. Palafin was less of an issue for Chien-Pao, but the dolphin was a decent check at full or if it got up a BU or two. With these two gone, however, Chien-Pao stands as the fastest unboosted Pokemon in the tier aside from Dragapult with a bunch of great options to back up its admittedly weak STABs in Sacred Sword, Taunt, and SD. I don't really think we have seen all this Pokemon can do yet, so I am excited to see how it develops without IB/Palafin.
Next, there are four walls (and several others) that really suffered at the hands of Palafin and/or Iron Bundle. Clodsire is now much more flexible in that it is no longer as pressured to run Water Absorb with a defensive Tera Type. I think Unaware is handily the better set now, which bodes well in a tier full of threatening sweepers. Dondozo usage was already on the rise, but it should continue to do so with the recent bans as Palafin and IB both beat most variants of Dondozo one on one. Clodsire + Dondozo seems like a very threatening Unaware combo right now. With both IB and Palafin running Taunt most of the time, Toxapex and Corviknight often struggled to stay healthy enough to maintain their status as checks. While these two and Clodsire + Dondozo still have to look out for threats like Chi-Yu/Chien-Pao and the looming Annihilape, I think all four got better with the Palafin/IB ban.
Choice Scarf Gholdengo stocks plummet as Air Balloon lifts the controversial cheese stick man off the ground. Scarf is still good, but one of its primary objectives was to force out IB and maybe tank an ice attack or two. Palafin was also very oppressive for Gholdengo in general as it could easily tank an attack or two and KO it with Jet Punch with some prior damage. With these two gone, I am wondering if Gholdengo will be able make use of more defensive sets thanks to its great typing and strong movepool. These sets could even serve as a wincon in some cases with Recover + NP + status immunity. There are several potential stopping points for Gholdengo though as we are likely to see the usage of the aforementioned Chi-Yu and Chien-Pao rise in addition to the already rising usage of bulky Garchomp/Great Tusk/Iron Treads.
Most generations start off pretty offensive, and rain as a playstyle usually fits right into that, but that hasn't necessarily been the case this generation. IB typically ran Tera Water, allowing it to easily tank a hit from Barraskewda and KO back with Freeze Dry. Rain powered up Palafin's Jet Punch to even more astronomical levels. The best rain teams I have seen thus far actually utilized IB and Palafin themselves, but it still came down to whether the rain player could outplay the opposing Palafin/IB. Given how offensive the metagame is at the moment, I expect we will start to see even more rain teams, especially those featuring Barraskewda.
Everything Else
I honestly can't think of much that loses out with these bans. Maybe something like Meowscarada or certain Tera forms of Garganacl? Even then, Palafin and Iron Bundle were such oppressive forces in the metagame that I think virtually everything appreciates their bans. I also agree with the sentiment that most of the egregious problems have been removed from the metagame, and that the remaining potential bans (Annilihape) hinge somewhat on a decision on Terastallization. I am looking forward to the PR thread and the resulting discussion.
These two just got a whole lot better.
Let's start with Chi-Yu. With Iron Bundle and Palafin around, most Chi-Yu had to run Scarf and Tera Water/Grass. Even then, both had their ways around Scarf Chi-Yu - Jet Punch always does a lot, even resisted, and speed boosting IB with Scarf or Agility was easy enough for some teams. The hazard vulnerability was also a huge problem in a hazard-centric metagame. Scarf Chi-Yu will still have a place with its insane power and good speed, but now it can more comfortably run Specs and HDB sets with offensive Tera types. I've seen the latter with Taunt + 3 attacks or dual STAB + NP recently, and it can just demolish unprepared slower teams. Chi-Yu is one to watch.
Chien-Pao faced a lot of opportunity cost with IB in the tier, as IB outspeeds it and achieves neutral coverage with its STABs, which are coming off the special side in a mostly physical metagame. Palafin was less of an issue for Chien-Pao, but the dolphin was a decent check at full or if it got up a BU or two. With these two gone, however, Chien-Pao stands as the fastest unboosted Pokemon in the tier aside from Dragapult with a bunch of great options to back up its admittedly weak STABs in Sacred Sword, Taunt, and SD. I don't really think we have seen all this Pokemon can do yet, so I am excited to see how it develops without IB/Palafin.
Next, there are four walls (and several others) that really suffered at the hands of Palafin and/or Iron Bundle. Clodsire is now much more flexible in that it is no longer as pressured to run Water Absorb with a defensive Tera Type. I think Unaware is handily the better set now, which bodes well in a tier full of threatening sweepers. Dondozo usage was already on the rise, but it should continue to do so with the recent bans as Palafin and IB both beat most variants of Dondozo one on one. Clodsire + Dondozo seems like a very threatening Unaware combo right now. With both IB and Palafin running Taunt most of the time, Toxapex and Corviknight often struggled to stay healthy enough to maintain their status as checks. While these two and Clodsire + Dondozo still have to look out for threats like Chi-Yu/Chien-Pao and the looming Annihilape, I think all four got better with the Palafin/IB ban.
Choice Scarf Gholdengo stocks plummet as Air Balloon lifts the controversial cheese stick man off the ground. Scarf is still good, but one of its primary objectives was to force out IB and maybe tank an ice attack or two. Palafin was also very oppressive for Gholdengo in general as it could easily tank an attack or two and KO it with Jet Punch with some prior damage. With these two gone, I am wondering if Gholdengo will be able make use of more defensive sets thanks to its great typing and strong movepool. These sets could even serve as a wincon in some cases with Recover + NP + status immunity. There are several potential stopping points for Gholdengo though as we are likely to see the usage of the aforementioned Chi-Yu and Chien-Pao rise in addition to the already rising usage of bulky Garchomp/Great Tusk/Iron Treads.
Most generations start off pretty offensive, and rain as a playstyle usually fits right into that, but that hasn't necessarily been the case this generation. IB typically ran Tera Water, allowing it to easily tank a hit from Barraskewda and KO back with Freeze Dry. Rain powered up Palafin's Jet Punch to even more astronomical levels. The best rain teams I have seen thus far actually utilized IB and Palafin themselves, but it still came down to whether the rain player could outplay the opposing Palafin/IB. Given how offensive the metagame is at the moment, I expect we will start to see even more rain teams, especially those featuring Barraskewda.
Everything Else
I honestly can't think of much that loses out with these bans. Maybe something like Meowscarada or certain Tera forms of Garganacl? Even then, Palafin and Iron Bundle were such oppressive forces in the metagame that I think virtually everything appreciates their bans. I also agree with the sentiment that most of the egregious problems have been removed from the metagame, and that the remaining potential bans (Annilihape) hinge somewhat on a decision on Terastallization. I am looking forward to the PR thread and the resulting discussion.
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Not sure where to put this, but for those of us who like playing on physical game, it would be nice if we could all agree on a room code for 6v6 OU like we did back in BDSP. Spread the word. Its extremely frustrating to play online right now. In BDSP it was clean, and 90% of all the people that I faced had decent teams that respected smogon's rules. You would see the occasional banned Gengar, but no legendaries ever.
I'd def add Ting Lu to list of things that got better. It's one of the few things that can come in on Gholdengo and Chi Yu, threaten them out and make progress through ruinination, getitng up hazards or ww. It felt really difficult to fit on teams before just because it was weak to the two premiere threats in the tier. Probably see a rise of Gholdengo + Ting Lu hazard teams
Gholdengo hazard stack will become meta. It's all getting banned all the way down. Quickbans are being abused to shit this gen and it's honestly really irresponsible/disappointing. The point of a quick ban should be to make an obvious ban that otherwise leaves people playing a shit meta not worth wasting time suspect testing. But the clear lack of unanimity just shows this is selective top level pruning. I predict chien pao is getting the boot next. Also it's incredible that things got banned BEFORE palafin.
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