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Metagame SV OU Metagame Discussion v4

We are discussing it. We don't know how tiering leads will decide on it, but if it was a complete non-option or if we didn't want to entertain the idea of freeing Terapagos then we should have shut discussion down by now. I think it would at the minimum need a PR thread before an actual test, but feel free to keep discussing in the mean time.
Glad to hear it. I apologise for making the assumption, kinda assumed there would have been some statement before now on it if this were the case but this is very welcome news.
 
We are discussing it. We don't know how tiering leads will decide on it, but if it was a complete non-option or if we didn't want to entertain the idea of freeing Terapagos then we should have shut discussion down by now. I think it would at the minimum need a PR thread before an actual test, but feel free to keep discussing in the mean time.
I figured it must be being discussed internally. I didn't want to say anything not to jinx it, but glad it's been confirmed. I hope the pro unban side wins, because Smogon rules must change if Gamefreak changes the rules, otherwise we have antiquated tools to deal with situations like these. Terapagos probably won't be the last, and even by itself it should have been enough to push for change, but regardless, I'm happy we are finally here. A lot of people have made excellent points for the free Terapagos cause, it's time to take action.
 
Hey everyone!!

I completed a list of over 100 changes for the sv speed tiers thread. This took forever but here it is!! The thread is linked here, if you want to find out more about the future of the thread you can find that here, but if you just want to look at the changes here is the list.
:Dragonite: 710, 647
:blaziken: 710, 647
:excadrill: 550
:jolteon: 394
:ninetales: 328
:Latias: 319
:cresselia: 295, 269
:samurott_hisui: 219
:moltres: 216
:pecharunt: 212
:glimmora: 208
:hoopa_unbound: 196, 176
:pelipper: 121
:hatterene: 107
:barraskewda: 816, 408
:polteageist: 786, 716, 524
:Dragapult: 766
:lilligant_hisui: 678, 618, 508, 463, 339, 309
:thundurus_therian: 662, 602, 496, 451, 301
:moltres_galar: 612, 306
:quaquaval: 590
:overqwil: 590, 206
:basculegion: 560, 280
:great_tusk: 546, 409
:slither_wing: 522, 430, 391
:ribombee: 520, 347
:meowscarada: 517, 345
:greninja: 514, 343
:sandy_shocks: 496, 301
:rotom_wash: 447, 406
:ceruledge: 442, 403
:magnezone: 360, 328, 240, 219, 156
:iron_boulder: 347
:entei: 328, 299
:comfey: 328, 299, 236
:ninetales_alola: 317
:zapdos: 301
:iron_crown: 295
:gliscor: 250
:ninetales: 236
:heatran: 200
:mamoswine: 196
:scizor: 171
:alcremie: 164
:chansey: 136
:ditto: 118
:torkoal: 114
:slowbro: 96
:hydrapple: 83
:pincurchin: 66
:gholdengo: +1 listed as :choice_scarf:
:Kyurem: at 634 had Positive misspelled
:hawlucha: at 670 changed from positive to neutral
:walking_wake: at +1 now :booster_energy:
:venusaur: at 518 :heat_rock:
:samurott_hisui: +1 now :choice_scarf:
:hoopa_unbound: 426 and 388 now :choice_scarf:
:okidogi: +1 now marked :choice_scarf:
:excadrill: at 550 marked as :smooth_rock:
:iron_valiant: +1 marked as :choice_scarf:
:overqwil: +2 marked as :damp_rock:
:ogerpon: at 319 now listed as all variants
:dragonite: at +3 labeled as +4 properly
:blaziken: at +3 labeled as +4 properly
:slowking: and :slowking_galar: referred to as Slowking-*
:iron_jugulis: fixed spacing
:barraskewda: marked as :damp_rock:
 
I generally think most things here are about a tier or so within what makes sense but Slither Wing seems to be egregiously underrated here. I don't think its like A tier or anything but its been on at least one proven sun team (Srn's Sun Squad), can run Vest reasonably well, can run bulkier builds with wisp, or go offense + slow pivoting. Theres also a LOT of fat dudes in this tier so you can go Low Kick for almost all the targets you'd wanna hit over CC to not hurt your survivability
 
I generally think most things here are about a tier or so within what makes sense but Slither Wing seems to be egregiously underrated here. I don't think its like A tier or anything but its been on at least one proven sun team (Srn's Sun Squad), can run Vest reasonably well, can run bulkier builds with wisp, or go offense + slow pivoting. Theres also a LOT of fat dudes in this tier so you can go Low Kick for almost all the targets you'd wanna hit over CC to not hurt your survivability
I just think it's extremely inconsistent, but I can see it! Thanks!
 
We are discussing it. We don't know how tiering leads will decide on it, but if it was a complete non-option or if we didn't want to entertain the idea of freeing Terapagos then we should have shut discussion down by now. I think it would at the minimum need a PR thread before an actual test, but feel free to keep discussing in the mean time.

Thanks for letting this continue. What are your thoughts? Not to demand an answer, but what do you think of the points I raise here?

 
Thanks for letting this continue. What are your thoughts? Not to demand an answer, but what do you think of the points I raise here?

I will answer this in 2 parts.

1. Personally I think Terapagos would be cool to use in OU just for what it brings to the table with another Rapid Spin mon and cool coverage and the ability. So I would support testing it for that reason.

2. Technicality and rule/policy wise, I think it's a complex ban. On a very simplified level, it does feel like removing the tera button for 1 pokemon which feels wrong even if it's tied to a form change. Now I know there's a lot of deeper stuff behind it and I don't really care to argue about the semantics behind it, but I think if we did want to free Terapagos, it would need its own "Terapagos Clause." I say this partially because, if we wanna free it, then we could make something like "ban all tera buttons with a form tied to it" but you'd be banning Wellspring and Cornerstone teras as collateral which would really suck. So you'd have to make the rule Terapagos-specific.

Now that being said, I think it'd be cool if our tiering rules were open to allowing a bit more complexity so long as it's straightforward. Especially given how old some of the rules are as well as the fact we have a bot epidemic terrorizing our ladders. We have 1 more year of this gen, I took a break the last year so I'm not really burned out compared to most people, but I think we should decide if we want to have our tiering strictly follow our ancient rules for the sake of the site's identity, or have tiering be more willing to adapt to the current active community. I just feel like we won't have much of a community left at the rate we're going at.

This is a small rant going off of the last sentence, but as someone who has been reading everything in the OU forum for 5+ years, it does sadden me to see how dead some threads are. This one I'm grateful is still active and I'd rather take terapagos discussion over silence or laddering against bots any day. But as a fellow community member and player, I love reading what tour players and people like council have to say about the metagame, but there's nothing recent in this thread aside from Finch/lax. The World Cup thread literally has nothing, SCL thread has a few predictions but otherwise nothing else. OLT thread has a few amazing posts which reminds me that Storm Zone has truly been one of the best and most consistent top player posting this generation and honestly deserves an award for that. Rant over but yeah I'd love to see more tier discussion and activity in general and think a Terapagos unban, even if complex, would be highly beneficial at this point in time. Anyways, this isn't to say to free Terapagos solely because of low activity, but rather that the rules serve the community and if the community wants to explore something new, then I think the rules should be flexible enough to allow that.
 
I say this partially because, if we wanna free it, then we could make something like "ban all tera buttons with a form tied to it" but you'd be banning Wellspring and Cornerstone teras as collateral which would really suck. So you'd have to make the rule Terapagos-specific.
As I've said, this is not an issue with more specific wording. "If a pokemon using a generational mechanic has a form change with increased or modified stats its enhanced form is subject to being tiered differently, even if that means said pokemon is unable to participate in the generational mechanic". There. Non Terapagos-specific, excludes the Ogerpons, and is applicable to future generations.
 
I will answer this in 2 parts.

1. Personally I think Terapagos would be cool to use in OU just for what it brings to the table with another Rapid Spin mon and cool coverage and the ability. So I would support testing it for that reason.

2. Technicality and rule/policy wise, I think it's a complex ban. On a very simplified level, it does feel like removing the tera button for 1 pokemon which feels wrong even if it's tied to a form change. Now I know there's a lot of deeper stuff behind it and I don't really care to argue about the semantics behind it, but I think if we did want to free Terapagos, it would need its own "Terapagos Clause." I say this partially because, if we wanna free it, then we could make something like "ban all tera buttons with a form tied to it" but you'd be banning Wellspring and Cornerstone teras as collateral which would really suck. So you'd have to make the rule Terapagos-specific.

Now that being said, I think it'd be cool if our tiering rules were open to allowing a bit more complexity so long as it's straightforward. Especially given how old some of the rules are as well as the fact we have a bot epidemic terrorizing our ladders. We have 1 more year of this gen, I took a break the last year so I'm not really burned out compared to most people, but I think we should decide if we want to have our tiering strictly follow our ancient rules for the sake of the site's identity, or have tiering be more willing to adapt to the current active community. I just feel like we won't have much of a community left at the rate we're going at.

This is a small rant going off of the last sentence, but as someone who has been reading everything in the OU forum for 5+ years, it does sadden me to see how dead some threads are. This one I'm grateful is still active and I'd rather take terapagos discussion over silence or laddering against bots any day. But as a fellow community member and player, I love reading what tour players and people like council have to say about the metagame, but there's nothing recent in this thread aside from Finch/lax. The World Cup thread literally has nothing, SCL thread has a few predictions but otherwise nothing else. OLT thread has a few amazing posts which reminds me that Storm Zone has truly been one of the best and most consistent top player posting this generation and honestly deserves an award for that. Rant over but yeah I'd love to see more tier discussion and activity in general and think a Terapagos unban, even if complex, would be highly beneficial at this point in time. Anyways, this isn't to say to free Terapagos solely because of low activity, but rather that the rules serve the community and if the community wants to explore something new, then I think the rules should be flexible enough to allow that.
I think the best way to distinguish Terapagos from the Ogerpon forms is pika pal's ditto argument. Ditto can transform into tera ogerpon with the right tera (e.g. copying wellspring with tera water) but never terapagos stellar under any circumstances.
 
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This is a small rant going off of the last sentence, but as someone who has been reading everything in the OU forum for 5+ years, it does sadden me to see how dead some threads are. This one I'm grateful is still active and I'd rather take terapagos discussion over silence or laddering against bots any day. But as a fellow community member and player, I love reading what tour players and people like council have to say about the metagame, but there's nothing recent in this thread aside from Finch/lax. The World Cup thread literally has nothing, SCL thread has a few predictions but otherwise nothing else. OLT thread has a few amazing posts which reminds me that Storm Zone has truly been one of the best and most consistent top player posting this generation and honestly deserves an award for that. Rant over but yeah I'd love to see more tier discussion and activity in general and think a Terapagos unban, even if complex, would be highly beneficial at this point in time. Anyways, this isn't to say to free Terapagos solely because of low activity, but rather that the rules serve the community and if the community wants to explore something new, then I think the rules should be flexible enough to allow that.
This has been an issue since the start of last year. It’s a mix between SV OU fatigue and players gravitating towards other spaces for discussion such as Discord. The top players apart from a few dedicated faces haven’t posted in years despite being active in the tour scene. Even within other 3D-era gens discussion still happens, minus SS. Obviously people have jobs and school so they’re not gonna have all the time to make a post, but Gen 9 has been having trouble finding an active playerbase since 2025. It’s a shame cause there’s a few interesting meta developments going on including Cress’ dominance, and an increase in niche picks like Mandibuzz. Winds and Waves being the first mainline games to break the 3-year generation cycle in a long time threw a wrench in Gen 9’s relevancy. The bot issue has been a huge problem but that discussion is for another day.

:sv/terapagos:

Now onto la tortuga. Pinkacross made a great video on retesting Terapagos, but to summarize what he said since I agree with alot of his points.

• Terapagos would fix alot of issues players have in the tier, most notably hazard removal.

• Its Terastal form can be treated as separate from base Terapagos. Unlike Ogerpon’s Tera forms which maintain the same stats, Terapagos gains a stat increase upon Terastilizing.

I’m not for complex bans but I believe a case can be made for Terapagos.
 
I’m not for complex bans but I believe a case can be made for Terapagos.
Personally I think Terapagos would be cool to use in OU just for what it brings to the table with another Rapid Spin mon and cool coverage and the ability. So I would support testing it for that reason.
The idea that the turtle would be great for the tier has been pretty much been just been a statement echoed by everyone in this discussion at this point. If terapagos didn't have a tera form it would obviously be unbanned tomorrow.

1791253486697.png

It's base stat total is nothing at it all, being just 600, with the highest individual stat being defense and spdef at 110. It has no recovery outside of rest, so even though it has amazing utility like toxic, twave, and spin it will still die pretty early on.

Offensively its a solid special attacking mon with almost every coverage move under the sun, a signature special normal type move with 8pp and 120 bp. To boost it can either use meteor beam or cm along with rapid spin which is decent, but without much recovery it'll be just a decent mon.

The benefits of having turtle in the tier is the amazing support roles it can fill. SV has a lack of removal outside of just 5ish mons. The ways to set hazards are also incredible, along side the blockers in the tier. H-Rott, Lu, Glimm along side blockers like Ghold, Pech, and Cha, make them extremely difficult to deal with, as the best removal options, Tusk and Ace, often don't have the survivability to come in more then a few times.

Terapagos is nice as its a removal mon with great survivability, gets guaranteed spins off with tera shell working like a multiscale, and can either dark pulse, earth power, or flamethrower Ghold or any other ghost types. It's also great into the offense meta, being able to stop setup sweepers.

My point being, this mon only adds to the tier without any reason not to unban it, except for tiering policies.

As nice as this discussion is, not only is it reviving this thread as TPP mentioned, but also to help bring attention back to the turtle which has been kind of forgotten about before this. It feels a little bit useless unfortunately. There will not be a suspect test, as you can't test a tiering policy clause. I don't think this discussion will change any council members opinion on how they should vote if there is a possible terap vote on council.
 
As nice as this discussion is, not only is it reviving this thread as TPP mentioned, but also to help bring attention back to the turtle which has been kind of forgotten about before this. It feels a little bit useless unfortunately. There will not be a suspect test, as you can't test a tiering policy clause. I don't think this discussion will change any council members opinion on how they should vote if there is a possible terap vote on council.
I agree with you. I think that the truth is that Smogon's stubbornness towards arbitrary rules decided 20+ years ago with no thought towards how the game design has so fundamentally changed has led to insane levels of stagnation, and combine this with Pokemon Champions not having or planning to have 6v6 singles means that all of this is likely too little to late.

Still, and while I'm sure you agree with me, I think it's worth stating that there's nothing wrong with showing that there's still life to be had in this generation, and, perhaps foolishly, either Smogon or someone else will eventually be able to fully realize the potential of 6v6 singles and the openness of fan projects when this inevitably is seen as retro, and likely the last mainline game to feature the traditional battle system.
 
This is a small rant going off of the last sentence, but as someone who has been reading everything in the OU forum for 5+ years, it does sadden me to see how dead some threads are. This one I'm grateful is still active and I'd rather take terapagos discussion over silence or laddering against bots any day. But as a fellow community member and player, I love reading what tour players and people like council have to say about the metagame, but there's nothing recent in this thread aside from Finch/lax. The World Cup thread literally has nothing, SCL thread has a few predictions but otherwise nothing else. OLT thread has a few amazing posts which reminds me that Storm Zone has truly been one of the best and most consistent top player posting this generation and honestly deserves an award for that. Rant over but yeah I'd love to see more tier discussion and activity in general and think a Terapagos unban, even if complex, would be highly beneficial at this point in time. Anyways, this isn't to say to free Terapagos solely because of low activity, but rather that the rules serve the community and if the community wants to explore something new, then I think the rules should be flexible enough to allow that.
Given that the last time I was properly active was when gen 6 was currentgen, and with how much I enjoy forums as a social medium over real-time platforms like IRC/Skype/Discord/etc (PS rooms are plenty enough for me), it was certainly somewhat saddening to open the SV OU forum and seeing only one single page of threads. Even discounting the individual-pokemon threads (of which i wouldnt be surprised if they're straight-up not allowed now), there were SO many resources and projects and forum "games" you could access and interact with, while now the only forum "game" thread currently active is Victim of the Week. Makes it a little hard for me to participate myself, given my lack of knowledge and experience in the tier - not very much to piggyback off of, not enough credentials to start my own threads (not like i have interest in running one anyways but still), and not enough knowledge to properly participate in this thread.

With this being said, imma just list out some thread types real quick that may be worth reviving in some capacity by someone:
-Laddering Achievements: Invent achievements for people to get and track the people who do, like winning with only Choice items equipped, getting a KO with Rapid Spin, or get a ranking of exactly 1337
-Teambuilding Workshop: Suggest cores and sets for people to build with, and upload built teams for posted cores/sets with the philosophy behind the direction it took and why
-"What's his Last?": Nominate and vote for a pokemon+set to cap off a given team of 5 pokemon
-Team Preview Analysis Workshop: Have a rotating slate of a team of 6, with only the info you can access from Team Preview, and suggest and debate about what sets those pokemon may potentially have
-Break This Team: Find cores that can break, destroy, or otherwise dismantle provided tems, including infamously infuriating ones
-Top 10 Titans: Nominate pokemon that you believe to be one of the ten most influential or impactful pokemon in the tier's entire history
-Pokemon Matchmaking: Try to find the best possible partner for a listed Pokemon
-Core Analysis Workshop: As opposed to a Good Cores thread, this thread doesn't aim to be an archive as much as it does a think tank, discussing threats and partners, strengths and weaknesses, justifications and reasonings for their use over others, etc
-Weeky Research: 3 lesser-used pokemon are selected each week, for participants to research and look into, or simply discuss
-OU Lessons: a non-discussive thread where, after a vote on a topic, a post in the form of a lesson is made on that topic, focusing on the specific scope of [SV] OU and its metagame
-Core Building Competition: as opposed to Matchmaking or Break This Team, this thread suggests certain parameters for participants to then invent cores to fit, i.e. must be capable of breeding, must have and use priority, must have a hazard remover, etc
-Community Create-a-team: Collaborate with the entire forum to build a singular team over the course of months
-EV Spread Compendium: Probably less relevant these days with sites like Pikalytics, but... an archive for every culturally-known EV spread for every OU-viable pokemon, alongside a short description of what that spread is supposed to accomplish and why it's ran over others.
-The Next Best Thing: Try to find, well, the next best thing, by taking the given OU pokemon and coming up with a set for it that isn't already known yet! (Imagine how early Red Card Glimmora could've been found with this thread...)
 
Given that the last time I was properly active was when gen 6 was currentgen, and with how much I enjoy forums as a social medium over real-time platforms like IRC/Skype/Discord/etc (PS rooms are plenty enough for me), it was certainly somewhat saddening to open the SV OU forum and seeing only one single page of threads. Even discounting the individual-pokemon threads (of which i wouldnt be surprised if they're straight-up not allowed now), there were SO many resources and projects and forum "games" you could access and interact with, while now the only forum "game" thread currently active is Victim of the Week. Makes it a little hard for me to participate myself, given my lack of knowledge and experience in the tier - not very much to piggyback off of, not enough credentials to start my own threads (not like i have interest in running one anyways but still), and not enough knowledge to properly participate in this thread.

With this being said, imma just list out some thread types real quick that may be worth reviving in some capacity by someone:
-Laddering Achievements: Invent achievements for people to get and track the people who do, like winning with only Choice items equipped, getting a KO with Rapid Spin, or get a ranking of exactly 1337
-Teambuilding Workshop: Suggest cores and sets for people to build with, and upload built teams for posted cores/sets with the philosophy behind the direction it took and why
-"What's his Last?": Nominate and vote for a pokemon+set to cap off a given team of 5 pokemon
-Team Preview Analysis Workshop: Have a rotating slate of a team of 6, with only the info you can access from Team Preview, and suggest and debate about what sets those pokemon may potentially have
-Break This Team: Find cores that can break, destroy, or otherwise dismantle provided tems, including infamously infuriating ones
-Top 10 Titans: Nominate pokemon that you believe to be one of the ten most influential or impactful pokemon in the tier's entire history
-Pokemon Matchmaking: Try to find the best possible partner for a listed Pokemon
-Core Analysis Workshop: As opposed to a Good Cores thread, this thread doesn't aim to be an archive as much as it does a think tank, discussing threats and partners, strengths and weaknesses, justifications and reasonings for their use over others, etc
-Weeky Research: 3 lesser-used pokemon are selected each week, for participants to research and look into, or simply discuss
-OU Lessons: a non-discussive thread where, after a vote on a topic, a post in the form of a lesson is made on that topic, focusing on the specific scope of [SV] OU and its metagame
-Core Building Competition: as opposed to Matchmaking or Break This Team, this thread suggests certain parameters for participants to then invent cores to fit, i.e. must be capable of breeding, must have and use priority, must have a hazard remover, etc
-Community Create-a-team: Collaborate with the entire forum to build a singular team over the course of months
-EV Spread Compendium: Probably less relevant these days with sites like Pikalytics, but... an archive for every culturally-known EV spread for every OU-viable pokemon, alongside a short description of what that spread is supposed to accomplish and why it's ran over others.
-The Next Best Thing: Try to find, well, the next best thing, by taking the given OU pokemon and coming up with a set for it that isn't already known yet! (Imagine how early Red Card Glimmora could've been found with this thread...)
Sort of related to the Analysis threads, one of my favorite old threads in previous gens was "Victim of the Week," in which a Pokemon was selected from the S through high B ranks (stuff that even if not common was definitely very relevant to handle) and users nominated things to check that set hard while having play into the rest of the tier. Besides the obvious, it also led to some funny tech ideas, one of which (at risk of tooting my own horn) I contributed was Skill Swap Victini into Volcanion to steal Water Absorb plus other tier-shaping abilities like Lando Intimidate and Pex's Regenerator.

It was a thread I thought was good for fostering creativity in the tier while simultaneously prompting "Other Options" type sets or a broader understanding of what was big and what the counterplay could be (Skill Swap made me realize how important abilities were to so many then-staples to function, and to a degree still is with things like Gambit, Alomomola, and Gliscor to name some).
 
it was certainly somewhat saddening to open the SV OU forum and seeing only one single page of threads.
I could be wrong but a big reason for this is because there was a lot of tournaments in the threads which took up most of the room, but those are all in the archive now.

Sort of related to the Analysis threads, one of my favorite old threads in previous gens was "Victim of the Week,"
That's still a thread and is active to this day
 
erm im larparific today:regiF:

Samurott-Hisui @ Choice Band
Ability: Sharpness
Tera Type: Dark
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Knock Off
- Ceaseless Edge
- Razor Shell
- Sucker Punch

i remember using cb samu a while ago with :fezandipiti: and it seemed like a neat offshoot then. rn though i think it does have really neat things going on for it. in comparison to say black glasses it def seems more limiting but its well worth it. sometimes you see :gliscor: get really greedy and stay in because usually razor shell will do like 80 max but you get a clean ohko. 4a is pretty much all you need and you get a lot of mileage out of these moves. ceaseless combined with tera dark really mows down a lot of usual checks like :dondozo: and even :corviknight:. this actually used to be an sd :kingambit: but i was noticing the lack of immediate power so it wasn't super needed. fun guy.

Garganacl @ Leftovers
Ability: Purifying Salt
Tera Type: Water
EVs: 248 HP / 52 Def / 208 SpD
Careful Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Salt Cure
- Recover
- Protect

i saw garg dropping to bl and wondering if it was actually ass like :okidogi: or just some really weird usage stuff. turns out its actually still really good. i really wanted to use cc :great-tusk: again so rocks :garganacl: it is. its still really good and i think it def should get some more use. a lot of :cresselia: just do not run cloak so you can greed and force them to switch or brawl with you. you really dont have to be super skilled with this guy just send it out to outchud the opp. idt theres anything too revolutionary about this guy but please use :garganacl: more because its good and also because i can cheese with cloak more often.


https://pokepast.es/53d273375ef1d6dc
this team got like top 40 i think and heres some screenshots
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9ou-2693816591-1np332td4jgynagg58u0a2kqryfq3grpw
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9ou-2693824333-i9j0hujpfnew8dv3wwrhtmudfnwq9g2pw
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9ou-2693840532-en6k22yj3tlvvh8g1dl9l5kkun6x2gvpw
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9ou-2693841053-fom4iqsyfxnn25tb0t9ag54fnfm8tcfpw
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9ou-2693828937-9ws9bn52g8p9i3k0yriftj7w12s8n53pw

heres videos that aim Rabia made about the team

heres another small funny team

Dragonite @ Loaded Dice
Ability: Multiscale
Tera Type: Fire
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Dragon Dance
- Scale Shot
- Fire Punch
- Encore
sometimes i forget this guy is a thing. i remember lorb outrage being a super big thing and then dying and realizing that scale shot is lowkey just as scary. it trades some of the immediate breaking power for the sweeping capabilities. encore is the most dishonest thing on earth though. sometimes :cresselia: or a :corviknight: or whatever get greedy and you get to use them as fodder. it also provides a really neat anti :kingambit: and :raging-bolt: tool that you can lowkey use to greed a meh gambit check or no ground. idk if it even has the usage to be a set anymore but its very nice to use whenever you feel like cheesing.

Pecharunt @ Air Balloon
Ability: Poison Puppeteer
Tera Type: Ghost
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Nasty Plot
- Malignant Chain
- Shadow Ball
- Recover

tbh max spa :pecharunt: is incredibly rare nowadays. i dont think its unjustified tbf since you really wanna greed the bulk but i think max spa can be really potent on teams willing to trade a lot of that :zamazenta: and :ogerpon-wellspring: checking for power. +2 maligants and shadow balls really slam a lot of non :kingambit: checks. being able to 2hko :zamazenta: or a dnite at +2 is really disgusting and be compounded on by poison and confusion. tera ghost is also really good to have here cuz it both removes the ground weakness but also boosts shadow ball to 2hko spdef glowking, which is really disgusting. i think it could def be used more on smth like a screens team that can go all out on offense. that or just pray you dont face one of those weird non kowtow gambits and be a chud maxxing mind reader.

https://pokepast.es/a9b728be13ae10a9
this team got like top 50 or smth like that. i forgot replays gg
 
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How are you guys/girls/enbies dealing with Fairy types? I'm pretty bad at teambuilding, so I tend to use sample teams, but most of the time those have a bad time dealing with fairies. Just look at the sample teams thread. Most of the teams have multiple Pokémon weak to fairies and one or maybe if you're lucky two resistances to them, but fairies are also an issue when trying to fit them into your team, since all of the offensive ones have common weaknesses that overlap with the stuff you want on the same team as a fairy. For example, both Iron Valiant and Enamorus overlap with Great Tusk and Dragonite. Maybe this is just my 1150 elo ass being bad at this game but i'd appreciate some tips.
 
How are you guys/girls/enbies dealing with Fairy types? I'm pretty bad at teambuilding, so I tend to use sample teams, but most of the time those have a bad time dealing with fairies. Just look at the sample teams thread. Most of the teams have multiple Pokémon weak to fairies and one or maybe if you're lucky two resistances to them, but fairies are also an issue when trying to fit them into your team, since all of the offensive ones have common weaknesses that overlap with the stuff you want on the same team as a fairy. For example, both Iron Valiant and Enamorus overlap with Great Tusk and Dragonite. Maybe this is just my 1150 elo ass being bad at this game but i'd appreciate some tips.
Glowking. That's it. It threatens fairies really well and walls most of them. And it's really easy to fit on a team when you're building
 
How are you guys/girls/enbies dealing with Fairy types?
Depends on the team honestly! Galarian Slowking is great for certain teams, but it doesn't really fit many faster-paced offense builds. You'd notice that those teams instead often pack a Gholdengo to check Iron Valiant in a pinch, a Ceruledge that can tank a Moonblast and won't get OHKOed by Shadow Ball / mixed Knock Off, even more niche picks like Iron Crown see a decent chunk of play. Red Card Glimmora is an offense tech that works well against Iron Valiant in particular, since without Booster Energy to boost its speed it'll often end up getting blown up by a faster Zamazenta's Heavy Slam or Darkrai's Sludge Bomb, and Booster Speed Treads is a nice fast Steel-type that can also do the trick while being hazard control for a team. Kingambit isn't great against the faster fairies, but it will always beat Hatterene.

For balance and bulky offense teams, Slowking-G is a fantastic pivot that handles Primarina and doesn't even mind switching in on a choice-locked Enamorus' Earth Power, but other mons are pretty prominent and can also function as Fairy checks. Gholdengo is still a balance staple that can even run bulkier sets to better check Val and often uses Air Balloon which walls Enamorus pretty well, and Cinderace is well-renowned for being able to take any hit from and remove a chipped Iron Valiant. Corviknight with Brave Bird is a good check for the fast Fairies as well, and so is Moltres which completely walls Enamorus. Balance without Slowking-G can often struggle against Primarina, but Primarina is slow and lacks reliable recovery so it'll often be worn down by hazards or forced to take damage and check things itself before it becomes a threat.

Pecharunt, Weezing-G, and Skarmory are also pseudo-resists on these teams, but none of them have great SpDef so they aren't always the greatest switchins to the tier's Moonblast-ers. Heatran is a less common option on bulky offense that makes Hatterene's life impossible, but it does lose to mixed Iron Valiant or Earth Power Enamorus (after having its balloon popped). A pretty big thing is that this tier is not too packed-out with Fairy-types, with Primarina or Enamorus not being too omnipresent, while Hatterene being so slow makes it something of an exception since it loses badly to the very-common Gholdengo and Kingambit.

all of the offensive ones have common weaknesses that overlap with the stuff you want on the same team as a fairy
In terms of fitting Fairy-types on your team, I'd definitely recommend that you don't worry too much about type stacking, especially when it's on Pokemon without overlapping roles! Iron Valiant and Great Tusk are a perfectly fine pairing as they have almost no overlap in what they want to do for a team. Both Tusk and special Val will often run no Fighting STAB anyway and, if you have a good answer to shared checks like Hatterene or Moltres, this shouldn't cause any issues. Enamorus is also quite fine being paired with other Flying-types since it's not too afraid of Kyurem and cannot run Flying STAB either, of course you should keep in mind the shared weaknesses this does bring but that doesn't mean they can't be used together at all; a more balanced team with a Scarf Enamorus will often appreciate something like a Corviknight to switch in on Poison / Steel moves and bring Enam back in safely with U-turn.

I'd also not discount teams with type overlap, one of my favourite teams I've ever built from back when Sneasler was legal had 4 Fighting-types, those being Great Tusk, Zamazenta, Sneasler, and Iron Valiant. This was post-DLC at the peak of Zapdos meta and keep in mind that this team also had a Rillaboom, making it incredibly weak on-paper to any Flying type, but the whole idea was that these Pokemon were unique enough to fulfil different roles on the team while having checks that overlap enough to break for one another. My Iron Valiant was Choice Specs with Tera Electric, letting it snipe things like Moltres in a pinch, and my Zamazenta was Tera Steel Heavy Slam with some attack investment to remove opposing Val or Enam and beat Slowking-G. Sneasler was my speed control and main sweeper, while Great Tusk gave me hazard removal as well as an alternative win condition.

The gameplan would often be to throw away my Rillaboom, Sneasler, and/or Bulk Up Tusk to take out Zapdos and make way for Zamazenta, it was absolutely not an easy team to pilot but it was incredibly threatening and one of the most rewarding I've ever had the pleasure of using, all despite having 4 Fighting-types, 2 Ground-types, and zero Flying or Fairy resists. It's actually an adaptation of a very successful team from the previous HOME meta that I ended up writing an RMT on, though this used Cresselia over Val (check this team out if you want to see a very early use of a very modern Cresselia set!). There's a sample team with Zamazenta, Val, and Hands as another example of this offensive typestacking, though I don't really feel the same way about this as it's a dual screens Hyper Offense team where defensive play is much less important. The point I'm making here is that type overlap isn't necessarily a bad thing, so long as you have a clear way to deal with the weaknesses that it brings and you aren't trying to use mons that do the exact same thing, it can even be a good thing when those Pokemon have tools to break walls for one another and work together to achieve their win condition.
 
On the topic of defensive counterplay - remember that Berries exist!

252 SpA Choice Specs Iron Valiant Moonblast vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Roseli Berry Zamazenta: 195-229 (60 - 70.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 Atk Zamazenta Heavy Slam (120 BP) vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Iron Valiant: 272-320 (94.1 - 110.7%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock
252+ Atk Supreme Overlord 5 allies fainted Kingambit Sucker Punch vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Colbur Berry Gholdengo: 204-240 (64.7 - 76.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock
252 SpA Gholdengo Focus Blast vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Kingambit: 612-720 (179.4 - 211.1%) -- guaranteed OHKO
252 Atk Iron Valiant Close Combat vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Chople Berry Heatran: 186-220 (57.5 - 68.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock
252 SpA Heatran Fire Blast vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Iron Valiant: 271-321 (93.7 - 111%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock

Boots or lefties are probably better for the given mon on slower and more balance-y teams most of the time, but on offenses that don't plan to switch a whole ton in the first place and have an issue with a particular typing, it's definitely the type of thing that can swing the momentum of an entire match. Shuca berry not popping like Balloon can probably fuck up some ground types as well.

And on the topic of type overlapping - from an offensive standpoint, that could actually be a good thing, if not actively intentional (consider gen 6's Birdspam team with 3 offensive Flying STAB users, with active intent to overwhelm the opposing team's flying resists).
 
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I swear there's a Normal Spam team lurking somewhere, keying off Facade/Knock Gliscor, Ursaluna, and Maushold. The first two naturally handle Flame Body, steel, and ghost types, paving the way for Maushold to click Tidy Up and start OHKOing things.

Mostly I just like Maushold and miss the early days of SV when it was niche, rather than now when it's almost solely a gimmick. Population Bomb being a coin flip to 2HKO 252/252+ Dondozo is all kinds of entertaining.
 
For anyone interested in contributing to the OverUsed dex, Trial QC is open for applications! This is hosted in the OU Analyses section that you'll see linked at the top of this forum.

Being part of the QC team is focused around quality checking analyses before they go onto the dex. It also gives you an insight and voice in planning for the dex, letting you join discussions around what sets we add & what writeups we end up focusing on. If you would like to give it a try or have any questions at all then let me know!
 
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