Here’s my submitted viability ranking. I based this ranking on a combination of my tour usage this past year and a slight correction for each mon to account for bias. Because I’m very comfortable with some mons and archetypes and less so with others, it’s obvious that my usage rates will not perfectly overlap with “objective” viability. The questions I asked myself when trying to correct this bias were “how well do I except this mon to trade into the opponent in any given game?” and “how good is this mon at doing the job it is supposed to do?”. I think these parameters are still a bit subjective and not very “scientific” or whatever, but I tried to at least be a bit strategic in my assessment of viability instead of just going off vibes.
Below you will find short comments on each mon above D tier, some longer comments where I figured a ranking might need some further explanation, a few comments on some E tier mons, as well as general remarks on how I think about the different tiers I assigned.
S tier – If these mons did not exist, the metagame would be fundamentally different. Every good team needs to have a solid plan on how to beat these specific mons.
:tyranitar: The king. I had a brief moment where I entertained the idea of ranking blissey #1, until I realised that every blissey stall team needs to be able to eliminate tar in order to function.
:blissey: #2 is a high ranking. In my opinion, blissey is more centralizing than skarmory. The fact it can check every special attacker in the game on its own, meaning every special offense needs dugtrio to eliminate blissey first shows just how centralizing and powerful it is. Stall also would not work in this tier if it wasn’t for blissey, and stall is the best archetype at the moment if you ask me. Aromatherapy is broken in how much it enables stall to be consistent. Bold bliss is so stupidly bulky it can even serve as an emergency check to many physical attackers
alongside already walling the special attacking half of the metagame. If it wasn’t for the existence of gengar, bold bliss would be beyond broken and run on every team. People still haven’t caught on enough somehow.
A tier – The undisputed staples of adv alongside the S tier mons. These mons can be run on almost any archetype and still do their job extremely well, and/or are so insanely good at doing one specific job that they are basically irreplaceable on a meta-defining archetype.
:swampert: Ranking it above skarmory is mostly due to skarmory being ranked low, see below. Still, pert deserves this spot. It’s the lando of adv, if you ask me. Can be slapped on any team and be effective. Its sets are also quite customizable to fit the pace of any given team. The rise of slop has also shown that endpert is stronger than people thought before, and endpert is indispensable on slop.
:skarmory: Don’t get me wrong, skarmory is still meta-defining. Its typing is broken, spikes are extremely important and it’s the best spiker, and its solid stats make it a potent physical check. There are two reasons I ranked skarm “only” #4: 1) spikeless structures are stronger than ever. Slop, while not completely taking over, has established itself as a viable archetype. Other spikeless offenses, while not meta-defining, all have their viable niche. Perhaps most interestingly, recent stall teams such as the ones by
Johnald have explored the idea of spikeless stall, and it turns out it is incredibly strong. There’s no need to go through the tiring task of keeping up spikes if you can just outlast and pp stall the opponent, or make progress through more reliable chip with knock off (which is very ironic given the old mantra that spikes are the pinnacle of consistency). 2) Recently, more and more people (especially
Shitrock enjoyer and
giraffefromholland) have explored the idea of replacing skarmory with forretress on spikes offense. In the past, the idea was that forre is amazing at role compression due to spikes + spin, but very limited because the existence of gengar warrants running pursuit alongside it. Now that people are ditching pursuit and just running forre as an offensive spiker that sets spikes, pressures spinners better than skarmory, and then can sometimes spin as a bonus or just blow up into something to keep offensive momentum, the value of skarmory has seriously been put into question. I still think skarmory is very strong though, and forre has its issues. I think ranking skarm #4 atm is fair.
:salamence: The spdef dd sets have elevated salamence to a new plane of viability. It feels like basically any spikeless offense slots dd mence nowadays. Beyond that, mence is also incredibly versatile.
:gengar: Spikes offense is a meta-defining archetype. Some spinners are viable, and gengar is the only spinblocker in the tier that can be used on offense beyond maybe some insanely weak picks like banette. This alone warrants a top 10 ranking if you ask me. Teams sometimes cheat a bit on gengar, but whenever they do and end up facing a gar, the matchup is close to being lost in builder. Gengar is also probably the second-most versatile mon in the tier behind tyranitar, and is a strong special attacker in its own right that does not even necessarily need spikes to function.
:jirachi: I’m one of the biggest jirachi believers in the community. First of all, it’s insane how versatile this mon is. It’s probably close to gengar in that regard. Wish sets are very reliable noob farmers and aero stoppers that can slot on essentially any archetype that isn’t hyperoffense, though to be fair they do have a tendency to get farmed by suicune. Superrachi is a potent breaker/sweeper and can be both very speedy and very bulky. Even mixed rachi somehow has a niche. Where jirachi really shines though, in my opinion, are its stall-breaking capabilities. SubCMRachi is just genuinely broken. I have argued for this in the past and so have
Padeli and
SpamOn. The only reason not many have caught on is that it is admittedly hard to build teams around the set. To provide a brief summary, this set straight up beats stall once claydol and a potential tar/meta have been chipped. A special attacker that beats bliss is insanely rare, and jirachi doesn’t need weatherclear support to do so like sub cune does. Dugtrio isn’t as big of an issue as some people think because substitute is a relatively safe click into it. Beyond that, serence grace also gives the set chances of just straight up robbing games, and the mon can still be used as a trading piece into more offensive teams due to its great stats and typing. Just insane.
:suicune: Bell curve meme. Noobs think this mon is broken because they haven’t discovered sand + spikes yet, and don’t know how to play against it. Realistically, cune is a threat, but it’s a healthy one that can be handled by good players. Still, I think in the end some people tend to underrate it, possibly exactly because of the “noob” take that cune is broken. It kinda is, for other reasons: V5 is possibly the strongest archetype in the meta. These teams were already strong when milo was the bulky water of choice. Now, once you recognize that aromatherapy makes the team both more consistent (hax-resitant) and lets you use a mon with actually good stats and a threatening setup move, they become incredibly hard to beat. I grant that cune needs more support than other defensive pieces, but given that this support is relatively easy to slot on the most broken stall mon in the meta, that really isn’t a big issue in my opinion. I think we need to acknowledge that cune is the swampert of stall, and that this alone makes it a top 10 mon given stall’s viability. Now, what I haven’t even mentioned yet is that cune can also run something
other than boldcune. Offcune is good, subcune is solid and sometimes broken, crocune is broken if you get lucky. I also think cune has a high ceiling when it comes to teambuilding. All of these sets can be optimized ev wise to beat certain things that a cune really shouldn’t.
:metagross: The biggest controversy on here. I think I need to state that mons 5-11 (mence to zap) are all so close viability wise imo that it was really hard to rank them. What speaks for metagross are its typing, stats and versatility. CB sets are the face of skarm beatdown, which is a viable, although not meta-defining archetype. Mixed sets are nice if you need to target something specific or want a special attacker that bliss can’t switch into. Bulky sets are quite nice at replacing swampert because meta’s normal resist frees up some things teambuilding wise. They can also be customized in very satisfying ways to pressure skarm or lure pert and bulky waters. Likely the strongest set atm tho is agility. I think meta’s biggest strength is its role compression – agility lets one of your sweepers also be your rock resist, which is great for offense (though, see the rise of endpert doing the same thing). The primary issue I have with metagross is consistency. Offensive sets really dislike the fact that their main damage dealing move is only 85% accurate. Another thing is that metagross is weak to spikes, which makes it easy to abuse as a defensive mon. It is also weak to earthquake, which in my view makes the whole theory of meta being a more offensive defpert a bit tricky – balances like unemployed 6 that want meta instead of pert tend to be a bit weak to dd sweepers, as fairly little chip suffices to suddenly completely break through your rock resist, which just isn’t the case with swampert.
:aerodactyl: A rather high ranking. The reason is simple: Aero spikes is a top 3 archetype in the metagame. You can’t replace aero at all on these teams. See gar, cune: that makes it a top 10 mon imo. Aero is also infamous for its game-stealing flinches. I also quite like that some people are currently experimenting with CB-less sets on aero spikes (which are already a staple on hyperoffense).
:zapdos: I think recent sentiment is that zapdos has lost some viability due to the rise of raikou and the fall of zapdug. However, I feel a bit bad about this ranking. It might as well have ended up #5. Again, for me these mons are all very very close. Zapdos is still a lot more reliable, and especially more versatile than raikou. It’s a great glue mon. I also think restzap is a bit underappreciated. Just a random thought: if the rock type didn’t exist, restzap would wall the entire metagame. I’m aware this is a big if, but think about it. Some mixed offenses that disrespect zapdos and neglect to put rock slide on any of their mixed attackers just straight up lose if they run into a restzap.
B tier – These mons are incredibly good at fulfilling their niche. However, they are a bit more specific than the higher rated mons above and can’t just be slapped onto anything without much thought.
:claydol: Dol is #10 in usage for me this past year. However, it’s hard to rate it higher than any of the S and A tier mons. It’s the most reliable spinner in the tier, but that’s it. It will do an amazing job on any team that needs spin, but unfortunately for dol, spin isn’t mandatory in adv. This makes it a B tier mon in my view.
:dugtrio: Incredibly hard to rank. If you go by my definition of the S tier, it should technically be S tier. However, it would be dishonest to claim that dug is as strong as the S and A tier mons. Even I as a stall main “only” have it #9 in usage. I think this ranking makes sense though: Dug enables special offense and stall by eliminating certain mons that would otherwise be insurmountable for these archetypes. It keeps certain mons in check, but you can’t just slap it onto a team without a plan and expect the team to be good.
:celebi: The most versatile B tier mon. Really good at a lot of things, but doesn’t feel quite as strong as the S and A tier mons. Heal bell on offense needs to be explored more.
:registeel: The star of the hour. Maybe a slightly hesitant ranking in case the hype wears off, but I stand by it. Great special check, also a secondary rock resist, and not as passive as most other defensive mons. I’m not sure how it took us so long to realize this. However: It’s weak to fire types, and while those are somewhat niche, it hurts to have a special check that can’t switch into certain special attackers teambuilding wise. It gets abused by 101 subs just as hard as other special checks. And, if you ask me, it isn’t as proactive as some people make it out to be. How is boldbliss a passive mon, but registeel isn’t? Both just twave into seismic opposing skarm, and while registeel is slightly better at not letting sweepers in, I don’t think boldbliss is terrible at letting sweepers in. I’m not trying to say bold bliss is just as proactive as regiseel, but that the gap is smaller than people think. Essentially, registeel is a great new tool, and I’m curious to see if I’ll rank it in A tier next year, but currently I don’t fully buy it yet and think the hype will (very slightly) wear off, cementing registeel as a very viable, but not completely meta-altering new option.
:starmie: Offmie is good. However, blissey. Defmie is decent. I like starmie a lot, but feel very confident in claiming that it is less viable than any of the S and A tier mons. Recover offmie is the future.
:forretress: Basically, I’ve already said what I think about forre when talking about skarm. The realization that forre fits on suitless spikeless offense gives it a very potent niche that clearly makes it an above C tier mon like it was before. What’s interesting is that pursuit isn’t even that hard to fit on spikes offense. I think there’s some potential there. I also really really like double spinner stall, such as forre + dol or forre + phan.
C tier – These mons have a very strong niche on certain teams. However, their weaknesses are a lot more apparent than for the mons rated higher.
:snorlax: In a vacuum, this is a very strong mon, see gens 1 and 2. Unfortunately, every paradigmatic feature of adv works against snorlax. Lax offenses are a healthy part of the metagame, but they are definitely middling in viability due to sand and spikes. Other lax teams exist, such as double blob by
ABR or the spikes balance by
L3W, but I think they are the exception rather than a potential new norm.
:jolteon: I think jolt’s biggest strength (beyond the obvious fact that it outspeeds everything, basically) is its role compression. Having a fast revenge killer that is also kiinda a special check is pretty neat. JoltSpikes, similarly to lax offense, is a healthy part of the metagame, but definitely not centralizing. I do like that it keeps other offenses in check. But as has often been the case in my assessments, blissey.
:raikou: Raikou is beyond a doubt an OU mon. At the same time, I think it’s pretty clearly not as strong as registeel. Still, it’s a very nice new/revived addition to the metagame. Alas, blissey.
:milotic: I really do prefer suicune by a mile, I think that’s obvious. Still, milo has its niche. Slightly more self-sufficient thanks to recover, and a better blanket/secondary check that also absolutely thwarts mixed offense.
:magneton: Hard to rank, for the same reason that dug is. Trapping skarm is amazing. Two issues: skarm isn’t as mandatory anymore, and using mag on your teams creates some holes. I’m actually higher on mag offense than I was in the past though. I think if you don’t fall for those terrible sample team mag offenses and build something with actual synergy and longevity, mag offense is a great bring in certain matchups. MagDol and SkarmMag also have their solid niches, though they’re clearly rather fringe archetypes.
:flygon: Enables superman. Superman is good, but defgon is unfortunately very underwhelming itself. Sometimes it’s randomly god and walls the entire opposing team tho. Offensive sets are hard to build around, but I think when you do succeed, the resulting teams are always very cool and quite strong. I think CB deserves more experimentation, I’m pretty low on sub sets though. Basically, you should run flygon occasionally, but not really because of flygon itself. That makes it a lot weaker than pert/meta, but at the same time it’s still clearly part of the lower half of OU.
D tier – Similarly to C tier, they have a niche, but some clear weaknesses. Clear power dropoff compared to C tier, as the niches become more niche and the weaknesses bigger issues.
:moltres: This is such a weird mon. It looks good into so many scouts, but then you realise you need to run a team with moltres on it and struggle to find a good one. Many teams cheat quite heavily on moltres, and that makes it appealing to use, but in practice it then misses overheat. Not as strong as anything above, but still viable.
:jynx: This will raise some eyebrows. I genuinely think this placement is justified, and my usage rate even puts jynx at #21 this past year. I’m honestly not sure why people don’t rank this mon higher. Maybe because it’s a very swingy mon that tends to rob games, and some people don’t want to engage in such “dishonorable” practices? Here’s the thing though: If a mon trades 2 (or even 3) for 1 75% of the time OR safely eliminates tar OR safely eliminates blissey (the top 2 mons in the tier imo, as you probably noticed by now), then I think it’s pretty strong. Now, I get that there is really only one place for jynx, which is jynxdug, but I think jynxdug is the strongest version of special offense (even if you account for the games where jynx misses sleep and dies). It would be unwarranted to put jynx higher than D tier, as it’s still niche and just an aggressive lead, but I think it fulfills that niche very well. I also want to compare jynx to other niche aggressive leads that I rank lower to illustrate a point, so let me compare it to medicham: When leading medi, the potential upside is obvious. But due to medi’s frailty, you need to get (almost) every turn right to actually get value out of it. Compare this to jynx: It’s surprisingly versatile when it comes to sets, which leaves your opponent guessing. You can also delay sleep to abuse their sleep sac line. This means that as the jynx user, your
opponent needs to get (almost) every turn right to
deny you value. That is just so so much stronger than what e.g. medi can do.
:heracross: Fighters are mid, but hera is pretty good. Its special bulk is often very convenient, and its typing means that it is checked by a lot fewer mons than other fighting types (mie, celebi, dol). It’s also customizable. However, its moves are inacurrate, and fighters just have issues in general.
:gyarados: These past years, people repeatedly discussed gyarados as a potential drop to UUBL, its OU status being a relic of the past. However, I’m the highest on gyarados that I’ve ever been. I think it’s terrible as long as you use it as a salamence that beats pert. But once you invest in bulk and use it as a midgame trader with potential to sweep certain team comps, it becomes pretty reliable. Twave is great at crippling certain mons to enable your team. What I like even more is running a loot of bulk with rest, potentially alongside cleric support. It’s a great fit on mag offense, as this completely patches up the moltres weakness and provides a lot more longevity than the usual mag team would have.
:charizard: I agree with many people’s sentiment that zard is on quite the decline. Mixed offense has kinda moved on from it, with slop being the hot new thing and not needing zard in the slightest. Zard spikes is very mid and usually prefers moltres.
:regirock: Very underexplored. Regirock for OU? I love how many roles this mon can compress. It’s genuinely the 4th best rock resist in the tier somehow despite not being a rock resist? It’s annoying to deal with, which usually lets it spread status quite well. It’s also a sandless tar which some very specific teams appreciate a lot. It fits well on slop and other spikeless offenses because its stats tend to let it trade up, but it’s genuinely also viable on spikes, from stall to offense, just because every archetype appreciates a rock resist with boom.
:cloyster: Has its very specific strengths. I think it should stay OU, but it’s definitely about as niche as an OU mon can get.
:machamp: Better than most other fighters and should probably be OU? Like, guts and solid bulk solve the issues fighters have to a degree. Only to a degree though, it’s still pretty mid.
:breloom: Cool mon. Hard to build around, and the payoff is mid, but it has its place in the meta.
E tier – I guess this is the OU cutoff. You could also place the OU cutoff at D tier already, I don’t really care how niche something has to get in order to no longer be OU. These mons clearly aren’t staples of the metagame and rare sights, but every mon listed here has a solid niche in my opinion. Every mon I didn’t list I have either never tried or tried and decided that it’s not worth considering for serious games.
:smeargle: I was tempted to place this fella in D tier even. The new agility set by
Spreek is amazing. The biggest issue with assessing smeargle is that its viability changes with every tiering decision by virtue of its ability to learn any combination of moves. I decided to save me the headache and just place it at the top of E tier.
:regice: Love its niche of beating superman and special offense. I think the fact that it’s weak to sand, and that ice is a terrible defensive type, unfortunately barely keep it from being OU, and definitely make it the weakest of the regis.
:dusclops: Really good on certain stall teams. Can’t see it ever being used on anything else though. Similar things could be said about misdreavus and sableye btw. I love that they all have their little niche.
:marowak: Some people have called it the better machamp. I loaded it in rev3 top cut and lost, that’s all the experience I have. Shoutout to
tigersuit for cooking up straight poison, but let’s not release the wak files.
:medicham: The biggest fraud of ADV. Curse jimothy (but thanks for putting on game lol). This thing is high risk medium reward, and I really don’t see why you’d want to put yourself in uncomfortable 50 50s from the get go in a serious game. Just too frail to work consistently, and the upside is not big enough imo. Genuinely the most potential I see is in bulky recover sets such as the one on the
Spreek medi superman (cursed lol).
:armaldo: Knock off is good! Hariyama I’m not convinced by. Introduce this guy.
:donphan: Underexplored. Amazing alongside forre, umbreon. I get the issues this mon has, but having another check for the biggest threat in the tier is always amazing.
:banette: Kollin7 somehow made this mon work. Just wanted to shoutout my goat.
Hope y’all had fun reading this! I apologize if parts of this are sloppy, this took longer than expected. Curious to hear anyone's thoughts on why I’m dead wrong about a certain mon, I love to get inspired to build around something.
ADV forever
