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With the conclusion of quite a few SV tournaments in the recent months, we’re going to be holding another VR voting slate shortly. So last call for nominations, get them in this weekend to be included in the slate!!
Usually all the mons on the low tiers are voted, but still I'm gonna nom some of them to UR. The reason for this is basically that I don't think it's good to fill the VR with some mons that have almost 0 usage through tours, mainly because the VR should be a tool for new players to get a better grasp of the metagame and putting 25 mons there won't help. Just one example of a good VR is the SS DOU one, look how tidy and clean it is.
"The following mons should not be ranked lmao, i dont care that some tour player used it one time in a live tour, they are misleading for new players" (Taken from this post)
The nominations (too many mons to write, so I just made this image. Also Zapdos-G and Kommo-o didn't appear because it didn't fit but I'd also nom them to UR):
Amoonguss 4->3
Amoonguss is a Good Pokemon and should be bumped up a tier. Great support, has never been bad. Heinous that it's considered 4 IMO.
Whimsicott 4->3
Once again another great support mon. Fastest Tailwind in the tier with Taunt, Encore, and being one of the few fairies in the tier has some great merits.
Torkoal 4->3
Great mon. The only (good) sun setter in the tier and enables protosynthesis mons (Like the t2 raging bolt) to get even higher damage numbers without having to use booster.
Dragapult 5->4
Amazing damage when paired with Chien-Pao, dragon darts is amazing. Very fast and can outspeed some mons in tailwind. Banded sets go hard, been having success on ladder with it.
Archaludon 3->1
Amazing mon. A great ability, busted signature move, and relatively good stats make this mon a threat. Can only get ohko'd by 2 mons in the tier (sometimes) without them Terastallizing.
Dondozo/Necrozma/Orthworm/Tsareena 5->UR
Genuinely have never seen them anywhere and they're generally outclassed by better Pokemon.
The year has ended and a lot of developments have happened in the last few months through SCL and World Cup, Archaludon has reassumed its throne as the most annoying thing ever and a massive amount of mons shifted around it. I'm going to go through most mons individually in this post, and provide teams I've used in the past year where I feel its appropriate. I figured this would be fun to do since I've been informing a lot of the teambuilding decisions on US West (though eragon is the primary builder) and thinking about the metagame more critically has actually expanded my enjoyment of the tier in recent months. This list is ordered with one exception at the top.
T3 -> T2
While not the *absolute* best pokemon in the metagame I find it to be by far the most oppressive, with rain structures having seen a renaissance where Archaludon almost always commits to having an assault vest for maximum stat stick and relying on Sinistcha, or more rarely amoonguss, for healing. Pioneered by some of the top players in SCL such as Spurrific and Nails, Archaludon has rapidly climbed its way back to the forefront of the metagame after a slump following its first suspect test with Pelipper's Rain, Tailwind, and Wide gaurd support and sinistcha's healing + trick room + redirection support compressing everything it needs into 3 slots and allowing the rest of the team to handle what few pokemon can threaten the core. Sinistcha's fantastic typing into the ground and fighting hits that threaten arch allow arch to preserve tera for MUCH longer than before, or not even have to rely on it at all, and the threat of getting speed control in either direction gives rain structures a level of constant, overwhelming field pressure at all times. Some players such as Frixel and SMB have even returned to optimizing body press snarl leftovers arch, meaning arch can still cause you a headache even when it's not relying on rain support. I find this pokemon to be extremely overbearing in the metagame right now, with its checks being very strained and the insane amount of versatility allowed in rain's other 3 slots mean most of the time you can just play decently and win with this pokemon without issue.
The defining pokemon of SV. Has been at the top since Flutter was around and has remained so throughout the entire year. If you have a healthy wellspring you ALWAYS have options to play out of a position thanks to its incredible tools and unparalleled tera value, with an extremely flexible fourth slot that can fit multiple grass moves, encore OR taunt for disruption, U-turn for momentum grabbing, swords dance if the team already has a redirector, or even strong coverage in superpower, knock off and play rough to hit some of the few mons that try to reliably stand in front of wellspring (though I will admit non-grass coverage is much more rare). The fact that ogerpon often runs grass coverage almost exclusively to hit itself is testament to how critical this pokemon is in the metagame, and I truly do think you can run wellspring on any team structure.
The GOAT. Like wellspring, having a healthy incineroar around almost always means that there's a way out of a bad situation, even in a world where landorus can click sandsear and make incin's life hell. US West had an incredible 80% winrate with Incineroar throughout world cup because it simply enabled safe and easy outplays into so many of our opponents. Incin being able to flex taunt and will-o-wisp allows it to tech for certain matchups like SD iron hands and Ting Lu on top of doing incineroar things, and the advent of HDB on incin a few months back has allowed it to gradually rise to the top of the metagame right under wellspring in my eyes.
T2 ->T1
AV iron hands has always been a Tier 2 pokemon in the metagame, leveraging unrivaled girth and strong attacks into the entire format, bailing many a player out of games since the very beginning of SV. However, Iron hands has seen a large uptick in usage recently thanks to its solid defensive profile into rain and positive matchup into pao, another mon that has seen greatly increased usage recently. Swords Dance sets have also made a grand resurgence in usage in the format on ting lu structures and a few other teams, notably spammed by Grandmas Cookin in SCL. I've come around to Zee being right a few months back when they claimed hands was tier 1, it's usage and set variety has certainly upheld that claim. Much like the two mons above it, if this guy is healthy, you usually have a pretty good shot at playing out of the game regardless of position. There's also a number of pokemon further down in the list that I think Iron hands is almost single-handedly responsible for making unviable (Gambit) or largely nerfs the viability of (chi yu) to such an extent that I have to respect its place in the metagame
T2 -> T1
I've felt that this mon is unbalanced for a very very long time but the usage stats and amount of teams it's been on haven't really supported it as tier 1 historically. And then SCL happened and this guy took over my last free brain cells. It turns out that the standard pao set is simply well rounded enough to abuse its unrivaled speed tier on any team really, acting as an offensive anchor against the tiers innumerable ice weak threats, and having a decent stopgap into mons that would otherwise annoy it in sacred sword. A pao with sash intact exerts pressure like nothing else in this format and it always has options to win an interaction, either by KOing you, teraing, abusing priority to subvert speed control, or simply drawing aggression to bait a protect or defensive switch. In the hands of top tier players pao can ALWAYS win out over a board stat thanks to it being the speed ceiling of the format barring dragapult and a few scarf/booster guys, pokemon that generally synergize WITH pao more than they do against it. In theory psyspam should limit pao but being a dark type and being able to remove the terrain means it's perfectly content playing into it, pao being so frail means that it should in theory be weak to speed control but it will gladly trade its sash to whack torn and other setters, relying on sucker to clean problems while bulky anchors help it get through the speed control turns. Iron hands should in theory stuff pao but ghost tera mitigates it and pao commonly partners with gouging fire and entei, both of which LOVE to prey on iron hands being on the field. Pao can come solo on torn structures to deal with landorus for a gholdengo, it shows up with ting lu teams to abuse hazards chip to take KOs it normally wouldn't, it's showing up as a speed ceiling for hardroom teams, and it creates its own archetype with espeed abusers and other bulky mons that exploit the insane power amp off it's ability. It has been top 3 in usage for 2 major teamtours in a row and I am more than comfortable calling it a tier 1 threat in this metagame, due to how consistently and commonly it finds value in tournament play.
While significantly lower in my mind than chien-pao, landorus is still the most effective threat in the format at just killing stuff when given any amount of support. The last year of metagame has seen multiple team styles aimed at slowing down or outright walling landorus but it's simply not possible to fully protect your team from this guy's obscene damage output. It's also the only thing really making archaludon look remotely balanced in this metagame, and I have to admit only a pokemon with tier 1 viability could successfully pull off that kind of gaslighting. Still the closest tier 1 mon to t2 simply because of how hard pao, snow, ting lu, and wellspring have been targetting it.
~~ Tier 2 ~~
T1 -> T2
The herald of the most defining structures of the format, Tornadus just barely misses out on tier 1 status in my eyes by not being splashable onto literally any type of team like the other 5 mons above it, and by having some exceptionally poor personal matchups into the likes of archaludon, diancie, and raging bolt; allowing these mons to freely click high-impact moves in front of torn. Still, everyone knows the pain this pokemon can inflict (on both sides of the board) with bleakwind and tailwind spam. There isn't much to say about this guy, though I think I'll shoutout sunny day on torn as lately I think it's a fantastic way to disrupt rain and snow, even if you don't bring teammates to abuse the weather.
T3 -> T2
Probably the win condition with the most even top-end matchups in the tier, being about even into rain, extremely positive into snow, and playable into landorus and ursalunas a la tera/redirection thanks to its consistent damage output into them. It's positive into crown psyspam, Hard counters diancie and has a solid time into paostuffs since those structures hate taking make it rain and don't have the freest time hitting dengo's base typing. Both chi yu and Kingambit are down a lot in the metagame right now in my eyes (and in recent tour usage) and I'll go into more detail on those two in their sections but as two of the main roadblocks for gholdengo in the metagame their fall-off has been massively beneficial for dengo and places it firmly in high Tier 2 in my eyes.
T3 -> T2
This pokemon is insane. Gen 8 Jirachi levels of supportive power with an absolutely disgusting signature move that lets it beat far more pokemon than it has any right to with enough bulk to live ice moves from chien pao with proper investment and typing that provides precious safety from landorus' offensive coverage. Sinistcha has everything you could ever want just in its movepool and typing but its ability really sells the whole thing, turning archaludons and ursalunas into unkillable beasts on all manner of weather teams and effectively enabling a more proactive version of the infamous incineroar-amoongus balance core that plays hard and fast with switches but also happens to have access to trick room. In a metagame where everything is trying to go as fast as possible sinistcha stands apart as one of the best pokemon at slowing things down and the only thing preventing it from taking over the universe is the fact that its role is directly competed with by Amoongus and on many teams ogerpon's offensive prowess is more desirable than sini's defensive domination. Ghost typing offering fake out immunity also adds a layer of consistency to sinistcha's redirection and trick room setting that other pokemon doing similar things certainly wish they had. I have generally replaced farigiraf on my tailroom structures with this pokemon as well, maintaining the ability to set trick room while being fake out immune but having a better defensive typing, more bulk, a more actively threatening damage option and vastly superior support options outside of trick room. - - - - -
A tailroom team I used in world cup that was highlighted in eragon's teamdump - - - - -
A trick room balance structure I built but haven't brought that has felt really really good in test games, Discharge raging bolt is immensely threatening next to sinistcha or Ursaluna and the sheer bulk of the pokemon on this team allows it to play in and out of trick room decently.
T3/T4 -> T2
These two sort of go together, pushed into tier 2 by their abusers, but also very strong in their own right and offering some key strengths into genies on both fronts. Ninetales doesn't need to be paired with Kyurem (or bax/bundle for that matter) to be effective which is why it's slightly higher than pelipper for me. Ninetales offers a mystery box of utility, dealing solid damage with blizzard, disrupting foes with encore disable or roar, can set up teammates with howl fake tears or helping hand, can coinflip games with hypnosis, can grab speed control with fast STAB icy wind, run surprise coverage such as freeze dry, foul play or moonblast to get the jump on certain pokemon and of course sets the extremely powerful aurora veil with great consistency enable its team to win damage trades with ease. This thing can be custom fit to whatever flavor of snow you want to run and honestly makes that team archetype so much more fun for it, a fantastic pokemon that you really can't go wrong by running. Pelipper, conversely, is a lot weaker than its contemporaries, heavily outshone by Archaludon's power on rain and not being nearly as crazy in the support department. However, with wide guard at its desposal, its own two wings to set tailwind, and a brilliantly useful water flying typing, Peli has just enough to threaten genies both offensively and defensively. On top of this it annoys a number of other top pokemon such as incineroar, ogerpon, sinistcha and more. Pelipper's kit is truly minmaxed for its role in the SV metagame and it is very impressive how much it gets done with 440 BST. The power of both of these pokemon into genies has solidified their respective weathers as staple parts of the metagame and I think they both deserve to be upheld in tier 2 for the impact they have had on the format in the past year
T4 -> T2
Eragon made a metacall on this pokemon in world cup and it turned out to be correct. Diancie saw incredible usage and success for us and it's all due to how incredibly valuable diamond storm is into the metagame. Diancie manages to offensively threaten pao, genies and snow in a single slot, something very few pokemon can boast to be able to do, and in doing so while also offering trick room access allowed us to stack multiple strong supportive tools onto our teams to make sure we always had options to play with in our games. Diancie's poor matchup into steel types is fairly easily remedied in this metagame with a number of absurd ground types and other ways to deal with the most common steels, and with most iron hands not opting into heavy slam the only other common rock resist is unable to really harm diancie, with both ursalunas hating body press. While diancie obviously won't carry every game it is an incredibly effective progress maker and cleaner that most importantly is self-sufficient in its job, meaning it can be used to help stabilize the aforementioned matchups all by its lonesome without costing the team a large amount of commitment. Hard stone leftovers psyseed goggles and even band on one very special team, diancie has incredible item flexibility to stylize its consistently threatening kit and win games for anyone. The nature of diamond storm's boosts also makes diancie an incredibly valuable pokemon to tera, and with all these traits in mind I simply have to say that diancie felt like one of the safest and easiest pokemon to pilot in the whole format for me in the past few months. Just make sure to bring some gholdengo hate on your team.
T3 -> T2
Probably the only pokemon in the tier that can threaten literally everything relevant in the format, courtesy of Ground-ice + freeze dry coverage and blizzard's high BP and freeze chance threateninng to break down neutral bulky mons like porygon with enough clicks. Flash cannon is my pick for best 4th move, making snow mirrors much easier and also forcing diancie to tera into a type that will likely be weak to your ice stab. On top of being consistently threatening, Kyurem is one of the few pokemon in the format capable of matching Archaludon's raw stat power, especially if you go tera ground to boost earth power and drop your steel weakness (bonus points for becoming a rock resist). Freeze chance is a really degenerate side effect of this pokemon being good, but Its a tolerable price to pay for this guy enabling bulky teams to be viable. Definitely think there's some room for innovation on Kyurem though, with choice items being very solid and a few moves like dragon tail breaking swipe and glaciate having potential into certain stuffs on AV sets.
T3 -> T2
The second-best check to archaludon on the metagame, Bloodmoon distinguishes itself from landorus in a number of big ways with various sets that I have consistently had a phenomenal time running. Many players have finally come around to running Assault Vest on ursaluna (a set that i have been preaching for over a year now) because the pokemon is just so exceptional at threatening everything with Bloodmoon, a moon that really doesn't need any damage buffs to hit stupidly hard, Earth Power for strong coverage, Hyper Voice for incredibly safe neutral damage and vacuum wave to clean pokemon. Vacuum wave in conjunction with Ursaluna's bulk allows it to shine as a better option over landorus into Chien-pao, who has only seems to get stronger as the metagame has gone on. Being able to clean rogue gholdengos and kingambits with V Wave,
having basically no safe switch-ins to its stabs, especially if it's terad:
252+ SpA Tera Normal Ursaluna-Bloodmoon Blood Moon vs. 200 HP / 0 SpD Ogerpon-Wellspring: 356-420 (101.4 - 119.6%) -- guaranteed OHKO
Full health Bloodmoon simply has the ability to threaten virtually every pokemon in the metagame from any board state, regardless of speed control thanks to the overwhelming amount of stat it has when gifted an assault vest and that kind of consistency is invaluable to me in a metagame as volatile as SV. Life orb and throat spray sets also continue to see use on trick room/tailroom structures to great success, and Calm Mind ursaluna is perhaps the scariest special setup attacker in the format with its incredible STABs and access to consistent spread damage.
Rounding out tier 2 on my list is bolt. This guy is at odds with the strongest attackers in the metagame, and honestly I don't blame anyone who rates it lower because of the fact. However my personal experience with bolt has been that if you position it correctly very few pokemon are comfortable with playing around its attacks, much less coming in on them. pao never wants to switch in on an electroweb, landorus never wants to switch in on a snarl, few pokemon can deal with a calm mind boosted Dragon pulse or even threaten out CM boosted bolt if it has tera active. This guy definitely has a lot of untapped potential in the metagame and whenever a team I build with the guy hits it sticks around in my builder for a *long* time, with one of the oldest teams in my builder that I still use consistently anchoring around raging bolt and amoonguss - - - - - I love this team and it's been consistently good for over a year
~~ Tier 3 ~~
T1 ->T3
Much like eragon, I believe this pokemon has had a decent fall off in recent months. Having rillaboom on your team is actively detrimental into rain and snow structures, and rillaboom doesn't do much better into everything else. If you're not playing against a weather team, you're probably facing genies or pao; genies has no issue blasting through rillaboom and pao is no less difficult to get past, especially since pao's often partnered with grass resistant mons like gouger, dragonite or entei if it's not running as a sollo breaker. Rillaboom also has a hard time into incin, who I also think can be place on any team in this format, and just generally fails to threaten any top pokemon in the metagame aside from wellspring diancie and the ursalunas. This in conjunction with the fact that hands and incin are both extremely viable fake out users makes me question rillaboom's place on a lot of my teams, with better fake out options available and usually wanting a grass type as a redirector on the team in this format. However, rillaboom is still rillaboom and I don't think it can truly ever be unviable unless it gets directly outclassed, and it still finds a good home on teams that opt to be bulkier than some of the top meta stuff or to enable glide on an offensive ogerpon, and high horsepower does allow rilalboom to still be somewhat effective into a lot of its negative matchups. Definitely a victim of the recent metagame though, and bringing rillaboom into a kyurem or an Archaludon matchup still feels abysmal.
T2 -> T3
Due to no fault of its own, Glimmora slots in at the top of tier 3 for me due to the metagame conditions around it. Archaludon, Gholdengo and Landorus all being as prominent as they are really limits this mon's viability a the top of the metagame, but its inherent value as a hazard setter and solid damage dealer means it can never truly be bad in SV. Stealth rocks set is as good as ever, pressuring snow teams and chien pao particularly hard, though the rise of boots incin has mitigated its impact on one of the best theoretical targets in the format. Meteor beam is pretty solid right now too, absolutely owning any non-resist with the strongest single hit in the format and vaporizing fire types, being able to take advantage of the relatively few rock resists in the format and punish foes that get out of position. Still neither set sees as much use now as it did before, and the metagame has adapted decently well to the presence of glimmora. - - - - -
A Spectrier structure that has been floating around for about 8 months but really shone in an SCL game where Bagel 6-0ed his opponent in round 1. This structure is kind of just belligerent offense.png but glimmora's poison support really makes the structure and allows it to play out of Ting lu and trick room matchups. - - - - -
A bulkier take on the concept of priority spam that leverages glimmora hazards to break things down into KO ranges over a game, I liked this team a lot when I build it around July but it admittedly has a rough time into genies.
T2 -> T3
Another guy that I think has suffered a bit from the metagame shifts has definitely been hearthflame. Unfortunately for this guy Max speed tornadus has become the dominant set and it hates bleakwind, and incineroar has become the best or second best pokemon in the format (I keep flip flopping on it). This combined with an unfavorable matchup into rain has lowered it for me a bit, but hearthflame still has the potential to sweep an unprepared or slower team with little effort. Critpon is a kind of funny way to break arch and ignore incin drops, though in practice it's a bit hard to actually position. - - - - - <- Funny ting lu sun jank idea - - - - - <- Really strong test game team built with eragon that mitigates hearthflame's main weaknesses
T4 -> T3
Rillaboom being so down in my mind has really pushed ursaluna up, being one of the only viable physical attackers capable of beating archaludon just being incredible difficult to switch in on with anything. Playing this guy well requires hard predictions but you are conistently rewarded with massive KOs every time you get a call correct, and ursa's gargantuan bulk makes sure you get multiple chances to do so. Fast ursaluna is exceptionally good at beating all variants of iron hands (especially if you have ghost tera, which you should) and really deserves to be explored more in this format, seeing how successful 177 and 166 speed hands has been throughout the year. I also lowkey consider this pokemon the real carry of fanroom, a team that evidently can adapt to beat anything in the format if you're good enough with it. - - - - - Fast ursaluna team again - - - - -
Really cheesey team I built in derby for some teammates that mostly just anchors cressbear
T4 -> T3
Good pokemon. has a lot of sets it can run between scarf, band, yache and sitrus with decent consistency at setting rocks and taunting annoying pokemon and ground stab is just so so threatening in this metagame. Mostly just a go-to on teams I don't use incin on in favor of hearthflame or some other fire type and acts as an extremely consistent positional tool around lando-i for said fire type while being covered better against the ice types in the metagame than an incineroar would be able to. Scarf is still a great set that's able to run circles around pao and does solid damage with stomping and tera blast. I think a set that is *heavily* underexplored in this metagame is Mirror Herb. Mirror herb allows landorus to take advantage of defiant users and dogi, while also punishing SD iron hands on the setup turn and immediately threatening a KO. I was angling to do exactly this in world cup but it ended up copying something much funnier instead - - - - - - - - - - <- Funny team that uses AV blastoise for typing + fake out/pivot + KOing landorus
T4 -> T3
The rise of sinistcha has enabled this guy to find a lot more teams to target, as sinistcha really can't do anything about amoonguss and amoonguss actively abuses the trick room and spores its allies. I still think this guy is a heavy matchup fish mon, instantly losing to any teams with taunt access, having a terrible time into ogerpon if it doesn't carry sludge bomb, autolosing to gholdengo, and generally hating all of the ice types and bleakwinds being thrown around. However I've had a bit more success with it recently in targetting scouts that are unprepared for it, and incin-amoonguss remains as solid a defensive core as ever. - - - - -
Early prep team for world cup that uses diancie ghold moltres to justify the double grass core into torn and snow, really good tools. - - - - -
Team that won the final game of world cup, frixel's scout looked exceptionally weak to amoonguss and taunt incin kinda farmed Iberia's ting lu/SD hands usage. Extremely solid team that could easily win more tour games and I don't think it has any real unplayable matchups.
Choice band outrage go brrr. Please click this button more it destroys everything. Nothing else to say here just
Dragonite @ Choice Band
Ability: Inner Focus
Tera Type: Normal
EVs: 204 HP / 252 Atk / 52 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Outrage
- Extreme Speed
- Stomping Tantrum
- Iron Head
T4 -> T3
I think this pokemon is extremely capable in this metagame if you're willing to commit your tera on it to beat landorus or support it properly to mitigate that matchup. Tera ground earth power on volcanion allows it to smash rain to bits and beat irons hands with consistency and allow it to click funny stat check buttons. I've really come around on this guy as I've realize that most of the pokemon I want to tera into don't overlap on the teams with mons that I do want to tera into and it allowed me to build some very fun balancey cores around it. - - - - -
One of the best teams built on US west during world cup and I highly encourage playing with it.
T4 -> T3
Incredibly stupid pokemon, probably the best pao counter in the format while simultaneously turning non-clam hands into an unmon with breaking swipe spam. DD is usable if you try hard enough but booster is one of the most dangerous support pokemon in the tier that happens to be capable of cleaning games itself if played correctly. Probably the most potent member of many ting lu cores, appreciating the spdef boost and returning the favor with howl buffs. Gouging fire has very few poor matchups, just a few dragons that heat crash can't do anything into, ursaluna-bloodmoon, clam SD hands (who has to risk getting burned to KO you) and landorus, who barring scarf you often have a speed advantage over and teammates that can KO it. Incineroar can be annoying but it's easy to bring teammates that can scare it off. Just a very powerful pokemon who has too many positive matchups to count and only a few negative ones that are still mostly manageable. - - - - - Eragon team. Funny. - - - - - Team is ass but carried by gouger.
T4 -> T3
I think this guy is slightly better than crown overall due to synergizing with more mons that just crown, psyseed is a really disgusting set into special offense and psy terrain in general is decent right now with hands and pao stocks up and rilla stocks down. - - - - -
I lost with this team in world cup (most because I neglected to calc) but it felt really good to test with as a more balanced take on psyspam that used keldeo to dispatch steel and dark types. - - - - -
Really good at matchup fishing, made with teammates during dpl or derby idr.
T4 -> T3
I don't use this guy much but I respect that he's good, whirlwind is a great move and turning off special attackers is good. Generally able to eat a hit from anything and hit back with reasonable strength and get enough value out of the slot with hazards/being annoying.
~~ Tier 4 ~~
Really competent utility box that can fill holes on more unique teams, probably the best pokemon at actually setting tailwind without priority (sorry moon you're not great). Wisp is incredibly good in this metagame with how high hands usage is right now, snarl is incredibly obnoxious to play around and mew's access to speed control ensures it can be very annoying if it gets into position. - - - - -
Derby era team from when kingambit was a lot better as a win condition than it is right now.
T3 -> T4
This guy has really fallen off as the metagame has progressed, eternally damned to be one point slower than landorus, and it doesn't play nice with incineroar sharing its typing and being a much more splashable pokemon. Continual increase in iron hands usage and ting lu developments pile on top of these factors to make chi yu a fairly inconsistent special attacker with its frailty on top of everything. All that said, manual sun chi yu teams are the most crushing way to counter snow and rain in the format, and beads of ruin enables some truly absurd damage calculations to ensure that this pokemon is never truly irrelevant. Choiced chi yu is also a very competent threat when piloted well, if only a bit volatile. I personally think Life orb chi yu carrying sunny day has solid potential right now but I haven't been particularly inspired to build much with it in favor of more consistent solid/playstyles. - - - - -
Don't remember when I built this but I've used it on ladder when bored a lot and in some test games, AV moon can ruin a lot of Spdef heavy teams.
Not a bad pokemon, but struggles to break down steel types and incineroar without committing to tera blast which can be pretty detrimental since this pokemon struggles to establish a dominant position if it has to switch out and lose the speed boost. Tachyon cutter into pao and glimmora sashes is extremely nice though, and I think choiced crown may even have potential off of psyspam thanks to volt switch access and great bulk to pivot around with. - - - - -
Brought this team into world cup and lost, this team was testing pretty well though and was a fun shot at building more balacned psyspam, anchored by Cm keldeo into dark steel and ground types. - - - - -
A team I made to face Ann in Seasonal, took the esm structure and mixed it up a bit with mons I enjoy a bit more, really weak into opposing landorus though.
T3 -> T4
the rise of sinistcha and my love for diancie has displaced this pokemon on the list a bit for me, but p2 is still a stat god. Maybe the best trick room setter into genies aside from cress with ice beam being so clickable in this format and tera blast offering STAB and coverage in one slot.
Definitely very useful to have next to arch in particular as seen on nails/eragon rain for the aforementioned matchup positive. Iron hands rise also hurts p2 a bit. - - - - -
One of my favorite teams I made this year, aiming to leverage Goodra's gargantuan bulk to enable it to curse up and use gyro ball, doing really solid damage after a couple of boosts.
T3 -> T4
The hyper has warn off for this guy a bit, with pao being its best check in the format hurting it a fair bit and farig TW offense stuffs that drago thrived on seeing less play in general. Dragapult asserting itself as a good proactive meta option also cuts into drago a bit. but a well-built team with this guy will almost always find it trading positive with its immense hit-taking and dealing capabilities. - - - - -
My favorite take on semiroom, would probably adjust a bit for modern metagame developments but still very viable since derby ended.
T5 -> T4
The performance of this pokemon in SCL has certainly put some respect on its name, being a very consistent offensive piece at the speed ceiling of the format with a move that plays itself in dragon darts and immunity to both fake out and intimidate. The sheer offensive consistency offered by pult in conjunction with the tempo it plays at makes it gravely threatening when all of its damage boosting factors are put into play and it's really only held back by a few pokemon in the metagame that it can still chunk heavily, and missing a consistent secondary STAB option.
God I wish this guy kept howl. Fantastic ability, good cleanup with extreme speed, broken STAB move that destroys all of the physical attacker in the tier and makes it incredibly difficult to switch in on. Has a very diverse item slot and rewards teams that just want a consistent fire type with good tools in access to good damage and priority. - - - - -
A very standard team with an entei, has been extremely useful for test games with other people. (don't run taunt pao lol) - - - - -
Built this in DPL and it's probably my most publicly spread team courtesy of one Akaru Kokuyo . FWG core is really good at cleaning up teams broken down by the ting lu arch scream tail stall core.This team can probably be iterated upon to find something more broken but as it is it's still incredibly annoying to play against with powerful tools into everything. Struggles into lando-i a bit and hearthflame though.
T2 -> T4
This guy fucking sucks right now. Extremely negative into iron hands and loses a lot of its threat power into ubiquitous redirection support in the tier, meaning most top teams are readily prepared for it by default. It fails to actually beat incineroar a lot of the time, the pokemon it's actively trying to face to proc defiant. It struggles to keep pace as a trick room threat with diancie or either ursaluna around having much stronger buttons to click without auto losing to iron hands, many teams' best option into trick room. Gholdengo and Archaludon are both more consistent as steel type threats because they don't have nearly as bad 4MSS as gambit. AV allows you to run all of kowtow iron head and sucker punch + a coverage move but you're still stuck with low kick which isn't that great into most of the stuff you want or stuck with tera blast which is extremely committal. All that said, gambit still has stupid stats, an unparalleled matchup into gholdengo and a solid time into snow if it has iron head, so I can never truly call it bad, just negative into the a lot of the metagame.
Solid bulky guy with access to tailwind and a really strong signature move, can force setup turns and sweep with the right support. Ratpacker's invites game against madaraaa showed both the praises and flaws of this pokemon pretty effectively, displaying how Moltres can both get outpaced in this metagame, and how quickly it can roll over a game if it gets just a couple of turns to work out for it. Really benefits from sinistcha being as good as it is and remains as a solid option in the background of the metagame.
Specs is very good at blowing holes in unsuspecting players, Seed Setup is usable as well. Another fast ghost type like dragapult that leverages its insane speed tier against the metagame to use its obscene offensive power with impunity. An excellent niche special attacker with noticeable consistency into rain. - - - The glimmora-chi yu structure is good.
T5 -> T4
Ice beam being capable of OHKOing lando-i + levitate lets this guy cling on to some relevance for me, has shown some success lately next to SD hands, offering it burn cleansing and ally switch shenanigans. Cressbear is still fine, though ursaluna does need to make a lot of calls correctly, and generally cress can still consistently get up a trick room. Also decent with arch.
I'm giving this guy some props for one last VR cycle, because its stats and striking power as legitimately insane and burn immunity is fantastic; but man it can be hard to use this one effectively. It has every tool it needs to be extremely threatening but lack of spread damage and mediocre defensive typing, especially with hands and ghold running rampant, means it in practice has to work pretty hard to claim the kills it deserves. Loaded dice DD and SD are all valid in some way and do different things but I've never really managed to build this guy in a way where I didn't have a few games wanting for a different set on it. Shoutout to sir jelloton 's bax snow team that he's used forever and is pretty fun. (note that this is a recreation and not jello's paste)
Rock STAB and wisp is enough to make this guy really useful into top mons. Has an unfortunate genies matchup but they don't particularly love trying to come in on rock moves/blitz, wisp for hands and rock slide into pao-dragonite is still extremely solid. Wellspring is really annoying for it, much more so than incineroar, but I honestly love this guy as a niche offensive intimidate/wisp mon regardless. - - - - -
Another seasonal team that uses electabuzz to help balance out the opposing genies matchups with band arcanine as a phys breaker and Cm keld wincon.
T5 -> T4
The queen of duu, rock stab is also extremely solid in DOU, owning snow teams and genies pretty hard while having ogerpon utility. The Bagel Sun sample makes great use of this guy and really opened my eyes to its potential in the metagame and its really hard to go wrong by using an ogerpon. - - - - -
Think I used this team in seasonal, felt great at the time but probably a bit dated now.
UR -> T4
Reg H was right this guy is really good at dunking on incin rilla ogerpon and arch. Dire claw is a disgusting move and sneasler's speed tier being so excellent, especially with unburden access off sash or grassy seed, lets it pretty consistently hit targets its looking for, or force risky switchins otherwise. Surprisingly solid defensive typing into threats like diancie and iron hands thanks to dire claw and resisting fighting/rock. Definitely interested in using sneasler on more reg-h style teams in the future.
Being a non-wellspring water type in SV comes at a premium but the reward in having an extra ice resist and means to threaten the ground types is often well-worth it for certain teams. All of the weather-adjacent water types are good at what they do, with the swift swimmers piling on ground type checks to support archaludon, bundle acting as a means to run faster snow teams and covering for rock and fire types on its own a bit better than kyurem with disgusting damage off specs or disruptive options with booster/sash and Walking Wake having a great speed tier and gross damage output with lorb/specs or trading well with AV/Snarl sets on sun. Keldeo, on the other hand, stands to me as a great pao check in a format where pao is free to assault most teams with impunity, resisting its stabs while offering good damage itself, notably being able to whack archaludon for good damage and outspeeding landorus as well. I've shared a number of keldeo teams in this post already and think it has a number of usable sets with coaching sitrus specs lorb av but I've already said it so many times in this thread and I hardly think anyone wishes to hear me reiterate it again. - - - - -
Posting this team here again because it was used in World cup for a win.
~~Tier 5~~
I don't care nearly as much about these pokemon as the ones above so I'm just going to cover the mons I have stuff to say about
Subtran is somewhat usable and it has an inherently decent toolkit but ground coverage is everywhere with fighting types not far off, and the types it wants to tera to are usually covered by most teams pretty well. Definitely usable to counter team some scouts though, flash fire is nice on snow.
T3 -> T5
This guy fucking sucks rn. Rillaboom and gambit being so bad reduces a lot of its positives, and other trick room setters just have so much more to offer in terms of utility. Psychic noise gives it a notably positive matchup into drain punch hands sets and it still gets to click a few buttons (for pitiful damage) each game but I feel that the metagame has largely adapted past farigiraf after the surge of farig teams in the middle of the year, and it really doesn't stand to offer much over other trick room setters on most teams. Also lacks consistency as a pao check if pao runs throat chop.
T4 -> T5
Moonblast is nice but its really the only thing justifying putting this mon on a team over torn, who outright beats it with superior damage output and icy wind. Encore is a great move except it often fails to get value into teams, with wellspring easily redirecting it and gladly getting stuck using follow me on many boards and pao and incineroar being able to ignore whimsicott and harrass it with impunity while still doing what they want to otherwise for the most part. Whims is useful as a grounded tailwind suer on psyspam, however, and other moves it has access too can fill funny holes on teams.
Really dangerous wincondition right now, extremely competent at taking games into a lot of special-heavy teams right now while notably being solid into hands and pao. Definitely a pokemon to keep an eye on for future tournaments.
T4 - > T5
Struggles to actually set up into a lot of the metagame with snow and psyspam and flying types everywhere, extremely tera-reliant in a bad way, especially with some of the mons it beats handily like chi yu and gambit falling so hard.
T4 - > UR
God this thing is dogshit. This thing is a joke of a win condition on trick room teams and does NOTHING for sun offense. It beats NONE of the common trickroom stopgaps in the tier with eruption spam, wasting precious trick room turns by doing 15% to ogerpon-wellspring or bolt or incineroar and costing many a team the game. Why would I ever use torkoal over diancie or usraluna, who stronger damage output on a less conditional basis with better offensive typings and far more bulk to function outside of trick room with? Why would I rely on torkoal to carry my trick room team's damage when hatterene or necrozma or hoopa can vaporize targets with expanding force without being solely reliant on their main stab typing like torkoal is to reach such damage thresholds while having actual offensive stats?Meanwhile on sun teams ninetales is genuinely always a better option, offering an actual speed tier to click will-o-wisp and fire moves with and not being a complete momentum sink by having access to eject pack . Ninetales offer SO many more support moves like fake tears encore/disable healing wish/memento snarl or hypnosis to justify it sitting on the field instead of pretending the pokemon with a base 85 attack stat is doing enough damage to be worth having out over a sun boosted bolt or walking wake or literally any other fire type, much less whatever the opponent currently has on the field. Relying on eruption to deal damage is awful in a metagame infested with stealth rocks usage and priority moves where getting chipped is almost fact of life. Nevermind the fact that torkoal itself is utterly useless into pelipper and snow, even if it gets the weather advantage, which is hilarious because manual sun from tornadus is so consistent at inhibiting these archetypes! Torkoal can't even afford to use eject button like politoed because it's so essential to keep its HP topped up, it's insulting! I legitimately see almost no reason to ever justify putting this thing in the builder when tornadus is a better sun setter by default offering equivalent damage output with bleakwind storm, which has a better offensive typing, and oppressive speed control, ninetales offers more utility out of a drought user and can actually use an item that gives you momentum to position your win conditions with, and on trick room torkoal is hopelessly outclassed by psyspam users, ursalunas, and diance as a win condition that aren't nearly as conditional in how their main damage option functions! This pokemon is a legitimate blight on the SV DOU ladder and has been since the inception of the tier, dragging down every player who uses it to mickey status and offering no recourse throughout the entire history of the format. It should not be used by anyone and I sincerely hope it never shows up on the VR again, although I know it unfortunately will.
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And that's about it, I'll be dumping the rest of my teams in Eragon's year review thread with some additional thoughts on stuff + a surprise which was probably maybe definitely more suited for this kind of post in general with all the teams I dumped to justify placements, but this was a VR nom post first and foremost and there's been so many shifts in the format that I wanted to cover. I definitely take the VR way too seriously but that's part of the fun. Overall I think the metagame is decent right now, I've certainly improved my opinion on it in recent months, arch is really dumb but for now it is possible to account for it in builder without straining too much. However it is still an extremely centralizing presence, it continues to get stronger as more teams around it develop, and if it came to a suspect right now I'd probably vote ban.
Edits: Typos, punctuation, fixing myself generally being bad at posting
The viability rankings have once again been updated! Thank you to everyone who nominated and voted. Nido-Rus abstained from this round. Here are the changes:
UR ->T4 UR ->T5 T4 -> T5 T4 -> T3 T4 -> T5 T4 -> T5 T4 -> T5 T5 -> UR T5 -> UR T5 -> UR T5 -> T4 T5 -> T4 T5 -> UR T5 -> T4 T3 -> T4 T3 -> T2 T1 -> T2 T2 -> T1 T3 -> T2 T2 -> T3 T4 -> T3 T4 -> T3 T3 -> T4 T2 -> T1 T1 -> T2 T3 -> T2 T4 -> T3 T2 -> T3 T3 -> T4
3 -> 4
Actuarily: Tier 4. Is a bit of a Tera hog since there’s a decent amount of fighting type attacks, and is much more susceptible to priority moves than the other TR setters. Against Torn/Lando offense it can still be quite effective though, which is why most of its usage recently has been on Archaludon squads.
Akaru Kokuyo: 4. Super reliant on Tera, it’s able to guarantee a Trick Room most of the time sure but it tends to also be one of the most passive setters the tier has, which is something that gets severely punished. Way better setters that are also very bulky like Sinistcha, Diancie, etc.
Bagel: 4. Pretty big tera hog and doesn’t really have the offensive presence to justify it a lot of the time. Has strong matchups into the genies but being so negative into Gholdengo + Archaludon is really rough. Feels most natural on more balanced TR builds which aren’t the most common and even then it has to compete with other setters that either have a lot more offensive upside (Diancie) or utility (Sinsitcha, Farigiraf), while on hard TR its lack of firepower can make it a liability.
Eragon: 4. Good mon but not super splashable. Many archetypes that use TR simply use another setter like Sinistcha, Indeedee-F, or Diancie. that often does something else in addition to setting TR. P2’s stats with eviolite are still incredible and it’s probably the best mon in the format at guaranteeing TR goes up but it’s just pretty niche due to being confined to specific TR archetypes that don’t want to use the other setters and can afford to have a mon on the team whose board presence isn’t super incredible after setting TR.
Madaraaaa: T4. Other comrades explained well. Is not the best trickroom setter right now, is passive sometimes, cannot easily stall in this metagame.
SMB: Tier 4, semiroom wants either a support mon or something more offensive to set tr (sinistcha, farigiraf, indeedee, diancie), p2 is a bit in the middle and being so passive with no support tools make it not very useful most times
Yoda2798: Tier 4. Porygon2 has been pretty niche for a while, there’s a lot of competition for Trick Room setters and the other options offer better value than its access to BoltBeam and recovery. One notable difference is that Porygon2 is vulnerable to Fake Out, which many other setters are either naturally immune to (Sinistcha) or have abilities which block it (Indeedee-F, Farigiraf). Meta wise, the increase in Iron Hands and Archaludon usage is negative for Porygon2 as both hit its one weakness hard, forcing it to be somewhat reliant on Tera, detracting from its strength of being able to more reliably set TR compared to other setters. As others have already said the biggest problem for Porygon2, however, is the lack of utility compared to alternatives; Porygon2 is pretty passive after setting TR and doesn’t do much outside of it. On the other hand, Diancie is far better offensively in TR (and while a Tera hog, as mentioned before Porygon2 also relies on Tera to deal with all the Fighting-type attacks at the moment), while Indeedee-F and Farigiraf can block priority outside of it for teammates, and Sinistcha provides the all-around best support with healing and redirection support.
Zee: Tier 4, it’s incredibly bulky and hits decently hard with a Download boost but I fear the cons outweigh the benefits. Sporting a weakness to Fighting in a tier dominated by Iron Hands just isn’t great, and ultimately the more common TR setters - Sinistcha, Farigiraf, Indeedee-F, Diancie - all offer greater benefits to teams as a whole.
3 -> 2
Actuarily: Tier 2. It’s arguably the biggest threat in the metagame, able to pick up multiple kos and take out unprepared teams (and even some prepared ones). The only downside is it requires multiple support pokemon; a rain setter, usually a healer of some kind, and speed control, which limits the flexibility and building options. So by definition it is more tier 3 as it requires a lot of team support and a specific teamstyle, but it’s so good once it has those characteristics that tier 3 is too low.
Akaru Kokuyo: 2. After the Archaludon suspect, people dedicated themselves to optimize teams with this mon and oh man they did it. You can build Archaludon + 5 supports and have a pretty good team there. Very very hard to take down with all the support it gets, and even if most of the times it requires Tera to get out of a bad situation, it’s often rewarded, all of this while also dealing massive damage with Electro Shot boosts + the rest of coverage moves it can pack. IDBP set is also very threatening if you’re unprepared but definitely the best set is AV Rain one, since it can shred teams EVEN if you’re prepared for it.
Bagel: 2. Stamina + Electro Shot + Tera make Arch a super flexible mon that can be a threat in multiple different ways. Having very specific counters mean that people playing vs Arch can often be forced into awkward positions which Arch can easily take advantage of. Also helps that other common rain mons like Pelipper Lando Sinistcha are all really strong and have great synergy with Arch.
Eragon: 2. Rain is one of the top archetypes in the format with a ridiculous number of iterations, all of which are carried by Archaludon. Everyone knows this Pokemon is a complete behemoth under rain and with the more developed rain versions we’ve seen in the last few months the archetype has reached the point where I’d say Arch belongs in Tier 2 for carrying the archetype, even if its uses outside of rain are not nearly as impressive.
Madaraaaa: T2. The bridge under rain is in a brilliant moment right now, stamina + electro shot +tera are just strong, you wanna keep alive your special sweepers or archa can win alone sometimes. With comrades like pelipper (rain + wide guard) and sinistcha (rage powder + hospitality) archaludon feels great.
SMB: tier 2, both the splashable iron defense set and the electro shot rain set excel at what they do and make it one of or the best wincon at the moment. It has some glaring weaknesses but with the right partners and the broken funny mechanic they can be fixed
Yoda2798: Tier 2. Partnering Archaludon with Sinistcha has greatly improved its ability to win games, as Hospitality and Rage Powder keep it healthy and mitigate the lack of Protect on Assault Vest sets. Sinistcha’s typing makes it especially great as a redirector, being immune to any Fighting-type attacks from Iron Hands and resisting any Earth Power (though notably not Sandsear Storm) from Landorus aiming for Archaludon, sometimes allowing Archaludon to delay or forego using Tera, and can often even make your opponent click another move to target Sinistcha even if you don’t actually use Rage Powder that turn. Trick Room also takes advantage of Archaludon’s fairly middling Speed into faster compositions, particularly Tornadus teams, as Pelipper is far less reliable for matching Tailwind. Aside from SCL, Archaludon usage hasn’t quite been at the typical level for a Tier 2 Pokemon, due to the fact it basically requires committing half your team and Tera to be effective, but it’s such a strong win condition and requires enough respect in the builder that makes up for it.
Zee: Tier 2. Archaludon teams have been incredibly optimized and of course you can’t have an Archaludon team without the man himself. It is a mon that demands respect in the teambuilder or it can easily steamroll teams with minimal effort. Has a good typing to start with and can use a variety of tera types to patch its weaker matchups.
1 -> 2
Actuarily: Tier 2. While yes it is an excellent support pokemon, many of the top threats are able to hit this super effectively, which limits the pivoting Incineroar can do. There’s just such a prevalence of fighting & ground type attacks, and pokemon like Okidogi that take advantage of Incineroar are becoming more popular.
Akaru Kokuyo: 1. Madaraaaa worded it perfectly. Thing provides too much for only 1 slot.
Bagel: 1. Does incin things, isn’t dead weight ever and is one of the best checks to common threats like Chien Pao and Gholdengo. As others have said, rn its a very flexible mon that is still a doubles goat.
Eragon: 1. Extremely flexible pokemon, +1 to everything Madara said below. Fits on basically every archetype and its various tools all serve to compromise the things in this format that it’s weak to. In a format that can often feel heavily volatile, this Pokemon is one of the most stable and consistent options you can include on any given team.
Madaraaaa: T1. Us west spammed incineroar and was right. Too versatile and makes every team compact. Even if iron hands heavily returned and lando-i is always T1, incineroar can be molded to play around (fast with will-o-wisp, av, shuca, using tera). Enters well into phisical attackers, pao, gholdengo and is a big plus.
SMB: tier 1, is the best user of fake out and best pivot. Wow sets are very useful right now
Yoda2798: Tier 1. Incineroar was actually in a rougher spot before and is better now rather than the other way around. Aside from Will-O-Wisp becoming increasingly common, Incineroar itself hasn’t really changed, but meta trends have been favourable. The main one being that the competition as a Fake Out user has fallen off: Rillaboom is a great deal worse than before (see below), and while Assault Vest Iron Hands is still good, Swords Dance is now the more common set. SD Iron Hands also then benefits from Incineroar as a partner, to provide opportunities with Fake Out to set up or help Sinistcha set Trick Room; on the other hand Will-O-Wisp also matches up well into opposing SD Iron Hands, severely limiting its damage. Otherwise, Incineroar is great into the rise of Chien-Pao, works with or against Gholdengo which is still going strong, and is a staple on Snow which remains a fairly common archetype. With all that said, it should come as no surprise that Incineroar has solidly been within the top handful of Pokemon for usage in the most recent tours.
Zee: 1. Just very useful for keeping a lot of Pokemon in check in one slot. PsySpam, Chien-Pao, Rillaboom, etc. Knock Off, Parting Shot, Will-O-Wisp on one mon is a massive amount of utility. Offensive sets can do great as well.
1 -> 2
Actuarily: Tier 2, feels like there’s pretty much always 3-4 pokemon on the opposing team that can hit this super effectively, so being t2 despite that is a testament to how good Rillaboom is at what it does. The main metagame trend in its favor is that psyspam is becoming more popular, but as many others have mentioned there’s just too many other trends that are unfavorable to Rillaboom.
Akaru Kokuyo: 2. Sad to see the monke fall but it’s what happens in tiers. In a meta where Archaludon Rain is spammed everywhere, this dude doesn’t really have a place existing. I still think it’s great into a lot of teams since it can have very good coverage in Knock Off & Highhorse Power, but it’s currently outclassed by the Ogerpons & Sinistcha. Still very good support Pokémon since it has Fake Out, Snarl & U-Turn, and can deal massive damage into unresisted Pokémon.
Bagel: 2. Solid pivot that can take an attack from basically everything. Fake out, glide, terrain utility, and wood hammer nuke is still a top tier toolkit, but Rilla is clearly not tier 1 cause it gets stonewalled and threatened by a lot of common mons. I don’t think its place in the meta has really changed too much tbh but it probably was never actually a tier 1 mon for me (dont check my votes).
Eragon: 3. This pokemon hates the entire metagame except for Ogerpon-Wellspring. Incin and Hands are far more splashable Fake Out options due to not having a type overlap with other, stronger grasses. I’m not really a believer in win percentage statistics but I’ve watched this pokemon have abysmal win rates (sub 40) for pretty much all of the last year and at some point you really have to wonder why. While the pokemon is great in a vacuum, it doesn’t really have exceptional matchups into any single archetype, and many of the top archetypes heavily punish it to an extent that none of the pokemon I would put in tier 2 really suffer. There’s no shortage of grasses or fake out mons and I’d say this is the least useful I’d ever say Rillaboom has been in my time playing DOU.
Madaraaaa: T2. I don’t wanna punish too much rilla but dwcup usage doesn’t lie, ogerpon and sinistcha are better right now. Suffers popular strong steels, tornadus and other T1/T2 pokemons. Cb set is interesting but in specific teams.
SMB: tier 1, it is still super useful in teams with steel types that do set up, it will always do something good. The most offensive sets are little explored and are very good since they can ohko stuff like hands, gholdengo or other steel types that would otherwise ignore it.
Yoda2798: Tier 2. Dropping to Tier 3 is just a step too far but Rillaboom is undeniably in a bad place right now. This may actually be the worst it’s ever been, being a mono Grass-type is just so bad in this meta. Archaludon and Sinistcha have both been on the rise, and completely laugh at any attacks Rillaboom throws out, but the kicker is they also do the same to Ogerpon-Wellspring, so if you want to use that (which is the better Pokemon), you really don’t want to stack Rillaboom as well now, when using both together was pretty solid in the past. Sinistcha competes as a utility Grass-type, but is far better with the likes of Archaludon or Swords Dance Iron Hands, and Rillaboom is an infinitely worse partner for Fake Out than Iron Hands or Incineroar. With Tornadus still everywhere which is a horrendous matchup, more Chien-Pao and Incineroar which check it offensively and defensively respectively, plenty of Gholdengo which sets up on it, and a good amount of Snow which is also rough for it, there are bad matchups everywhere Rillaboom looks, and outside of Ogerpon-Wellspring very few good ones to balance it out. Ogerpon-Wellspring and Sinistcha are better Grass-types, Iron Hands and Incineroar are better Fake Out users, and Wood Hammer is no longer a strong neutral attack to throw out with just how many Pokemon eat it. Like Akaru Kokuyo said, I think changing things up with the likes of High Horsepower can breathe some new life, and Rillaboom can still be good on the right teams, but it’s still a far cry from the splashable glue you can slap on any team without thought that it has been in the past.
Zee: 2. I’m a little hesitant to drop all the way to 3 but the mon has undeniably been on the downswing. Like others have said, it just kinda has negative matchups to the majority of Pokemon in its power level, stacking Grass types in a tier dominated by Tornadus and Chien-Pao is definitely risky, and it faces competition from the other beefy Fake Out users like Incineroar and Iron Hands.
2 -> 1
Actuarily: T1, priority spam has been a common archetype all generation long, worthy of t2 in itself, and now people have found structures where chien-pao functions well outside of priority spam. It’s excellent into torn/lando offense, reasonable into gholdengo set up, solid into hail, and just has so many favorable matchups and board states that despite it’s awful defenses it always keeps the chien-pao user in the driver’s seat.
Akaru Kokuyo: 1. Almost the perfect glass cannon. Faster than virtually anything in the tier, has an amazing coverage and stabs, and enables your teammate to deal huge damage too with its ability. As bagel said, the trades this thing forces are usually favorable for it.
Bagel: 1. Its speed + power + prio + coverage means its almost always threatening something. It’s really hard to have a real check to a well played chien pao and more often than not it takes a trade to remove (which pao is on the favorable end of the vast majority of the time)
Eragon: 1. One of, if not the strongest offensive piece in the tier thanks to its incredible speed stat that outpaces essentially the entire tier. I think the main driver of this mon’s rise is the success it has seen while being paired with just about any other physical attacker you can think of, particularly during SCL. You can fit Pao on just about anything that’s not fullroom and can often be used to help a team deal with weaknesses to other top mons like Lando or Torn.
Madaraaaa: T2. I abused of this amazing pokemon, is “solid” with sash on the field and is the fastest sweeper pokemon in the metagame. Punishes genies and dragons, depending if has sucker punch or throat choap is a threat for sinistcha and gholdengo. Said that, I think incineroar’s presence can mitigate the power of pao, and raising hands, archaludon convince me of Tier 2.
SMB: tier 1.5 but I guess closer to 1, very splashable thanks to its offensive type, doesn't really need the team to have physical attackers because it can work alone. Many times it trades not so well vs bulky stuff or if it is intimidated but it still has a lot more advantages than disadvantages and doesn't need support to work.
Yoda2798: Tier 1. Since around SCL, Chien-Pao has clearly established that you don’t need a dedicated partner like Dragonite to make the most of it, Chien-Pao can stand alone as one of the best offensive Pokemon in the tier. Ogerpon (both -Wellspring and -Hearthflame) and Iron Hands are some of the most common Pokemon in the tier and can benefit nicely from Sword of Ruin, while helping to deal with Incineroar in return. Chien-Pao is the fastest unboosted Pokemon in the vast majority of games, letting it make use of its offensive capabilities, with Sucker Punch and its ability to threaten Tornadus mitigating its vulnerability to Tailwind. A shift I’ve noticed is the return to practically every Chien-Pao using Focus Sash again, as there was a period where Life Orb was popular, which doesn’t quite pick up as many OHKOs or is as effective at cleaning in say a priority spam team with a bunch of hazards up, but is far better on general goodstuffs teams for trading and guaranteeing that Chien-Pao always gets value. Sacred Sword force Archaludon to Tera (often into an Ice-type weakness which can then be exploited), and Ice Spinner removes Psychic Terrain to unlock priority again, while Throat Chop is an option if you really hate Gholdengo. Teammates like Dragonite or Glimmora can be nice, but Chien-Pao is just overall an incredible attacker that requires no real support, even capable of seeing use on some Trick Room teams as a fast mode option.
Zee: 1. Chien-Pao is the tier’s unboosted Speed ceiling, which means teams are often going to have 1 mon at most (a Scarfer usually, maybe a Protosynthesis mon) that can hit it before it swings, if you want to disregard Sucker Punch. Genies and all the Grass types make the tier look like a buffet for this guy. Ice Spinner clearing terrain has actual utility, and of course entire team archetypes are built around stacking physical threats to take advantage of Sword of Ruin.
3 -> 2
Actuarily: T3. I love sinistcha’s unique attributes as much as anyone, but it has to choose between redirecting, setting TR, or switching out so that it can heal, and that leaves it little time for damage. It has some archetypes that it’s really good on like SD/BD Iron Hands, Archaludon rain, or hail, but in many other teamstyles it doesn’t fit as well as other grasses, so it has a lot of competition limiting its viability.
Akaru Kokuyo: T2. People have finally found how to correctly build with this Pokémon and boy has it worked. Probably the best utility Pokémon you can splash into a lot of popular builds like ArchaRain and Setup (with screens/veils and Trick Room). Has the broken move Rage Powder without being as passive as Amoonguss since it can also threaten burns with Matcha Gotcha, has Trick Room, and has Life Dew to give even a longer sustain to whatever it wants. Can even be a win condition if used with Nasty Plot or Calm Mind. Very good mon overall and I’m glad it’s finally shown how good it can be.
Bagel: 2. Sinstcha + incin is the strongest combo in the tier at enabling setup pokemon and can really work with any mon that wants to boost its stats. Sinis has a solid typing and toolkit (aka trick room) to deal with genies so its a great partner for Arch. It doesn’t apply that much pressure (compared to amoonguss’ spore for example) but it's also risky to ignore as matcha gatcha burn + healing can give it a lot of extra longevity.
Eragon: 2. One of the best redirectors and the best mon at keeping other strong mons healthy. Since the last vote, this mon has been paired more and more with Archaludon on rain while maintaining significant usage outside of that particular archetype. Archaludon often can feel unkillable with support from Sini and the two have basically perfect type synergy. Rain’s further development is definitely a driver of the mon’s success but it’s also the only Pokemon that fulfills its specific niche thanks to its very unique role compression.
Madaraaaa: T2. Healing ability + good bulk + access to matcha gotcha is great. Good Matchup vs T1 ogerpon, sinistcha is able to put trickroom at least one most of times or helping the team with regular switch in-out. Sinistcha can dance from full support with rage powder, life dew and trickroom to nasty plot/calm mind offensive sets with shadow ball, solid pokemon.
SMB: tier 3, it can be overwhelmed relatively easy, a little overrated right now due mainly to archaludon I believe after not being used so much a couple of months ago, very good pokemon but not good enough for tier 2
Yoda2798: Tier 2. I was one of the people picking up on how well Sinistcha was doing during ODST, with the split usage between the two (competitively identical) formes causing it to go under the radar. Looking at combined usage, it was 15th in SCL, 9th in DWCoP, and 6th in Invitationals, having (deservedly) continued to rise in usage since then. As others have said Sinistcha has an all around amazing kit, with Hospitality, Rage Powder, and Life Dew making it excellent at keeping teammates alive, while Trick Room with natural Fake Out immunity and a great defensive typing make it an excellent setter. Matcha Gotcha is a laughably overloaded move, offering spread burn chance, recovery, and decent damage all in one. Rather than supporting setup, Sinistcha can go itself with Calm Mind or Nasty Plot though I think those aren’t quite as good and not why it should be Tier 2. As everybody knows, Sinistcha has fully unlocked Archaludon, being the reason behind its recent resurgence, but Sinistcha is definitely not a one trick pony. Sinistcha is also commonplace on Snow, first being popularised by this generation’s FanRoom team, and has also seen use as one of multiple setters on harder Trick Room teams. Sinistcha is just surprisingly splashable, I’ve used a team with it and Gouging Fire/Ting Lu and you can just keep your teammates alive forever. If there was no Archaludon in the tier I don’t know if Sinistcha would still be Tier 2, but it is so Sinistcha definitely is, with everything else it also works with combined.
Zee: 2. Sinistcha is so good. Really good at just enabling any set up sweeper of your choosing thanks to the ability and potentially Life Dew. Has pretty good matchups against some of the tier’s common faces like Ogerpon-W, Landorus-I, and Iron Hands. I’ve also been a fan of the CM/NP sets that I’ve seen recently pop up. Overall a splashable mon with lots of utility that can take on multiple roles.
2 -> 3
Actuarily: T3, as others have mentioned its worse than Archaludon & Gholdengo, but it also arguably requires less teambuilding support, and can be more of a “good mon to put on your team that needed a steel” as opposed to being the big threat to build around. The main thing limiting Kingambit is that players have gotten better at playing around it, utilizing redirection to limit its ability to sucker punch everything into oblivion, which forces the player using Kingambit to often go for hard reads and not using sucker punch when they may have needed to.
Akaru Kokuyo: T3. Unfortunately Kingambit finds itself as the worst best steel the tier currently has, and you don’t really want to be using many steels given how the tier isn’t that friendly to them. Maybe AV Set is the most usable one right now but even then it struggles so much since it’s very tera hungry to not immediately die to a lot of things.
Bagel: 3. Currently the worst set up steel but SD can still win games on its own if opponents are not careful and it still has great stats to be solid at trading as an AV mon especially if tera is used.
Eragon: 4. This pokemon has fallen off really hard. As madara said, the other steels are significantly better and more splashable and Iron Hands has risen even more since the last slate. I think you have to commit very hard to running this pokemon in a way that prevents it from being even Tier 3. Another factor that heavily limits Gambit’s strength is how it struggles to even beat the dominant Intimidate mon even after a defiant boost, making it often feel like it’s not even good at doing what it’s supposed to do. There’s still a place for the mon in this tier but it’s much, much smaller than when the prominent intimidate Pokemon didn’t resist Dark and Steel and I haven’t really seen any prominent teams featuring the mon in a long time.
Madaraaaa: T3. Gholdengo and archaludon are better steel types, iron hands return makes kingambit not easy to pick in teambuilder. Still a valid pokemon.
SMB: tier 3, not among the best steel types right now and depends on many 50-50s and using tera
Yoda2798: Tier 4. Kingambit was already overrated before and has now gotten worse as well. Gholdengo and Archaludon are far better in the role of “setup Steel that requires committing Tera”, Chien-Pao is far better as a Sucker Punch bot/PsySpam check for offensive teams, and Swords Dance Iron Hands works far better with Trick Room. Fighting-type attacks are more common than ever making Kingambit incredibly reliant on Tera, while Incineroar commonly running Will-O-Wisp shuts down Swords Dance sets without needing to worry about attacking into a Tera. Even without running into priority blocking Kingambit is a much worse win condition than Gholdengo or Archaludon, just use one of those or pair Swords Dance Iron Hands with Sinistcha instead. Assault Vest Kingambit can still be cool, but the Pokemon is niche and very much outclassed by better options. People are voting Ting-Lu down to Tier 4 but that’s had more usage than Kingambit in all of Invitationals/DWCoP/SCL and I’d easily say it’s a better Pokemon with more of a defined niche in the meta.
Zee: 3. Gambit’s definitely in a rough place. Outclassed in effectiveness by the other boosting Steels, generally less preferred than other Darks like Pao and Incineroar, and doesn’t appreciate the half-dozen redirectors the tier has on offer when boosted Sucker Punches are practically its entire brand. However, it’s not like the mon is completely washed. It’s not herculean to set up a Swords Dance and it does make pretty good use of Tera, so I think 3 is fair.
4 -> 3
Actuarily: T3, Rain is good again and it does the job of setting rain and has great typing to let it beat the ground & fighting types archaludon is weak to, but outside of that pelipper is quite bad standalone, so I think 3 is as high as it can get.
Akaru Kokuyo: T3. Rain is in an amazing spot right now and Pelipper can do massive damage with its stabs + can provide utility in Tailwind, Wide Guard, Helping Hand, or even slot in a funny Tera Blast like Ground to surprise some Pokémon.
Bagel: 3. Really annoying mon that does just enough damage to be scary, has just enough bulk to take a neutral hit from just about anything, and has just enough utility to provide value outside of being the rain guy. Has really strong synergy with the common rain support mons with its ability to scare lando in particular
Eragon: 2. Rain is really, really good. I voted Arch to 2 and I think it makes the most sense to put Pelipper with it since Politoed hasn’t seen nearly as much use. 9 times out of ten rain means Pelipper and the archetypes rise to become one of the most established builds in the tier means that Pelipper should rise with it.
Madaraaaa: T3. Zee and Bagel explained well Pelipper’s situation. In this period, good pokemon.
SMB: tier 3, rain is in a good spot and offensive pelipper sets are much more useful than the defensive sets used before.
Yoda2798: Tier 3. Pelipper is not a real Pokemon but enabling Archaludon is enough to make Rain, and therefore Pelipper, worthy of Tier 3. Pelipper also has just enough utility beyond Drizzle to be useful, with Flying-typing and access to Tailwind being nice for some teammates, but not enough to be a Tier 2 Pokemon, and its usage level backs that up.
Zee: 3. I understand the sentiment that it makes sense to rank Arch and Peli together but I do think there is a clear hierarchy in effectiveness even if one is enabling the other. That said, Pelipper is still a solid mon. Water and Flying offense just does pretty well into the meta, there aren’t a lot of things that can instantly remove it, and you have the option of using something like a bulky Damp Rock set, full Speed/SpAtk, or even Scarf.
4 -> 3
Actuarily: T3. The combination of speed, bulk, breaking swipe, howl, and reasonably good damage from the fire move is enough for t3, since there’s so many different pokemon that appreciate what Gouging Fire can do. It pairs well with a lot of other top threats like Chien-Pao, Ogerpon-Wellspring, and Dragonite.
Akaru Kokuyo: T4. With the current popularity of both Rain Teams & Trick Room Diancie, Gouging Fire finds itself in a rough spot, lacking both offensive and defensive tools against the most used teams right now. Also Incineroar insane usage is this Pokémon worse nightmare, pretty bad spot right now for it.
Bagel: 4. Can really only work on one teamstyle that I personally find to be pretty inconsistent. Gouging in particular is often total dead weight in the rain matchup which is hard to forgive in this meta. Additionally Incin slows down what it wants to do a lot.
Eragon: 3. Gouging Fire has seen consistent usage for almost a year now, pretty much always paired with Pao, to the point where Gouging Fire stuff has cemented itself pretty clearly as a defined archetype. I wouldn’t rate it as one of the top archetypes but it’s fairly strong and pops up with decent results in pretty much every tour.
Madaraaaa: T4. I completely agree with bagel here.
SMB: tier 5, I don't think I've ever seen it shine ever, the howl and support sets are pretty bad and passive unless it faces the right team, very weak to incineroar and dd doesn't do enough damage, very few times I would choose to use this pokemon.
Yoda2798: Tier 3. Gouging Fire usage dipped slightly in Invitationals but was still at a strong level in DWCoP and SCL, and while I think it has now gotten a bit worse I think it’s still deserving of Tier 3, particularly as the defining piece of the Howl archetype. Breaking Swipe works as pseudo-Intimidate, which with Burning Bulwark lets Gouging Fire match strongly into the myriad of physical attackers in the meta, notably having a very strong matchup into Chien-Pao in particular as one of the few Pokemon able to outspeed it. Out of the other most common Pokemon there’s Tornadus which doesn’t directly threaten you, Gholdengo which you should generally beat unless it already has a Nasty Plot, and Landorus which does threaten you, but you outspeed and can KO at +1 with some chip or Sword of Ruin, and usually have Ting-Lu to help deal with as well. There were some DWCoP games where Gouging Fire ran rampant as a result, as teams often struggle to really threaten it outside of one or two Pokemon. As Actuarily said there’s a lot of already great Pokemon which pair nicely with Gouging Fire, and appreciate boosts from Howl they can’t normally get; on the other hand Ting-Lu also has a well established partnership with a lot of synergy between the two. However, as others have said, the teams stacking Gouging Fire with a lot of physical attackers do run into problems against Incineroar, which can perpetually Intimidate cycle and Parting shot to limit damage, and Archaludon which can stack Stamina boosts to become almost untouchable if not played around well. Those can definitely be a problem for Gouging Fire teams, but I don’t think they’re insurmountable with the right teammates. Gouging Fire has some tough matchups but I think there’s still enough going for it to be Tier 3, especially if you look beyond the traditional structures used with it.
Zee: 3. I think this guy is pretty neat. There’s a lot of inherent value in outspeeding Chien-Pao and weakening its output with Breaking Swipe, and stacking Howl boosts on the right mons can just take over games. It’s bulky as hell and pretty difficult to remove quickly if you aren’t packing a Landorus. Struggles with meager output at first and can be prone to Intimidate cycling but I think 3 is totally fair.
4 -> 3
Actuarily: T3, I just think there’s a ton of good grasses so you may not see this as much, but none take advantage of unprepared teams like Amoonguss. Many teams are running just 1 spore immune, so if you’re able to play around that Amoonguss can win games. That being said, there is a reason why you’d often prefer other grasses, as Amoonguss has tough matchups into some common archetypes, so it has to be used on the right team that rounds out its weak points.
Akaru Kokuyo: Eragon said everything I think. Go read his opinion.
Bagel: 3. Agree with everything eragon says, amoon is basically always going to have some value in a matchup. Getting 1 spore off can win a game, but its longevity + bulk + redirection regardless of spore is still a great toolkit.
Eragon: 3. While it competes with Sinistcha for a niche between healing and redirection, Amoonguss’ typing and ability to disrupt things with spore has proven to be more and more valuable the last few months. While its matchups into the top mons aren’t the greatest, Amoonguss always provides at least some value regardless of whatever team it queues into. Only prevented from being higher due to the many competing options for redirection and the abundant grass types immune to Spore (as well as Tornadus being omnipresent).
Madaraaaa: T3. Agreed with Eragon: amoonguss, even if less popular now, is a consistent factor to consider if you face it for the various support can offer.
SMB: tier 3, it is always going to do something good and many teams are not prepared or have a very weak matchup to spore
Yoda2798: Tier 4. See my previous vote, Amoonguss still isn’t great into the top Pokemon and is a much inferior support Grass-type than Sinistcha outside of Spore, which requires something else setting Trick Room or using Tera against something expecting to KO you to really be effective. Yes, Amoonguss can do well into more Trick Room oriented teams that are now greeding going without any Tera Grass or Safety Goggles, but punishing unprepared teams alone isn’t enough for Tier 3. If I’m in a Sinistcha mirror I’d maybe prefer to have an Amoonguss, but otherwise I’d much rather have Sinistcha than Amoonguss, generally speaking. Amoonguss with a different Trick Room setter is more justifiable, though the role compression of Sinistcha doing both in one makes it the superior option outside of more heavily Trick Room oriented teams - which do exist, but are more niche and so aren’t enough of an argument that Amoonguss is splashable enough for Tier 3. On a side note I will concede that Amoonguss is better than Sinistcha as a redirector specifically with Gholdengo, though Amoonguss still struggles without TR with the same issues as always, which is why Ogerpon is a better redirector partner and nearly always used with it so any Amoonguss pairing with Gholdengo is still niche as well. After being an okay 17th in usage in SCL, Amoonguss dropped down to 30th in DWCoP and 39th in Invitationals, that is not a Pokemon with the general applicability for Tier 3, and a Pokemon that has options to specifically counter it almost entirely and isn’t a defining piece to any archetype doesn’t have a strong argument on the pure strength side either.
Zee: 3. I think it is pretty much impossible for me to consider Amoonguss any lower than this, Spore is without question the most broken move in the game and Regenerator + Pollen Puff ensures it and its teammates can be kept healthy with proper control of the board. Yeah there’s a billion Grass types to choose from but I don’t think that’s enough to keep it in 4.
3 -> 4
Actuarily: T3, nothing else in the tier is able to pack the immediate offense that Regidrago offers, and while it does require good positioning and speed control, if you do position it well it can be game over.
Akaru Kokuyo: T4. The insane ammount of pressure thing thing packs is not a laughing matter, but it relies on so many factors in order to be effective that most of the time it can really only launch a strong Draco Meteor instead of consecutive Dragon Energy, plus Tera Fairy being very common on a lot of Pokémon like Archaludon, Incineroar or Gholdengo isn’t helping it much.
Bagel: 4. Balance teams have figured out how to handle this mon a lot better over the course of SCL and Invis, as Drago is an extremely linear mon that doesn’t offer a lot of flexibility and needs a lot of support to really thrive.
Eragon: 4. The mon’s use in tours kind of dropped off after Derby as its brand of Torn HO somewhat fell out of favor. I’m a bit less certain on this than I was a week ago, as we’ve started to see more Drago usage during DLT. However, I attribute this primarily to the nature of the tour so I think dropping it is still correct since it hasn’t seen the usage that led to it being bumped up to 3 in the first place.
Madaraaaa: T3. Is under pao’s blade and needs mandatory speed control to destroy, but thanks to the power can offer I think this pokemon deserves tier 3. Can have terablast steel to surprise, dragon energy is a huge menace that can erase both opponents, with help of redirection or in speed control (with farigiraf, psy terrain).
SMB: tier 4, needs a lot of support to work well and very weak to priority or tera fairy which are quite common.
Yoda2798: Tier 4. Regidrago’s usage has tapered off in recent tours alongside Farigiraf teams, which were the most common structure it was found on. Dragon Energy is still an incredibly strong move, and with speed control Regidrago can be difficult to deal with (I can definitely admit to getting caught out by Choice Scarf sets in particular on ladder), but it hasn’t really solidified a strong enough place in the meta to maintain Tier 3 in my eyes: Gholdengo, Ursaluna-Bloodmoon, and Chi-Yu are all more typical picks for spread special attacks. I definitely don’t think Regidrago is bad per se, but as others have said it’s quite linear so a Tera Fairy (a good Tera type anyways) can catch it out, so perhaps just requires more support than is worth it compared to the aforementioned Pokemon.
Zee: 4. Regidrago can be very effective in limited doses, but ultimately the scope of what the mon can do is just too narrow, especially when we’re seeing a lot more Fairy Teras and Diancie that just shut it down completely.
4 -> 3
Actuarily: T3, obviously it can get crowded out as many teams want to use the T1 form, but Lando-t still offers a lot between intimidating, pivoting, hitting really hard, and spreading rocks. The main downside is just how frequently teams would prefer a special attacking ground, and special Lando-t is pretty mediocre.
Akaru Kokuyo: T3. I really want to put it Tier 4 but I think it does just enough to be 3. Best set is probably scarf, although Band or Bulky Sitrus can be found from time to time. Intimidate, access to U-Turn and packing a super effective move vs popular threats like Gholdengo, Iron Hands & Incineroar makes its value pretty high in a game. Drawback is you’re probably getting punished with whatever move you lock yourself in (U-Turn also gets punished for not doing a lot of damage to many Pokémon). Also being almost immune to Landorus is a nice plus.
Bagel: 4. I think support sets are not good and too passive, would only consider scarf or AV as they pack more offensive punch. Opportunity cost of not using Landoi (or incin tbh) is pretty massive, and its just in an awkward spot where its not really the best at anything.
Eragon: 3. Great typing + one of the best rocks clickers in the tier + taunt disruption. Competing with Lando-I for usage is really unfortunate for it but it has enough merits to see consistent use. Scarf sets also provide value to some Pao teams although they are not as powerful as they used to be.
Madaraaaa: T4. Scarf is decent + pao, but seems enable to do what should do especially with ground move. Diancie, archaludon can boost def easily, incineroar is annoying iron hands endures quite easily. And if you want special ground sandsear just pick landorus incarnate, possibility of burn is nice but does not match with sheer force orb damages. Hail matchup is bad, rain matchup too. T4 now.
SMB: tier 3, I used the scarf set twice in wcup, quite good at the role compression of intimidate + speed control + sr. Slower sets could be considered on the right team but I don’t think it would do more than just setting sr
Yoda2798: Tier 4. Landorus-T has grown on me, especially the Choice Scarf set, but I’m not fully convinced yet it’s actually good enough to be Tier 3 yet, though I could be convinced in the future. Offering a different Intimidate option to Incineroar is cool, and Choice Scarf being able to outspeed and U-Turn Chien-Pao is nice, but it feels pretty weak outside of using a Ground-type move into a weakness or committing Tera which feels not great. Stealth Rock is nice but when you give up the Speed of Choice Scarf you have even less pressure after that. As others have said a significant factor when it comes to Landorus-T is the opportunity cost of not using Landorus-I, and typically meaning not using Incineroar either, and while some teams do like having Landorus-T instead I’m not convinced it’s what that many teams would prefer. Landorus-T’s usage in tours hasn’t quite been high enough to convince me on a rise, and neither have its performances either.
Zee: 4. I do like the Scarf set in particular just as a fast pivot with a solid set of offensive coverage but I think sharing a usage slot with Lando-I is pretty rough. It’s also held back by weak BP on all of its moves and doesn’t typically run ways to boost them, unlike Lando-I and the Ursalunas.
4 -> 3
Actuarily: T4, Torn is such a better option unless you really need disruption from like encore, and I think you’d rather spend it’s very limited time on the field clicking tailwind and getting out of the way for your other offensive threats. There’s still merits for it, but needs a very specific team to prefer it over Tornadus.
Akaru Kokuyo: T4. Don’t use this unless you’re cheesing with Beat Up, we have Tornadus…
It has a couple more utility moves but definitely lacks the presence Tornadus gives.
Bagel: 4. Loses to and is worse than torn on most teams. Has some unique tools with encore + fake tears but its still niche. Another underrated thing that hurts whims’ viability is how its basically 100% invalidated by gholdengo which has been on the rise recently I feel.
Eragon: 4. Torn almost completely outclasses it and matches up extremely well into Whims, making it very difficult to justify Whimsicott on most offensive structures. Prankster encore is enough to carve out a niche but I think tier 4 is perfectly fine for it as generally you’ll want to use Torn instead.
Madaraaaa: T4. Good in specific HO teams but is a deadweight most of times, is not best grass nor best tailwind setter. Seems prankster annoying moves it offers are quite decently avoided by redirections, switchs, abilities, tera in this metagame. Slower than pao, cannot also try dirty beat up strategy/moonblast easily.
SMB: tier 4, just use tornadus unless you want fake tears or want desperately a fairy type
Yoda2798: Tier 4. Whimsicott is cool on that one team with Spectrier and Chi-Yu but is otherwise incredibly difficult to justify over Tornadus. Whimsicott’s defensive profile is much worse, losing the Rock-type weakness and gaining a Water-type resistance (though Tornadus is still good into Ogerpon-Wellspring anyways) at the cost of being worse into opposing Tornadus, Landorus, and any Fire-types. Tornadus being good into Landorus and Whimsicott being bad into it is probably the biggest difference, as outside of your own Landorus, teams can often struggle to find another switch-in. Bulky Tornadus can safely run Covert Cloak without much risk of being OHKOed, Whimsicott cannot, so either has to go without Fake Out immunity and use Focus Sash or worry about dying in one hit, both of which are big downgrades over Tornadus. Encore can be annoying and Fake Tears can work with the right teammates, but Whimsicott is just generally so much worse over Tornadus.
Zee: 4. On a lot of teams it just very hard to justify over Tornadus, with Whimsi often being outright worse due to less offensive pressure and more weaknesses. Encore and Fake Tears are nice and there are some teams that can get mileage out of it but ultimately don’t think it should be bumped.
4 -> 3
Actuarily: Tier 4, Torkoal has a place on both Fullroom & some Sun teams, but neither have seen a ton of usage recently, and until we see more success for this, t4 is the right spot.
Akaru Kokuyo: T4. Very good Trick Room Pokémon if several conditions are met at the same time (Facing a weatherless team, facing a team with no bulky resists to fire (Raging Bolt, Incineroar, etc.), facing a team with few TR answers). Very hard to meet these conditions consistently. Still, it can cause a massive snowball if not handed carefully.
Bagel: 4. Only really used on TR teams but can absolutely farm unprepared teams, and puts a lot of pressure on teams to keep their Torkoal checks healthy. Rise of rain hurts, but it will always have a place on more offensive TR teams.
Eragon: 4. Sun’s viability has remained relatively stable since the last slate and while it does see occasional use I don’t think the archetype is common enough to justify raising Torkoal to tier 3, especially considering that many teams just use Sunny Day Torn as their weather control.
Madaraaaa: T4. Sun is not the best weather now, needs support for setting trickroom and hazards matchup is horrible. Still the slowest offensive tool in trickroom, not to be ignored.
SMB: tier 4, it's like the third option for setting sun I'd consider in sun teams, which are not in a great spot with rain being so solid. A must in tr teams but these are not so good either
Yoda2798: Tier 4. Even setting aside the recent rise in rain, Torkoal is a Pokemon pretty strictly relegated to a specific couple of teams to be worth it, in FullRoom and Sun, neither of which are that great currently. Even before the recent rise in Rain Torkoal and those teams weren’t super strong but that also doesn’t help. Torkoal needs a lot of support to be a real Pokemon when there are better options available, and like eragon said opting for Sunny Day Tornadus is a much easier route if you want to go that direction.
Zee: 4. Has to compete with other weathers too much and a decent amount of Glimmora usage means you’re running a risk of starting a match at 75% at any point. Reliant on TR and normally priority blocking as well which is just a lot of requirements to have in the builder. Definitely possible to pull off some sweeps with this guy but those games are few and far between.
Part two of the slate, as the write-ups put it over the word count.
2 -> 1
Actuarily: Tier 1. SD has seen a lot of usage lately, as when combined with the right teammates it can win games by itself. The AV set is always great, able to dish out solid damage trades vs almost all of the metagame. It has pretty solid matchups into a lot of common team types like rain, hail, and priority spam, ensuring that it’s never deadweight.
Akaru Kokuyo: 1. This thing rose again to the top of the tier. Has insane bulk, has insane power potential, can run a plethora of sets and all of them are good, it makes no sense. You really can’t go wrong throwing this mon on any team.
Bagel: 1. Huge ball of stats that can be put on any team with AV or be a more dedicated wincon with SD. AV can 1v1 just about every relevant mon in the tier and soft checks a massive amount of threats. SD is much more situational but is often scarier to play against.
Eragon: 1. The second best fake out option in the tier behind Incin and one of the most consistent mons in the tier at providing value into literally any matchup. This mon saw a high usage in all of the recent tours and has solidified itself a top 5 mon in the tier.
Madaraaaa: T1. Hands is waking up. Fantastic and unique stats, coverage, with support moves and various sets, all good. A pokemon that essentially is playing without ability in this metagame but is so easy to pick in builder. Difficult to ko even with a double into it.
SMB: tier 1, great at trading, will always do something, and can be a very good wincon with the right coverage move
Yoda2798: Tier 1. Iron Hands is in an amazing spot right now, as reflected by being number one in usage in Invitationals, particularly due to its partnerships with two Pokemon that have risen in usage recently (coincidentally its 2nd and 3rd most common teammates after Ogerpon-Wellspring): Chien-Pao and Sinistcha. Chien-Pao might seem counterintuitive as a partner at first, “why would I want to weaken Iron Hands’ great bulk?”, but on balance this helps more than it hinders: Iron Hands is still fat enough to tank hits, but Sword of Ruin can tip the scales for KOs on its opponents, or in the case of Drain Punch provides additional recovery through the increased damage. As a couple of quick examples I found (assuming dex spread Iron Hands), Sword of Ruin turns Wild Charge into an OHKO against full bulk Tornadus, and makes +0 Drain Punch a roll to KO standard Incineroar. However, the arguably bigger synergy comes from matchups, Chien-Pao is one of the best checks to what is probably Iron Hand’s biggest nemesis in Landorus, reliably dealing with the Pokemon which threatens it most. In return, Iron Hands helps deal with Incineroar, for example a -1 Sword of Ruin Close Combat will KO Incineroar most of the time. Sinistcha offers a completely different route to success for Iron Hands, offering Trick Room to take advantage of its low Speed, redirection support, and healing from Hospitality (and potentially Life Dew). Like Chien-Pao, Sinistcha deals with Landorus for Iron Hands, either by setting Trick Room for it to be KOed before it can connect an Earth Power, or by redirecting any of its attacks (with the exception of Sandsear Storm) away from Iron Hands to keep it safe. Assault Vest sets are more common Chien-Pao type teams, and Swords Dance more common with Sinistcha, but Iron Hands is very flexible and both can work with either (or neither!). Both sets are very strong, with Assault Vest being a trade machine, and Swords Dance offering the potential to win games itself. There is very little reason not to use Iron Hands, and flexibility with things like coverage move and Tera type help it to adapt even better to practically any team’s needs.
Zee: 1. Hands is the man. Both AV and Swords Dance sets are incredible to me, with the former being a solid glue mon to any team capable of patching lots of holes with its coverage slot and tera type options. Swords Dance can take over games easily thanks to its natural bulk combined with support from Sinistcha. I think the mon is so good that I honestly have to question why I wouldn’t add it to my teams.
1 -> 2
Actuarily: T1. This is THE tailwind setter, and it even pairs well with a few of the top offensive threats that appreciate tailwind. There’s so many different variations of Torn offense, but they all involve Tornadus.
Akaru Kokuyo: Read eragon post. (Or my previous Slate comments about Torn, it’s pretty much the same…)
Bagel: 2. Agree with everything Eragon said, Torn is near omnipresent for good reason but there are plenty of common board states where it ends up feeling like a dead slot (Arch and Ghold both love to take advantage of Torn for example).
Eragon: 2. Still a very powerful mon but doesn’t see quite as much usage as the mons that I’d say are tier 1. The most dominant form of speed control in the format, Tornadus exerts constant board pressure with Bleakwind Storm, allowing it to consistently get value even after it has clicked tailwind. However, much of the metagame has evolved to punish Tornadus, something we saw a lot of in SCL, which limits its splashability.
Madaraaaa: T2. Hardest choice of tier personally with iron hands. Tornadus is fantastic, putting tailwind=winning most of times, has access to icy wind, bleakwind storm, taunt, weather changer move… is one of the first pokemon you take to build a team. But judging this period, I agree that is deadweight sometimes, semiroom and bulky stuff that can nullify and kill tornadus are more frequent now. Drop in T2.
SMB: tier 2, obviously the best speed control, but there are many matchups where it is deadweight and quite abusable.
Yoda2798: Tier 1. Tornadus was 2nd in usage for SCL, 2nd in usage for DWCoP, and 5th in usage for Invitationals, narrowly behind the other top Pokemon but well ahead of the rest. Tornadus remains THE premier option for Tailwind and speed control in general, that hasn’t changed. Look at practically all the top Pokemon’s most common teammates, and you’ll find Tornadus right up there, for good reason. To put things in perspective, Gholdengo is the vast vast majority of the time paired with Tornadus, and is a top 8 usage Pokemon itself across the last few tours, and that only accounts for around half of Tornadus usage. Or as another example, look at the two teams in the final game of invitationals: both rain teams with Pelipper of course, but both also still opting for Tornadus as well, despite already having a Flying-type that can set Tailwind and weather. Tornadus offence is easily the most common archetype in the meta, with Tornadus being the common theme. If you’re using something else it’s a weather team, a priority spam team, a Trick Room team, if you’re using goodstuffs it’s heavily implied that it means a Tornadus team. Tornadus on PsySpam teams is basically a given, and even on those other archetypes Tornadus can still find its way in as mentioned before (people are using SemiRoom as an argument against Tornadus - what about the SemiRoom teams that have Tornadus?). Sure, you don’t want to click Bleakwind Storm against Archaludon or Gholdengo, but it’s still plenty good into a lot of other stuff and doesn’t change Tornadus from being the best speed control Pokemon in the format. Icy Wind Tornadus has grown in usage recently and is maybe the best Landorus check offensively and defensively combined, manual weather is great in a meta where many teams are fighting for control, and Taunt is still an option to help against Trick Room, which against the SemiRoom teams with no priority blocking can be quite effective. Ogerpon-Wellspring feels bad into Archaludon but that doesn’t mean it’s not Tier 1, Tornadus has its flaws but no more so than any other Tier 1.
Zee: 2. Just gonna +1 on eragon on this one, I fully agree with his sentiment.
3 -> 2
Actuarily: Tier 2. Arguably the best set up pokemon in the game, due to its solid bulk, typing, and incredible spread attack. Other sets like scarf/specs are also solid, but have to be played against very differently, making it have some surprising versatility. Tera fairy with dazzling gleam is arguably the best fairy attacker in the metagame lol
Akaru Kokuyo: Tier 2. Best set up Pokémon right now. I think you require a bit of support (Redirection, speed control, sometimes even Fake Out cycling to allow it to live hits), but the reward is an insanely high damage output Pokémon with a spread move. Can run different teras to adapt to what you want to have a better matchup against (in NP sets), but can also run the Specs set (solid atm) or Scarf set (not very solid but still can work).
Bagel: 2. Best set up option that can be pretty flexible with its spread/tera/item/moves to do a lot of different things depending on the team. Less chi yu and kingambit makes this an even better choice in the current meta.
Eragon: 2. Agree with Bagel/Zee that this is probably the number one setup threat at the moment (if we’re disregarding electro shot). Ghold akes advantage of an excellent typing and can take over games if it gets going. However, it sometimes struggles to either find time to set up in the face of mons like Lando-I and Chien-Pao or even break through opposing mons like Hands or Incin. These are pretty major issues that come into play in some form more often than not so I think this is pretty close to tier 3 to be perfectly honest– the tier is generally fairly offensive and set up isn’t really favored most of the time. Nevertheless, I think alternative sets like specs or plot/dgleam are enough to bump it up to tier 2. Further, Plot Ghold does a good job of balancing being explosive (only requiring one turn to get going) while still having a good defensive profile, something pretty much nothing else besides Arch can do.
Madaraaaa: T2. I think is the best pokemon of tier 2, near to tier 1(with pao and tornadus). But has bad matchup vs multiple T1/2 pokemons and right now seems not so easy to setup. Can face, setup and cancel all T2-3-4 stuff after some plots, just needs consistent support.
SMB: tier 2, next to archaludon the best set up, and this one doesn't need so much support to work, with a fake out or redirection it can wreak havoc. The typing and ability are great to take a lot of free turns to get it into the field or set up.
Yoda2798: Tier 2. As per my last vote Gholdengo should never have dropped in the first place, it has consistently remained one of the most used Pokemon as the premier setup and spread attacker in the tier, the drop was an overreaction to it no longer being quite as amazing as it was first after the Flutter Mane ban when Tera Dragon felt near impossible to deal with. Gholdengo is a Tailwind attacker naturally immune to Fake Out to stall it, a setup attacker naturally immune to disruption from status moves, and has access to one of the strongest spread attacks in the game in Make It Rain. Throw in immunity to Archaludon’s Body Press while resisting its other common attacks outside of Electro Shot (which you can make take two turns by overriding weather with Tornadus), and a naturally great matchup into Snow teams to help genies, and you have one of the best Pokemon in the tier. Nasty Plot appreciates support, but the best Pokemon in the tier are that support so it’s hardly a big cost. Gholdengo has some set variety with tweaking Nasty Plot sets or using other sets like Choice Specs (which is nice), but overall it remains one of the best Pokemon in the tier and nothing else can quite do what it does.
Zee: 2. I think this is the premier option for set up in the tier at present. The great typing, ability, and stat spread just make it so easy. Put it next to Ogerpon and Tornadus and the mon can just shred through teams. I’m a big fan of the Fairy Dazzling Gleam set, giving it some unique coverage to sweep through teams that would otherwise be more resilient to its typical STAB combo.
3 -> 2
Actuarily: T3. Hail is great, but does have its limitations and people have gotten better at playing vs it, and threats like Gholdengo have gotten even more popular.
Akaru Kokuyo: T3. As Actuarily said, people have learned how to play vs Snow teams and aren’t as dominant as they once were, so I’ll keep it in T3. Still, do not underestimate a Veils team, or you will lose to unkillable setup threats.
Bagel: 3. Has a nice toolkit and enables some really strong strategies but gets stonewalled way too easily by too many threats to be any higher than this.
Eragon: 2. There’s definitely some truth to what my fellow rankers are saying but I think the negative matchups into other top mons are generally irrelevant in regards to what Ninetales wants to do most of the time- set veil and die. Snow has enough variations to the point where I’d consider it a tier 2 archetype thanks primarily to pressuring genies. Further, in contrast to the other weather setters, snow teams without Ninetales simply do not exist– there’s no competition between multiple setters and snowscape isn’t a high enough value move for Torn to click it. Ninetales is also generally the best way to set screens in the tier, which helps elevate it above tier 3 for me (I also put Pelipper in tier 2 and I think the two mons are generally even with Pelipper maybe slightly higher just for weather but possessing less valuable utility).
Madaraaaa: T3. Good moment for hail and for A-tales too, has good blizzard and annoying encore/roar, but has not good matchup vs incineroar, gholdengo, archaludon which I think are 3 of the best pokemons around.
SMB: tier 3, hail is always a safe and solid pick but it would hurt my eyes to see a pokemon as ninetales in tier 2 being so passive and abusable
Yoda2798: Tier 3. If other weathers didn’t exist then maybe this would be justifiable, but that isn’t the case. Snow is a solid archetype, and Ninetales-A has a nice amount of utility in its kit (being a good bit better standalone than say, Pelipper, in my opinion), but it doesn’t have the splashability of a Tier 2 Pokemon, and its usage reflects that. As zee said there’s a lot of weather wars in this meta, and Ninetales-A is a Pokemon that quickly goes from hero to zero if Snow is removed before it can set up Aurora Veil. On another note, Grimmsnarl exists if you’re just looking for screens and don’t want to worry about weather, which cuts into its viability as general screens setter without any Snow beneficiary.
Zee: 3. I don’t think any weather setter can really be higher than 3 in this tier, there’s just too much fighting between rain and snow and sun (typically Sunny Day but Torkoal does exist) for any one to ever come up with that much of a lead. Ninetales in particular is just too pressured by the Steels, Glimmora, and Hearthflame. Cool utility moves and great for enabling Kyurem but just can’t rank it any higher realistically.
4 -> 2
Actuarily: Tier 3. Diancie’s biggest problem is that it has an awful matchup into the 3 biggest special attackers in the meta (Landorus/Gholdengo/Archaludon), and thus is constantly threatened by just about every team type. The one team style it really eats against is priority spam, but even then those teams should have some options vs Diancie. Beyond that, most of the fat mons in the tier Diancie struggles to damage sufficiently, like Iron Hands, Ting-Lu, etc. that doesn’t let it sweep as much as it would like. Despite all that, with the right partners and played correctly, Diancie can still be pretty viable, and that’s just a testament to how insane Diamond Storm is.
Akaru Kokuyo: Tier 3. My problem with Diancie is that it’s a matchup roulette; it has some very farmable matchups while also having one of the most impossible matchups of all time. Either way, Mon is very strong if you come unprepared vs it, but definitely requires a lot of help with dealing vs what it struggles before popping off.
Bagel: 3. Very polarizing mon that I find lacks consistency. It has some very strong matchups (incin/pao) and some very weak ones (ghold, lando) and it often is very reliant on tera and (usually) Trick Room to succeed.
Eragon: 2. Diamond storm is a broken move. One of the best tera abusers in the tier and fits on more teams than I think people give it credit for. While it’s true that there’s several very negative matchups for diancie (Arch, Ghold, Lando-I) it basically matches up extremely positively overall into the rest of the tier. A well positioned Diancie can more often than not withstand basically every physical hitter in the tier, making it a strong candidate for many teams that need insurance into stuff like Pao.
Madaraaaa: T3. Good matchup vs raising incineroar, strong rock spread move, good vs priospam, I saw some fast (or not min speed) diancie with pao sinergy and that’s interesting, but relies too much on tera and thats why for me cannot be higher.
SMB: tier 3, it relies a lot in tera to put work b ut 4 is too low for a pokemon that can autowin some matchups, I wouldn't put it higher than this cince it's very weak to steel types and wow is very common in incineroar
Yoda2798: Tier 3. Diancie structures have been optimised but it still faces the same fundamental problems as before, mainly that Diamond Storm either does approximately 100% or approximately 0% depending on the target, and it’s weak to almost everything so you may as well kiss goodbye to any hopes to Tera on anything else if you want to use Diancie in that game. Tier 2 is definitely a step too far, the difference between Diancie and Sinistcha (an actual Tier 2 Trick Room setter) is night and day. As others have said, Diancie is inconsistent, some teams are shredded by Diamond Storm while some can stall Diancie out, even if those Pokemon can’t threaten a boosted Diancie themselves. For a Pokemon so Tera hungry, the price of admission isn’t always worth it for what you get, so it doesn’t deserve to be ranked higher with the likes of more reliable Pokemon that require less support.
Zee: 3. I agree with Madara, Diancie does fit pretty nicely in the meta we’ve seen develop over the past few tours, with Rock spread being some of the best offense you could have in the tier, but it’s lack of Speed and poor defensive type mean it’s likely gonna be forced to Tera a lot, and ultimately can just be shut down before it gets the engine going. Solid mon but there’s a fair amount of risk in using it.
3 -> 2
Actuarily: T3. Hail is great, but does have its limitations and people have gotten better at playing vs it, and threats like Gholdengo have gotten even more popular.
Akaru Kokuyo: T3. I used to think Kyurem could work without needing Ninetales-A but now I think they kinda have to be together. Great bulky mon with access to spread Ice moves which is very good in a lot of scenarios, while also being able to land super effective moves vs steel types. Great mon but rock weak and most of the times lacks protect because of Assault Vest, which often causes it to be doubled.
Bagel: 3. Has some really bad matchups that force either very specific gameplay sequences or tera to get out of. Still very solid into all of the grasses (bar hearthflame) and genies but such a reliance on tera and specific support keeps it from being any higher.
Eragon: 3. Generally agree with what others have said here. While Ninetales gets a pass (imo) for having some prominent negative matchups thanks to providing consistent utility, Kyurem does not and can be interchanged for other snow mons (bundle). Otherwise, this is a very bulky pokemon that can often be very difficult to remove and can often trade favorably thanks to decent coverage into the main threats of the tier.
Madaraaaa: T3. Other members worded perfectly about kyurem. Solid pokemon, is the main but not the only choice in hail as a-tales partner (iron bundle, baxcalibur are decent options). Has not the impact of the banned black version.
SMB: tier 3, ninetales tier, best pick for bulkier snow teams but very tera hungry and needs some support to work, in the form of incineroar, sinistcha, etc
Yoda2798: Tier 3. If one of the two were to actually go up it would be Kyurem rather than Ninetales-A, assuming it proved itself on teams without Snow a la Kyurem-Black, but thus far that hasn’t been the case. Kyurem as a staple of Snow deserves to sit in Tier 3 with Ninetales-A, but without solo success it can’t think about going higher. I have thought about using Kyurem by itself before since it matches well into a lot of the top Pokemon, but its weaknesses have just been too much, and it really wants the support of Ninetales-A to boost it offensively with Blizzard and defensively with Snow and Aurora Veil.
Zee: 3. A lot of what I said for ATales applies here in that it does struggle into the Steels and mons like Glimmora and Diancie, and requires weather up to be able to spam its best move with confidence. Has to be Terastallized in pretty much every game. Definitely has killer stats and great moves but I don’t think it should be bumped.
3 -> 2
Actuarily: T3. Special attacking grounds are good, and this thing can be used in both Trick room & tailwind that gives it some nice versatility of teammates, but it often struggles to get OHKOs the same way the other form does, and ground/normal is awful defensive typing if it isn’t getting those OHKOs. AV is a solid item to round out its bad special defense stat, but then it loses out on a lot of power, and so it basically always needs to be hitting first because it just trades 2hkos with a lot of the tier.
Akaru Kokuyo: T3. I think for Trick Room teams it’s a very good choice over Landorus, and although some fast bear Tailwind teams or the AV/Lefties CM variants exist, LO TR is probably the best. Doesn’t provide as much as other Pokémon to be ranked at 2 though, so I think 3 is fair.
Bagel: 3. AV sets are cool but its poor speed and typing are pretty detrimental to its effectiveness, so it ends up relying on tera a lot of the time (recurring theme here) + no damage boosting item is really felt. On the other hand Lorb sets are way scarier as offensive threats compared to AV but need serious support to reach full potential.
Eragon: 3. Strong mon but competes heavily with Lando-I for a niche as a specially attacking ground type. That said, Ursaluna’s superior bulk when holding an AV makes it a strong candidate for some teams that can’t afford another (somewhat) frail attacker in Lando but still need a way to hit mons like Arch or ghold. However, as Zee pointed it out, it has decide between multiple items and can’t do everything all at once, which is ultimately what makes Lando a stronger choice in a solid majority of cases.
Madaraaaa: T3. Outrageous special attack and coverage + ability, but the typing really has too many weaknesses, with bad spdef (that’s why AV set raised). I think more interesting sets can be explored but since has some big flaws is T3.
SMB: tier 3, it requires other mons to really shine or even an offensive tera, non life orb sets are at the middle point of not killing stuff and not getting ohkod but with it being so slow it is very often not a good damage trade. It is a good pokemon but not at tier 2 level.
Yoda2798: Tier 3. Another ambitious Tier 2 nomination; Ursaluna-Bloodmoon is a fearsome attacker but beyond raw firepower it finds itself lacking. As others have said, Ursaluna-Bloodmoon is a Landorus alternative for more Trick Room oriented teams, with its lackluster Speed and vulnerable defensive typing, and while it can be used outside of Trick Room it’s far more reliant on Tailwind compared to Landorus. Ursaluna-Bloodmoon is a solid Pokemon, but it requires too much support and doesn’t provide enough to be on the level of a Tier 2 Pokemon.
Zee: 3. I just don’t think this is a mon that has the makings of something in tier 2. It’s slow, and moderately bulky but has a defensive type that half the higher tiered mons can swing on for super effective. Is often split on items between running AV for bulk and losing a considerable amount of power or running LO for output and going down easily to strong special attacks. Can be solid when supported well but it takes a bit to get it in the prime position.
2 -> 3
Actuarily: T2. Hazards are quite good and popular, and this THE hazard mon, able to both set and remove. Beyond that, the meteor beam set is quite good and probably a little slept on.
Akaru Kokuyo: T3. I think people have learned how to deal with Glimmora, so the pressure it used to cause it’s not as effective as before. Power Herb set exists and is very powerful with speed control, but I think the suicide Rocks set is the best it has. Can enable some setup Pokémon to start setting up right away unfortunately.
Bagel: 2. Best hazard clicker and only hazard remover while still being strong enough to threaten serious damage with its attacks. Extremely consistent at bringing value as even 2 turns can mean rocks+tspikes up and 50% taken from an opponent mon. Demands a lot of attention and forces opponents into very specific gameplans a lot of the time. “Glimmora gameplan” should be one of the first things on any teambuilding checklist right now.
Eragon: 3. Good, not great. I might be a bit lower on it than most but I think both of its common sets have major issues. The sash set often struggles to fit all the moves it wants between stealth rock, poison/ground/rock coverage, and mortal spin and protect. It can’t do everything all at once and I think this is fairly easily exploited. Further, amoonguss/okidogi combine to be more common than at many previous times, which can greatly lessen the value of Glimmora’s ability. The meteor beam set is basically Nihilego larp, which is still an ok set but misses out on the value of sash, making your Lando-I (or anything else that can hit you hard) matchup particularly egregious. It does benefit from being faster than a lot of the mid tier speed mons but still gets outsped by a lot of things. I’d say rocks is its strongest niche but there are other mons that can do that so I personally wouldn’t rate it in tier 2 off that alone.
Madaraaaa: T2. Premier hazards setter (and remover) and also strong special attacker. Even if it dies, most of times settles terrain for the companion behind, breaking opponents sash, putting tspikes for bulky stuff. Meteor beam set can be rare but strong as well, coverage ground/poison/rock (and more) is amazing.
SMB: tier 3, of course one of the best lead options, but very expectable and abusable, if it does not get toxic spikes it loses a lot.
Yoda2798: Tier 2. I’ve always been a bit low on Glimmora compared to other people, to me it always feels on paper like trading 6 Pokemon for 5 Pokemon plus Stealth Rock and Toxic Spikes, which I don’t feel is really worth it outside of priority spam. Increasingly I think that if you want Stealth Rock then Glimmora is just the best option, and Stealth Rock is really great against so much so that’s actually valuable enough itself. Glimmora was also 11th in usage in DWCoP and 9th in Invitationals (though a less respectable 23rd in SCL) so I suppose that also backs it up staying in Tier 2. I do think Meteor Beam is quite hit or miss and not as good as Focus Sash, but Focus Sash is the more popular set anyways. Stealth Rock breaking Chien-Pao Focus Sash, limiting Tornadus’ ability to set Tailwind multiple times, chunking down Snow teams, and generally chipping everything into range for more offensive Pokemon is just so valuable, while Toxic Spikes wears down fatter Pokemon you may otherwise struggle against.
Zee: 2. I would say this is one of the best “lead options” in the tier. So easy to get Rocks up early game and a Mortal Spin poison or Toxic Spikes drop as well. It’s got a really high special attack with great coverage so it’s not impossible to get chip or even a KO before it goes down. This extends to Meteor Beam sets which are definitely rare these days but can be really effective.
2 -> 3
Actuarily: T3, while it can hit really hard, firepon just doesn’t balance that utility vs offense scale quite like waterpon. So this pretty much always wants to be more of just an offensive pokemon, which it is quite good at, but struggling vs one of the most popular defensive pokemon in Incin can be limiting.
Akaru Kokuyo: T3. I think firepon is really good only in specific archetypes like soft sun or when you have another utility grass type (And don’t want to run two bulky ones). Unfortunately Incineroar is at it’s best moment right now so it’s not going to be that fun, but can still do funny things with Tera and Bonk button.
Bagel: 3. Can be extremely devastating and break through defensive checks with pure power but offensive checks like glimmora and torn are more difficult for it. Pelipper+Arch being so popular can also be very difficult for hearthflame.
Eragon: 3. Continues to have the same issues it’s always had. It has a really high damage ceiling but can be a little difficult to position and sometimes it’s just not worth tera’ing it. It often wants to be bulkier but dropping speed on it can give you major issues. Further, Wellspring’s generally better typing for the metagame means it’s often difficult to justify using it as your Ogerpon.
Madaraaaa: T3. Firepon is clearly powerful, but Rain dominance + raising incineroar are bad news. Simply not the best moment for it right now.
SMB: tier 3, quite weak against incineroar and dependent on tera, competes for a slot with ogerpon water which is an overall better pick
Yoda2798: Tier 2. I think Ogerpon-Hearthflame has gotten slightly worse than before but it’s being overstated just how much, I don’t think it’s now two tiers below Ogerpon-Wellspring in viability. 10th in usage in SCL, 10th in usage in DWCoP, 8th in usage in Invitationals is not the stats of a Pokemon on the way down, that’s like perfectly average for Tier 2 Pokemon. I’m just not seeing how Archaludon rain is so hard for Ogerpon-Hearthflame in particular as opposed to Ogerpon-Wellspring or Incineroar instead. Ogerpon-Hearthflame still does 50% to Sinistcha in Rain (or can OHKO with Tera, though I don’t know how often that will be the right play), and at least has the ability to smack Archaludon with Sun up, where Ogerpon-Wellspring doesn’t touch either no matter what basically, and its Ivy Cudgel in rain is a bit stronger than Wood Hammer against Iron Hands but still around a 2HKO either way so not that big a difference. Incineroar is pretty laughable into Archaludon as even if burnt it still has Electro Shot for boosting, two Knock Offs into Sinistcha does about the same as two Ivy Cudgels since the second one will be weaker, and while Iron Hands can be burnt they should often be able to play to avoid it. So even without Sun I don’t think you’re really losing much with Ogerpon-Hearthflame, especially if you’re comparing it plus something better against Rain to both Ogerpon-Wellspring and Incineroar together. The opportunity cost of using Ogerpon-Hearthflame over Incineroar and Ogerpon-Wellspring still is real as it was before, but Iron Hands is still a great partner for Fake Out, and if you really want Intimidate there’s Landorus-T as we’ve seen some of so I don’t think it’s too big a disadvantage if you want the better offensive ability which is definitely nice for a number of teams. More Incineroar is definitely the most annoying thing for Ogerpon-Hearthflame, as it often relies on picking up KOs before its target can retaliate, but I don’t think it’s substantially worse than for Ogerpon-Wellspring who still doesn’t like being Intimidated but also can be burnt in return for being able to hit Incineroar. With teammates like Iron Hands, Landorus, and Glimmora you can still deal with Incineroar, Ogerpon-Hearthflame doesn’t like facing Intimidate but I don’t think it’s a substantially worse matchup than for other physical attackers. On another note I’ll just say that Ogerpon-Hearthflame is incredibly good into Snow (much better than Ogerpon-Wellspring especially), being able to threaten Ninetales-A from setting Aurora Veil without weather support which is nice. Ninetales-A can EV to always live Ivy Cudgel, but they need to be scared of you using Tera because not only is nuking Ninetales-A big in itself, but Ogerpon-Hearthflame with Tera is quite strong against a lot of common Snow teammates like Kyurem, Sinistcha, and Iron Hands. TL;DR - Ogerpon-Hearthflame isn’t worse into Archaludon Rain than Ogerpon-Wellspring/Incineroar, it’s not THAT much worse against Incineroar, and it’s really good into Snow, so it’s still a solid alternative Ogerpon-Wellspring
Zee: 3. I’d rank this mon tier 2 if it didn’t have to compete with Ogerpon-W for a slot, because I think the coverage and the attack boost from Embody Aspect go such a long way, but Ogerpon-H is definitely hurt by increases in Incineroar and Glimmora usage, as well as the dominance of Archaludon rain practically requiring it be paired with sun for maximum effectiveness.
4 -> 3
Actuarily: T4, while it hits like a truck under TR, that’s really the only way it can be used, unlike its other form. The poor defensive typing and being prone to intimidate often makes it fall flat.
Akaru Kokuyo: T4. Agree with SMB, literally stole my words.
Bagel: 4. I don’t think this has gotten particularly better recently. Obviously can be very threatening but is noticeably slowed down intimidate, wants to tera ghost a lot to dodge fake out, and even then it isn’t a tall ask for players to pivot around its attacks. The support needed to make it work and all of the potential roadblocks means its tier 4.
Eragon: 4. Strong attacker with a lot of stats, allowing it to take most attacks very well. However, it’s very difficult to justify most of the time as the other grounds are easier to use on basically every archetype except specific trick room teams. Ursaluna is a staple on many of these TR teams thanks to the aforementioned stats + some of the best damage output in the game, but this is still basically one archetype that sees consistent but not incredible usage (also struggles with the weaknesses Bagel/Zee highlighted).
Madaraaaa: T4. Requires too much support, suffers intimidate cycling, weak vs sinistcha, ogerpon and pao. Good sinergy with cresselia but is not so easy now to make it shine. Obviously, offensive is a threat.
SMB: tier 4, similar to bloodmoon in fitting in semiroom compositions but being weak to intimidate and not so good in tailwind makes it fall 1 tier in comparision
Yoda2798: Tier 4. Ursaluna should definitely be running something like Throat Chop in the 3rd slot to hit Sinistcha (other options are pretty bad anyways) IMO. Still, the Rillaboom downturn doesn’t exactly help Ursaluna when it's being replaced by Sinistcha which is also good into it, and nothing else has really changed for it. As others have said, Ursaluna hits a single slot hard in Trick Room, but is slowed down by Intimidate and often wants to Tera to avoid Fake Out, can often need a turn for Flame Orb to come online, and is much more reliant on Trick Room than its counterpart. Ursaluna-Bloodmoon is also much harder to switch/Tera around due to Mind’s Eye. Seeing the resurgence of Ursaluna + Cresselia teams is nostalgic, but it still requires a lot of hoops to jump through, and when compared to Ursaluna-Bloodmoon these flaws become magnified.
Zee: 4. I think this mon has seen a bit of an uptick in usage in recent tours but I still feel like it’s so hard to position and is a big risk/reward type of guy. Big damage but the STABs can be danced around with careful positioning and it loses HP gradually to the most common counterplay strat (stall out TR).
4 -> 3
Actuarily: T3, has just enough firepower and excellent coverage that lets it hit everything in the tier hard, and can be very difficult to switch in on. Can be used on both TR & tailwind teams, and has a solid defensive typing, and some great Tera options.
Akaru Kokuyo: T3. Its bulk is no joke, it can eat a lot of hits even super effective ones, has good utility moves like Roar, Will-o-Wisp and Haze, and deals a good amount of damage with its stabs (Plus Steam Eruption has 30% chance of burning which is like 99% of the times…). Can be deadweight into a lot of stuff like Raging Bolt (if no Epower) but can do very well into a lot of things.
Bagel: 4. Still feels like the worst of both worlds as a fire and water type a lot of the time. Fire type that can’t reliably handle the grass types and as a water type its hindered by its poor speed more often than not. Has fierce competition with both other fires and waterpon. Still really struggles into all of the dragons in the tier.
Eragon: 3. I’m on the fence here but it has a very unique typing compression + good coverage into the tier. I do think competition with other fires is somewhat real as you don’t really want to stack too many ground weaks which is probably the biggest limiting factor on Volcanion. However, I think Volcanion’s style of mon that just sits on the field and attempts to trade damage favorably is pretty decent in a tier as fast paced as this one and an AV set with tera ground earth power has grown on me thanks to being able to flip matchups into stuff like arch and hands. Could realistically be tier 4 but I just think it plays decently well into the pacing of the tier and still has the tools available to it to trade well in most games.
Madaraaaa: T4. Hybrid typing that burns water and fire slots, which offer a lot of better choices. Not a bad pokemon itself, but is a zero vs dragons and suffers archaludon shot.
SMB: tier 3, wow volcanion is great both with leftovers or covert cloak, bad matchup against dragon type but apart from that it can trade pretty well vs a lot of stuff
Yoda2798: Tier 4. Volcanion was forgotten about for a while and has been used a bit again recently but it’s still not that great. As others have said Volcanion takes up the slot of a Water- and Fire-type, meaning you lose out on the offensive pressure and redirection support of Ogerpon or utility of Incineroar as you don’t want to stack them together. Also, as I said on the last slate, “Volcanion is a Water-type that loses to Landorus, and a Fire-type that doesn’t resist Grass for going up against Rillaboom”, meaning your team needs to fill in the holes left that those slots usually fill. Volcanion is a niche Pokemon that only really fits on a subset of SemiRoom teams, I don’t think Tera Ground Earth Power really changes that.
Zee: 4. There’s lots of other Fires with more well-defined roles than Volcanion, and while there really aren’t that many Water types in the tier it’s kind of hard to overlook Ogerpon-W’s utility and damage output.
4 -> 3
Actuarily: T3. Psyspam is solid, both with iron crown or on fullroom, and this is the key piece to both of those teams. Follow me + TR + setting psychic terrain lets this always have value.
Akaru Kokuyo: T4. Agree with eragon & zee.
Bagel: T4. Indeedee was already carried by its ability and psyspam isn’t particularly strong right now. As a redirector outside of psyspam its outclassed by all its competition in the tier.
Eragon: 4. Just has a lot of competition for everything it does except for setting psychic terrain, which is less valuable right now thanks to Crown struggling into much of the metagame. It does an ok job at a lot of things but generally there are better redirection options.
Madaraaaa: T4. Psyspam is T3/4 now and indeedee is T4.
SMB: tier 4 is where i rate psyspam, I don’t think it deserves a raise, it is very matchup fishy
Yoda2798: Tier 4. PsySpam hype has fell off, I think it’s pretty dubious and you’re often better with two standalone Pokemon (e.g. Gholdengo and something that helps against Incineroar or provides any valuable resist). 17th in usage in SCL, 19th in DWCoP, 25th in Invitationals. Indeedee-F does also see use on hard Trick Room teams, but even combined I don’t think those two archetypes push it into Tier 3, other redirectors and Trick Room setters are much better, and the PsySpam duo is just not that great.
Zee: 4. I think Psyspam is pretty much always gonna be on the line between 3 and 4 in this gen, but I’d like to go back to my reasoning on Pelipper & Archaludon: even though Indeedee is the enabler, it definitely feels less effective than the sweeper. I don’t really think this mon sees play out of Psyspam anymore so not worth talking about it in other contexts.
4 -> 3
Actuarily: T4 is fine for Ting-Lu, as it really only sees play on like howl squads, which shows how reliant it is on other pokemon to be viable. It can be a solid hazard setter with whirlwind and great bulk, but glimmora’s popularity really limits those sets. Ground + dark typing just leaves it to be 2hko’d by a lot, and thus despite its great bulk it doesn’t last as long as you’d typically like.
Akaru Kokuyo: T4. I love Ting-Lu teams but unfortunately they aren’t at their best moment right now. It gets too passive in way too many situations which is something this tier punishes very hard. Can also sometimes insta win games by you clicking rocks turn 1 though, and the ability can help some Pokémon setup, but definitely more cons than pros.
Bagel: 4. Too passive. I think any well built team shouldn’t have a problem either denying Ting Lu from spamming hazards and phazing (either through disruption or pure damage) or taking advantage of its passivity with a setup threat + redirection/fake out (or be gholdengo)
Eragon: 4. I think this mon greatly struggles into well-built teams that often have ways to position around it or deny rocks. A lot of the time it doesn’t make a whole lot of progress after clicking rocks and its typing is weak to a lot of things, which limits the impact its high bulk + ability can have. In terms of how it fits on teams, I think it’s generally limited to being an option on Gouging Fire stuff but that archetype doesn’t need it to function, making me rank it a tier lower than Gouging Fire itself. I do think Dozo/Ting-Lu stuff is pretty underused and deserves exploration as the two compliment each other well but we really haven’t seen that combo in a while.
Madaraaaa: T4. I think can be incredibly good vs some matchups, but is too passive most of times vs other things. Super bulky, hazards access and whirlwind make it a solid pokemon, really slow but with its ability can not be that good in trickroom teams.
SMB: tier 4, there are teams that lose heavily against him, but I still see him as a niche pick, too passive most of the time so he conditions the team where it is placed too much
Yoda2798: Tier 3. I think this is borderline and I’m a bit biased since I’m personally a big fan of Ting-Lu so I’ll be optimistic and go with Tier 3. You do really want to pair Ting-Lu with Gouging Fire, and while you can use Gouging Fire without Ting-Lu I still mostly view them as a pair and so on a similar level. Ting-Lu is undoubtedly quite passive, but what it brings to the table is being unbelievably fat compared to everything else, and holding a valuable niche as a hazards setter and phazer. There aren’t many good hazards setters besides Glimmora so Ting-Lu is a nice option for that, with its bulk helping guarantee you can set. I think Whirlwind is also quite valuable at the moment, with there being a number of setup Pokemon and Trick Room setters you can force out while racking up hazards damage. Ting-Lu won’t pick up many KOs (especially with Incineroar using Intimidate, Will-O-Wisp, and Parting Shot on you), but that’s fine as it still fulfills the aim of whittling down the opposing team for something like a priority spam core to finish up late game. Ting-Lu is not a Pokemon you can slap on most teams, but what it does is very unique and quite important to the teams it’s on, which I think justifies it being in Tier 3.
Zee: 3. I don’t have a strong opinion on Ting-Lu but I’ve seen this thing be a menace in games where it manages to lay a hazard, chip multiple mons with Ruination, and Whirlwind out a set up sweeper. 3 seems fair to me.
3 -> 4
Actuarily: T4. Sadly it’s just not threatening enough to justify its awful bulk. Often needs like specs + sun or Tera to get the OHKOs on neutral targets, but then there’s plenty of fire resists to ko it back. The right teams can make this work, but they’re much rarer than say Hail, which is much more viable and in tier 3.
Akaru Kokuyo: 3. Thing enables a lot with Beads of Ruin and still hits like a truck, but unfortunately metagame isn’t that friendly to Chi-Yu right now. A lot of fire resists, a lot of Pokémon that outspeed and KO, etc. Can still do amazing at some sun teams or HO teams though, and Overheat is most likely going to KO you if you are not a resist.
Bagel: 3. Still threatens a lot of the tier and has a lot of flexibility in how it can be used. Its pure damage output means it's not dead weight even in poor matchups like rain.
Eragon: 3. It’s ok but struggles with competition with other fire types which are a bit more consistent at getting value in every matchup imo. It does have a generally higher damage ceiling than the other fires which is nice but I often feel that its generally poor defensive stats hurt it a bit in a tier where the fire typing can be really valuable defensively in the face of things like Ghold and Snow.
Madaraaaa: T3. Even if had lower usage in recent tournaments (incineroar comeback) I think is a good tool in HO/sun teams, sash or scarf are best item, offers sinergy to all special attackers around.
SMB: tier 3, it has its place in hyper offense teams and does very well there, outside of that there are better options for fire type.
Yoda2798: Tier 3. I think Chi-Yu has been in a tough spot for a while. Ogerpon-Wellspring and Landorus outspeed and threaten it, Chien-Pao also threatens it even through the Grassy Seed Nasty Plot sets that were popular for a bit, Iron Hands eats anything bar like a Choice Specs Overheat in Sun and Drain Punches up in retaliation, choiced sets are vulnerable to Fake Out (and Tornadus, if Choice Scarf to make up for its Speed), and for the aforementioned reasons all sets are pretty Tera hungry. As a result, other spread attackers like Gholdengo and Ursaluna-Bloodmoon are more common, especially as you get to use Incineroar or Ogerpon-Hearthflame as well, two Fire-types that require less support to be reliably good. Despite all that, the recent success of pairing Chi-Yu with Spectrier has done just enough to sway me to keep it in Tier 3 for now, as a pairing reminiscent of the days of Flutter Mane, Spectrier provides the fast (Fake Out immune) partner Chi-Yu needs to deal with most of its checks and provide a true beneficiary for Beads of Ruin (something many Chi-Yu teams lack). With its place on (manual) Sun teams as well, I think there’s just enough life left in Chi-Yu to hold its place in Tier 3 despite its many flaws.
Zee: 3. Chi-Yu can be a pretty devastating mon still, I don’t feel like enough of the metagame landscape has changed for it to be lower than 3. We’ve seen new innovations with it like the Spectrier team or the snow team that got spammed during DWC.
3 -> 5
Actuarily: T4. Stopping priority + setting TR can be devastating to teams relying on priority to beat TR, but outside of that Farigiraf doesn’t do a whole lot, so it absolutely needs the other slot to be dealing out heavy damage.
Akaru Kokuyo: T4. I think having the ability to block priority nowadays isn’t that great anymore. Sure you block fake out but now you’ve become passive and more of a deadweight than an actual Pokémon. You either try to compensate for that with Throat Spray and be frail or dedicate yourself to support your ally and make the game a 1.5v2 situation. I think there are better options for both TR teams & HO teams with anti TR techs.
Bagel: 4. Definitely not as effective as it has been but still has a great toolkit and maybe the best TR setter at enabling more offensive strategies (as opposed to sinistcha) without needing to fully commit to hard TR.
Eragon: 4. Prio block is still quite valuable in a tier with Iron Hands and Incin seeing high use + it can add a TR component to some offensive teams. However, it has broadly poor matchups into most mons in the tier outside of catching a stray fake out, which means its role is pretty limited to supporting other strong mons. While it can definitely be effective at this, I think this is a weakness that makes it so the teams that want Farigiraf tend to be very specific hyper offensive tailwind teams, confining Farig to tier 4.
Madaraaaa: T3. A crucial stone for semiroom/tailroom teams, a good special atk (and fantastic psychic noise vs hands, sinistcha…) but the ability is just amazing. Helps pokemons to be unstoppable in and out of trickroom, blocking prio spam attackers, prankster moves and fakeouts is a unique quality that deserves tier 3.
SMB: tier 4, sometimes very frail / tera dependant to set tr, and it has stopped getting usage in ho teams
Yoda2798: Tier 4. Farigiraf teams have tailed off but it still has a distinct niche over other Trick Room setters, particularly due to unconditional priority blocking support. That said it’s definitely hard to justify over something else like Sinistcha which has a better defensive profile and support is that more generally useful, or Diancie which is better as an offensive TR setter. Farigiraf is still an important piece for specific compositions, but other SemiRoom structures are doing better with other setters less prone to being dead weight.
Zee: 4. 5 is definitely too extreme of a drop, it’s not as good as it was a few meta cycles ago when it felt like everyone was spamming Tornadus goodstuffs only, but it’s still a bulky and reliable TR setter that can enable some devastating sweepers like Ursalunas, Diancie, or Torkoal.
Hey guys, I just wanted to share my thoughts on a pokemon.
to rank 2
Right now it sits at rank 3. With the banning of Archaludon rain has been pretty much nowhere to be seen, which has benefitted this pokemon so much. If opponents are using a weather, they are using sun or hail. Sun only buffs Ogerpon's crazy power and makes even resisted hits hurt, and naturally it has a good matchup into common hail pokemon. Having the ability to gain an attack boost while simultaneously attacking is not something many pokemon can do and sets it apart from other physical attackers in that regard by being immediately threatening.
It's biggest downside is it faces competition from ogerpon water which generally fits on more team structures.
No shift in viability, its offensive profile remains the most consistently threatening pain point in builder in the format, but worth mentioning that emergent bulkier sets have impacted some of the opinions below. Sash Stealth rocks has also picked up a bit, providing enough set variety to really plant this pokemon firmly in tier 1 for the foreseeable future
T2 -> T3
My opinion on this pokemon has not changed in the past few months despite the arch ban removing its worst matchup. The top end of the metagame is so crowded that rillaboom can struggle to find a place, especially with the grass type so completely contested by ogerpon amoonguss and sinistcha and punished by everything else. This will never ever be a bad pokemon but I cannot deny that its role is extremely contested by pokemon that either offer a little more or have better matchups into the biggest threats of the metagame.
T2 -> T3
This thing's ability is grossly overrated. Stealth rocks are of course incredibly valuable but a large amount of teams and pokemon are either unbothered by tspikes or it is superfluous with rocks chip into them. Boots incin is incredibly popular and gholdengo/landorus represent the two most common special attackers in the format, which are completely unphazed by toxic spikes. Psyspam has no issue dealing with this pokemon whatsoever thanks to both tachyon and expanding force handily disposing of it. Pao is annoyed by stealth rocks but really doesn't care about the spikes chip at that point. Snow comps can easily carry icy wind on ninetales to break sash and leave glimmora wide open to earth power from kyurem, and are extremely comfortable with leading those two pokemon into rocks setters. Better yet the sample Kyurem outspeeds glimmora anyways, and glimmora's common tera types of grass/flying give it no leverage to stick around long enough to actually click everything it wants to into snow. Diancie can be quite annoyed by the poison spreading but diancie comps are oft carrying amoonguss to offset chip damage from a variety of sources and does away with toxic spikes in an extremely non-committal slot in the builder. Glimmora still annoys Iron Hands and slow healing-focused sinistcha comps by cutting into its longevity with the poisoning, rocks are superb in this metagame with all the sash spam and Offensive Rock STAB is still excellent into genies and snow so glimmora is by no means a bad pokemon but similar to fellow Tier 3 amoonguss I cannot in good faith call it a tier 2 threat when almost every top level archetype in the metagame is already prepared to deal with it without really even going out of their way to do so.
T3 -> T2
Diancie has emerged since world cup as a huge threat in builder with Diamond Storm being one of the most threatening moves in the tier. The development of Diancie-Incin-Amoonguss balance cores has to me provided a solid and threatening archetype for diancie to call home with stable matchups into most of the metagame. Rock stab is massively threatening in this tier and diancie pushes things to the edge with its incredible bulk lending it to hard check pao and trick room foiling the genies gameplan with excellent consistency. Aside from leading recent balance cores diancie is still incredibly flexible at fitting on other comps such as snow fullroom and semiroom, offering these teams a much appreciated progress-making backbone that can sit on boards where speed control is not in your favor with relative ease. Diancie is possibly the best standalone trick room setter in a format dominated by tailwind offense, contested perhaps only by sinistcha, and I believe every team should be double-checking its gameplan into it right now.
T3 -> T4
This pokemon fails into every tier 1 pokemon and that alone is reason enough for me to drop it. Pao sacred while resisting sucker, Incin easily standing up to it even with a defiant boost and now often carrying wisp (usually for other, better pokemon such as SD hands and okidogi), Wellspring turning sucker punch minds games into a guaranteed line with follow me, Hands entirely hard countering gambit and landorus outright nuking it into orbit. The recent sub trends of bullk/sash landorus are even worse for gambit with calcs like this:
+2 252+ Atk Black Glasses Kingambit Sucker Punch vs. 252 HP / 40 Def Landorus: 322-381 (84.2 - 99.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
All of these compounding factors turn kingambit into a tera hog that tries to leverage raw stats to muscle through half the metagame or a lackluster bruiser on trick room/howl teams that simply offers less than something like ursaluna or diancie, pokemon with better offensive options and less vulnerable typings. Kingambit can still very well succeed on teams that choose to support it or ruin unprepared opponents (unlikely in this format right now) but those successes are more befitting of other fellow tier 4 pokemon like Spectrier, Moltres, Regidrago and Ursaluna than its contemporaries in tier 3 like Kyurem and Hearthflame which are much easier to fish opponents with. It's just hard for me to see why this pokemon deserves to be in tier 3 when so many top level teams carry multiple capable responses for it, and it's not even because of gambit specifically!
~~Underrated Alternate Speed Control Guys~~
UR -> T5
Way better than orthworm. Bronzong can absolutely eviscerate genies comps by offering an incredibly difficult to remove trick room and win condition in one slot with IDBP TR. While it is obviously a limited pokemon in a few ways, levitate is an oustanding ability in this metagame and gives it access to ursaluna as a great partner, even offering ursaluna ice spinner terrain control to resolve the grassy terrain issue for it. Bronzong's steel typing is a great strength in this metagame, with very few viable steel types (gambit crown and gholdengo) all of which are more offensively oriented and can get bullied by a number of threats in the metagame. Bronzong is a good backbone for hard trick room oriented teams into landorus and the tiers many threatening ice types in particular
UR -> T5
The other side of the coin to bronzong. Another genies all-in-one stopgap, corviknight offers tailwidn instead of trick room while being equally good at ironpressing to victory and not having to pay the price for its mediocre statline thanks to a relative lack in offensive fire types. Corv can boost out of danger from hands and many of the fire types that would threaten it such as heatran and volcanion are heavily pressured in the metagame as is, leaving a very limited and manageable checklist of actual top counters to Kyurem, Chi yu, Gholdengo and Raging Bolt. Corviknight represents a fairly reliable bulky tailwind setter in a format where the niche is sorely lacking and deserves to be explored more for the unique utilities it offers. That said, its stats really do suck.
UR -> T5
Another bulky tailwind guy that's good into genies, this one has seen a lot of success on a certain diancie team in OSDT and Derby. Hydreigon merges being a genies check with also putting a halt to standard gholdengo's activities and having a great defensive typing into ogerpon incineroar and chi yu. Snarl is fantastic utility on this guy and earth power lets it whack a good chunk of the metagame, but obviously the main draw here is being a good defensive tailwind into Genies and other HO comps. Tera steel is outstanding on a levitate mon and gives you a lot of bang for your buck wtih this guy into snow and regidrago, unlike most lower tier supportive mons. Hydreigon still has to contend with not having prankster but being immune to taunt from torn naturally and having so many good matchups with its defensive typing in a tier that is utterly lacking in fairy types means it can find plenty of opportunity to set tailwind and get its snarl on.
T5 -> T4
Might even be tier 3. Being able to differentiate itself from whims and torn by actually being able to hit Gholdengo, having a great defensive typing into a good chunk of the metagame and most importantly: access to fast breaking swipe, roaring moon has seen a decent rise in usage in the past few months. Breaking swipe lets moon thoroughly hinder ogerpon and provides greatly useful compression for teams looking to squeeze in come physical checking without having to lock into intimidate. Moon makes a great pairing with diancie on tailroom for this reason, checking Gholdengo and slowing hands/wellspring enough to provide it space to setup. The blistering speed tier from booster energy and great natural bulk usually lets moon get its say in regardless of the board and fast Knock Off is incredible in this metagame into pokemon like lando-i and hands. Very powerful pokemon and I hope it continues to rise on more balanced tailwind structures.
T4 -> T5
Porygon finds itself to be more passive than a large quantity of trick room setters in the metagame without offering anything more than generic bulk and ice beam coverage in a metagame with a number of dominant ice types and other, better setters with that same coverage. Other than having generic bulk, a trait trick room teams are not in want of given the threats they have access to this generation, porygon offers no consistency as a trick room setter. Being locked out of an item slot leaves porygon unable to tech for spore, fake out, or taunt as other setters such as cresselia are. Indeedee and Sinistcha come with the benefit of being effectively immune to fake out anyways and offer substantial alternative supportive moves such as healing and redirection while not being entirely passive thanks to Matcha and terrain boosted psychic. Porygon can't even consistently guarantee it gets a special boost a lot of the time, especially into common leads like ogerpon and incineroar. Even further, porygon fails into the most common trickroom stopgaps in the tier, incineroar and iron hands, who will gladly knock or drain punch it respectively and laugh at the damage porygon will be failing to do back. Unfortuantely I fail to see porygon doing much of anything in a metagame where so many better and more specialized trick room setters exist, so many pokemon actually exist at a power level to go stat for sta with it, and so many teams have multiple ways to stop trick room that it can't compete against.
UR -> T5
Extremely consistent rocks in a metagame where rocks are really good. Extremely fast icy wind in a metagame where icy wind is good thatnks to genies. Extremely funny calc into iron hands from a good team structure that arose recently.
252 SpA Life Orb Beads of Ruin Deoxys-Speed Psycho Boost vs. 0 HP / 208 SpD Assault Vest Iron Hands: 447-530 (99.5 - 118%) -- 93.8% chance to OHKO
I've seen this team structure win enough (and kick my own ass enough) that I can say deoxys-speed is worth exploring more, especially next to chi yu.
~~ Low Tiers~~
T5 -> UR
Ass.
UR -> T5
I think every single person who has played this tier for more than a year has faced that damned hoopa trick room team in a tour match at some point. Hoopa can be grateful that there are no fairy types to hit it and u-turn is a rarity somehow, it's a disgusting ball of stats with the strongest expanding force in the game (deoxys-attack always ran timid, this guy gets to run modest) and it makes excellent use of grassy/psychic seed to steal random items and annoy people with.
Some shouts for mons I think could make VR but need more attention before I consider them worthy of a nom. Redirection that resists torn is a surprisingly useful combo, add on ewebs taunt and volt pivots and you have a decent pokemon Both forms of enamorus are deeply underexplored. Tera fairy specs puts out flutter numbers and there's plenty of ways to support that with speed control and other tools. The metagame has forgotten what a good specs tera moonblast can do and this mon can probably exploit that. An eforce clicker that can actually hit incin and gholdengo while not taking too much damage from either. Rillaboom stocks continue to stay relatively low, psyspam could very well do with some innovation.
Now that OSDT has finished up and DPL is getting started, we're going to be holding another VR voting slate soon! This is the last call for VR nominations, get them in sometime this week so we can include them in the slate.
On most teams there is likely to be at least 2 out of the 3 of Chien-Pao, Ogerpon, and Tornadus which all cause problems for Landorus. Snow is more popular than ever and loves to see Landorus. Even Iron Hands will happily take an Earth Power for Ice Punch trade and come out on top. In general the metagame has shifted to become more hostile to Landorus with more PaoNite as well, and players are getting better at playing around Landorus and being smarter with Tera for example.
T2 -> T3
I think I gaslit myself into ever thinking this is a tier 2 Pokemon. Sinistcha is never able to do all that is advertised while a lot of teams rely on it to do all those things. Between setting Trick Room, redirection, and healing up teammates it can get stretched thin and not really fulfill all of thise duties. Despite being an apparent Wellspring and Landorus counter the typing is still very exploitable and Sinistcha often wants to tera. I also think that Sinistcha lends itself to passive teams and playing that can more easily be punished by proactive play. I just think a (non-Incin) Pokemon that gets the most value by switching a lot is hard to be that highly ranked.
T5 -> T4
We've seen some rain teams featuring Basc-f pop up more recently and this may be a controversial opinion but I think it's best trait on those teams is actually being a fast water type attacker as opposed to Last Respects (still very strong obviously). Rain teams also allow Basc to run other items aside from Choice Scarf such as Lorb or Band. Scarf sets with Adaptability are still viable and need to be respected as well. In general think the mon might be a bit underused and looking at the VR it fits in better with the tier 4 guys imo.
Sticking to my previous noms but had a few things to say:
T4 -> T3
I think this pokemon is generally a good bit better than everything else in t4 and in general really benefits from the tumble rillaboom's usage has taken, replaced by a welcome face in iron hands. Earthquake is pretty clickable on this guy right now and that's when the bear is at its strongest.
T4 -> T3
A core component of trick room and iron crown is vibing in the big tier 3. I think its correct given its strong matchup into recent bolt setup stuffs, capability into genies and ability to punish pao/hands. Rillaboom usage remains relatively low letting indeedee freely have its way with terrain and enable comps like psyseed sd hands and the ever-present fullroom. Just a bit of a strange snub imo.
Reiterating support for tier 2 diancie and Hoopa to make the VR given its prominence on what is probably the most popular team of the generation, those are the noms I definitely feel strongest about.
T1 -> T2
Seconding this. While landorus threatens immediate damage into a lot of the top threats, I think it is pretty easily accounted for in the builder. Tornadus and Chien Pao fit naturally on so many teams and with icy wind becoming more commonplace on tornadus sash landorus isn't even safe.
T2 -> T1
This guy is really good. Speed control is so important in this format and having immediate access to a speed boost automatically makes this pokemon good. It also threatens big damage on other top threats like landorus and ogerpon. No other tailwind setter really matches just what this guy can do.
T3 -> T4
This guy was kind of only good because Archaludon was good. We've seen it be used on some gholdengo teams but i think the bulky steels are better supported in other ways. It has the benefit of being able to immediately reset sun but that doesn't warrant a tier 3 spot i think.
Noms cause T4 -> T3
Insane with specs blizzard, which whilst there is Kyurem, this things speed is absurd and can wreck a lot more of the tier, and you can also run booster speed encore icy wind to ruin a lot of mons days, heavily underrated and has a very unique place outside of being a kyurem substitute. T1 -> T2
Whilst undeniably amazing i feel that the competition that other grass types provide knocks this down a few pegs, particularly due to the decrease in rain usage, and the other ogerpon formes bringing a lot of offensive utility to the table. T3 -> T2
THE Lando I partner, which with scarf is just insanely strong provide you can handle the speed control/iron hands and incin, can easily tear apart many teams. Scarf is amazing, sash and cloak are fun, willo caused many ragequits on ladder, shockingly versatile whilst being monsterous offensively. T5 -> T4/T3 (Cope)
Its stab is insane into the current meta rn, as long as you can handle the genies, its set diversity (particularly in item) is infuriating, dire claw is just broken, fake out and coaching is insane support, handle the many grasses and darks populating the tier. Degeneracy at its finest, in both the team preview mindgames, and RNG. If this sleeps me one more time tho petition to suspect immediately.
Can’t regidrago Tera fairy and it learns earth power
T2 ->T1
T2 -> T1
T1 -> T2
T3 -> T2
T3 -> T2
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T3/T4 -> T2
T3 -> T2
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T1 ->T3
T2 -> T3
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T4 -> T3
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Eragon team. Funny.
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T4 -> T3
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T3 -> T4
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T3 -> T4
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T5 -> T4
T4 - > T5
T5 -> UR
T5 -> UR
T5 -> UR
UR -> T5
UR -> T5
UR -> T5
T5 -> UR
UR -> T5
Both forms of enamorus are deeply underexplored. Tera fairy specs puts out flutter numbers and there's plenty of ways to support that with speed control and other tools. The metagame has forgotten what a good specs tera moonblast can do and this mon can probably exploit that.
