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Metagame SS OU Metagame Discussion Thread v7 (Usage Stats in post #3539)
- Thread starter TPP
- Start date
What are people's thoughts on Weather right now? It seems like a lot of people are running scarfers with ridic base speed or high-speed mons that set up easily on their teams, which really makes weather sweepers not able to do their jobs. Sand and Rain should be good, but it just feels like there's always a scarf Dragapult or an Unburden abuser to stop them.
the thing about countering the new pokemon is you need an entire team not just one. regieleki is fast and can have team support via rapid spin while his teammates take care of all ground and ghost types. this puts a lot of pressure in the teambuilding with regieleki and makes thier team predictable. if not thier team is just broken mons with no synergy whatsoever.
Rain's biggest issue is Regieleki, I think. That's not to say that it's an insurmountable issue--specially defensive ferrothorn can cover in a pinch, while Swampert, Seismitoad, or Gastrodon just shut it down completely. However, every other new toy that rain has just gets absolutely decimated by it, and that restricts it a lot, since it's pretty easy to build a team around Regieleki that just kills rain pretty easily. It's not bad, and it's definitely better than it's been in a while, but it's not quite top tier, to say the least. (Zapdos is real fun on rain, though.)
Sand's good. Dracozolt is pretty great, Tyranitar is good, Excadrill got knocked down a bit but it's still pretty damn good. Biggest issue for sand right now is that choice band Genesect just slaughters Dracozolt with extreme speed, which takes away the biggest new thing going for it, while it also kills Tyranitar pretty easily with either iron head or u-turn. If you're choosing to run Hippodown, then you don't get killed as easily by it, but you still can't do a whole lot to it, so any amount of chip means you just lose. And Excadrill is defensively... not great, to say the least, so even after a little bit of chip it can get revenged with a choice band extreme speed. So Genesect kind of sucks for it.
Sun's back to being good again, with Cinderace back in the tier and Blaziken being introduced. Not that it was ever really bad, but it's definitely better now. However, Landorus, Regieleki, and opposing Blaziken being so common hurt it a lot, and just like sand, banded Genesect hurts, especially with e-speed.
Genesect is just generally a bit anti-weather right now, since its extreme speed is so powerful that it can bop a lot of these fast weather sweepers, but I think rain's better equipped to handle it with the more defensive options it can run. (Genesect's also broken as hell and will probably be one of the first things banned, but that's not relevant until it actually happens, so I won't speculate how that'll impact things until it actually happens.)
Unrelated to all of that, but Volcanion is pretty neat. Good? I wouldn't go that far, but heavy duty boots + water absorb makes it surprisingly decent defensively, and steam eruption is a great move. Most of the new pokemon and returning pokemon aren't great for it, so it's definitely not gonna end up in OU, but it has some merit and is worth further exploration, I think.
Also, try mixed Blaziken with fire blast + lo, and then your choice of close combat, earthquake, thunder punch, and protect (swords dance is kind of redundant on mixed, just run flare blitz then)--don't remember who mentioned it before, but it allows it to take on Lando-T a lot better which is pretty neat, and guarantees (85% of the time) that Buzzwole dies, since the defensive set can take a +0 flare blitz iirc. Dunno if it's better than swords dance or any other set, but it's fun to mess with people with that.
Ring target lures are really fun. Shows you just how powerful eleki can be. My biggest overall problem with rising voltage is that you're dependent on terrain, which in this meta changes all the time. Stuff like rillaboom and scarf lele can really be a pain. It's fun but a little tough to work around.
Here's a fun replay with the team:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1209024903
There aren't that many individual mons that seem egregiously broken by themselves to me, but the problem is that there are just so many mons that snowball out of control, combined with a bunch more that deal massive chunks of damage that are hard to play around. The sheer number of beast boosters, moxies/speed boost, and bulky dragon dancers, is kind of wild, and their are a bunch of great breakers to open holes for them.
Its interesting right now and people are probably mostly ok with it just because its a change of pace compared to the stale and boring pre-CT metas, but I feel like it would get old real fast if they were to not quick ban anything.
It might be kind of tricky to get the balance right when their are so many broken things to start that not that many really stand out. I wouldn't mind the council not taking an overly heavy handed approach with the quick bans. I would definitely like to see Genesect go, and then maybe 1-2 beast boost/moxie'ish/speed boost types + Kyurem-b + 1 breaker. That would be the maximum amount I'd expect from initial quick bans (4-5) and I don't think it would be unreasonable to do fewer initially.
Its interesting right now and people are probably mostly ok with it just because its a change of pace compared to the stale and boring pre-CT metas, but I feel like it would get old real fast if they were to not quick ban anything.
It might be kind of tricky to get the balance right when their are so many broken things to start that not that many really stand out. I wouldn't mind the council not taking an overly heavy handed approach with the quick bans. I would definitely like to see Genesect go, and then maybe 1-2 beast boost/moxie'ish/speed boost types + Kyurem-b + 1 breaker. That would be the maximum amount I'd expect from initial quick bans (4-5) and I don't think it would be unreasonable to do fewer initially.
Idk i kinda disagree with this. Unless Eleki is scarfed himself, He's outsped by scarfers like Cinderace, Dragapult, and even Zeraora. I just don't find speed to be Eleki's biggest issue. Even if you don't have a fast enough scarfer, Eleki is so weak that priority like grassy glide from Rillaboom can take it out. Overall I just don't find Eleki to be that threatening.
Spent the past 2 days building and playing with all kinds of teams, even made a few first day forum rates, and I feel like it's time for the obligatory initial thoughts post that most contributors feels compelled to make when a new meta arrives. The post will be a bit of a mixed bag as I'd like to talk about a couple cores and team structures, and break away from the mold of writing a couple sentences per mon. That said I am going to start this post off by posting about one mon individually, so here we go...
Regieleki has grabbed the attention of pretty much everyone who has tried out OU this DLC, and I can't blame them. An unrivaled speed tier, an ability that essentially gives it double Electric stab, and the challenge of using a mon with next to no actual coverage making it engaging to build with is incredibly interesting. Regieleki truly is an offensive juggernaut, with a major Achilles heel in ground types as it simply does not have the tools to break past them. I actually quite enjoy the niche Regieleki is creating for itself as I think it might be one of the best ways to teach newer players how to actually play Pokemon in a competitive fashion. Using something like Regieleki, or facing it in battle, will teach users to identify wincons and preserve the right mons in a way that we just have not seen before. Someone using Regieleki has to take a second at team preview and identify the possible ground type on the opposing team, and make a plan for how they're going to chip it down and eventually kill it so Regieleki can be successful. With the understanding that once I get rid of that one Ground type I win, so even if it means taking some damage or even losing a mon whatever I can do to weaken the opposing Landorus-T is a positive. Regieleki also is not some monster with amazing coverage that just click buttons at any stage of the game and makes progress, it requires actual strategy to accomplish anything meaning you will need to do more than button mash to find success. Still it has enough overbearing power that once you get rid of those ground types it simply wins most games, making it simple enough for most new users to grasp and understand. Also facing Regieleki will teach users to preserve the correct mons. Your opponent is obviously trying to win with Regieleki, so you can't be making dumb decisions and taking bad risks with your Garchomp or you lose. Facing this matchup will also help people realize that keeping your Landorus healthy might actually be more important than a kill in the long run, since you will need a healthy Landorus-T or the game is over and your opponent wins by clicking Rising Voltage a few times. Obviously this type of theory can be applied to most offensive mons and their checks, but the absolute one-dimensionality of Regieleki makes these relationships that much clearer and easier to understand.
Last generation we saw the rise of BuluTran, which saw major success across the entire 7th generation. However, today is a new day and Rillaboom is here to try and usurp Tapu Bulu. Rillaboom provides the Grassy Terrain Heatran loves with the added benefits of being able to grab momentum with U-turn, priority in Grassy Glide, and access to Knock Off which is just great utility to have. That said Rillaboom does lose the fairy typing Bulu provides, which means teams that use Rillaboom with have to add that beneficial fairy typing elsewhere in the builder. An interesting mon that everyone has been talking up the past day that works really well with this core is Swampert. Swampert forms a momentum core with Rillaboom thanks to its new toy Flip Turn, creates a GFW core with Rilla and Tran, and provides the core with the mandatory Ground type most teams demand right now. Overall this is a very strong core, and I expect it to shape the meta moving forward this generation.
There was an excellent post made about these two earlier on, but I'd like to touch on them for a second. Firstly Tyranitar is individually amazing right now, as having a Ghost resist really helps teams function currently. Also even without Pursuit Tyranitar helps switch into Heatran which can be useful, I've been running a lot of Tyranitar + Swampert and have been able to manage. With Tyranitar being really solid in its own right having more flexibility with Sand is really nice. Dracozolt provides a Sand Rush abuser that isn't excadrill, meaning all sorts of new team structures can form around sand since the option to not run Excadrill is now available. Even though Drill will probabaly remain the premiere abuser, it's nice to have a second option. An example core I've seen running around is Tyranitar + Dracozolt + Weather Ball Lando - I. I really think this team style is going to flourish this DLC, and find consistent success throughout the generation - even if the standard sand that prevails in a few months is unlike any sand we've seen be a meta staple before.
I just want to take a second to mention Ground types overall in the current meta. Before this DLC it hasn't exactly been as mandatory to have a solid ground type on every team, or at least not to the extent it has been in previous generations. This is partially because the number of usable ground types was at a low, and the premium electric type in the tier was Zeraora. That has changed with the return of Landorus, Garchomp, Zygarde, Swampert (now decent with Flip Turn), and strong electrics like Koko and Zapdos + the emergence of Regieleki and Sand Rush Dracozolt. In the end I really don't see this as a strain on building, but something that should be taken care of naturally when building solid teams given how useful good ground types are. In the end this is my little PSA to say use ground types on all your teams moving forward, it's not difficult and will improve your teams.
That's about all I've got for the moment. I didn't really hit on anything ban worthy since I figure the council has a fairly good idea of what needs to go initially. Personally, I would appreciate if the council made their first voting slate on quick bans public before voting so users have a chance to weigh in, but if not I'll save my thoughts on bans until after the first wave which I expect will prove uncontroversial with most users as we remove the obviously unhealthy stuff.
That's about all I've got for the moment. I didn't really hit on anything ban worthy since I figure the council has a fairly good idea of what needs to go initially. Personally, I would appreciate if the council made their first voting slate on quick bans public before voting so users have a chance to weigh in, but if not I'll save my thoughts on bans until after the first wave which I expect will prove uncontroversial with most users as we remove the obviously unhealthy stuff.
Dedicated weather builds seem fringe at best; the metagame is filled with priority, overwhelming speed control, and Pokemon that are super trendy that do not mesh well with weather builds. Naturally, some Sand teams can work due to how solid the inducers and Sand Rushers are. However, Rain and Sun teams are hit-or-miss. Rain with the new Electric types and Sun with Blaziken do seem promising, but it may be better in the future once things slow down a bit.
+1 to this. I definitely struggled on the very first day of the DLC as I did not give much thought to putting a Ground type on my team for I had severely underrated Eleki because of its shallow movepool. However, despite being quite utterly one dimensional, it is quite effective at doing what it does, i.e put dents in anything that doesn't resist/or is immune to Electric. Thunder Cage's residual damage is really helpful in chipping and wearing down its resists upon switch-in too, and if the opposing Pokemon cannot threaten Eleki via priority or the rare case of it outspeeding Eleki, Eleki can just Volt Switch out of harms way.I just want to take a second to mention Ground types overall in the current meta. Before this DLC it hasn't exactly been as mandatory to have a solid ground type on every team, or at least not to the extent it has been in previous generations. This is partially because the number of usable ground types was at a low, and the premium electric type in the tier was Zeraora. That has changed with the return of Landorus, Garchomp, Zygarde, Swampert (now decent with Flip Turn), and strong electrics like Koko and Zapdos + the emergence of Regieleki and Sand Rush Dracozolt. In the end I really don't see this as a strain on building, but something that should be taken care of naturally when building solid teams given how useful good ground types are. In the end this is my little PSA to say use ground types on all your teams moving forward, it's not difficult and will improve your teams.
I ended up facing a lot of teams with Eleki and saw different variants of it via OU room tournament games and ladder games and it can run 3 items quite well despite it being quite one dimensional. Those 3 are: Light Clay, Choice Specs, and of course, HDB. Light Clay allows it to function quite well on offensive teams with providing quick screens, Choice Specs gives it a guaranteed 2HKO on Specially Defensive Heatran after Thunder Cage's residual damage, and HDB is just extremely damn useful on Eleki as you're going to be switching in and out often.
Regieleki @ Light Clay
Ability: Transistor
EVs: 28 HP / 252 SpA / 228 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Reflect
- Light Screen
- Volt Switch / Rapid Spin
- Thunder Cage / Rapid Spin
I have used this variants of this set on multiple times now, often swapping up the moves if Rapid Spin is necessary, but support Eleki works quite nicely on offensive teams. 228 EVs in Speed allow it to outspeed base 100s at +1, though it can be adjusted to 216 to only outspeed Scarf Genesect. Thunder Cage is just an amazing STAB as it provides chip damage and has a really solid BP, while Volt Switch is great for pivoting. Both moves receive a significant buff due to Eleki's ability. Regieleki's existence in the team allows you to make aggressive double switching as you're essentially baiting the enemy to bring in their Ground type. A partner like Rillaboom, Pheromosa, or even Tornadus-T at times can function well. All aforementioned Pokemon can carry U-turn and keep the momentum of the game in your favor. Pheromosa and Rillaboom in particular can threaten Ground-types with their movepool and Tornadus-T can switch into an Earthquake.
To summarize: Eleki is in no ways a perfect Pokemon, however it is extremely fun to play with because of its amazing speed tier and good offenses. In all cases, while facing a team running Regieleki, you have to keep your Ground-type healthy at all costs, otherwise Regieleki is just going to bully your Pokemon by its STAB moves, or at times buff its own team with Dual Screens.
Thoughts on some of the most notable mons from the new meta
Quickban worthy:
I will admit that I vastly underestimated this pokemon. 120 base attacking stats and 99 speed seemed underwhelming, especially with the lack of boosting options outside of speed. But the bug is easily the #1 poke in OU right now, and should be on every team. With scarf/band/specs + proper download boost and coverage move, this mon can outspeed and one hit KO anything in OU. That may be a bit of an exaggeration, and specs isn't a great set compared to the other options, but the fact is has the potential is disgusting. And since every set and every coverage move it can carry is equally viable, you basically have to scout the bugs entire moveset before you can confidently wall it. For sure broken, send it to Ubers.
I would argue this is the #2 ladder poke rn. Gross power, only really needs Earth Power, Sludge wave, and focus blast to be good. Auxiliary slot for sub or something. With rock slide only wallable by latis. Has knock off and 125 base attack for latis anyways. Can pull many of the defensive tricks lando-t can having two immunities, decent bulk, and useful resists. Basically, run ice beam on your scarfers and avoid fat teams until this is banned lol. Picks walls apart.
Tbh this is kind of lando on steroids. Almost as powerful, its three move coverage is basically perfect, has incredible speed and a much better boosting move. And since the power doesn't come from the ability naga gets to use its ability to boost speed. In reality this is more often checked since heatran is so good atm, and since it cant run over ttar. That being said, naga is definitely much more explorable that lando, since it isn't bound to running lo and has spikes. This and landorous are the defense killers that make fat so impossible to run right now.
This is actually probably the real #2 rather than lando, but I haven't used it or played against it too much yet. But yeah lead 6-0 kyub is almost as easy as lead zen mode gdarm. It literally just needs a single dd and icicle spear can do the rest. Non dd sets are manageable but the threat of dd often elevates them to high threat level. I don't understand how this was allowed but not the fish. But both deserve Ubers in the end.
Potentially Broken after the meta calms:
Its fast. Its decently strong. In this fast kill or be killed meta it can come up short on KOs and die to the incoming hit, but once the meta settles down i think U-Turn sets will be really annoying, and CC will always be a powerful cleanup option. Boots is not as good on this mon as they were on zera and pult, since those liked being at pristine shape to take a hit. Phero cant take the hit anyway so i say why bother? Maybe I'm just bad lol *shrug*
Setup sets seem slow at the moment, and specs is a laughable breaker with its 65 base speed. AV is good glue right now but nowhere near banworthy. As the meta slows this could easily marinate into a top threat, but mag isn't there yet.
Fast, strong. Perhaps the harder walls like pex and hippowdon dying to all the other crazy shit is giving cinderace more KO opportunities than it should have, but Ace still seems really, really strong from my playtesting.
Only run SD setup. And remember that even at +1 blaziken is really slow, especially if its adamant. These limitations have made this mon underwhelming for me. With the right matchup, once it gets to be +2/+2 to game is over, but those matchups can be rare. LO + flare blitz recoil can have Blaziken kill itself, and if it lacks protect you can switch in a scarfer as blaziken SD's to scare it back out. But by running protect you waste a coverage slot and can be walled by certain flyers, or just be forced into flare blitzing and dying. Dies to gene extreme speed and scarfers on faster teams, and it can still thud against some harder walls. Overcomeable flaws, but has been really underwhelming for me so far.
(pls add sprite)
For starters, I want to preface this by saying that regieleki is by far the worst mon listed. To be honest, regieleki is probably balanced in ZU. Why? Because it is complete stonewalled by any pokemon with the ground typing, even ZU pokemon with 50 bst. Its coverage is nonexistant, so it has no recourse against any ground type in the game. So why is it banworthy if it is so effortlessly walled? Because regieleki 6-0s any team lacking a ground type. Its got a stupid fast, very strong volt switch to weaken its checks and a pace that outspeeds most scarfers. So if this gets banned, it will get banned off of the same basis the fish got banned: since it forces teams to run a ground type. So I think regieleki will get banned? No, ground types are basically a stable of teambuilding already and are much more common than water absorb pokes. Is this overhyping its power a little? Probably. But nobody is running ferrothorn and the damage calc isn't updated yet so I don't know the calcs it has against electric resists. But while pokemon like dragapult are good, they are definitely never going to get banned. The fact that I can find logical reasoning to ban regieleki at all puts it on this list.
General Disappointments:
Lol we all know how these got butchered. They aren't bad but they aren't the meta breakers they were in the fantasy metagame we were playing before the official PS drop.
Zygarde is probably going to be broken long down the line, but in the meta we have right now its really bad for me. Others probably disagree, but for right now I struggle to find a defined role for Zygarde. Maybe its because everyone who uses this against me runs garbage bulky setup spreads which don't work against my teams, so I'm not exactly inspired to try and make Zygarde work. But in general it seems underwhelming when my opponents use it. Maybe I just expected more because it was ubers last generation.
I've fought 0 torn-t and 0 kartana. I've also used 0 torn-t and 0 kartana. This means they are PU pokemon and are terrible. Objectively speaking.
There is a better version, people who use this either are looking for gen 7 vibes or didn't get the memo.
So bad its attacks do shit damage just use latios. If you can't tell I lost a few games cause this thing is weak as hell.
Of course, other mons are good and others are fun, but these are the standouts to me so far.
Quickban worthy:
I will admit that I vastly underestimated this pokemon. 120 base attacking stats and 99 speed seemed underwhelming, especially with the lack of boosting options outside of speed. But the bug is easily the #1 poke in OU right now, and should be on every team. With scarf/band/specs + proper download boost and coverage move, this mon can outspeed and one hit KO anything in OU. That may be a bit of an exaggeration, and specs isn't a great set compared to the other options, but the fact is has the potential is disgusting. And since every set and every coverage move it can carry is equally viable, you basically have to scout the bugs entire moveset before you can confidently wall it. For sure broken, send it to Ubers.
I would argue this is the #2 ladder poke rn. Gross power, only really needs Earth Power, Sludge wave, and focus blast to be good. Auxiliary slot for sub or something. With rock slide only wallable by latis. Has knock off and 125 base attack for latis anyways. Can pull many of the defensive tricks lando-t can having two immunities, decent bulk, and useful resists. Basically, run ice beam on your scarfers and avoid fat teams until this is banned lol. Picks walls apart.
Tbh this is kind of lando on steroids. Almost as powerful, its three move coverage is basically perfect, has incredible speed and a much better boosting move. And since the power doesn't come from the ability naga gets to use its ability to boost speed. In reality this is more often checked since heatran is so good atm, and since it cant run over ttar. That being said, naga is definitely much more explorable that lando, since it isn't bound to running lo and has spikes. This and landorous are the defense killers that make fat so impossible to run right now.
This is actually probably the real #2 rather than lando, but I haven't used it or played against it too much yet. But yeah lead 6-0 kyub is almost as easy as lead zen mode gdarm. It literally just needs a single dd and icicle spear can do the rest. Non dd sets are manageable but the threat of dd often elevates them to high threat level. I don't understand how this was allowed but not the fish. But both deserve Ubers in the end.
Potentially Broken after the meta calms:
Its fast. Its decently strong. In this fast kill or be killed meta it can come up short on KOs and die to the incoming hit, but once the meta settles down i think U-Turn sets will be really annoying, and CC will always be a powerful cleanup option. Boots is not as good on this mon as they were on zera and pult, since those liked being at pristine shape to take a hit. Phero cant take the hit anyway so i say why bother? Maybe I'm just bad lol *shrug*
Setup sets seem slow at the moment, and specs is a laughable breaker with its 65 base speed. AV is good glue right now but nowhere near banworthy. As the meta slows this could easily marinate into a top threat, but mag isn't there yet.
Fast, strong. Perhaps the harder walls like pex and hippowdon dying to all the other crazy shit is giving cinderace more KO opportunities than it should have, but Ace still seems really, really strong from my playtesting.
Only run SD setup. And remember that even at +1 blaziken is really slow, especially if its adamant. These limitations have made this mon underwhelming for me. With the right matchup, once it gets to be +2/+2 to game is over, but those matchups can be rare. LO + flare blitz recoil can have Blaziken kill itself, and if it lacks protect you can switch in a scarfer as blaziken SD's to scare it back out. But by running protect you waste a coverage slot and can be walled by certain flyers, or just be forced into flare blitzing and dying. Dies to gene extreme speed and scarfers on faster teams, and it can still thud against some harder walls. Overcomeable flaws, but has been really underwhelming for me so far.
(pls add sprite)For starters, I want to preface this by saying that regieleki is by far the worst mon listed. To be honest, regieleki is probably balanced in ZU. Why? Because it is complete stonewalled by any pokemon with the ground typing, even ZU pokemon with 50 bst. Its coverage is nonexistant, so it has no recourse against any ground type in the game. So why is it banworthy if it is so effortlessly walled? Because regieleki 6-0s any team lacking a ground type. Its got a stupid fast, very strong volt switch to weaken its checks and a pace that outspeeds most scarfers. So if this gets banned, it will get banned off of the same basis the fish got banned: since it forces teams to run a ground type. So I think regieleki will get banned? No, ground types are basically a stable of teambuilding already and are much more common than water absorb pokes. Is this overhyping its power a little? Probably. But nobody is running ferrothorn and the damage calc isn't updated yet so I don't know the calcs it has against electric resists. But while pokemon like dragapult are good, they are definitely never going to get banned. The fact that I can find logical reasoning to ban regieleki at all puts it on this list.
General Disappointments:
Lol we all know how these got butchered. They aren't bad but they aren't the meta breakers they were in the fantasy metagame we were playing before the official PS drop.
Zygarde is probably going to be broken long down the line, but in the meta we have right now its really bad for me. Others probably disagree, but for right now I struggle to find a defined role for Zygarde. Maybe its because everyone who uses this against me runs garbage bulky setup spreads which don't work against my teams, so I'm not exactly inspired to try and make Zygarde work. But in general it seems underwhelming when my opponents use it. Maybe I just expected more because it was ubers last generation.
I've fought 0 torn-t and 0 kartana. I've also used 0 torn-t and 0 kartana. This means they are PU pokemon and are terrible. Objectively speaking.
There is a better version, people who use this either are looking for gen 7 vibes or didn't get the memo.
So bad its attacks do shit damage just use latios. If you can't tell I lost a few games cause this thing is weak as hell.
Of course, other mons are good and others are fun, but these are the standouts to me so far.
I know everyone is focused on trying out and enjoying the new mons, whereas I myself haven't had any chance to play, but I feel like I should at the very least make an observation:
Along the same vein of always carrying a ground type, I feel as though Zeraora might actually get BETTER, as a mon with volt absorb, a respectable speed tier, and decent coverage (Grass knot I think?).
I kinda hope that when QBs happen that the tier has an adjustment period and possibly a second round of QBs for anything that might have slipped through the cracks before Suspect testing begins.
Also, I'm actively curious if Clefable finally doesn't need to be on 50% of all teams anymore. Has anyone been seeing/using clefable?
Along the same vein of always carrying a ground type, I feel as though Zeraora might actually get BETTER, as a mon with volt absorb, a respectable speed tier, and decent coverage (Grass knot I think?).
I kinda hope that when QBs happen that the tier has an adjustment period and possibly a second round of QBs for anything that might have slipped through the cracks before Suspect testing begins.
Also, I'm actively curious if Clefable finally doesn't need to be on 50% of all teams anymore. Has anyone been seeing/using clefable?
+1 252+ SpA Choice Specs Tapu Koko Rising Voltage (140 BP) vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Ferrothorn in Electric Terrain: 198-233 (56.2 - 66.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock and Leftovers recovery
+1 252+ SpA Choice Specs Tapu Koko Volt Switch vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Ferrothorn in Electric Terrain: 99-117 (28.1 - 33.2%) -- guaranteed 4HKO after Stealth Rock and Leftovers recovery
Modest has a solid chance of killing SpD Ferro from full with Volt Switch into Rising Voltage. Timid does the same with a layer of Spikes thrown into the mix. Better pack your Seismitoads on Rain.
Can we all sit down and reflect that Choice Scarf Zeraora is now apparently, according to our good friend here, the norm and gold standard. It loses to Zera regardless, but the mere notion of this guy casually listing Cinderace and Zeraora as regular old Scarf users amuses me greatly.
Let me also go ahead and mention that I am not advocating for action against Regieleki. Unlike Vish it DEMANDS team support to function, whereas Band Vish could 2HKO the whole tier and its WA "counters" w/ coverage, while Scarf is just a cool catch all for offensive checks thinking they good. Here, not only are Ground types on every team regardless of Regieleki's rxistence, some if these Pokémon are also very useful outside of beating Regi (dare I say, a few are broken). And if you decide to use Regi by itself, it goes from truly leveling the meta to being forced to spam VS lest it loses momentum vrs fat grasses.
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1. What are you most excited to use in the new metagame?
On day 1 of Crown Tundra, I made a team with the 6 broken sweepers: Genesect, Lando-I, Blaziken, Magearna, Naganadel, and Kyurem-B. It was a really bad team but it was a lot of fun to use!
4. How do you feel about the new Galarian Formes, Regis, and horse legendaries?
Lately, I've been loving the ghost horse with choice specs on webs teams. It completely destroys all offense without urshifu.
Regieleki is also really fun to use, but it I feel like I double switch more than I click an attacking move with it.
I've also used G-Zapdos on webs and its really good as well, much better than bisharp.
9. What is your favorite returning mon?
It's a tie between Kyurem-B and Lando-I.
Heatran is also really solid, he's holding the meta together.
The meta is really fun, but it's obviously impossible to make a team that even semi-reliably covers all the top threats. We definitely need to ban a few mons. I believe that the most broken mons are as follows:
1. Completely broken, it's impossible to scout the set, forces heatran onto all your teams or else you lose 6-0. Banded espeed destroys offense, and scarf/specs destroys balance/bulky offense. Shift gear is more matchup fishy but it can be an automatic 6-0.
2. If they don't have a melmetal, or if you can remove it, you win with 1 dd. This thing is way to powerful. +1 Lo fusion bolt 1hko's genesect, which is ridiculous considering that its non stab
3. Completely 6-0s many balances or bulky offenses. Focus blast 2hkos corv and mandibuzz, so they aren't counters (lmao). Also by far the best rocker in the tier cause you only really need earth power, focus blast, and sludge wave
4 It's like hydreigon with better speed and dual stab, and impossible to revenge kill unless you sack another mon to draco because of beast boost. So instead of getting 1 kill per game, it gets at least 2.
Not broken yet but could be:
On day 1 of Crown Tundra, I made a team with the 6 broken sweepers: Genesect, Lando-I, Blaziken, Magearna, Naganadel, and Kyurem-B. It was a really bad team but it was a lot of fun to use!
4. How do you feel about the new Galarian Formes, Regis, and horse legendaries?
Lately, I've been loving the ghost horse with choice specs on webs teams. It completely destroys all offense without urshifu.
Regieleki is also really fun to use, but it I feel like I double switch more than I click an attacking move with it.
I've also used G-Zapdos on webs and its really good as well, much better than bisharp.
9. What is your favorite returning mon?
It's a tie between Kyurem-B and Lando-I.
Heatran is also really solid, he's holding the meta together.
The meta is really fun, but it's obviously impossible to make a team that even semi-reliably covers all the top threats. We definitely need to ban a few mons. I believe that the most broken mons are as follows:
1.
Completely broken, it's impossible to scout the set, forces heatran onto all your teams or else you lose 6-0. Banded espeed destroys offense, and scarf/specs destroys balance/bulky offense. Shift gear is more matchup fishy but it can be an automatic 6-0.2.
If they don't have a melmetal, or if you can remove it, you win with 1 dd. This thing is way to powerful. +1 Lo fusion bolt 1hko's genesect, which is ridiculous considering that its non stab3.
Completely 6-0s many balances or bulky offenses. Focus blast 2hkos corv and mandibuzz, so they aren't counters (lmao). Also by far the best rocker in the tier cause you only really need earth power, focus blast, and sludge wave4
It's like hydreigon with better speed and dual stab, and impossible to revenge kill unless you sack another mon to draco because of beast boost. So instead of getting 1 kill per game, it gets at least 2.Not broken yet but could be:
Can someone explain to me why Lando-I is so good? I get that it might be broken, but is it really that obvious it needs to be quickbanned already? I’ve been playing OU on and off since the end of gen 5 and have never quite understood how it’s so good it needs to be immediately quickbanned every generation without even a suspect test anymore. I get that this seems like a dumb question to most people since it’s a popular consensus every time we get to a new gen that Lando-I is clearly broken, but I’ve never fully understood this. Maybe it’s cuz I play almost exclusively offense and never fat balance teams or stall??
Katy
Banned deucer.
a good typing coupled with a great speed tier and also a good special attack in conjunction with a super powerful ability in sheer force and life orb alongside great attacks like sludge wave, focus blast, rock slide, psychic, stone edge, and earth power makes lando i a great threat in the metagame. Most if not all of its attacks are boosted by sheer force coupled up with a life orb as these attacks all have a side effect pretty much, which strengthens its sheer power even further. it also has only one true weakness being ice and it also has boosting moves to profit from, like rock polish and calm mind.
lando i is a superb breaker in its own right and can handle most team archetypes like bulky offense and balance with threatening them with the sheer amount of coverages it gets and i view lando i in this gen also worthy of a mon to keep an eye on. like it can run a good amount of sets as well and scouting for it might be problematic. the best pokemon might be blissey / chansey to take its strong special attacks but even then, after the boost are removed from blissey and blissey is low enough it cannot come into a strong focus blast anymore, and almost the same goes for chansey when the eviolite is knock off during the game before.
lando i was and will be one of the strongest pokemon in the tier and with all these things explained above i feel like its def worth to keep an eye on in this gen as well, as it either blows you away with coverage or it just outspeeds a lot of scarfers after a rock polish and dents holes into the team.
so ya in the past gens it def was banworthy with all the points stated above.
Sheer Force and constant momentum with U-turn. Yes, it lost one of its tools in Hidden Power Ice to deal with... itself, but it doesn't really need that when a combination of Earth Power/Sludge Wave/ U-turn/Focus Blast/Psychic gives the genie damn near all it needs to blast giant holes into the enemy team and then just U-turn out thanks to a decently fast 101 base speed. It's just frustrating to deal with for something so fast and hits so hard.
Yeah Lando-I doesn’t seem like much on paper but Sheer Force is just a broken ability on a special attacker with the move pool to abuse it.
It’s the same reason Cinderace and Greninja are problematic. Most offensive Mons have one or two STABs and then some weaker coverage for situational use.
When ALL 4 of your moves hit like a truck and you can hit so many things super effectively it becomes... unmanageable.
It’s the same reason Cinderace and Greninja are problematic. Most offensive Mons have one or two STABs and then some weaker coverage for situational use.
When ALL 4 of your moves hit like a truck and you can hit so many things super effectively it becomes... unmanageable.
Finch may I ask when certain pokemon will be suspected or quick banned ?? will it be any time soon?
Simply put, Landorus-I is a wallbreaker that doesn't really have the flaws of other wallbreakers, well, to the same extent, and it pretty much amplifies everything that makes a wallbreaker good so much more. Landorus-I is near impossible to consistently switch into, its really fast, it has an amazing ability in Sheer Force, and its a threat to basically any playstyle. It's such a punishing Pokemon since it the drawbacks of clicking its incredibly powerful moves are pretty much negated since it doesn't take Life Orb recoil, on top of this. It barely gets worn down because the only way it really gets chipped is with status or Stealth Rock damage, which is an incredible advantage over other Pokemon because its immune to Spikes.
Then when you add its amazing coverage options, it becomes a nightmare to deal with, because its checks and counters change depending on the moves it has. Corviknight loses to Gravity, Blissey loses to Focus Blast, offensive teams lose to Rock Polish and defensive teams lose to Calm Mind, and that's not all it can do, it can use Knock Off, U-turn, and Rock Slide as well and still be hard to handle. The big thing is that Landorus-I can viably fit any of these moves into its move slots because the only move it really needs is Earth Power and arguably Sludge Wave. Overall, its an unpredictable, incredibly adaptable wallbreaker that lacks the flaws of being a wallbreaker other than not being too bulky. Which are the main reasons why its so good and and in my opinion, broken in the metagame.
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Flame Body Heatran is actually really interesting right now. Potential burns on all of Genesect, Dragapult, Rillaboom, Galarian Zapdos, Tornadus-T etc etc can be really clutch. Flash Fire mostly been useful for opposing Heatran so far but its not like you're a consistent answer to eachother anyway. Thinking about making the switch across on quite a few teams!
I would argue that Moltres is a better flame body user in this regard. It tanks hits from all of the aforementioned Pokemon sans maybe Torn-T and Dragapult better than Heatran can, and can threaten them all back with its STABs or heal with Roost. Moreover, in the wake of Cinderace's to the tier, there is somewhat of an opportunity cost to not having flash fire to sponge banded Pyro Balls.
Sure but we aren't comparing Pokemon with Flame Body. We're comparing the merits of Flame Body vs Flash Fire once you've already decided to use Heatran. Flame Body isn't the reason to use Heatran, but you may be tempted to use Flame Body just as gravy for the numerous Pokemon that try to U-turn on it. Moltres gets Flame Body too, yeah, and is (debatably) better against Torn-T and Dragapult, but it also loses out on all things that you decided to use Heatran for in the first place.
This is like saying that Torn-T makes better use of Regen than Slowbro. Like, great, but if I'm already deciding to use Tornadus-T because of its typing then knowing how good Slowbro is at using Regenerator is unimportant. Same abilities don't make Pokemon interchangeable in those roles, particularly when we're talking about defensive Flying types vs Steels types
Fair enough and all, but Moltres fulfills a similar defensive niche to Heatran in these examples. I don't think the Tornadus/Slowbro analogy is that applicable, as they have very different roles.
Moltres, in my opinion, outclasses Heatran in the niche of "defensive fire type with Flame Body to punish U-Turn". The crux of my point is that if one is to use Heatran in this metagame, it should probably be running Flash Fire to get the most out of its defensive capabilities; at the point that one is considering running Flame Body, they should also consider whether Moltres is just a better option for their team (or worth using in addition to minimize opportunity cost).
I'm pleasantly surprised with how good Swampert and Moltres are. It's nice seeing Pokemon from yesteryear be viable again especially in such a a hostile metagame.
As for quickbans I think the first ones to go should be Genesect and Lando-I. They both have far too much flexibilty to reliably counter and guessing wrong on a coverage move can often be curtains in a lot of games. Their flexibility makes them the most splashable mons in the tier and not running them can feel detrimental at times. Stuff like Naga and Blaziken are very strong I feel like there's at least some counter play to them I think they can stay a little while longer.
As for quickbans I think the first ones to go should be Genesect and Lando-I. They both have far too much flexibilty to reliably counter and guessing wrong on a coverage move can often be curtains in a lot of games. Their flexibility makes them the most splashable mons in the tier and not running them can feel detrimental at times. Stuff like Naga and Blaziken are very strong I feel like there's at least some counter play to them I think they can stay a little while longer.