Dont whose idea it was to bring flutter back but just no. I don’t understand why commander is not banned and tatsu is, storm drain tatsu would be a far better meta game addition than flutter and would offer great counter play into waterpon. If we can ban shadow tag why can’t we ban commander?? Also I would love to see a ban on dark void and an unban of darkrai, a voidless rai is 10x less broken than Flutter. These are the meta game changes we should be making not reviving one of the most broken mons dou have ever seen.
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Metagame np: SV DOU Stage 15: Without Me | Flutter Mane Suspect
- Thread starter bagel
- Start date
BUTTER MAN 1
BUTTER MAN 2
BUTTER MAN 3
before i start uh this is literally my first suspect thingy so ill probably get a bunch of stuff wrong
flutter manes faster than like the entire tier when boosted, and pressures a lot of teams to invest more in speed control in tw icy wind or tr, flutter fish is extremely strong but its strength is comparable to paonite imo so speed seems to be more powerful, though i feel like the tier has the tools to handle flutter manes speed, and most of the adjustments i predict people would make to counter flutter aren't that suboptimal imo, such as assault vest incin and more choice scarf usage. imo fairy types are pretty lacking in this tier so flutter mane could help counter stuff like dragonite and raging bolt, as well as the tera dragon mons
BUTTER MAN 2
BUTTER MAN 3
before i start uh this is literally my first suspect thingy so ill probably get a bunch of stuff wrong
flutter manes faster than like the entire tier when boosted, and pressures a lot of teams to invest more in speed control in tw icy wind or tr, flutter fish is extremely strong but its strength is comparable to paonite imo so speed seems to be more powerful, though i feel like the tier has the tools to handle flutter manes speed, and most of the adjustments i predict people would make to counter flutter aren't that suboptimal imo, such as assault vest incin and more choice scarf usage. imo fairy types are pretty lacking in this tier so flutter mane could help counter stuff like dragonite and raging bolt, as well as the tera dragon mons
I’m on the fence and open to convincing on either side of the argument. I’m not loving the current state of the meta for a variety of reasons unrelated to Flutter but I can’t tell if Flutter makes those issues I have better or worse. Calc also don’t feel as horrible as they once were, though I completely see the keep it banned argument.
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my issue with flutter mane is that it makes it just so easy to win. this is the most obvious ban argument for me, no calcs, no teambuilding, no nothing. im finding myself having an extreme advantage vs no flutter teams, my flutter mane is always my wincondition and my opponents flutter mane is always my biggest threat. it carries really hard, makes the game so simple because its stats and typing are broken, and thats something no balanced pokemon does.
ftr, this is an issue totally on the suspect system. drop tests shouldnt be done in 2 weeks regular tests, weve seen this shit in ou before w palafin and zama and we are repeating it now
ftr, this is an issue totally on the suspect system. drop tests shouldnt be done in 2 weeks regular tests, weve seen this shit in ou before w palafin and zama and we are repeating it now
At this stage, I’ve realized just how powerful Flutter Mane is. As other testers have noted, it’s extremely easy to win against opponents who aren’t aware that “Flutter Mane is now available.”
On the other hand, the current ladder teams tend to assume there’s no offensive Fairy-type attacker in the meta. Meanwhile, the typical suspect test builds revolve around Choice Specs Flutter Mane + Tailwind + Sun. While this setup is certainly effective, the testing environment would be more rigorous if opponents were building with a more comprehensive and informed perspective.
In conclusion, I suggest keeping Flutter Mane available for a longer period—or unbanning it—and observing how the meta evolves.
On the other hand, the current ladder teams tend to assume there’s no offensive Fairy-type attacker in the meta. Meanwhile, the typical suspect test builds revolve around Choice Specs Flutter Mane + Tailwind + Sun. While this setup is certainly effective, the testing environment would be more rigorous if opponents were building with a more comprehensive and informed perspective.
In conclusion, I suggest keeping Flutter Mane available for a longer period—or unbanning it—and observing how the meta evolves.
reqs get!
not a record i'm exactly thrilled with but in nonetheless, i used this for the entire suspect https://pokepast.es/1c458b2277c08b03 . i think it's an obviously quickly built mishmash but the SR sash ghost landoi with booster fake tears flutter felt really strong, i wanted rocks to punish a theoretical move of incin items from boots to AV to deal with flutter chiyu, and fake tears EP also drops that- felt really good into the resulting sunspams as well as tw offense bc 607 speed guy outspeeds most of the tier in tailwind skull emoji
i'm on the fence at the moment bc unbanned flutter instantly hits the tier as the top mon and will certainly warp the tier into something much different than we're currently used to, but i'm not sure if that's necessarily a bad thing. definitely definitely broken but my perspective coming from VGC i think makes me a little lighter on flutter than maybe DOU players would be. leaning do not unban, gonna think about it some more. cheers
not a record i'm exactly thrilled with but in nonetheless, i used this for the entire suspect https://pokepast.es/1c458b2277c08b03 . i think it's an obviously quickly built mishmash but the SR sash ghost landoi with booster fake tears flutter felt really strong, i wanted rocks to punish a theoretical move of incin items from boots to AV to deal with flutter chiyu, and fake tears EP also drops that- felt really good into the resulting sunspams as well as tw offense bc 607 speed guy outspeeds most of the tier in tailwind skull emoji
i'm on the fence at the moment bc unbanned flutter instantly hits the tier as the top mon and will certainly warp the tier into something much different than we're currently used to, but i'm not sure if that's necessarily a bad thing. definitely definitely broken but my perspective coming from VGC i think makes me a little lighter on flutter than maybe DOU players would be. leaning do not unban, gonna think about it some more. cheers
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The question we must ask is not whether Flutter Mane is strong, as it clearly is, but whether it is uncompetitive or broken per Smogon's tiering policy; I'll be voting to unban Flutter Mane on the grounds that it is neither.
Flutter Mane clearly isn't uncompetitive. Players facing Flutter Mane retain agency in battle through positioning, prediction, and team construction choices. This contrasts with genuinely uncompetitive elements like Evasion abilities that reduce battles to coin flips, or uninteractive setup strategies like Eevium Z and Commander that offer few reasonable counterplay options.
The perception of Flutter Mane as "broken" must be contextualized within the natural progression of power creep across Pokemon generations. Each new generation introduces mechanics, stats, and movepool combinations that appear overwhelming when viewed in isolation. SM Doubles witnessed similar rhetoric regarding Z-Moves, Terrains, and Deoxys, yet it went unbanned and the format adapted. There's also the historical precedent established by Pokemon that were demonstrably more centralizing yet remained legal in their current generation metagames. XY Doubles saw Landorus-T achieve usage rates exceeding 70% while warping the entire metagame around its presence. These Pokemon were clearly very good, but over time players developed counterplay. The knee-jerk reaction to ban immediately once given the opportunity prevents the natural metagame evolution that has historically produced some of Doubles OU's most celebrated formats, like XY and SM.
Ultimately, I would prefer to play a format that is more authentic to the original cartridge games, trusting that the metagame will naturally adapt and balance over time. Unbanning Flutter Mane is a step toward preserving that generational identity while still maintaining a competitive metagame.
Flutter Mane clearly isn't uncompetitive. Players facing Flutter Mane retain agency in battle through positioning, prediction, and team construction choices. This contrasts with genuinely uncompetitive elements like Evasion abilities that reduce battles to coin flips, or uninteractive setup strategies like Eevium Z and Commander that offer few reasonable counterplay options.
The perception of Flutter Mane as "broken" must be contextualized within the natural progression of power creep across Pokemon generations. Each new generation introduces mechanics, stats, and movepool combinations that appear overwhelming when viewed in isolation. SM Doubles witnessed similar rhetoric regarding Z-Moves, Terrains, and Deoxys, yet it went unbanned and the format adapted. There's also the historical precedent established by Pokemon that were demonstrably more centralizing yet remained legal in their current generation metagames. XY Doubles saw Landorus-T achieve usage rates exceeding 70% while warping the entire metagame around its presence. These Pokemon were clearly very good, but over time players developed counterplay. The knee-jerk reaction to ban immediately once given the opportunity prevents the natural metagame evolution that has historically produced some of Doubles OU's most celebrated formats, like XY and SM.
Ultimately, I would prefer to play a format that is more authentic to the original cartridge games, trusting that the metagame will naturally adapt and balance over time. Unbanning Flutter Mane is a step toward preserving that generational identity while still maintaining a competitive metagame.
I think a lot of arguments around allowing flutter depend on the meta adapting to it, but I want to ask, how? First off, physical attackers are not, and never will be, a fully reliable answer to Flutter. Not only does flutter have countless partners that can easily resolve this issue, redirection from ogerpons and amoon, incin, partners like chi yu and lando that can easily ko most of said threats, torn for speed control, niche options like tsareena and ndd (the latter also providing redirection) to stop prio spam, but also, flutter's stats are so insane it can easily invest massively in bulk and it can take a shocking amount of hits. Further you have incin and other options like screens to shore up its bulk furhter. I've also experimented with cm grassy seed flutter to pretty decent success. Drawing from my experience from vgc, there is no way to reliably check flutter, and it can ALWAYS adapt to its checks. I've seen it time and time again, flutter making a new set to beat its counters. Even if you manage to tech around flutter's physical damage reduction like with defiant kingambit, then you just thud into regular offensive flutter + chi yu cores. Additionally, flutter outspeeds the entire meta, causing an insane mess of speed creeping and icy wind wars between opposing flutters, which I find really unhealthy. (Particularly when ppl catch onto twave flutter). I can't think of a single mon or core of mons that can reliably check both supportive/defensive flutter + a common partner like incin and offensive flutter + chi yu/lando (heatran dies tospecs shadow ball + dark pulse and loses damage wars if you play around it). And anything that might is so specific that the meta is centralised around it to an almost insane extent, but unlike lando t or other similarly central pokemons in past metas, flutter can win games by itself, and exudes an immense offensive pressure whilst being the fastest thing in the tier.
Further, the few mons that are good in the tier outside of checking flutter, like rilla and tera woger, are almost always used to damage trade with other massively dangerous foes, and thus are very vulnerable and easy to chip down for flutter, or for flutter to chip for its partner. Flutter can activate so many offensive cores whilst seemlessly being a game ending threat in itself, whilst it can slot with ease into common balance builds and single handedly ruins so so many otherwise strong and viable options within the tier. Flutter is an obviously unbelievably unbalanced mon, and it has proven time and time again in formats of a much higher power level then this that it has the tools to adapt to whatever you attempt to check it with, and controls the game in a way no other mon currently legal can.
Further, the few mons that are good in the tier outside of checking flutter, like rilla and tera woger, are almost always used to damage trade with other massively dangerous foes, and thus are very vulnerable and easy to chip down for flutter, or for flutter to chip for its partner. Flutter can activate so many offensive cores whilst seemlessly being a game ending threat in itself, whilst it can slot with ease into common balance builds and single handedly ruins so so many otherwise strong and viable options within the tier. Flutter is an obviously unbelievably unbalanced mon, and it has proven time and time again in formats of a much higher power level then this that it has the tools to adapt to whatever you attempt to check it with, and controls the game in a way no other mon currently legal can.
Decided to get got reqs again because why not, almost got the flawless anyway ban flutter guys
thinking that flutter should be reallowed is fine, but these arguments are not it man
If flutter mane should be legal, it should be because we actually see that the metagame has developed to a state where it can handle it no problem and its actually a benefit for the tier. sadly, two weeks retests do not allow this and are based just on hypotheticals, hope and aversion to change.
you could say this about absolutely every pokemon, every piece in the metagame ever. this means nothing. you can develop counterplay to everything. you could change Flutter Mane in that post to Eternatus-Eternamax and nothing would change. The issue is not "developing counterplay", but rather is that counterplay enough? In case it's enough, is it too limiting building wise or playing wise, where you open yourself up to losing to other stuff? Can the metagame actually handle said mon without crumbling? I, or no one, has an answer to this, and this is why we don't tier on hypotheticals but we are trying to do it here i guess
This "knee-jerk reaction to ban immediately once given the opportunity" is actually the third suspect this pokemon recieves after being allowed for an entire year and being banned for the next one. In a year, metagames have a ton of time to adapt, and they naturally do, just ask the vgcers. This wasnt an overreaction, given it took an entire year. This sentence is just a bunch of nothing too, bans happen because "natural metagame evolution" gets stopped by these broken pokemon. Those historically celebrated Doubles OU metagames have also had bans, perhaps faster than Flutter Mane as well. Did the Snorlax ban halt the development of the smdou metagame then? Should we unban Darkrai from XY DOU because it was a knee jerk reaction?
If flutter mane should be legal, it should be because we actually see that the metagame has developed to a state where it can handle it no problem and its actually a benefit for the tier. sadly, two weeks retests do not allow this and are based just on hypotheticals, hope and aversion to change.