Tera is broken.
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Metagame SV OU Metagame Discussion v3
- Thread starter TPP
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Tera is broken.
This is very contradictory. A metagame isn't going to be particularly balanced when broken mons are running around. And we have issues like the hazard problem which are very much an imbalanced dynamic that has made the tier worse *cough gliscor cough*
There is infernape.
Oh wait you said viable.
There is kingambit.
Oh wait, he may get banned.
There is ursi...never mind banned.
I guess your best shot is a specially bulky mon like either of the goodras.
They are both more viable than blissey.
Hisuian Samurott is putting you in his hate list.
Gholdengo has got thunderbolt coverage.
Besides that, hisuian samurot is fragile.
Anyone wanna try a plate of piping hot AV hamurott? (IT'S FRESH FROM THE OVEN!!)
Samurott-Hisui @ Assault Vest
Ability: Sharpness
Tera Type: Water
EVs: 236 Atk / 20 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Ceaseless Edge
- Razor Shell
- Knock Off
- Aqua Jet
Unironically I've been off and on using AV Hamurott with the typical sweeper setup (albeit with Flip Turn, Aqua Cutter, and Sacred Sword over Knock, Jet, and Shell.) It puts in a fair bit of work most games.
The root causes of current hazard issues are the high quality of spikers, scarcity of reliable hazard removal, and existence of Gholdengo. I agree that tera is not a root cause.
However, tera absolutely exacerbates current hazard issues. Ting-Lu has been using Tera Ghost to spinblock tusk the entire generation. Physdef Gholdengo also uses tera ghost to remove its ground weakness and fully spinblock pokemon like Great Tusk and Cyclizar. I've seen/used plenty of pokemon with tera ghost for other purposes like Iron Moth, Heatran, Hydreigon etc which can all serve as a spinblock as well.
Idk how you can say "hazard setters...don't tera, and neither does ghold" if you've been watching tournament/high ladder hstack games throughout this gen.
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then why hasn't it been banned from any of the lower tiers? surely if it were as broken as you say there would at least be an effort for each individual tier to pick up ou's slack and ban it, right?
cyclizar? really? this isn't last year, dude. cyclizar is not relevant in the modern meta. according to last month's stats, more people were using sandslash and victreebel at high ladder than cyclizar. and besides that, cyclizar runs knock off, which chunks tera ghost mons anyway
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You've repeated this flawed argument before, and it's already been refuted too. Tera is not innocent in lower tiers in the slightest. Pokemon are banned and suspected in lower tiers as a direct result of tera.
You've also ignored the larger argument of "Moves/mechanics that are unhealthy in OU aren't necessarily unhealthy in lower tiers, and that doesn't matter. Did we see baton pass chains rocking NU's meta? No, and that doesn't change the fact that a baton pass ban in OU was necessary" which I already said once here.
Cyclizar has been very relevant in past metas on stall teams like this one and later saw usage holding boots on other variants of stall. If you're tapped in to some stall developments, I've heard whispers of techs like Tera Fire Overheat Cyclizar to get past Gholdengo as well, which a Tera Ghost Gholdengo would eat and continue to spinblock. I haven't seen much cyclizar stall in the dlc meta, but I wouldn't write it off so quickly, and it was mostly included in my post to be thorough (coulda mentioned iron treads and quaquaval too idk)
listen man, I like you and I don't want you to get in trouble, you may want to delete this comment in order to avoid a flamewar in the comments.
you don't necessarily have to agree that tera is "broken", you can still accept the fact it "non balanced".
calling it ban-worthy is debatable.
maybe we should all avoid the debates on the balance of tera until the time where the counsil will consider doing some suspect test?
personally I like tera but I am open to the possibility that banning it may end up being a necessary evil.
I think if they weren’t at risk of being ostracized for banning a generational mechanic while OU gets to keep it, many of the lower tiers would at least consider a Tera suspect. Little Cup doesn’t really count as a lower tier, but it’s considered suspecting the mechanic, and there’s been talks of some policy in Ubers as well.
Gonna switch the flow a lil bit with whatever tera talk is happening. At the end of this generation, ONLY because of the sheer forces introduced I will take it upon myself to make a story for the OU metagame timeline. Here's what I got so far:
1. Flutter Mane & Houndstone ban simultaneously
2. Palafin & Iron Bundle ban simultaneously
Then my memory gets hazy after that in terms of what comes next exactly...
3. Chi-Yu ban
4. Chien Pao ban
5. Espathra ban
6. Tera suspect
7. Annihilape ban
8. Cyclizar ban
9. Kingambit suspect
10. Shed Tail ban, Cyclizar unbanned
11. HOME drops
12. Last Respects ban, Houndstone unbanned
13. Regieleki ban
14. Magearna ban
15. Zamazenta Crowned ban
16. Volcarona & Urshifu Rapid Strike ban
17. DLC 1 drops
18. Baxcalibur ban
19. Ogerpon Hearthflame ban
20. Ursaluna Bloodmoon ban
21. Roaring Moon suspect (present day)
Ik we had like a few radars here and there, and people like blunder and pokeaimMD made videos on each and every tier importance. Feel free to call me out on any flaws on the specifics of how it actually is timeline wise. I'll update this starting right now. This is gonna be one hell of a story I'll tell you that much. It might not even be able to fit in a Smogon post.
1. Flutter Mane & Houndstone ban simultaneously
2. Palafin & Iron Bundle ban simultaneously
Then my memory gets hazy after that in terms of what comes next exactly...
3. Chi-Yu ban
4. Chien Pao ban
5. Espathra ban
6. Tera suspect
7. Annihilape ban
8. Cyclizar ban
9. Kingambit suspect
10. Shed Tail ban, Cyclizar unbanned
11. HOME drops
12. Last Respects ban, Houndstone unbanned
13. Regieleki ban
14. Magearna ban
15. Zamazenta Crowned ban
16. Volcarona & Urshifu Rapid Strike ban
17. DLC 1 drops
18. Baxcalibur ban
19. Ogerpon Hearthflame ban
20. Ursaluna Bloodmoon ban
21. Roaring Moon suspect (present day)
Ik we had like a few radars here and there, and people like blunder and pokeaimMD made videos on each and every tier importance. Feel free to call me out on any flaws on the specifics of how it actually is timeline wise. I'll update this starting right now. This is gonna be one hell of a story I'll tell you that much. It might not even be able to fit in a Smogon post.
Don't quote me on this but I'm positive that Chi-Yu was banned simultaneously with Cyclizar and Annihilape. Chien-Pao and Espathra were banned at the same time IIRC too
Kingambit was Suspected after Home. Also there was a Zamazento Hero Suspect prior to it which resulted in No Ban (good thing).
Chi yu, ape, and cyclizar ban all happened simultaneously after the tera suspect. The chien-pao suspect happened in tandem with the espathra ban
I don’t remember when exactly it happened, but there was also the Wake suspect shortly after it released
Edit: it was after the Espathra ban and before the shed tail ban, back in March 2023
Edit 2:
Quickly wanted to say thank you for correcting me
Pao was unbanned at the onset of home, and I believe it was quickbanned around the same time as Zamazenta-Crowned.
I genuinely don’t believe that tera is the root of all evils in this tier like it’s sometimes made out to be. I am by no means a top player and these points have already been discussed ad nauseam in the Tera thread by people more experienced than me. But since this conversation keeps getting dredged up I might as well add my two cents.
In my part of the ladder (~1800), I often encounter games where tera, while forcing progress, does not decide the fate of the match. In the games where the tera play does feel overbearing (which are not the majority) it is usually because the recipient is one of a select few breakers (i.e Kingambit, Roaring Moon). These are abusers that people have already wanted banned.
I sometimes see the argument that “even if all the problematic tera abusers are banned, new ones will pop up to take their place and nothing will get better.” But I feel that this argument is purely hypothetical, because there are still problematic abusers who have yet to be banned since before HOME (Kingambit), which people have been pointing fingers to for a while.
Another argument is “look at this long list of banned Gen 9 mons. Surely it must be due to tera?” While it’s true that some mons were banned due to tera (Volcarona, Regieleki, Palafin possibly), there were plenty that would still be overbearing without tera (Shed tail, last respects, Annihilape, Chi-Yu, Bundle, Flutter Mane, etc). We are in a generation with extraordinarily powercreep. Tera is partly to blame for the long banlist, but it is not the singular root cause.
The final point I’d like to address is “tera is problematic because it forces coin flip predictions and immense variance of possible sets.” While I see where such a statement is coming from, I don’t actually think that this is a bad thing in essence. Pokemon is inherently an unpredictable game. Chess exists for people who want to play a game that is controlled, predictable, and perfectly balanced. Personally, I disliked Gen 8 because it felt too much like chess and not enough like, well, Pokemon.
TLDR: Yes, the meta has issues. Gholdengo has exacerbates the hazard problem and people have been calling out Kingambit as the #1 tera abuser for a while. We haven’t seen a healthy tera meta because these mons, which have been problematic for a while, are not yet banned. And having a long banlist in this powercrept generation is not a bad thing either.
In my part of the ladder (~1800), I often encounter games where tera, while forcing progress, does not decide the fate of the match. In the games where the tera play does feel overbearing (which are not the majority) it is usually because the recipient is one of a select few breakers (i.e Kingambit, Roaring Moon). These are abusers that people have already wanted banned.
I sometimes see the argument that “even if all the problematic tera abusers are banned, new ones will pop up to take their place and nothing will get better.” But I feel that this argument is purely hypothetical, because there are still problematic abusers who have yet to be banned since before HOME (Kingambit), which people have been pointing fingers to for a while.
Another argument is “look at this long list of banned Gen 9 mons. Surely it must be due to tera?” While it’s true that some mons were banned due to tera (Volcarona, Regieleki, Palafin possibly), there were plenty that would still be overbearing without tera (Shed tail, last respects, Annihilape, Chi-Yu, Bundle, Flutter Mane, etc). We are in a generation with extraordinarily powercreep. Tera is partly to blame for the long banlist, but it is not the singular root cause.
The final point I’d like to address is “tera is problematic because it forces coin flip predictions and immense variance of possible sets.” While I see where such a statement is coming from, I don’t actually think that this is a bad thing in essence. Pokemon is inherently an unpredictable game. Chess exists for people who want to play a game that is controlled, predictable, and perfectly balanced. Personally, I disliked Gen 8 because it felt too much like chess and not enough like, well, Pokemon.
TLDR: Yes, the meta has issues. Gholdengo has exacerbates the hazard problem and people have been calling out Kingambit as the #1 tera abuser for a while. We haven’t seen a healthy tera meta because these mons, which have been problematic for a while, are not yet banned. And having a long banlist in this powercrept generation is not a bad thing either.
Thanks for giving me more free likes on that old ass post because of your Tera nonsense
I'd like to add on this, that on most turns your opponent terastalizing is an objectively bad play and you don't even have to consider it much, I do not play tours but as I am usually top 500 (sometimes tilt) and have played players rated 2000-1900 on a regular basis all gen without ever feeling like it's unpredictable and uncontrollable.
Smogon strives for the most competitive metagames possible
That is why I love gen 8 OU, sure games lasted ages and various other lengths sometimes but it was a metagame that rewarded good play actively that was competitive and allows all types of team styles, which is what Smogon metagames strive for. Gen 8 is symbolic of that. I am someone who enjoys gen 8 for all the stuff you can run, even if it got stale for people it feels a lot like ADV where you can get away with running a ton of wacky stuff in gen 8 OU.
Ideally this is what Smogon is striving for, gen 8 was a very competitive meta and pretty healthy for the most part, even if people are split on enjoyment. Gen 9 is far from being anywhere near competitive, partially due to tera the problems indirectly escalated by it like the hazard problem and other general broken stuff too.
Say what you want about gen 8, but its a very competitive metagame.
it's so competitive that it's even competing for the "most boring meta" trophy
seriously, though, i do agree. gen 8 was about as engaging as eating drywall but it somehow closed out as one of the most balanced iterations of ou despite the crown tundra massacre. maybe gen 8 made a deal with the devil to be remembered as balanced and this gen is an ironic punishment
I mean, to do that, it necessitated banning Gen VIII's central mechanic entirely just a few months in, so I dunno if I'd truly call it "balanced".
i mean that ou was balanced by the end, not that the gen itself was balanced. dmax-era gen 8 was the least competitive that ou has ever been
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