Oh God, not another Wobbuffet discussion!

[ULra]

Now, my first post was pretty half-assed. I'll go into a more complex analysis now. Defensive stats of 190/58/58. Weakness to Dark, Ghost, and Bug, two of which are very common and one of which is decently common. The basic requirement of running a Wish Pokemon with Wobbuffet is a bit of a let down. It almost doesn't seem worth it, all you gain is the possibility of a free switch or of a KO, which I can achieve one of with something as simple as Encoring Jumpluff and the other with Dugtrio. Like I said earlier, Wobbuffet hasn't given me much trouble. But, I have only faced lead Wobbuffets, which got shut down easily by my Jumpluff.

People are claiming that Wobbuffet regresses the metagame into the Stone Age, saying all you must do is pick a move and cross your fingers. It is much more than simply that. You must, as with anything, predict when it is safe to send Wobbuffet in. Then, with Pokemon such as Lucario, Infernape, and Salamence, you have to either have prior knowledge of their movesets, or get lucky and pick the right one the first time. I doubt Wobbuffet can take very many Crunches from Lucario, Flamethrowers/Fire Blasts from Infernape, or Draco Meteors/Dragon Pulses from Salamence.

Wobbuffet does provide advantages as well. Belly Drummers thank the guaranteed free switch, but that also means you are inclined to run a Drummer, who are vulnerable to things as common as Status, Stealth Rock, and Spikes. These same Belly Drummers can be set up with Jumpluff or other Encorers. Even Stunsleepers are easily passable to assist Belly Drummers.

The fact of it is, Belly Drummers set up easily, but they all have their barriers. Charizard is walled by Suicune, who takes a maximum 60% from Fire Punch. All that is needed is a priority move and Suicune to stop it. Linoone has trouble with steel types in general, as the standard runs Shadow Claw/Extremespeed/Belly Drum/Filler move. Hariyama is very slow and the set just doesn't work.

There are better options believe it or not. I would run something such as CBcross over Wobbuffet any day. All CBcross needs is Paralysis support and clearance of Ghosts. Wobbuffet needs Wish support, a Rapid Spinner, and perhaps a Belly Drummer to function well. You are basically basing your team on Wobbuffet. And why? To get a free turn or a free KO over a sweep.

Wobbuffet's shift to OU really makes sense to me. If you aren't running something that can stop/stall Wobbuffet, you're running the wrong team. Wobbuffet is just another Specsmence or Blissey. Which actually makes me want to go deeper into the faults of the arguments posted here.

"Nothing can swap into Wobbuffet." Nothing can swap into Blissey either. Obviously, things can swap into it, but what I mean is if you swap a Blissey counter into Blissey, are you going to expect your opponent to keep Blissey in? No. They are going to swap out. Blissey comes in freely on ANY special attacker, forces a switch, and gets a free turn. Sounds like Wobbuffet doesn't it? Does Blissey deserve Uber status? In some people's eyes, yes. In Smogon's eyes, not so much.

Back to a previous subject, running the right team. 100% of the Wobbuffets I have seen are leads, what are most lead Pokemon? Sleepers or Sweepers. My preference is toward the sleepers, which allows the shut down of a Pokemon posthaste. Sweepers are easily walled, Weavile by Forretress, Salamence by Blissey, etc. If you have to swap from running a lead sweeper to a lead sleeper, you were playing the inferior in the first place.

I really suck at ending long-winded speeches, so I'll revert to second grade logic.

THE END

Cue the barrage of people pointing out my argument's flaws.

 

[DiamondDust]

What im really looking for is, are you for or against wobb being in OU?

oh and from my experiences on shoddy battle, half of all leads are sleepers and sweepers. on wifi, 90% of all leads are sweepers. i believe wobbufett would be even more of an annoyance in wifi, because we all know that the wifi metagame is much different than that of shoddy.

so, i am against wobbufett being in OU. that isnt my full arguement of why it should stay in the uber bucket but many other people have already stated it. its just too good. it gets you a free revenge kill and sometimes a setup. though we already have functioning pokemon like that i feel wobb is more powered than them. oh and if your wobb packs destiny bond its basically 2 free ko's.

also i must say, sweepers can function perfectly as well as sleepers. my scarf togekiss pulls of sweeps usually even when people have counters for it.

 

[Hunter_RuLe]

Wobbuffet's shift to OU really makes sense to me.

He is for.

People need to stop using Wobbuffet as lead, TTar, TauntDos and sleepers make it not that great. I'm using Wobba in my lastest team, but not a lead. Good use of wobbuffet (more than just 1 kill) requires much support like wish/aromatherapy and u-turn. Statuppers and Perish Trapping work with it aswell. However, as Obi said, Wobba needs support to be a major theat to your team. He isn't much different than say Garchomp. Wobba always makes one pokemon fall, but he always fills one slot too. Every good team makes sure Wobba can't do much after that one kill (Pursuit/Sleep/Taunt/Uturn/ect.), and many choice users can 2hko it now making him much more difficult to switch in.

Wobbuffet is good, and unprepared teams fall against him. But these teams fall to threats like Garchomp, Infernape or Breloom aswell, so Wobbuffet doesn't need to be Uber. When everyone is gonna use him, people will use things like Dugtrio, Spiritomb and TTar much too, making him less popular. Sweeper leads will just become less popular than sleepers, thats how the metagame works, it changes as new theats come in. Wobbuffet changes the metagame, but he doesnt break it imo.

 

[DiamondDust]

i dont believe we should let one pokemon in if it will change the whole metagame. deoxys-speed, coming into the metagame, didnt change it dramatically. it hardly changed it at all. anything that can take a hit counters is, swampert mainly.

so my point is, why change the whole metagame just so we can get used to one pokemon?

 

[c l e a r]

He is for.

People need to stop using Wobbuffet as lead, TTar, TauntDos and sleepers make it not that great. I'm using Wobba in my lastest team, but not a lead. Good use of wobbuffet (more than just 1 kill) requires much support like wish/aromatherapy and u-turn. Statuppers and Perish Trapping work with it aswell. However, as Obi said, Wobba needs support to be a major theat to your team. He isn't much different than say Garchomp. Wobba always makes one pokemon fall, but he always fills one slot too. Every good team makes sure Wobba can't do much after that one kill (Pursuit/Sleep/Taunt/Uturn/ect.), and many choice users can 2hko it now making him much more difficult to switch in.

Wobbuffet is good, and unprepared teams fall against him. But these teams fall to threats like Garchomp, Infernape or Breloom aswell, so Wobbuffet doesn't need to be Uber. When everyone is gonna use him, people will use things like Dugtrio, Spiritomb and TTar much too, making him less popular. Sweeper leads will just become less popular than sleepers, thats how the metagame works, it changes as new theats come in. Wobbuffet changes the metagame, but he doesnt break it imo.

I am using Wobbuffet right now not as lead, but backed up by 2 Wishers and Aromatherapy. It may not be the best thing in the world, but it is guaranteed to get something out. As soon as he gets a Wall like Bronzong or Blissey stuck, it's over if I can set Bellyzard up, unless they have something that carries Focus Sash or Sucker Punch.

I think I was the first one to say to AA that it is an absurd idea to lead with it. I did a lot with it last night on Shoddy, usually helping setting up Bellyzard and then in late game, trap a sweeper and take it down. It's just too damn good.

A lot more people are finally seeing this the right way now, it's a good thing. You just haven't actually seen how easy it is to set it up.

 

[Articanus]

Gengar @ Life Orb
Levitate: Hasty
128 Attack, 252 Speed, 128 Sp. Attack
Shadow Ball
Hypnosis
Perish Song
Explosion

Just use Perish song and almost immediantly bring in Wobbufett. Pure Evil.

 

[Jumpman16]

that set needs mean look to be effective or they will just switch as soon as you use PS

 

[Mario With Lasers]

...Encored my Block until i died from Struggle...yeah,dumb like that

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought Encore couldn't force Struggle? I mean, once the move's PP ends, Encore should end too, no?

 

[Bologo]

i dont believe we should let one pokemon in if it will change the whole metagame. deoxys-speed, coming into the metagame, didnt change it dramatically. it hardly changed it at all. anything that can take a hit counters is, swampert mainly.

so my point is, why change the whole metagame just so we can get used to one pokemon?

What's so bad about change in the metagame? If the metagame slightly changes to get used to one pokemon, you may see that other banned pokemon are not so much of a challenge either, bringing them into the metagame, but since you get used to the change that Wobbuffet brought, the others may not give that much of a change after, therefore allowing for more balance.

 

[BrazilianDragonite]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought Encore couldn't force Struggle? I mean, once the move's PP ends, Encore should end too, no?

Maybe not on Shoddy...i don't know...what i remember is just being encored to death.

 

[Lee]

Bologo, I know you love anything that can Encore, but I'm surprised that you're so defensive of a Pokemon that throws prediction out of the window.

Ultimately, I think Wobba has the potential to lead to the death of the Choice Items. I'll have my CB Gallade in, and glance at the opponents remaining Pokemon to see which move to pick. I know that if I pick any move other than Night Slash, I'm easy pickings for Wobbufet. But unfortunately, Night Slash is Gallade's weakest move.

The same could be said for any Choice user who's primary attack isn't super effective on Wobbufet. No matter how well you predict, he WILL get you.

And I think that's a tragedy, because I love the prediction mind games that Choice items encourage.

 

[TheMaskedNitpicker]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought Encore couldn't force Struggle? I mean, once the move's PP ends, Encore should end too, no?

True. I tested this. If an Encored move runs out of PP, the Encore ends at the end of that turn.

Masked Nitpicker...away!!!

EDIT: If this is not the case on Shoddy, then it needs to be fixed immediately. It makes Wobbuffet even more powerful if this limit is not in place.

Other things that make Wobbuffet more powerful on Shoddy than it should be: If I'm reading the code right, Payback requires you to get hit in Shoddy in order to double the power. This means that a user of Payback does less damage on a predicted Wobbuffet switch-in than it otherwise would.

Also, I have no idea if this is in place or not, but Counter and Mirror Coat should only reflect back damage from the last hit of a multi-hit attack. Rock Blast is a powerful tool against Wobbuffet (not to mention any Charizard switch-in). Somebody should check that this is implemented correctly.

 

[BrazilianDragonite]

True. I tested this. If an Encored move runs out of PP, the Encore ends at the end of that turn.

Masked Nitpicker...away!!!

EDIT: If this is not the case on Shoddy, then it needs to be fixed immediately. It makes Wobbuffet even more powerful if this limit is not in place.

I know that's probably a simple question...but can struggle be encored?Because Bastiodon is slower,and Wobby just encored me after the PP ended.

 

[Bologo]

Bologo, I know you love anything that can Encore, but I'm surprised that you're so defensive of a Pokemon that throws prediction out of the window.

Heh, I know it's ironic. I am quite an heavy user of Dugtrio who also doesn't require any predicition though. I just love the combo of Trap + Encore!

I really wouldn't be so defensive about Wobbuffet being allowed if I never faced one before though. It did Encore my Stealth Rock form Claydol, but I still pulled through with my prediction.

I'll agree that Wobbuffet doesn't need much prediction to use, especially against Choice users, but it does force me to predict when I'm using everything else.

Really, I did kinda turn my back on the Darkrai argument going from for Darkrai in OU, to being neutral on the subject, but that was because some of the arguments convinced me in that thread.

However, a lot of the arguments I've been seeing for Wobbuffet being in uber seem to be implying that the Wobbuffet user is a superhuman telepathic that can predict perfectly which move the opponent is going to use, and that Wobbuffet is always going to do the correct move no matter what. That's obviously not the case unless it's against a Choice user.

I personally like the fact that it'll discourage rampant Choice users anyway. Perhaps this means a drop in those extremely annoying SpecsMences and CB/CS Garchomps and such. I can't say that those use an incredible amount of prediction either.

EDIT: I'm facing more Wobbuffets, but they're still not giving me any problems. I'm getting more pissed off at Rain teams. -.-

 

[TheMaskedNitpicker]

I know that's probably a simple question...but can struggle be encored?Because Bastiodon is slower,and Wobby just encored me after the PP ended.

This isn't exactly what you asked, but I think it's what you meant.

Pokémon X is Encored into Move Y which has 1 PP left.

Wobbuffet uses Safeguard.
Pokémon X uses move Y.
Pokémon X's Encore ended.

Wobbuffet uses Encore.
But it failed!

^This is how it works in-game. A move with 0 PP left cannot be Encored.

Whether Struggle can be Encored once it's actually used, I don't know. My guess would be no.

EDIT:

I personally like the fact that it'll discourage rampant Choice users anyway. Perhaps this means a drop in those extremely annoying SpecsMences and CB/CS Garchomps and such. I can't say that those use an incredible amount of prediction either.

Hear, hear! Choice items are very powerful and one of the limits on this power is Wobbuffet. A metagame without Wobbuffet will naturally be more offense-based because of the removal of this limiting factor.

 

[Jiggy-Ninja]

Hear, hear! Choice items are very powerful and one of the limits on this power is Wobbuffet. A metagame without Wobbuffet will naturally be more offense-based because of the removal of this limiting factor.

The thing is though, Wobbuffet can simulate the downside of a Choice Item with Encore, and you don't get any of the boost.

 

[DiamondDust]

i think what he is saying is if you have 2 PP and they use encore, does your encore end. it seems you answered his question without the intention of answering it the way you did.

 

[Bologo]

The thing is though, Wobbuffet can simulate the downside of a Choice Item with Encore, and you don't get any of the boost.

Yeah, but then Wobbuffet's most likely to switch out if it Encores something that wasn't an attack. Then you're free to switch too, though the opponent does get a free turn, but many things besides Wobbuffet can give free turns.

If Wobbuffet Encores the wrong move, eg. predicts sub on Breloom, but gets spored instead, it's screwed.

Encore's a great move, but it really has a lot of risk with it.

 

[TheMaskedNitpicker]

The thing is though, Wobbuffet can simulate the downside of a Choice Item with Encore, and you don't get any of the boost.

Ah, but that's different. With a Choice Item, the Pokémon cannot switch and is forced to continue using the move it used last turn (before Wobbuffet showed up). Without the Choice Item, the Pokémon has the opportunity to switch the move it's using as long as it's faster than Wobbuffet. Also, Wobbuffet must take a turn to use Encore, meaning that there is an element of prediction.

 

[Lord Alchemy]

It turns out that on February 2nd (the only day you played with Wobbuffet), you were the only person who used a team consisting of Charizard, Umbreon, Crobat, Gyarados, Electivire, and Wobbuffet, so I was able to figure out your user name and count the number of times you won with this team. It turns out that out of 38 matches, you won 24, or 63% of your matches. I suppose this is fairly impressive but there are many people who win more matches using different teams.

Given your statements I was expecting at least 90% win rate or something, but I would question if even that would prove much. There are probably people who do have a daily 90% win rate on the ladder and have on their team, say, Garchomp. That does not necessarily mean Garchomp is broken. However, if one of the only ways to win is with Wobbuffet (we could call this centralisation) that would be more suggestive of him being broken. 90% might might suggested this was the case, but certainly not 63%. Hopefully we will be able to see if this is the case in a couple of weeks or whenever we do an analysis of the testing period's battles. We will also definitively see if the number of viable pokemon has contracted, or if the number of viable moves has (it's been possible to do a move analysis for a while, but I never got around to it).

Did you also read the part where I threw the team together in 2 minutes? If you ask me, unless I was playing the biggest scrubs in the world, I should have won less then 50% of those matches. Thats the problem with Wobby.

That team was thrown together quickly and has massive problems. Rhyperior is basically a GG if it packs Megahorn, Stone Edge, and EQ. Also keep in mind that I've never used any of those Pokemon before. EVER. This means I forget about Motor Drive, and make stupid mistakes when switching in Umby and the like only to end up losing a big part of my team. Also notice I have no way to deal with spikes of any kind (Stealth Rocks hurts a ton), and no phazer.

Yet you don't think a shit team made in 2 minutes winning 63% of its matches is bad. HMMMMMM.

Also, when the consider the fact that most of the people on Shoddy I faced had NO IDEA THAT WOBBY WAS ALLOWED, I'd imagine any usage % at this time would be totally worthless. Unless you allow Wobbufett for a couple of months and allow the metagame to stabilize around him, you won't have any worthwhile information. Outside of the fact that you can throw together a bunch of random crap and have Wobbufett hold them together for a winning record.

 

[THE_IRON_...KENYAN?]

This sounds mildly fun.

 

[umbarsc]

Bologo, I know you love anything that can Encore, but I'm surprised that you're so defensive of a Pokemon that throws prediction out of the window.

Ultimately, I think Wobba has the potential to lead to the death of the Choice Items. I'll have my CB Gallade in, and glance at the opponents remaining Pokemon to see which move to pick. I know that if I pick any move other than Night Slash, I'm easy pickings for Wobbufet. But unfortunately, Night Slash is Gallade's weakest move.

The same could be said for any Choice user who's primary attack isn't super effective on Wobbufet. No matter how well you predict, he WILL get you.

And I think that's a tragedy, because I love the prediction mind games that Choice items encourage.

Actually, I think Wobbuffet leads to several interesting mind games, namely against stat-boosters. Should you Encore the Swords Dance, or Counter the Outrage? Encore is just an incredibly fun move, and is even more fun when the opponent can't just bring in a generic counter to force it out.

However, I'm glad people are using Choice Band Gallade.

 

[Lord Alchemy]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought Encore couldn't force Struggle? I mean, once the move's PP ends, Encore should end too, no?

You can force people to struggle if you Encore them into a non-attack move, then Taunt them. I did that a couple times with my BulkyDos. It was pretty damn funny.

 

[Bologo]

Did you also read the part where I threw the team together in 2 minutes? If you ask me, unless I was playing the biggest scrubs in the world, I should have won less then 50% of those matches. Thats the problem with Wobby.

That team was thrown together quickly and has massive problems. Rhyperior is basically a GG if it packs Megahorn, Stone Edge, and EQ. Also keep in mind that I've never used any of those Pokemon before. EVER. This means I forget about Motor Drive, and make stupid mistakes when switching in Umby and the like only to end up losing a big part of my team. Also notice I have no way to deal with spikes of any kind (Stealth Rocks hurts a ton), and no phazer.

Yet you don't think a shit team made in 2 minutes winning 63% of its matches is bad. HMMMMMM.

Also, when the consider the fact that most of the people on Shoddy I faced had NO IDEA THAT WOBBY WAS ALLOWED, I'd imagine any usage % at this time would be totally worthless. Unless you allow Wobbufett for a couple of months and allow the metagame to stabilize around him, you won't have any worthwhile information. Outside of the fact that you can throw together a bunch of random crap and have Wobbufett hold them together for a winning record.

63% win rate is actually quite terrible, even for a quickly thrown together team. Anyone can throw a team together in 2 minutes and get at least a 63% win rate if they don't totally suck. If you can predict moves properly, it's not any trouble at all to pull that off. I was able to get like a 75% win rate using my UU team that I threw together in about 5 minutes, and they were facing friggin OUs!

If you were facing people that had no idea that Wobbuffet was allowed, of course they're going to be surprised, since they weren't able to prepare for it, and therefore will have a high chance of losing, so you just contradicted your own argument there about Wobbuffet's moves giving you the high win rate. If people didn't know that Salamence or Garchomp was allowed, then of course the user of them would win too, since the opponent couldn't prepare for them. If you say that a lot of people that you faced didn't know that Wobbuffet was allowed, yet you still lost any matches, then maybe it's not as broken as you tried to make it out to be.

I'm think that the point is that you greatly exaggerated your win rate with that BellyZard comment to make Wobbuffet sound a lot better than it actually is.

 

[SubVersion]

Wobbuffet does provide advantages as well. Belly Drummers thank the guaranteed free switch, but that also means you are inclined to run a Drummer, who are vulnerable to things as common as Status, Stealth Rock, and Spikes. These same Belly Drummers can be set up with Jumpluff or other Encorers. Even Stunsleepers are easily passable to assist Belly Drummers.

...

"Nothing can swap into Wobbuffet." Nothing can swap into Blissey either. Obviously, things can swap into it, but what I mean is if you swap a Blissey counter into Blissey, are you going to expect your opponent to keep Blissey in? No. They are going to swap out. Blissey comes in freely on ANY special attacker, forces a switch, and gets a free turn. Sounds like Wobbuffet doesn't it? Does Blissey deserve Uber status? In some people's eyes, yes. In Smogon's eyes, not so much.

Pretty much everything here is wrong.

Firstly, Belly Drummers are not set up anywhere near as effectively with the likes of Jumpluff or other users of Encore. Why? Because you completely forgot Wobbuffet has Shadow Tag. Shadow Tag means that Wobbuffet gets one free turn to bring in that Belly Drummer. Then the Drummer has one free turn to set up as the opponent switches out. If Jumpluff Encores a non-attacking move, the opponent can switch straight away. You might get a free switch-in, but that's it; You'll be facing a non-Encored Pokemon now and you can expect to take a hit if it suspects you of Drumming.

That's why your Blissey example is flawed. Blissey switches in for free against any Special Attacker. But so what? You have only have one free turn, not two like Wobbuffet would provide. That one turn they're switching to Random Physical Pokemon A, there's nothing you can really do except either switch yourself (hoping that your switch-in can beat their switch-in), or fire off a weak Ice Beam or Seismic Toss and hope to lightly dent whatever comes in. That isn't threatening. Two turns of free set up thanks to Wobbuffet; That is threatening.

You're also making the mistake of assuming the opponent is only using standard Belly Drummers like Charizard or Hariyama and the like. If they're using a Belly Drum Smeargle, they can pass that +6 attack to anything they damn well please, and I explained in my last post why its pretty much impossible to reliably stop it without a minimum of two phasers on the team.

Good use of wobbuffet (more than just 1 kill) requires much support like wish/aromatherapy and u-turn. Statuppers and Perish Trapping work with it aswell. However, as Obi said, Wobba needs support to be a major theat to your team.

Unfortunately, that's all wrong. Wobbuffet only needs to come in once an entire match, Encore a support (or ghost, if you're using Smeargle) move, and thus set up a sweep that you probably wont stop.

I'll say it again: Actually killing things with Wobbuffet should be an afterthought. He's far more valuable to a team simply Encoring non-damaging moves when he can. If you're building a team with Wish support, Aromatherapy, u-turn etc just to make Wobbuffet feel comfortable, then you're using him wrong. He shouldn't be used to kill unless he's got no other choice.

However, a lot of the arguments I've been seeing for Wobbuffet being in uber seem to be implying that the Wobbuffet user is a superhuman telepathic that can predict perfectly which move the opponent is going to use, and that Wobbuffet is always going to do the correct move no matter what. That's obviously not the case unless it's against a Choice user.

Then you're reading the wrong posts. The Wobb user doesn't need telepathic prediction to figure out that the Forretress that just switched in against my un-boosted physical attacker is probably going to lay some rocks on the turn it assumes it has free. I don't need to predict that if something on my team is already asleep, Gengar is going to try Shadow Balling me. The best part is, if you bring Wobbuffet in against the right things, even if you get the prediction wrong (say Gengar uses Thunderbolt instead of Shadow Ball to stop your free Smeargle switch-in), you still kill the opponent (Thunderbolt wont be hurting Wobb much and he can just bounce it back with Mirror Coat).

It isn't a matter of Wobb needing superhuman prediction; Make an informed guess, and if you're right, you set up your sweep. If you're wrong, you kill something anyway. Its a no-lose situation for the Wobb user.

If Wobbuffet Encores the wrong move, eg. predicts sub on Breloom, but gets spored instead, it's screwed.

A smart Wobb user is never bringing him in against a Breloom unless something else on the team is already asleep. =\

Without the Choice Item, the Pokémon has the opportunity to switch the move it's using as long as it's faster than Wobbuffet. Also, Wobbuffet must take a turn to use Encore, meaning that there is an element of prediction.

Which is why a good Wobb user is only bringing him in against traditionally slow support Pokemon. There is no prediction if you bring him in on the turn Swampert used Stealth Rock or the turn Forry used Spikes.

A lot of the posts I'm seeing so far are assuming two very wrong things:

A) Wobb needs to kill something to be useful.
B) Wobb only provides one free turn of set-up, which lots of other stuff does too.

Wobb only needs to Encore something - once - and you're on your way to victory. He also provides two free turns of stat-up, one for switching and for using a move, which no other Pokemon does simply by switching in. The sooner people stop bringing up these invalid arguments, the better.