Metagame SV OU Metagame Discussion

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Grimmsnarl @ Light Clay
Ability: Prankster
Tera Type: Steel
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 252 SpD
Calm Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Reflect
- Light Screen
- Taunt
- Focus Blast

As someone that likes to play Screens offense, I've been using this set more recently. Standard Grimm usually invites a free switch-in from various Dark-Types in the tier. Running Focus Blast off of a Base 95 SpA will OHKO Kingambit and 2HKO the rest. Assuming you set up screens as well, you can trade hits even if you're slower.
 
I have no idea why you keep mentioning Chesnaught as if it is at all ever going to be relevant in ou, especially with all the power creep this generation. Grass/Fighting is not an amazing typing and Chesnaught has very little else going for it.
It's my favorite mon, I need to promote it because nobody likes it, and gamefreak doesn't give it attention at all. Everyone has a Pokémon they would love to get all the attention in the world.
 
I have no idea why you keep mentioning Chesnaught as if it is at all ever going to be relevant in ou, especially with all the power creep this generation. Grass/Fighting is not an amazing typing and Chesnaught has very little else going for it.
chesnaught has historically been a solid uu mon and i can see a possible ou niche for it. it's got a lot more going for it than you think:
  • one of the strongest body presses in the game thanks to fighting stab
  • resists rock and ground simultaneously, which is especially important against stuff like offensive lando-t and curse eq garg
  • bulletproof makes it immune to shadow ball in a meta infested with ghosts that like running choice items
  • beats gambit or forces tera 100% of the time
  • subseed chesnaught shits on stall every day of the week and twice on weekends
 
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Feels like I’m using gambit and tusk on every team I make in order to have a switch in to pult/gholdengo and opposing gambit respectively. Only other reasonable gambit answers I can think of are iron hands and quaquaval and then Garg for pult. Anyone have any other ideas?
 
If Gambit is so centralizing how come no one is running Flamethrower on Pult or Focus Blast on Ghold to lure it? Checkmate atheists.

Sucker Punch goes first and Gholdengo usually offensive teras into Ghost, so gg is correct. Same to FB on Dengo and lets not bring up FB never hitting.
 
Feels like I’m using gambit and tusk on every team I make in order to have a switch in to pult/gholdengo and opposing gambit respectively. Only other reasonable gambit answers I can think of are iron hands and quaquaval and then Garg for pult. Anyone have any other ideas?
So I have not used this mon since the Chi-Yu days (outside of ND) so IDK how good it is in OU, but Ting-Lu feels like it'd do reasonably well against all three, though U-Turn from Pult will wear it down pretty fast. I was never really a fan of it since it felt like a bit of a momentum drain, but using it in ND has improved my perception of it. It def is a momentum drain, but setting up every single broken hazard while acting as a stop gap to several threats + dealing consistent damage to potential switch-ins like Hatterene & Great Tusk w/ Ruination are pretty nice. Lack of recovery does suck, but having the bulk to take many super effective hits lets it get the job of setting hazards done pretty nicely, which can be critical vs some variants of Gambit or Pult that elect to not run HDB.

Typically my go-to answer for Gambit was Restalk Rocky Helmet Orthworm w/ Body Press, which also countered some other big threats like Roaring Moon & Great Tusk w/ Tera Ghost, but that set will be a lot worse now. Still, Rocky Helmet mons feel like they'd do very well vs Gambit because its lack of Recovery & dealing a set amount of chip damage which bypasses its bulk. Someone earlier mentioned Rocky Helmet Dondozo, which I'm planning to try out since it seems fun.
 
chesnaught has historically been a solid uu mon and i can see a possible ou niche for it. it's got a lot more going for it than you think:
  • one of the strongest body presses in the game thanks to fighting stab
  • resists rock and ground simultaneously, which is especially important against stuff like offensive lando-t and curse eq garg
  • bulletproof makes it immune to shadow ball in a meta infested with ghosts that like running choice items
  • beats gambit or forces tera 100% of the time
  • subseed chesnaught shits on stall every day of the week and twice on weekends

It has always had OU niches when it was around back in gens 6/7 even if they were small for similar reasons. Chesnaught's defensive profile is quite unique and will at least have some niches in OU even if it ends up in UU/RU by the end of the gen. Also other than Kommo-o it is really the only other relevant bulletproof user we will have most likely.

Also Chesnaught got body press this gen.
 
The 1LDK heat
Always a metagame changer :blobpex:

Anyways let's change the topic real quick, what are your quick thoughts on this meta, played a few games yesterday, people seem to migrate from Shed Tail HO to Glimmora hazard vomit HO again, but it's manageable for the most part, just annoying. What have you guys been seeing?
 
The 1LDK heat
Always a metagame changer :blobpex:

Anyways let's change the topic real quick, what are your quick thoughts on this meta, played a few games yesterday, people seem to migrate from Shed Tail HO to Glimmora hazard vomit HO again, but it's manageable for the most part, just annoying. What have you guys been seeing?
Can we please call Glimmora hazard stack "Hazard Vomit HO" from now on
 
Side note, last night I got to thinking about picking Pokemon for various types... and a lot of outclassing happens in terms of viability on teams. A lot of the time, it's trying to slot on a Pokemon you want to fill a specific typing, but there's just better options than it.
For instance, let's break this down bit by bit (I'll be factoring in some Pokemon from other tiers, as some have actual niches in OU.);
Grass - Offense: Breloom, Meowscarada, Iron Leaves, Tsareena. Defensive: Amoonguss, Wo-Chien, Toedscruel, Decidueye, Brambleghast.
Why would I want to play something like Breloom, when Meow is faster and more consistent? Spore is a thing, yes, but if I want it for that, Amoonguss does the job better. Why should I use Tsareena over Toedscruel, or vice versa, as a utility Pokemon?

Fire gets egregious with this. Armarouge, Ceruledge, Cinderace, Skeledirge, Typhlosion, Iron Moth, Volcarona.
Why should I use Arma or Typh when Volc and Moth exist? Why use Arma/Ceru/Typh when Dirge exists and wins games on its own thanks to Unaware?

There's actually very few standalone types that actually don't suffer from this, one of which is Dragon. We have so many Dragons that are good right now, in spite of things like Valiant existing, that they're all more or less side grades of one another. Dragonite, Mence, Bax, Moon, Pult, and even Mid... I mean Wake. You want a physical Dragon? Take your most fitting pick of Dnite, Mence, Bax, Moon, or Pult. Special? Dnite, Pult, Mence, Wake. Bulky? Dnite, Bax, Wake. Mix? Dnite, Mence, Pult. You have so many mix and match options here. (Garchomp isn't really listed since 90% of times it is seen, it's the utility Chomp.)

Water is probably the most flexible one here. Quaq, Gastro, Wake, Azu, Dozo, Gren, Washtom, Pex, Alo, Gyara, Quag, AquaRos...

It just sort of baffles me thinking about this. Some types are just bad with options (Electric), some have heavily outclassed choices (Grass/Fire), and some are very well off with options and/or side grades (Dragon/Water).
 
I will not describe my observation about this tier in much detail but I have noticed that I have much more success on ladder when I run (Rocky Helmet, Defensive) Iron Hands and (Specs) Greninja.
I know that is not really "Metagame Discussion", however I wanted to see if others here have also success with Iron Hands and Greninja on the ladder.


Also Life Orb Spezial Cyclizar is kinda dope. I didn't expect it too hit so hard and with Rapid Spin you can outspeed some key threats and put them in terrible postions.

252 SpA Life Orb Cyclizar Draco Meteor vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Great Tusk: 343-406 (92.4 - 109.4%) -- 56.3% chance to OHKO Copied
 
I will not describe my observation about this tier in much detail but I have noticed that I have much more success on ladder when I run (Rocky Helmet, Defensive) Iron Hands and (Specs) Greninja.
I know that is not really "Metagame Discussion", however I wanted to see if others here have also success with Iron Hands and Greninja on the ladder.


Also Life Orb Spezial Cyclizar is kinda dope. I didn't expect it too hit so hard and with Rapid Spin you can outspeed some key threats and put them in terrible postions.

252 SpA Life Orb Cyclizar Draco Meteor vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Great Tusk: 343-406 (92.4 - 109.4%) -- 56.3% chance to OHKO Copied

Can't speak to Greninja or Iron Hands myself, but I will definitely vouch for Cyclizar. Tera Dragon Draco Meteor with or without Life Orb drops every single non-scarfed Dragon and can pretty heavily chunk anything else. Is it a practical use of Tera? No. But that means no one thinks you're stupid enough to do it and that Roaring Moon is actually super unsafe against you.
 
This tier is kinda hard to build sometimes
a rant disguised as an essay by one of the best worst players in the metagame

I stole this formatting from the AAA forums and the :insertmon: spam going popular
So, as a personal opinion, gen 9 is fun, it's balanced, it has a lot of creativity thanks to tera, and it rewards interesting building and all fun all flowers and rainbows, but sometimes, things just don't go well, and It's not just me, some people often find themselves in this position, so I'm gonna take the anger of everybody and transform it into a shit post. So let's see some of the reasons why your "next heat team that's gonna change the meta entirely" falls flatter than a bowl of piss. I won't go into too much detail (so that people who don't have these problems don't call me a whiny little bitch) and these problems are in no particular order, so feel free to expand in whatever really

Chapter 1: Why do I always have 3 weak to Iron Valiant mons


The metagame is filled with Fighting types, Dragon types and Dark types. And for good reason, resist from these mons are scarce, meaning that they can do whatever they want, UNTIL :Iron Valiant: gets in, and then, you just take the L. :Iron Valiant: is so valuable right now because it's the best offensive fairy type in the tier right now, and while its defenses are poor, a quad resistance to dark and a dragon immunity always gets her some spots. And thanks to the large variety of sets it's running, one turn could very well mean the end of you, especially is that is either the specs set, or a booster set and the guy is playing 10D chess. :Azumarill: and :Hatterene: also deserve some special mentions, the former is nowadays a :Walking wake: counter that's more than able to pull her own into a game. The latter is either a HO para supporter or a Stall + Sun Breaker with Calm Mind. But both are threatening and valuable for their niches.

Chapter 2: Phanto(Me)

Once upon a time, GF decided to made Gen 8, the gen in game sucked, the gen in comp sucked, and everyone died, the end. But let's get to the point, ⁣:Dragapult: :Skeledirge: :Gholdengo: and :Zoroark-Hisui: are the 4 available ghost types in this meta (if not counting tera) and these 4 post always a big problem, why? Because ghost is free, shadow ball and/or hex. :Gholdengo: can stall and wall break, ⁣:Skeledirge: can wall break and wall, :Zoroark-Hisui: can wall break and :Dragapult: does the 5 at the same time, and the 4 have additional tools to make them harder to check alone, ⁣:Dragapult: has 4000 sets, ⁣:Skeledirge: has W-o-W, a Sound Move and recovery, ⁣:Gholdengo: has pure damage, recover, a boosting move and a broken ability, and :Zoroark-Hisui: has a good move pool, types and its ability combines well with the meta. So you basically need to account for them in some fashion

Chapter 3: THE ONE PIECE, THE ONE PIECE IS REAL

:Kingambit: :Hydreigon: :Roaring Moon: :Ting Lu: :Meowscarada: :Greninja: and :Garganacl: are our ghost resistance available, from these, ⁣:Garganacl: is not a dark type, and he has its own chapter don't worry. :Greninja: and :Meowscarada: are frail, ⁣ :hydreigon: :roaring moon: while different in move pool and functionality, the nasty weakness to fairy doesn't help a lot. :Ting Lu: is a momentum sinker and can't really damage the mon. And that leaves us with :Kingambit: even tho quad neutral to fighting is bad, that has never stopped :Tyranitar: for success, and with a neutrality to fairy, great damage, enough bulk and priority, makes it a very anti-Bullshit mon, that gets slotted into a lot because fuck man, what are you supposed to do really. He really does everything, from sweep to wall break to come back to anything. It has become a necessary evil in order to keep the phantoms out of the fucking S tier. To the point where people have become too paranoid of this thing, max speed on defensive :rotom-wash: and :skeledirge:? Really?

Chapter 4: Mom would be sad if she saw the flying type pool in gen 9

Dexit + low defoggers means that our flying types in OU are LITERALLY :Dragonite: and :Corviknight:, if we count OU tier and not UUBL and lower, we literally have as many viable birds as FUCKING GEN 2. AND FROM THESE 2 :DRAGONITE: DOESN'T EVEN USE FLYING MOVES UNLESS FOR SPECIFICALLY TROLLING :GREAT TUSK:. WHICH MEANS THAT IN REALITY, WE HAVE AS MANY VIABLE FLYING TYPES AS GEN 1. And that means we have to go to UU for the flying types, ⁣:staraptor: is HO only buts it's fun. :Talonflame: is defensive oriented but its actually a better defogger thanks to :Gholdengo:. :pelipper: is rain, and let's be real for a sec rain is a gimmick (fun fact: tera fairy :Toxicroak: blanks both :Walking Wake: stabs, and It's overall decent in this meta) and :Iron Jugulis: which is a stall breaker (I haven't used it really) but he really is one of the mons of all time. Lack of defoggers and ground immunity means that sometimes your role compression can be easily fucked if :Great Tusk: predicts and Knocks Off your item.

Chapter 5: Garganacl (yep, we're doing this again)

I have already done a big ass post regarding this thing that keeps on creating 1000 new cheese sets per day, and to be honest, I'm getting too tired (I'm writing this while allergic, and it's 11:PM) but to keep it short, the "just put covert cloak" is one of the most short-sighted answers I have seen in this metagame. It stops momentum of any offensive mon that is not Grass, Ground or Fighting, and that can even fail if he teras. I know its never gonna get banned, but Andviet gave up, and I haven't seen YnotMence here in ages, so somebody has to keep the flame burning

Conclusion

These are just some of the common constricts I have found myself having in this metagame, some may agree, some may add more, some may disagree and get things off the list. But luckily, the player base has found ways to create wonderful teams even when all of these stuff is involved, so let's have a toast for everyone who uses the resources well, because you my friend are gonna be the one that conquers the world at the end of the day. If you wanna expand on something in particular, add or critique, do it, just give me likes. I'm going to bed now, I'm too tired (and feeling really sick)
 
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Way back when we had a vote on tera I was completely against a ban or even a restriction. I think I'm starting to change my mind. I enjoy changing your type to something creative as a lure set etc. But STAB tera just seems cheap. This isn't coming from a salty loss but rather a week of using tera dark kingambit and winning a few games I really didn't deserve to.

A good example was my opponent essentially getting me down to only gambit Whereas they still had 4 pokemon. I swords danced on his dondozo switch in and dealt 61% with tera dark black glasses kowtow. That's literally the bulkiest physical pokemon in the tier and it was a very clean 2hko. Body press did about 43% back with my steel type gone. I then ohko his last 3 pokemon in the back INCLUDING a dragonite through his multiscale after tanking the espeed.

I know gambit itself is broken and will likely get suspected but it's not the only one pulling crap like that. Tera dragon baxcalibur is just as obnoxious. I think its a case of making strong pokemon stronger, giving them more benefit than weaker pokemon get with a defensive tera like amoongus for example. And for me that removes the fun and creativity of the concept. Thanks for listening LMAO sorry for the rant
 
Chapter 4: Mom would be sad if she saw the flying type pool in gen 9

Dexit + low defoggers means that our flying types in OU are LITERALLY :Dragonite: and :Corviknight:, if we count OU tier and not UUBL and lower, we literally have as many viable birds as FUCKING GEN 2. AND FROM THESE 2 :DRAGONITE: DOESN'T EVEN USE FLYING MOVES UNLESS FOR SPECIFICALLY TROLLING :GREAT TUSK:. WHICH MEANS THAT IN REALITY, WE HAVE AS MANY VIABLE FLYING TYPES AS GEN 1. And that means we have to go to UU for the flying types, ⁣:staraptor: is HO only buts it's fun. :Talonflame: is defensive oriented but its actually a better defogger thanks to :Gholdengo:. :pelipper: is rain, and let's be real for a sec rain is a gimmick (fun fact: tera fairy :Toxicroak: blanks both :Walking Wake: stabs, and It's overall decent in this meta) and :Iron Jugulis: which is a stall breaker (I haven't used it really) but he really is one of the mons of all time. Lack of defoggers and ground immunity means that sometimes your role compression can be easily fucked if :Great Tusk: predicts and Knocks Off your item.
In fairness to this point, when HOME drops the tier will quickly become the Flying type apocalypse as 11 new Flying types will be in the tier (with some bad ones of course), 15 if you count the genie forms. And if you add levitators into the mix, you also got the Gen 4 Psychic Trio.

To not make this a one liner, I'm curious what people think of the new and improved Lake Guardians and their viability in the tier when HOME releases. With their new Signature Move Mystical Power, it will act as a base 70 Charge beam that always boosts Special attack. They retained their access to great support moves like SR and Taunt, as well as U-turn. In previous generations this didn't quite cut it, but given how common Great Tusk is as a lead, I could easily see one of them being OU viable as a SR Lead against Tusk.
 
To not make this a one liner, I'm curious what people think of the new and improved Lake Guardians and their viability in the tier when HOME releases. With their new Signature Move Mystical Power, it will act as a base 70 Charge beam that always boosts Special attack. They retained their access to great support moves like SR and Taunt, as well as U-turn. In previous generations this didn't quite cut it, but given how common Great Tusk is as a lead, I could easily see one of them being OU viable as a SR Lead against Tusk.
I think the biggest issue comes down to each mon lacking something to fully take advantage of the Signature. Uxie and Mesprit have pretty lacking Special coverage (most notably lacking a Special Attack to break Steel types even after a Boost or two) given their less than stellar speed and Okay-ish Defensive stats, while Azelf is frail and vulnerable to/exploited by some other notable mons in the tier based on 4MSS with its coverage like Kingambit (after Tera if carrying Fire Blast), Skeledirge, Dragapult, Roaring Moon, Dragonite, Ting-Lu (Can't KO due to Levitate but safe for Hazards and Ruination chip hurts on a mon without recovery), Meowscarada, and Greninja.

Azelf already had Nasty Plot for set up sets (as do all 3 members via TM), so this would be a move used more as an endgame win-condition that's then competing with things like Booster Valiant, Skeledirge (who leans Bulky instead of Speedy admittedly), and of course Kingambit (who has the bulk for hits he has to take a lot more immediate power, and Priority to minimize Revenge Kill potential).

Uxie or Mesprit could maybe pull something off, 75/130/130 and 80/105/105 being respectable defensive stats, if they had reliable recovery beyond Rest Talk. Mystical Power to both attack and Boost plus one anti-Psychic Resist coverage move like Dazzling Gleam and a Pick-two of RestTalk, utility like Encore, Substitute, Thunder Wave, or a defensive Boost like Amnesia/Calm Mind to improve survival/Snowballing.

In the context of OU I just don't think these moves help the trio do things they didn't already, which still tended to be lower tier performance.
 
If Gambit is so centralizing how come no one is running Flamethrower on Pult or Focus Blast on Ghold to lure it? Checkmate atheists.

Honestly it’s crazy to think about where gambit would be without tera. Without tera literally every fighting type in the game handles it lol

Way back when we had a vote on tera I was completely against a ban or even a restriction. I think I'm starting to change my mind. I enjoy changing your type to something creative as a lure set etc. But STAB tera just seems cheap. This isn't coming from a salty loss but rather a week of using tera dark kingambit and winning a few games I really didn't deserve to.

A good example was my opponent essentially getting me down to only gambit Whereas they still had 4 pokemon. I swords danced on his dondozo switch in and dealt 61% with tera dark black glasses kowtow. That's literally the bulkiest physical pokemon in the tier and it was a very clean 2hko. Body press did about 43% back with my steel type gone. I then ohko his last 3 pokemon in the back INCLUDING a dragonite through his multiscale after tanking the espeed.

I know gambit itself is broken and will likely get suspected but it's not the only one pulling crap like that. Tera dragon baxcalibur is just as obnoxious. I think its a case of making strong pokemon stronger, giving them more benefit than weaker pokemon get with a defensive tera like amoongus for example. And for me that removes the fun and creativity of the concept. Thanks for listening LMAO sorry for the rant
I was pro some sort of restriction, came around on tera after seeing the cool defensive uses, and now I’m back to wanting a restriction. Your example is the exact reason why. Changing your type is sick and usually not broken (unless your name is volc or gambit). But giving double stab just pushes wallbreakers so such an insane level. I don’t want to go back to a boring clefable corviknight snooze fest meta but some of the wall breaking feats you can achieve with tera are just silly lol.
 
Once upon a time, GF decided to made Gen 8, the gen in game sucked, the gen in comp sucked, and everyone died, the end.

Gen 8 OU by the end was really fun honestly, and I miss the stability that gen 8 had now that we are in an unstable gen 9 meta. But yeah other than gen 8 smogon singles yeah competitive sucked in gen 8. I hope gen 9 gets to that point eventually, but I personally think for that to happen we need to unfortunately ban tera. I enjoy tera as much as the next person, but there is simply too much to account for with tera being present even with team preview, since you don't know what is coming until you play the person, and they can still choose to use a different tera than the obvious one to beat you, so once home comes out, if I do take part in the suspect test for tera I will be voting full ban simply for the mind games tera allowing and sheer power being too much.
 
i just hope that when home comes out they don't do the tera suspect too soon. during the first suspect, the meta was heavily unbalanced for non-tera-related reasons, which probably inflated the number of qualified voters because you could just slap broken shit onto your team and generate free elo. considering how close the results were, it's probable that the state of the meta at the time actually changed the outcome of the entire suspect test. so let's not be chomping at the bit for another tera suspect until we're really sure all the broken stuff is out of the way this time

i say this because i know that if no one speaks up we're gonna get a tera suspect before a magearna ban and no one will be happy with that
 
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i just hope that when home comes out they don't do the tera suspect too soon. during the first suspect, the meta was heavily unbalanced for non-tera-related reasons, which probably inflated the number of qualified voters because you could just slap broken shit onto your team and generate free elo. considering how close the results were, it's probable that the state of the meta at the time actually changed the outcome of the entire suspect test. so let's not be chomping at the bit for another tera suspect until we're really sure all the broken stuff is out of the way this time
I feel like while this is important ALL of the broken stuff being gone means things broken BECAUSE of tera will also be gone. I think it is 100% important to let the meta game settle, but I think it is important to let it settle so that people are able to get used to what new mons want to use tera and how they want to use it. We have seen so many developments in tera from day 1 and while a rando tera can absolutely ruin your day most of the time you have an idea between 2-3 types for each mon you face. The way tera feels now feels very different than how it felt when we first got everything and we didn't know the best tera types for mons to use or simply didn't experiment that much. I think we need to get the obviously broken stuff out, whatever it may be, like chi-yu, Annihilape, chien-pao, etc was pre home but mons that are borderline like wake, volc, and gambit are in this meta probably shouldn't be suspect until after tera

Speaking of tera I feel like tera will just fall into being not broken once we get better defensive mons back from home. Even if we get powerful offensive mons back I feel that many of them will just be busted on their own(both urshifus, spectrier, etc} and once they are out of the tier we will have a similar meta but with much better defensive and support mons. Hopefully there will also be enough type diversity that makes it much harder to just need a single tera type to break a game open. Now instead of fire + grass(stupid quiver dance moth) being able to hit most of the best defensive mons for super effective damage you have to deal with heatran, volcanion, the hisui mons and you have to put more thought and probably telegraph more what your tera type is because it will be harder to just have a generic good matchup vs most of the meta.
 
I think we need to get the obviously broken stuff out, whatever it may be, like chi-yu, Annihilape, chien-pao, etc was pre home but mons that are borderline like wake, volc, and gambit are in this meta probably shouldn't be suspect until after tera
fair enough, but they definitely dropped the ball by only doing 2 radars before the tera suspect last time. i don't want that to happen again
 
With Tera, my personal leaning is Tera Preview + No STAB Tera, but I know a lot of people may dislike that (and some dislike the idea of doing anything except Unban/Ban I know), but IDK

To me it just removes the two worst parts of Tera while keeping the part that is worth having. And even among the "Mons Broken By Tera", this lowers that potential number by quite a bit.
 
Chien-Pao was not obviously broken outside of Tera. Being able to Tera is what allowed it to beat most of its counterplay, termnal. This is backed up by Chien-Pao having the lowest ban percentage of mons banned through a suspect test in Gen 9 OU. Without Tera, Chien-Pao isn't a straight upgrade over Gen 8 Weavile since Triple Axel is stronger than Chien-Pao's Ice STAB even accounting for Sword of Ruin, Knock Off was extremely useful, and Weavile had better special bulk than Chien-Pao, making it a better check to Dragapult.
 
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