Metagame SV OU Metagame Discussion v4 [ survey results -- see post 21,221 ]

[Avira]

Roaring Moon/Walking Wake: I have to say I was very surprised and even laughed a bit seeing these two here. For Moon, it got banned with a pretty large majority, I'd like to know why it was included in the first place.

Write-in: Tera blast, similar to Kyurem (and a large part of Kyurem's kit in doing so) it's hard to argue it's broken outright but I hate the dynamic it brings to the tier. I just wish there was a suspect in one of the last few months to put the nail in the coffin for this topic in general. If it got banned, great it was broken and if not alright there you go no more discussion on this. Feels like an annoying hanging thread that imo plagues the tier.

Roaring Moon was most likely included 'cause new OU Council member, fusien, wanted it to be. fusien has literally said in the OU room on Showdown that if you think Roaring Moon is broken you need to get good. It's likely not a coincidence that as soon as fusien joined the OU Council that there was discussion among the ranks of the OU Council for retesting Roaring Moon.

Yeah, I hate the dynamic Tera Blast brings to the tier, much like you do.

 

[DaddyBuzzwole]

enjoyment: 7
over the last 6 months we've started to get to a point where i'm actually feeling engaged playing this game again, but it's still a little too fishy with too high of a presence of broken nonsense for me to properly enjoy

competitive: 7
in terms of balance, this is probably the best spot the meta's ever been in, but we still have a long way to go before i can score svou higher than a 7

4
i'm still on the fence about dragonite and have been for a while, but i fully support a suspect of it. it definitely has a lot of elements i would consider problematic, especially in regard to its ever-expanding set diversity and the difficulty of actually guessing said set, but if you actually do guess the set right or carry a broad-spectrum check it's really really easy to play around. i don't know what i would vote in the actual suspect, but i put 4 because i very heavily support a suspect of the mon

5
fuck this mon

5
pretty much everything that can be said about waterpon has already gotten said. even that sentence is probably a repeat of something i've said a dozen times at this point. get rid of it

3
i'm still mad about what happened a year ago. i don't think i'll ever stop being mad about it. but as for the mon itself, i think kyurem is actually not that big of a problem right now, all things considered. definitely something to revisit in the future, but as for now i'd prefer we focus on waterpon, dnite, and of course kingambit if we ever actually get our shit together and put it back on the chopping block

1
i really don't think this guy is a problem at all. annoying, sure. braindead, yes. nightmarishly hard to wall, absolutely. basically a hard stop to either offense or fat depending on set, 100%. but a problem? i don't think so. i don't really like the "unga bunga me click one move and you die" dynamic, in fact i fucking hate it, but i don't think walking wake is good enough or splashable enough for me to consider an issue right now. it's almost exactly as consistent as sun is, and sun hasn't been consistent for a while

1
gotta say it's pretty funny finding this guy on here again. i honestly don't get it. it was a moderate problem a while ago but i think people have comfortably adapted to its presence here. the obvious big major weakness of gliscor is the simple fact that kyurem continues to exist, but there's a bunch of other littler problems for gliscor that compound to make it honestly not even worth putting on the survey in my opinion. it's another one of those mons that's just really annoying

a number too low to express in any existing notation
if the first tiering action in six months is undoing our last tiering action, which was itself a repeat of a previous tiering action that was undone, i will personally take control of the tier and ban it again my own fucking self

write-ins: gholdengo and [this post was last edited by a moderator 5 seconds ago]

 

[Fusien]

fusien has literally said in the OU room on Showdown that if you think Roaring Moon is broken you need to get good.

Ok clarifying that this is an exaggeration lmao, I'm open with my thoughts on that moon shouldn't have been banned but that's because of factors intrinsic to how moon works as a mon and its role on teams it used to be on (ill write a post later when I have time). There are obviously good players that don't want moon to be unbanned, its not a l2p situation.

I did advocate for moon to be included on the survey, and that's because, in addition to potential benefits to the meta I'll describe later, I've noticed that beyond just myself, rmoon has been brought up in conversations regarding the meta's state (i.e in comparison with SPL era, dealing with oger, etc.); it is also the most realistic unban mon imo, and enough time has surpassed where its fine for people to survey whether they prefer the meta with its absence or not.

On a different personal note, I am curious on if the qualified vs more general base results on this will contrast. I've often heard more pro-moon rhetoric from tour players than from the general base. This is of course analogous (it is still divisive among the former group), and since rmoon was not surveyed in 2025 until now, we do not have results to compare the opinion. Nevertheless, it will be interesting to see on whether this difference of opinion exists, or if there is an overall trend that is observed in both.

 

[Dreadfury]

Sharing some of my votes although they might be a little different now than I voted a ~day ago:

Enjoyment: 9. Late-stage OU is always fun IMO. We're kinda at that point where all sorts of weird-ass shit is viable and I tend to be all for those sorts of metagames. I like metagames where half of UU is genuinely great in OU. I liked that state of SwSh and I like it here.

Competitiveness: I can't remember what I put for this. Probably like a 7? There's some cheese but I feel like it's never the sort of "the better player lost" sorts of cheese I've grown to expect. A LOT of matchup fishing going on overall, though, which could very easily bump this down in my eyes on a different day.

DNite: 3. I think it's problematic but I also think it serves an important purpose in this tier beyond just being super threatening with like 20 different DD sets.

Kingambit: 1. I'm never not gonna vote for a 1 for this by this point. You're pretty much passively preparing to not get swept by this and its defensive utility actively makes the tier better. I think it should always be on surveys, but I don't think this mon is problematic in the slightest anymore.

Wellspring: 3-4 leaning 3. It's definitely not the oppressive threat it was a couple months ago. It's still really unhealthy IMO, but it's much more manageable at the moment.

Kyurem: 3. I don't like this mon, I don't like what it does for this tier, and every time I blink a new completely different set starts doing stuff. Still has a unique enough defensive profile and Ice STAB is really useful in a tier like SV OU, but this mon is frustrating.

Walking Wake: 1. Finch's explanation about this mon makes a lot of sense and I do think this mon is extremely brainless into offense (you're clicking Steam and something's dropping like a sack of potatoes) but this thing's only as consistent as Sun is, and weather's inherently kinda all over the place this gen. This isn't anywhere near the caliber of, say, Archaludon on Rain and that's the closest thing I can compare this with.

Gliscor: 2, but I'd put this anywhere higher on a different day. I don't care much for SD sets right now, but those tried-and-true fat sets are madness-inducing to play against when the thing's vomiting out layers so regularly. It's shockingly consistent.

Roaring Moon: I said a 3 on the survey because I kinda liked that metagame more for a while, but I honestly feel like this is a solid 1. This tier does not have consistent Moon answers, and I'd take ten Dragonites over one of this mon any day of the week.

Write-ins: Only write-in I had was asking what in God's name Wake was doing on here, but Finch explained that after I already submitted it. If I filled this out later on I'd have mentioned a Terapagos clause (yes, I watched the Pinkacross video, but I'm honestly a big proponent of a Terapagos sans Tera as is) had I filled this out tonight instead of the night the survey dropped.

 

[1LDK]

fun 7
balanced 7
dnite 2
kingambit 1
oger-w 1
kyurem 3
walking wake lol
gliscor lol

roaring moon adamantly against and this is where I'll stop for something, I have said this before but not as publically. IMO, the reason why you can't have roaring moon in sv ou is because every roaring moon check loses hardcore vs gliscor, and every gliscor check loses to roaring moon. The only 2 who can reliably check both at the same time are corviknight and skarmory, but both of them are trash and easy bait. Both are physical attackers with knock and ice weakness. But the combination of Moon's power and Gliscor's defensive tools make answering both tricky, which stretches teams thin. You can't have both on the tier, is either one or the other, and for the looks of it everyone is voting for Gliscor to stay. If you want roaring moon in the tier? ban gliscor, if you want gliscor in the tier? keep roaring moon locked. The community has made its choice regarding this matter, and I for once agree with the general notion.


anything else? gholdengo
are you good at the game? no lol

 

[Tenebricite]

Regardless of its prevalence in the current metagame trends of SV OU, I firmly believe that Kyurem must be banned. The sub freeze dry sets will continue to be a menace to balance and limit team building creativity. Its probability to freeze its checks after successive freeze dries represents an objectively uncompetitive element in SV OU. Kyurem is completely ridiculous and I can only see SV OU being a more enjoyable and competitive metagame without it.

I urge you to rate Kyurem a 5 on the survey, suspect, and ban this aberration to the competitive spirit of our game.

 

[Dhrabb]

Write-ins: Only write-in I had was asking what in God's name Wake was doing on here, but Finch explained that after I already submitted it. If I filled this out later on I'd have mentioned a Terapagos clause (yes, I watched the Pinkacross video, but I'm honestly a big proponent of a Terapagos sans Tera as is) had I filled this out tonight instead of the night the survey dropped.

I kind of forgot about Terapagos too, which I got reminded of from the Pinkacross video. I definitely support unbanning it and would've included it in my write-in if I didn't have the memory of a goldfish

 

[DaddyBuzzwole]

I kind of forgot about Terapagos too, which I got reminded of from the Pinkacross video. I definitely support unbanning it and would've included it in my write-in if I didn't have the memory of a goldfish

same here. can you kind folks on survey duty please retroactively write this in on my survey as well

 

[658Greninja]

How much do you enjoy SV OU rn?: 5
How competitive do you find SV OU rn?: 4

I think the metagame is in a more balanced state, but laddering in SV OU is a series of Mickey Mouse ahh games where matchups determine games. I believe there are two culprits.

4
Dnite is the embodiment of my problems with SV OU. Numerous different sets, and a new one pops up every month. Lefties Tera Fairy Dnite remain the most egregious set. Multiscale not only makes it very doable for Dnite to get 2-3 boosts, but also makes scouting difficult for Offense and BO. Dumb MU fish. If banning Tblast was still on the table, I’d go for that cause witthout it, Dnite becomes 30% more honest.

1
I’ve recently voiced my feelings for Kingambit, but in short, Gambit is a healthy presence in the meta with ample counterplay (will go into that if prompted) due to many structures having natural responses to Gambit like Zama or Lando. Zama in particular pushed more Ghost or Fairy variants, leaving Tera Fire and Dark seeing less usage. Its also important to mention that Gambit’s setup opportunities are not really vast. It can find ways in on choice-locked Shadow Balls or Gking, but most other mons in the format have ways of crippling or severally damaging Gambit.

4
Most brainless mon in the tier. It legit only needs Ivy and Knock to break things. The best Wellspring counterplay is to use your own Wellspring. Broken STAB move with 100 BP and makes no contact, has perfect coverage, and can double as a support because why the fuck not? Its a problem for both Balance and even offense, because Wellspring scares off every rocker/spike setter in the tier. Wellspring is difficult to punish and with some running Synthesis, you can’t use the “just wear it down with hazards” argument.

2
Freeze is dumb as shit, but other than that, idt Kyurem is really an issue. I’ve seen more Scarf and AV sets, the former gets surprise kills on Pult, Wellspring, etc while the latter trades with almost every special attacker at full, but nothing that makes Kyurem broken. Unlike Wogre, you can use the hazard argument, because rocks are hella punishing for it without Roost in its arsenal anymore. Its defensive typing is also ass, so it doesn’t get free switch ins like Wellspring or Demonite.

1

my reaction to that information

1
SD Tera Blast Fairy tech from August is funny, but nothing crazy to start advocating for a ban. Unlike Wellspring, SD Gliscor is weak as shit without a boost and even with a boost it can still fail to pick up kills. Rillaboom returning to the forefeont also makes non-speed invested Gliscors tougher to use, thus Gliscor is more prone to big nuke dmg. Not to mention that G-Weez is still popular on the Balances its good vs.

 

[UltraSword]

Fun: 8
Competitive: 7
I won't lie these scores were probably a bit higher than they should have been, but I do think that SV OU is currently in its most fun and balanced state. It is definitely not perfect, but I feel like a lot of things are better than they were at the same time a year ago.

3
I don't think any of the pokemon mentioned are particularly problematic enough to be suspected but this is easily the closest pokemon to being one. It has an insane variety of sets, is easily the best abuser of tera in the tier, has an insane defensive ability, got encore for some reason, and even has priority to top it off. Still, I think there is enough to hold back Dragonite to where I think it is still a fine pokemon. All of those sets do have genuine counterplay once you figure out what the set is and while guessing wrong can lead to a loss, I think in most instances it is a genuine skill issue if you can't guess what set Dragonite is based on the team composition is (even if tera does obviously complicate thing).

1
It may still be quite a scary pokemon but I think it has plenty of counterplay at this point to where I think it isn't problematic at all. It absolutely has to use sd and sucker punch and almost always uses kowtow cleave which only leaves one spot open. This predictability makes Kingambit quite a bit easier to take down and I think it is enough to where I can say it is at least fine if not healthy.

2
I have already explained multiple times before that I do not think Wogerpon is outright broken and I won't keep repeating myself. However, I will say that I do think she might not be healthy. I think the thing that brought me to this realization is the fact that she learns spikes. Wogerpon is not only a pokemon that can set spikes, but she is also a pokemon that beats most other spike setters, and she can do that while also being a powerful offensive threat. Wogerpon isn't like gen 7 Greninja either who set spikes to provide pressure as she genuinely has real defensive properties that make it a great spike setter. This on top of the other insane moves she has like synthesis and u-turn are definitely enough to convince me that Wogerpon, while not broken, is probably not healthy as she can take so many roles that make it genuinely hard to replace on many teams.

2
I think I put this as 1 on the survey but I meant to put it as a 2. This pokemon has the same problem as Dragonite where it has a variety of sets that can be hard to predict. However, because Dragonite outclasses it so much when it comes to its physical sets, I think Kyurem is definitely not nearly as problematic in comparison. I probably would keep it at 1 but Kyurem is still quite dangerous thanks to its special sets also being hard to predict and the fact that if Dragonite is ever banned physical sets will potentially be problematic again.

1
Listen I get now why it was on the survey and it is quite hard to beat on sun teams but it is also a pokemon that is only good on sun teams imo (balance Wake is not real) and sun teams have plenty of counterplay. It also doesn't help that Walking Wake is pretty much forced to use a choice scarf as it needs to outspeed so much to be effective. This of course leads to the problem that every choice locked pokemon suffers from which is the need to make perfect predictions and this is especially hard for Walking Wake considering fairy types and Wogerpon exist. It is not a bad pokemon by any means but I do not think it is problematic in the slightest because it has so many limitations.

1
Gliscor is not problematic imo as it is very predictable with its defensive sets. It also isn't that threatening with sd as it has to choose whether to use knock off or earthquake as both can be played around rather easily and both moves are bad into Corviknight.

3
I am a bit mixed on this one as while I do like the meta more without it, there were certain advantages to the Moon meta, and I do not think it was banworthy.

Other: In hindsight I wish I answered Terapagos but I originally wrote about tera blast as while I don't think it is broken, I do think it deserves a suspect at this point.

 

[Cade of Hoenn]

Fun: 4
Competitive: 7

Gen 9 probably won't be remembered as a great or balanced generation, but it will at least be memorable with Tera shenanigans.

5

Do we really want a generation with tera + multiscale + 1000 sweeper sets? There is a set of this pokemon that beats every team and I really don't think there needs to be. It's extremely hard to predict this mons set, and it can run away with games like nobody's business.

4

+2 Tera dark + 5 allies fainted sucker punch can OHKO defensive gliscor, and is a guaranteed OHKO if you have black glasses. This pokemon is a sweeper with the second highest attack in all of OU, all while its tied for the 6th highest defense in OU, the 7th highest HP in OU. Do we really want to engage in sucker punch 50 / 50s with this overtuned monster? While encore and chip are potential things to wear it down, the most competitive and most ideal tier is better off without kingambit.

5

I think a healthy tier, and the tier we should be striving for is where there are both offensive and defensive answers to various pokemon. Ogerpon has virtually no viable defensive answers, and thus functions as an accelerant to the metagame. The 350 speed benchmark is very oppressive and keeps offensive at the top while suffocating defensive teams. +2 SD Tera Water Ivy Cudgel can OHKO both Zamazenta at +1 and Weezing Galar. Do we really need this in the tier? We do not need the stockholm syndrome that is wellspring to continue to dictate the metagame with it's extreme offensive, defensive and utility capabilities.

4

10/10 I support bringing back the fraudulent Russian elections for this one. Similar to dragonite it's boosting and damage capabilities are very hard to cover for, with DD and specs sets countering each other's walls, and mixed sets for a headache of a mix-up. Tera ground or fire is amazing coverage allowing kyurem to run away with games in an instant. This would be a 5 if it wasn't for it's loaded dice icicle spear & scale shot sets being able to handle dragonite multiscale.

2

It's strong, and it's great on sun. It has defensive answers like galarian slowking and AV primarina, and offensive answers like I-val, enamorus, and specs-pult. I don't think this really needs a ban, but I recognize it's strength, hence 2.

3

Gliscor is in one word: annoying. Immunity to status on a defensive wall with the best chip heal in the game and 2 immunities very strong. However this is doing some stuff to keep otherwise insane boosters at bay, and is functioning as a powerful defensive wall, spikes setter, and overall force slowing the meta down. Drag, gambit, wellspring, and kyurem frankly take priority as the most banworthy things in OU, but once they are handled I'd like to return to this, especially if the metagame without those 4 is especially suffocated by gliscor afterwards. Hence, 3 for we can keep it for now, but in the future it's likely something I'd like kicked out.

1

It's not a priority to bring this back.

Roaring moon was a fun mon, but only in the sense that it felt like the first few months of a new metagame where obviously broken stuff is legal. Tera fairy was overwhelming, tera steel and ghost turned the tables on counterplay, booster energy + DD felt impossible to wall. For those who loved roaring moon, it was good while it lasted, but I don't think it leads the way to a better metagame. Don't cry because it's over, smile because it happened.

Other: Tera in team preview PLEASE

 

[Kazt_5]

Survey time woo

Enjoyment: 8/7
I find the meta to be fun, pretty much every mon in OU is good and viable and even some goofballs in like trick room, garchomp, blaziken, oger teal, and more keep things pretty interesting. The gameplay itself is as fun as ever, it's very tactical and very positional while being aggressive, tera keeps being my favorite gen gimmick, opens a lot of options, keeps you on your toes and can bail you out offensively or defensively, lots of strategy and timing behind it. With that said the meta is slightly samey on what you encounter; your tusks, zamas and ting lus are present in pretty much every match, which is not a bad thing necessarily, but they keep in check so many things that it becomes a bit hard to experiment and deviate from the meta, dumb stuff like dnite makes both building and playing really unfun to try. Overall good with some issues (that might not be necessarily addressable?)

Competitiveness: 9/8
Proooobably the most balanced the meta has been all gen, pretty clear cut what's good, pretty clear cut how to stop it, even with the clear top mons there's still a good amount of variety, nothing is super ultra overbearing in gameplay and at top level (at least from what I've seen in recent tours) is usually decided by who plays better which is a good sign. Some mons can be a bit goofy which I'll discuss next

Dragonite: 4
I think dragonite has to go and it's the one very clear blemish I find in the meta. I've been saying this guy is broken since before roaring moon testing and I still think dnite is more broken; very uninteractive to play against, you either have the perfect mon against it or your team just loses to it on preview and there's nothing you could've done, and you have no way to actually know if it's either. There's things you can do against it and I do see some points about it having some counterplay but I think the experience of preparing against it in builder and playing against it is just way too much. It can do a million different things and when one set catches on and it becomes the best guy of the month, people start building for that, and when that set or couple of sets aren't the biggest issue people go back to old dnite sets or even new stuff to always keep dnite on top. Nothing to do, goodbye dnite

Kingambit: 2
It's been 3 years grow up. Obviously insane mon but literally every team ever is overprepped for it, the set variety makes it really annoying but I don't think it's unreasonably strong for this meta; loooots of options to answer it, and at least for me lately losing against it feels more like the opponent played it well rather than gambit being absurd

Ogerpon-Wellspring: 2
Meh, it's fine. You have to for sure have something in your team for it in order to not lose but so do gambit, bolt, zama, wake and more. It strains building a little but playing against it is fine. Obviously strong but not insane

Kyurem: 2
Meh, it's fine. The best mons against it are some of the best mons in the meta: gking, zama, gambit, ghold; some others like crown, valiant, heatran, garg, clef, ace, pult, blissey, defensive tera, priority in general and even more if it teras. You can naturally check kyurem without trying too hard; and it has a bit of a dnite thing going on in the sense that it has many sets that can beat different things, but you usually have something against almost every set it can go for, and some of its sets aren't even all that. The variety might throw people off but I don't think it's that crazy; very strong but I don't even consider it a top mon

Walking Wake: 1
What are you doing here :sob:

Gliscor: 2
2 because I specifically hate playing against it and I think it's cheap, boring and uninteractive. But objectively it's fine

Roaring Moon retest: 3
Genuinely don't care one way or another, if stays banned cool, if we test it cool too. It's probably too strong but I'm not opposed to test it


Bunch of 2s in this one because I'm not blind and I can see they are really strong and have some issues, but I don't think any of them but dnite is ban worthy at all. Even in this overpowered ass gen I think we are at a decent point in regards to balance. I'll make a separate post later about what I would unban/look into

 

[Napoli Burns]

Dragonite always needs to have the right set and use Tera to destroy a team. Kyurem is quite different: without needing Tera, it can simply freeze its few (truly) viable checks. The rest of it has 130 for every attacking stat, and its only true weakness is not being able to use boots. The remaining Pokémon do not seem problematic to me for now, according to the broken check broken logic.

Finally, I don't understand the point of completely prohibiting voting for Tera Blast in the survey, since as a slot it could have been used much better than Gliscor and Walking Wake. I don't think anyone in the last 50 pages has expressed a desire for their potential suspect, unlike Tera Blast.

 

[Karxrida]

Finally, I don't understand the point of completely prohibiting voting for Tera Blast in the survey, since as a slot it could have been used much better than Gliscor and Walking Wake.

Because it keeps getting brought up (including having like two PR threads, one of which was fairly recent) and proceeds to go nowhere due to lack of support. I wouldn't be surprised if Finch feels discussing it further is a waste of time and/or finds it annoying.

 

[CodeFour]

Because it keeps getting brought up (including having like two PR threads, one of which was fairly recent) and proceeds to go nowhere due to lack of support. I wouldn't be surprised if Finch feels discussing it further is a waste of time and/or finds it annoying.

yeah idk what it would hurt to keep a pulse on it in a survey being published with anything else conceivably problematic being included. We need to know what walking wake surveys at but we are DONE with tera blast.

 

[Finchinator]

we are DONE with tera blast.

Tera Blast has been discussed in the council chat and the tier leader chat within the last 24h with me bringing it up firsthand. It is possible we will include it in the next survey in late November/early December, which will take place after the ongoing SCL ends.

A Tera Blast suspect was never happening directly after the PR thread closed and it wouldn’t make sense to have it in the middle of SCL either, but we are not necessarily “DONE” with the topic.

I read everyone’s responses and I hear yall

 

[EpicGuy321]

Fun: 8
Competitiveness: 3 because TB Dnite
Everything 5 except Moon 1
Writeins: Tera Blast and Solgaleo

Objectively perfect decisions fight me

---

Remember my Heatran set which came to me in a dream (literally)?
Just got an insane replay with it (ignore elo)
bro went CRAZY
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9ou-2463854364
sheist

 

[Welcome to mars]

This is the one of the few places on this site I know I can engage in discussion without seeing ZA spoilers if I ever decide to play it

Metagame Enjoyment: 7
Metagame balance: 9
The state of the metagame is more relaxed now with only one pokemon in my opinion being problematic, there have been developments such as the rise of ceruledge and Therian forme Tornadus but they haven’t been too crazy and were overall welcome additions to the tier. Now it isn’t perfect and hasn’t been the most enjoyable time I’ve had with gen 9 OU (nothing is topping early dlc 2 for me), but I think this is a pretty good metagame minus the ogre and I plan on playing it more.


: 1

Now this is a strong pokemon, but its numerous flaws such as its base 80 speed, 4 ice weakness, tendency to not use stab and overall moderate tera hogging prevent it from being broken in my eyes especially given that it suffers from four move slot syndrome since it struggles choosing what moves it wants to run, dragon dance is almost mandatory (there are certainly exceptions) on offensive sets and extreme speed is not far behind but other moves are not easy to pick, earthquake would be wanted for it hitting most extreme speed resists super effectively but you would also want fire punch (or tera blast fire because people certainly use that…) to avoid being stone walled by corviknight, roost to increase longevity, encore to get set up opportunities, ice spinner to slam particularly pesky flying types like Zapdos, Gliscor and therian forme landorus. Dragonite obivously isn’t ruined by these issues but they ultimately effect how it responds defensive pokemon as it will have to pick and choose which ones it can actually beat 1 on 1.



Its also still vulnerable to Burn and paralysis unless it chooses tera fire or electric as these status conditons can get rid of any chance of it possibly sweeping far too easily, so Dragonite will have to be cautious around pokemon that can potentially spread these conditions whilst seeking to set up.


: 1/2

This Pokémon and its sucker punch games can still be worrying to face and its still a force to be reckoned wuth, but its weaknesses are clear and defined enough to take advantage of and prevent it from steamrolling your team. Its sucker punch games don’t exactly work on healthy resists, fighting types such as Great tusk, Iron valiant and especially Zamazenta can easily shatter a non terastalised kingambit with stab (whilst also being great against sucker punch!) and it either relies in sucker punch or its solid but not perfect bulk to answer faster mons that it doesn’t hard, meaning if kingambit wishes to work around these threats in a late game sucker punch sweep, it may need the tera intact.


Its also very vulnerable to burns even after multiple supreme overlord boosts and wil o wisp from pokemon like dragapult (which would normally checked by kingambit!) and moltres (which can also burn it in contact) can restrict what it can do, though its not as bad as dragonite given kingambit can afford to run lum berry.

: 5

I’ve made my opinions on wellspring ogerpon clear before and they certainly haven’t changed, this pokemon is still a nightmare to address offensively due to its attacks getting boosted from just being in its wellspring forme, its stab combo of ivy cudgel and power which ( which are 120 and 144 bp respectively after mask boosts) crushing most pokemon used against strong physical attackers and the fact that it has ways around pokemon that resist grass / water such as playrough to shred the seemingly perfect counter Hydrapple, U turn for most grass types and knock off just hitting almost everything extremely hard anyway whilst crippling them severely with item lost. It commonly adds on to this with SWORDS DANCE to reach absurd damage output normally achieved by pokemon with severe enough drawbacks to keep them in check whilst ogerpon has good speed which it actually can afford to boost with trailblaze, solid bulk and its worst flaw is only having water as a type to terastalise into which is downplayed by it getting a special defense boost from it anyway.

This pokemon’s sheer wallbreaking ferocity with insufficient drawbacks is far too restraining in the teambuilder in my opinion due to the sheer lengths that must be taken to account for it defensively which is almost mandatory unless you’re running a hyper offense team and I would fully support it being suspect tested as a result.

:2
I’m a little less mixed on this pokemon compared to the last suspect and I feel like its specifically 2 to me rather 2.5 like last time, I think that whilst it can still be a little crazy at times with its tera blast fire dragon dance sets, its been causing far less issues and just isn’t too concerning to me. It often wants to run non heavy duty boots items like choice specs for special wallbreaking sets and loaded sets but that causes it to lose 25% of its ho every switch in to rocks, its dragon dance sets have to choose between having to give up some physical power to run earth power or use up the tera slot to run tera blast fire in order to check steel types which otherwise wall it due to its limited physical movepool and its typing is rather screwed up defensively so that can give it trouble setting up or switching in. Its issues are just more exploitable nowadays so I do lean to it being balanced more than before.

:1

Gliscor is goated but it is nothing worth banning to me, its swords dance sets rely on multiple boosts and facade for power and on tanking every single hit without any boosts to its defenses to actually complete the sweep and defensive sets are not oppressive on the meta since they don’t do too much and are very much vulnerable to ice moves. Gliscor is also going to absolutely go through it whenever it faces galarian weezing which forces it to take damage from poison instead of healing from it.

:1

I get that its a strong sun mon and its good that its not been treated like a fraud anymore, but its still exploitable due to its reliance of sun and can be predictable with its specs sets usually going for the same moves. I’m actually kind of confused why its here…

retest: 3

I’m very on the fence with this, it could go either way with me since I’m not entirely sure it would mess up the currently stable metagame, but the possibility of tiny Salamence doing exactly that isn’t zero. I’ll just see how discussion on moon goes given my mixed feelings on the matter and the fact that I admittedly wouldn’t be able to adaquetely explain my full thoughts on this as a result of them.





As for write ins, I have none yet, but I’ll be considering writing in solgaleo on the next survey.

 

[Finchinator]

Survey results will be up tonight or tomorrow night depending on I cope my schedule goes. Initial findings don’t indicate anything too shocking, but a pretty big gap between qualified and general relative to normal in a few areas. I will outline it all in the post.

Have a great week everyone

 

[Avira]

Survey results will be up tonight or tomorrow night depending on I cope my schedule goes. Initial findings don’t indicate anything too shocking, but a pretty big gap between qualified and general relative to normal in a few areas. I will outline it all in the post.

Have a great week everyone

My guess is that the score for Ogerpon-Wellspring will be much lower for the qualified demographic than that of the general playerbase, qualified players believe the meta to be more fun and competitive than the general playerbase overall, and Roaring Moon had noticeably more support for a retest among qualified players than the general playerbase even though it is still far from being enough to get retested.

 

[CooolTrainer]

My guess is that the score for Ogerpon-Wellspring will be much lower for the qualified demographic than that of the general playerbase, qualified players believe the meta to be more fun and competitive than the general playerbase overall, and Roaring Moon had noticeably more support for a retest among qualified players than the general playerbase even though it is still far from being enough to get retested.

I wonder if this would change after watching Vert have his Zamazenta get crit OHKO for both his games in the OLT semis. Definitely took away a win.

 

[Avira]

I wonder if this would change after watching Vert have his Zamazenta get crit OHKO for both his games in the OLT semis. Definitely took away a win.

As the person above me indicated, in Game 1, it was a very greedy play to have Ting-Lu use SR on Turn 1, letting Ogerpon-Wellspring get to +2. I know Ivy Cudgel can be stupid at times, but in Game 1, it was more Vert's fault that that happened, and Vert did still win Game 1. The high crit chance of Ivy Cudgel is just something you have to take into account when checking Wellspring even if it can be really dumb to lose a match 'cause of it. Vert, to my knowledge, has never called for a ban of Ogerpon-Wellspring (I think he'd be more likely to call you bad for thinking she's broken), and I don't believe that is changing now.

 

[DaddyBuzzwole]

The high crit chance of Ivy Cudgel is just something you have to take into account when checking Wellspring even if it can be really dumb to lose a match 'cause of it.

why is this "just something we have to take into account"? what's the justification for tolerating this instead of treating it the same way we usually treat mons that can rng past their checks? how do you even take it into account when the number of checks waterpon has even without factoring in the crit is already so limited?

 

[KamenOH]

what's the justification for tolerating this instead of treating it the same way we usually treat mons that can rng past their checks?

It shouldnt be justified, just as the rest of em shouldn't either. RNG is a facet of the game ultimately, and while Smogon tries to minimize it, there isn't much we can do about crits.

Rant of RNG and Moves

What, are we gonna ban critical hits or non-100 accuracy moves next? I mean, what's the difference between a move landing a crit, versus a move like dynamicpunch that's a coinflip to deal massive damage? Then again, going down this line of cocaine thought leads us to whether or not OHKO moves are banworthy, and tbh I never really understood why they were banned. You can't make them any more accurate than 30%, and most of the time you will waste not just a moveslot but a whole turn. Hell, the only ones I see getting real use are Ting-Lu Fissure and maybe, real fringe, Kingambit Guillotine. The former sees minor use in VGC because it can afford to waste a turn or three, while the latter might be able to secure a cheeky kill on something it would already be able to defeat.
I don't see them getting any real use outside of those two mons, be it for 4MSS reasons or simply because they're too risky for too little a reward.

 

[Avira]

why is this "just something we have to take into account"? what's the justification for tolerating this instead of treating it the same way we usually treat mons that can rng past their checks? how do you even take it into account when the number of checks waterpon has even without factoring in the crit is already so limited?

'Cause a 1/8 chance to crit is hardly the meta-breaking thing you think it is. Yes, Ogerpon-Wellspring is quite strong offensively and hard to check defensively, but that's why you can't just rely on Zama but also need Pecharunt or a Water-resist that is neutral to or resists Grass as well, and there are good, viable mons that do the job. There are hardly any top threats in this meta that you can handle 100% of the time with just one mon, and that's not unique to Ogerpon-Wellspring. If the pro-ban crowd wants Ogerpon-Wellspring out of here, it has to demonstrate on a game-to-game basis why she's too much for the meta, either by being unhealthy, broken, or a combination of both, and the qualified demographic of OU Tiering Surveys repeatedly making Ogerpon-Wellspring less of a priority than other threats shows that the best players for the most part don't find Wellspring to be broken.