Metagame NP: ZU Stage 5.2 - Grassy Seed Banned @68

[5Dots]

I like the team posted. The only issue i have with it is how Thwackey has swords dance paired with choice band. Would it do better with Wood hammer replaced or using eviolite instead of choice band?

 

[Tuthur]

[Unhealthy] can also be a state of the metagame. If the metagame has too much diversity wherein team building ability is greatly hampered and battling skill is drastically reduced, we may seek to reduce the number of good-to-great threats. This can also work in reverse; if the metagame is too centralized around a particular set of Pokemon, none of which are broken on their own, we may seek to add Pokemon to increase diversity.

This is from the Tiering Policy Framework and I think this statement describes very well the current slate of the ZU metagame. There is a wide variety from wallbreakers in the tier and it's almost impossible to build a reliable balance team because the walls covering for most threats don't overlap and you always need to pressure some threats offensively. This makes matchup for defensive teams extremely crucial as they can't cover everythin, i.e. they have to pick what wallbreakers they lose to.

Overall, I've found 2 wallbreakers to be the hardest to prepare for defensive teams: Magneton and Centiskorch.


Magneton's Choice Specs set has established as a key wallbreaker in ZU, with very limited defensive counterplay. Out of the S-A-B-ranks, only Galarian Stunfisk and Ferroseed reliably switch into it, as nicher options like Unovan Stunfisk, Specially Defensive Eldegoss, and Palpitoad work too but are far harder to justify. Ferroseed also has the problem of not having recovery outside of Leech Seed and not blocking Magneton's Volt Switch, meaning it gets worn down quickly by Magneton, whereas with Grassy Terrain support Galarian Stunfisk loses to Magneton because of Mimicry. Imo, the unhealthiest aspect of Magneton is its extremely hard hitting Volt Switch in a tier lacking Electric-immunities able to survive an Analytic boosted Flash Cannon (Silvally-Ground, Manectric, and Galarian Stunfisk mainly), meaning it's almost always going to get momentum and heavily damage something. Between its decent Speed tier and excellent defensive typing providing it notably a Toxic immunity, it's hard to pressure for defensive builds if they don't use one of the very specific answer as even super fat special walls like Audino can't switch into Choice Specs Analytic boosted Thunderbolt. While Ferroseed is a great mon, while not amazing at punishing Magneton, I think Galarian Stunfisk wouldn't be so good without Magneton in the tier (kinda like defensive Poliwrath when Sneasel was arround), as it is incredibly passive, has no recovery outside of Leftover, and fails to handle well most other special wallbreakers outside of Frosmoth.


Centiskorch was on the last voting slate and comes with less opportunity cost now that Lycanroc is gone. The defensive counterplay to Centiskorch has always been limited to few Pokemon in Qwilfish, Altaria, Golbat, Miltank, and Cramorant. The latter two have been falling off and weren't that great anyway as Leech Life is dealing insane damage to Miltank after two Fire Lash Defense drops and as Cramorant is OHKOed by Power Whip if it clicks Roost and OHKOed by Power Whip after Stealth Rock if it got previously hit by Knock Off. In spite of Centiskorch being a top wallbreaker since january, ZU didn't succeed to find more defensive counterplays. Golbat has been a very niche option that only fits on stall teams because of how much support it needs to work. Nothing else than these options can come safely into Centiskorch without fearing getting 2HKOed by Fire Lash into the right coverage move. Centiskorch has some flaws such as its quad-weakness to Stealth Rock meaning it needs Heavy-Duty Boots and to avoid Knock Off, missing a lot of OHKOes, and being weak to Toxic, however.

Offensively, the counterplay to both of these threats is more than enough, but defensively it is restrained. The former has several different answers but most of them are fringe or unreliable, while the later has fewer but is more easily pressured. I don't think any of these wallbreakers is broken, however the slate of the metagame being unhealthy, it leads to me to want to tackle one of them, preferably Magneton.

 

[Jett]

MAGNETON BECOMES ZU'S MAIN ATTRACTION
In a shocking turn of events, Magneton has risen up as one of the premier wallbreakers.​

From Jett | Mauville City | Wednesday 13th April 2021

It has been nearly two weeks since the April shifts occurred, and the effects of Vanilluxe's(right) departure have already been fully realised. Solid special attackers have remained a scarce resource over these past few months and this has been worsened by the recent tier shifts. Ultimately this has led many people to default to Magneton(below) as their choice of special attacker.

OTHER SPECIAL ATTACKERS

To understand Magneton's rise to prominence, we firstly have to look at its direct competition. Offensive special attackers can generally be split up into 3 different subclasses (granted some Pokemon fit into multiple categories), setup sweepers, stallbreakers, and wallbreakers, with Magneton residing in the latter group. Setup sweepers such as Ninetales and Frosmoth are in a decent spot in the metagame: the former has been on the rise ever since the removal of Magmortar. The aforementioned Pokemon have access to great coverage moves making them valuable assets in nearly all matchups. Stallbreakers such as Skuntank are also solid options in ZU albeit their effectiveness is slightly more matchup dependent than other special attackers; Uxie no longer being ubiquitous has hurt Skuntank's reliability.

However, both these subclasses (maybe with the exception of Frosmoth) lack the immediate power that wallbreakers such as Basculin, Thievul, and Magneton offer. What sets Magneton apart from special wallbreakers is its great defensive typing and its reliability. Despite being slower than both Basculin and Thievul meaning it cannot fulfil a cleaner role without Choice Scarf, access to amazing dual STAB and an incredible base 120 Special Attack makes Magneton far less situational than any of its competitors. Its mediocre Speed is rarely an issue as most walls are outsped by it, and most revenge killers cannot risk directly switching into its attacks. Other wallbreakers are far more reliant on their abilities - Basculin's non-STAB attacks are far weaker as they aren't boosted by Adaptability, while Thievul is only potent when Stakeout is at play. With this said, it is obvious why Magneton has seen a surge in usage in the current metagame.

TOO GOOD?

Especially in the past week, there have been several discussion on Magneton and whether it deserves to be suspect tested or even quickbanned, so I thought I might chime in with my own opinions. Choice Specs Magneton is one of the most difficult Pokemon to switch into, because of the lack of solid Volt Switch absorbers that can also shrug off its Analytic boosted Flash Cannon, with both Stunfisk formes and Palpitoad being some of the few Pokemon that can be considered reliable long term answers. Special walls such as Ferroseed are also solid answers to Choice Specs Magneton but cannot block its Volt Switch attempts, so must be paired with an Electric-immune Pokemon. Offensively there are some one time switch-ins such as Silvally-Ground, Manectric, and Alolan Dugtrio that outspeed Magneton and threaten it out to regain some momentum.

Eviolite Magneton may focus more on one of its other abilities Magnet Pull. This Magneton set can be paired with a Pokemon such as Rotom to lure in a Ferroseed or Galarian Stunfisk and cripple it with Trick, and then use Magneton to remove it thanks to Substitute and Magnet Rise respectively. These Steel-types are conveniently some of the better switch-ins to Choice Specs Magneton. Eviolite sets may still opt for Analytic as an ability and the freedom to switch moves can heavily punish teams that don't have a Pokemon that resist both moves.

Scarf Magneton is extremely niche set that I honestly haven't seen very often, but it can occasional catch people off guard, but in general you're better off using a Pokemon like Rotom or Manectric if you want an Electric-type to act as a cleaner or revenge killer.

That being said, Magneton obviously isn't without its flaws; the most glaring is its middling Speed tier means that it can be revenge killed fairly easily. While it can be difficult for these Pokemon to initially switch in, slow pivots can often stomach a hit or two, and safely bring in faster Pokemon to regain some momentum. Despite its solid defensive typing, most generic special walls are generally well equipped to deal with non-Choice Specs sets, while Choice Specs is heavily prediction reliant. A combination of an Electric Immunity and Steel-resistant Pokemon may be able to buy enough turns for your team to deal with opposing team before Magneton tears apart your own.

Overall, I think that we should be very careful when it comes to taking any action on special attackers given the current circumstances of the metagame. There is also a scarce number of viable special attackers and while this is not inherently a bad thing or problem, it is something you have to consider when looking at the direction the metagame is heading. On the topic of the direction of the metagame as a whole, I think that ZU is in a decent spot but it is a combination of cheese teams like Rain and Grassy Terrain being extremely painful to deal with depending on matchup, and borderline Pokemon being strong on several different archetypes that I think hold it back from being even better. It is very difficult to point at one thing at say it is the biggest problem because I feel these stretch the limits of teambuilding and make it difficult to prepare for everything, which is worsened by the fact that Gen 8 as a whole has kinda been a matchup fest for a lot of tiers and metagames. This may also be one of the reasons why some people believe that Offense and Stall are fine at the moment, but Balance suffers or is a lot more restricted because of the way it has to account for threats. Back to specifically Magneton, I believe it to be one of these borderline Pokemon so I'm not opposed to some sort of suspect test (I suppose I'd even support it) for it in the near future but I haven't completely made mind up on whether I would personally vote to ban it or not if given the opportunity to.

Please turn to Page 2 to find out about Palpitoad, the Magneton answer.

 

[gye5]

a very underated mon in the metagame. it is a mon that is really hard to switch around, a great physical a bulk that allow to take hits from the like of kanga, skorch and if needed vally ground. with stone edge, heat crash, eq and a filler move. Many mons like cuno, qwilfish and in some cases garb, run speed to creep skorch, so it means that with a damant nature it can outspeed both and if they start running more speed, means less bulk. Its main is the pitiful spe def, so stuff like rotom, basculin and other special attackers can scare it out, so watch out when using it, and also it isnt the fastest mon around so be careful when using it.
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8zu-1321337122-uewikaux1ypqyr7vddjsjhm2lf8jzrrpw
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8zu-1321419632

 

[5gen]

Hello all. ZU council decided to vote on Magneton for a council ban and it was banned unanimously. Here is the voting sheet. Tagging Kris or Marty to implement, thank you.

This may come as a surprise considering there was no formal announcement of a council vote. However, Magneton is the most pressing issue in ZU. There have been great posts in this thread regarding Magneton and recent discussions among council on Magneton and what to do. Magneton simply lacks defensive counterplay and is too effective of a wallbreaker for ZU. Teams must rely on otherwise mediocre Pokemon such as Stunfisk, Galarian Stunfisk (arguably), Lightning Rod Pincurchin, and Palpitoad. If teams did not pack these switch-ins, Magneton forced insane 50/50s. Due to its high power and great STABs, 50/50s are highly difficult calls to make because Pokemon risk being knocked out or heavily chipped. Moreover, Volt Switch adds another dynamic to playing against Magneton since it makes Magneton that much more difficult to revenge kill. For more reasoning, council members posted their explanations in the voting sheet.

 

[kay]

Lets talk about Sun because I think its a largely under rated playstyle right now.
So really the backbone of sun is just how insane Shiftry is with a sun speed boost with its ability to out speed every scarfer not named Cinccino, and with a single Growth boost its pretty much going to one shot the entire tier with its mixed heat wave set. If you get a free turn to set up with Shiftry you can literally just win the game off its back alone.

Outside Shiftry your abusers get a little more shaky, with Ivysaur and Leafeon being the main 2 ones with things like Exeggutor and Maractus as substitute options. Ivysaur's bulk and immunity to toxic gives it a lot of flexibility in setting up with Growth, especially against fat teams that can't really punish you. But its speed tier means you need to run Timid to order to out speed a lot of scarfers even under sun which leaves it a little lacking in power even after a +2 boost. Leafeon on the other hand is able to actually out speed even scarf Cinccino which is a feat not even Rain can accomplish. Sadly it lacks Growth so you'll have to make due with a mixed SD set but the fact that you're able to break Tangela and Ferroseed with a simple knock --> weather ball means it still does what you need it to do.

A weakness I've noticed while using sun though is unlike its counterpart in rain, you're much more pressured to find a free turn to set up a Growth/SD with Sun because you lack a Ludicolo type mon that's able to not only self set and abuse, but also just have rain up and have immediate breaking power. The closest you get is Shiftry but you really want to be saving that as opposed to using it early to break apart teams. But when you do find free turn(s) to set up your ceiling is so much much higher than rain which keeps sun very relevant and very scary.

My initial impressions of sun is that its pretty much on par with rain in terms of viability so I've left my sun team I've been using here for anyone wanting to try it. (Kebia Berry on Leafeon means you can freely click SD vs Tangela and Skuntank teams and still reliably beat them)
And here is a replay of sun in action with an older version of the team that really showcases how broken Shiftry can be.

 

[gye5]

I wanna talk about to mons I would like to see in ZU once again for now.
, lets start saying that this mons is a very dangerous wallbreaker, that I think It will benefit many teams in the wallbreaking departament and it has some checks that can abuse its speed tier, its defense arent great, so it has to watch out for attacks. With stuff like audino, articuno and tangela(with vital spirit it can come on sleep powder) magmortar will be a healthy presence for the meta, making sure that mire defensive teams wont be a big concern for most teams, with good and splashable wall breaker for that role. If someone still doubting about checks well, we have vally ground, that is very popular, kanga that revenge kill it, centiskorch, nintelales that has become popular and the less common appletun.

This mon didnt really have a chance in the tier, because it was banned alongside other broken stuff. So I a retest has to be done, mons like skunktank, audino can take its hits, other mons like kanga, scarf rotom, scarf sawk and many other can check it depending on the set. With everything running knock off, it wont have many chances to switch and tying with the vallies isnt great. But its offensive power is really good, helping teams to break stuff like tangela, clefairy, alcremie, uxie and disrupting things like audino and pyukumuku, all depending on the set, so the list could be larger. So now that many things had been banned, its time to retest some mons. People tend to be scare about offensive mons more often than not, and we should start looking the positive of this mons being in the metagame.

 

[viet noa]

I wanna talk about to mons I would like to see in ZU once again for now.
, lets start saying that this mons is a very dangerous wallbreaker, that I think It will benefit many teams in the wallbreaking departament and it has some checks that can abuse its speed tier, its defense arent great, so it has to watch out for attacks. With stuff like audino, articuno and tangela(with vital spirit it can come on sleep powder) magmortar will be a healthy presence for the meta, making sure that mire defensive teams wont be a big concern for most teams, with good and splashable wall breaker for that role. If someone still doubting about checks well, we have vally ground, that is very popular, kanga that revenge kill it, centiskorch, nintelales that has become popular and the less common appletun.

This mon didnt really have a chance in the tier, because it was banned alongside other broken stuff. So I a retest has to be done, mons like skunktank, audino can take its hits, other mons like kanga, scarf rotom, scarf sawk and many other can check it depending on the set. With everything running knock off, it wont have many chances to switch and tying with the vallies isnt great. But its offensive power is really good, helping teams to break stuff like tangela, clefairy, alcremie, uxie and disrupting things like audino and pyukumuku, all depending on the set, so the list could be larger. So now that many things had been banned, its time to retest some mons. People tend to be scare about offensive mons more often than not, and we should start looking the positive of this mons being in the metagame.

i can understand the sentiment behind unbanning magmortar, but looking at the viability rankings, there’s not many pokémon at all that can switch into magmortar. besides alcremie, and maybe cofa & uxie, who can consistently switch into a specs magmortar?

 

[gye5]

I wanna talked about 4 things that are being discussed by the council rn.
ground, well I think this the most problematic one of the four, first it doesnt struggle with coverage, so this gonna be a very dangerous attacker that is hard to wall for teams lacking stuff like tangela, avalugg and pyku. Its good defenses let this mons set up easier than most sweeper and blocking volt que switch from rotom is very use, and makes a great pair with kanga. Also this mon can use mix sets that let beats its common counter but they arent used as much. The main issue with this mon is that many teams run similar structure to avoid getting swept easily, most balance teams run tangela for example and this make building harder. We have had this mon for a while and it at least deserves a suspect test, it is broken but not as much as thing we had already banned.

wont go much on this, is good wallbreaker but this aint broken, the same stuff that checks gurdurr and sawk helps with this and its struggle with kanga and vally ground. This is a fine mon, no need to ban this or suspected.

I thought this was broken, but more and more things are being run like thwakey, cuno and other grasses. But I still think this is bordeline broken and I wouldnt mind a suspect test about this.

Unlike rain, this is harder to use but sometimes even more lethal. Many stall teams are using Alt and ditto, that pretty much makes ur life difficult, Kay said many things about sun, so I wont say much. I think a way to solve this is starting to use semi sun teams, giving more slot to stuff that can deal with the sun checks first.

Please do not quickban, I think the community should be the one deciding this, this are threats that have been for while, so everyone can have the freedom to vote. Two options, suspect test or surveys.

 

[Pabloaram]

If someone didn't know we gain Aurorus and Vanilluxe this month. Mostly because of the Snow Warding ban in NU.

About the new mon, Aurorus is by far the only usefull of the two.
Being a Stealth rock setter that can beat (kinda) the legendary Ice bird Articuno or a setup swepper.

Aurorus Set

Stealh Rocks (Aurorus) @ Power Herb / Heavy Duty Boots
Ability: Refrigerate
EVs: 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Stealth Rock
- Hyper Voice
- Freeze-Dry
- Meteor Beam / Ancient Power

This set could use Ancient Power as his rock STAB but the lack of dmg is noticiable against Cuno. Heavy Duty Boots is a option if you dont want to take hazzard damage but remember Meteor Beam is a 2 turns moves

Swepper (Aurorus) @ Power Herb
Ability: Refrigerate
EVs: 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Rock Polish
- Meteor Beam
- Hyper Voice
- Freeze-Dry

This moveset is more setup and go. Could work better with screen support from Uxie.
At +2 is faster than Jolly Scarf Sawk

Vanilluxe lack a good niche other than a Ice Type with taunt. Rotom-F outclassed in the wallbreak department and Uxie in the screen setter job.

Have a nice week...

 

[S1nn0hC0nfirm3d]

​

If someone didn't know we gain Aurorus and Vanilluxe this month. Mostly because of the Snow Warding ban in NU.

About the new mon, Aurorus is by far the only usefull of the two.
Being a Stealth rock setter that can beat (kinda) the legendary Ice bird Articuno or a setup swepper.

Aurorus Set

Stealh Rocks (Aurorus) @ Power Herb / Heavy Duty Boots
Ability: Refrigerate
EVs: 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Stealth Rock
- Hyper Voice
- Freeze-Dry
- Meteor Beam / Ancient Power

This set could use Ancient Power as his rock STAB but the lack of dmg is noticiable against Cuno. Heavy Duty Boots is a option if you dont want to take hazzard damage but remember Meteor Beam is a 2 turns moves

Swepper (Aurorus) @ Power Herb
Ability: Refrigerate
EVs: 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Rock Polish
- Meteor Beam
- Hyper Voice
- Freeze-Dry

This moveset is more setup and go. Could work better with screen support from Uxie.

Vanilluxe lack a good niche other than a Ice Type with taunt. Rotom-F outclassed in the wallbreak department and Uxie in the screen setter job.

Have a nice week...

Thank you so much!! I was actually in the middle of making my own post about the new mons. I'll put that below.

New Mons!

New shifts! ZU regained Aurorus and Vanilluexe after their short stunt in NU, only to drop after a Snow Warning ban. That ban also affects us in ZU, so these two once super-potent special Ice-types are heavily nerfed.

Aurorus @ Power Herb / Focus Sash
Ability: Refrigerate
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Meteor Beam / Earth Power
- Stealth Rock
- Hyper Voice / Encore
- Freeze-Dry

Aurorus @ Power Herb
Ability: Refrigerate
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Meteor Beam
- Rock Polish
- Hyper Voice
- Freeze-Dry

Aurorus @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Refrigerate
EVs: 252 HP / 144 SpD / 112 Spe
Calm Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Freeze-Dry
- Earth Power
- Stealth Rock
- Toxic / Stone Edge

Aurorus losing Snow Warning basically means it has the inferior Refrigerate + Hyper Voice combo to rely on compared to its old Blizzard + hail chip. This isn't that big of a nerf but still notable. I know I used to like Meteor Beam + Stealth Rock as a wallbreaker that fit SR, and that's probably just as true today with the limited switch-ins to its coverage. It can also try a full suicide lead variant with Focus Sash and Earth Power for Galarian Stunfisk and Encore for other leads. Otherwise though I still think Rock Polish sets are pretty potent, outspeeding common Choice Scarf Pokemon like Rotom and Sawk and can still be a decent wallbreaker to threaten Tangela and Altaria. Then there's something a little more experimental I had in mind: maybe SpD? It's very bulky, which makes it great to for some natural bulk to setup / wallbreak, but I wonder if the consistency of pressuring p much every Defogger and Spinner with Freeze-Dry + EP and then the threat of Toxic makes me think it could potentially be a sleeper stallbreaker. Despite a lack of resistances, its decent Speed and neutral MUs against Rotom, Skuntank, and even Frosmoth if you wanted Stone Edge could justify its use.

Vanilluxe @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Weak Armor
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Ice Beam
- Freeze-Dry
- Toxic
- Taunt

Vanilluxe lost a lot. It's Ice beam is a lot weaker compared to Blizzard + Snow Warning chip, but hey, it was still an A- rank mon last we had it, and that was in a meta with Magneton. It probably is still workable as a stallbreaker, but there's totally competition now with NP Jynx in comparison. The advantage Vanilla has is really just Freeze-Dry, and maybe u can play off Weak Armor to clean in some late-game scenarios, but overall this was a notable nerf. Don't discount it completely!

Council Minutes!!!
​

Council Minutes for ZU is always more of a recording than an announcement, as like I have always said when doing these, ZU council chats are almost completely public. Every meta and VR related discussion can be viewed in real time in ZU's Discord, and the remainder of this post will be my thoughts along with what was discussed recently with the council.

Joy and Pain, are like Sunshine and Rain!

Council has acknowledged two weathers as being potentially problematic with limited counterplay. Rain previously plagued ZU metagames this generation, and unlike simply banning Drednaw and Ludicolo, there's a lot more rain abusers like Kabutops, Poliwrath, even Hurricane Noctowl was used on a rain team in seasonal. Then there's sun, which hasn't been around long as rain in terms of popular use, but a lot more of the community has started picking it up. Sun tears through passive mons like Audino, Tangela, and Ferroseed that can't do much against boosted Grass / Fire coverage. Counterplay is limited to play against both, especially when Kangaskahn and Piloswine only handles Sun sweepers, and Thwackey and Tangela only handle Rain.

Still, most of us are not the most convinced of sun yet, but maybe sun could be over the edge. I personally spent the better half of this week testing sun independently and with teammates, and I came to an underwhelming conclusion. I had a hard time with sun, my teammates had a hard time with sun, I even beat sun a good amount of times in room tours. Granted I was using some secret sauce that I'll explain below, but at its best, Sun rn is in a weird state of "either the sweepers 6-0 or I lose" with little in between.

Of course there's good fundamental arguments for a sun ban, and I don't want my personal experience to discredit the whole. Sometimes sun comes down to a roll or a 50/50 and the playstyle is so close to being overwhelming. I think it's best to give it a little more time, check out a how UMPL finishes up, and we'll come to a conclusion on what to do thereafter. To me, sun and would only be one of many potentially unhealthy aspects of the metagame, and I'm not sure if nerfing it first is worthwhile before we tackle individual mons.

Rain, however, was a lot more decisive: Do we ban something to check it, do ban the entire playstyle, or is there nothing wrong? Rain is a sample team it's so prevalent and some seasonal players use it every round. Kabu + Ludi compliment eachother very well, and a setup sweeper or wallbreaker is all rain needs to poke holes for those sweepers to excel. Some of us think that Ludi is the issue, especially with its great coverage and being the best specially-based Swift Swim user. Others think that even with 1 or 2 bans, rain would still be an issue! In that event, it could be worth it to just ban Damp Rock and nerf rain indefinitely. Either option has precedents: we certainly banned rain sweepers like Drednaw in the past, and PU has banned Heat Rock + NU banned Snow Warning to avoid banning too many of the same broken aspects of a playstyle. Personally? I'm still not the most convinced if rain needs a ban, but I'm a minority here. A rain ban certainly has its perks, and if there was one route to go I'd go for banning Damp Rock more than trying to pick off the many rain sweepers we have.

Other Threats:

Besides weather, Frosmoth, Centiskorch, and Silvally-Ground have seen ban support from council and community members. Frosmoth is commonly forgoing Substitute for Hurricane to beat the influx of Fire-types like Ninetales and Rapidash, although they still need chip damage at +1 for it to KO. Its support can easily wear down its checks like Ferroseed, Galarian Stunfisk, and Articuno; still, there is a ton of Ferroseed usage as of late as a splashable Frosmoth check. Centi does pretty much the same things it does when we first voted on it. The DNB arguments hold up for the most part and if anything the reason why people may have changed their minds is simply power creep due to bigger titans to tackle back then. Centi is clearly very rewarding and nearly unstoppable, with defensive checks still hating Knock Off. Supportive Rapidash is picking up steam but that still hates Knock Off and at bests trades Toxic against Coil sets. Even Silvally-Ground has ban support for being super good and checks all hating U-turn. Tangela is everywhere (for a lot of reasons) but even that loses momentum vs the fast and powerful Silvally-Ground. I compared its checks and counters to the already banned Sneasel, and ultimately while they both had limited checks, I think we all agreed that Silvally-Ground both had more defensive answers and offensive answers with Gourgiest-Small and Basculin easily revenge killing it, and others like Ninetales, Rapidash, and even Choice Specs Manectric being plausible as well with chip damage.

What we vote on and when we vote is still up in the air. Quickbans aren't out of the question, but personally I'd still favor a suspect test.

I hope this post summarized the main points of contention between council in the past week or so. Expect more from us as UMPL inevitably unearths more support for different bans and strategies. Oh and one more thing: have you heard of Choice Band Articuno?

​

CB Cuno takes advantage of a mostly unresisted STAB combo of Flying / Ice and two strong attacks to boast: Brave Bird and Tripple Axel. The extra power of CB makes me perfer this set compared to just an offensive HDB set, but this means the mon needs a ton of support. I opted for Hattrem as a go-to hazard deterrent to buy some time, and Palpitoad to check the three notable mons resistant to Articuno's STAB attacks: Kabutops, Coallasol, and Rotom-F. Is this set worth this NFE support? Yeah, I think so, it's a lot of fun and super strong. I've also had a lot of good results for whatever reason, and I thought I'd share the good times with everybody else :)

Team: https://pokepast.es/2ba8c2c8199cc69d
Replays:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8zu-1332266602
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8zu-1331656162
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8zu-1331758936

 

[kay]

but at its best, Sun rn is in a weird state of "either the sweepers 6-0 or I lose" with little in between.

I think this puts it perfectly. Suns in an extremely volatile state of either completely blowing someone out of the water without any room for counter play, or looking totally lack luster depending on the match up. And the match ups more often than not come down to a cluster of pokemon working together to wall out sun as opposed to using specific pokemon to help vs sun. Something like Coalossal/Rapidash isn't enough on its own to beat sun, but something like Coalossal/Rapidash + Garbodor can be enough to wall out sun whereas on the other hand something like Coalossal/Rapidash + Qwilfish isn't, even though Qwilfish and Garbodor are normally seen as completely interchangeable on a lot of teams. That makes it extremely frustrating for both players because you're both just rolling the dice and hoping on the match up. While it lacks the overall positive match ups that rain has, its extremely polarizing in its match ups where you're either 100-0 or 0-100 in a way no other play style can claim and its extremely frustrating for both people and not very healthy for just how easy and thoughtless it is to play.

Do we ban something to check it, do ban the entire playstyle, or is there nothing wrong?

Rain has the same issue outlined with sun of just how match up fishing it can be and just how strong it is compered to the ease and thoughtless play needed to pilot it but it trades its 100-0 match ups to have better overall match ups. You no longer bank on them not having specific cores and instead rely on them to not have specifically made rain counters. It loses the power ceiling that sun has but the greatly increased consistency makes it a much stronger threat in my eyes and I'd personally advocate for a ban on the weather rocks as opposed to banning a rain abuser. Ludicolo is the main problem when it comes to rain but rain can still totally function in the same unhealthy match up check capacity that it currently can by swapping Ludicolo out for another rain abuser such as BD Poliwrath, Taunt SD Qwilfish, or even Dreadnaw depending on which you weren't using already. Rain has plenty of other options and I'm not sure a Ludicolo ban does enough to actually fix the problem.
That and setting the precedent for us of banning the weather rocks gives us an easier time in the future if we address sun and even hail as problematic elements in the meta. We can fall back to this and have a very easy way to address other forms of weather if the need arises without having to keep 3-4 mons on the banlist just to keep all 3 rocks. Now this is assuming sun ends up being problematic, and that pu does drop the hail abusers that are quickly falling down to zu and that it ends up being problematic too. Its a lot of ifs but I think its a way cleaner way of doing things that keeps as much of the meta intact while also dealing with the problematic elements. The last thing I want to do if we have to do something about weather now and then go back and do what NU had to do and unban some stuff and start banning the rocks like we could've from the start.


As for my thoughts on Centiskorch, Silvally-ground, and Frosmoth; I'm pretty indifferent. While I think you can make a case against them, its shown that the meta is fully equipped with dealing with them and while they are the real threats of the metagame, they're also totally manageable. Each of them takes time, planning, and effort to break past defensive cores and its an extremely skill intensive battle of resource management and team building. The level of centralization around them has been rather healthy and I don't see a pressing need to ban them.

 

[Hitmonstars]

Just gonna post my thoughts here on the mons being discussed rn
Sun
Sun I feel is the most interesting playstyle rn,when it works it's absolutely amazing and dealing with sun after it's setup is near impossible,however sun when sun struggles to setup it really struggles I'm mixed on this one

Rain
Unlike sun where idk if something will be banned I'm very sure something will be banned for Rain whether it's Ludicolo or Damp rock,I personally prefer Damp rock as I feel that Ludicolo (Being the best abuser) being banned will not solve the problem of Rain being broken, Ludicolo will simply be replaced with another mon and rain teams will still continue to be broken.Rain has proven to be incredibly powerful with the common team of Uxie,Liepard,Kabutops,Ludicolo, Qwilfish and a grass resist being incredibly powerful and ripping through basically everything.Unlike sun,Rain finds it alot easier to setup and abuse it's weather making it alot more consistent.


Frosmoth and Centiskorch
These mons are fine imo,the meta has the tools and options to deal with them and I feel like they provide a healthy presence.

Silvally-ground
I feel like this is the most overated mon rn,while it doesn't have many counters, it's checks are common and tangela is starting to become very common,While it can be really strong it's checks are too common for me to call it overwelming.

 

[czim]

​

Due to the increased talk on tackling rain and some people wanting to ban Damp Rock I'm gonna talk about why we should be banning Ludicolo instead of killing the whole playstyle by banning Damp Rock. Personally, I think what pushes Ludicolo over the edge is that it doesn't need a turn to setup like the other abusers of rain (or sun). Shiftry, Qwilfish, Ivysaur, Kabutops, Leafeon, Poliwrath (whatever else u add here) will always need to setup before being able to break teams reliably. Ludicolo, on the hand, has the breaking power right off the bat with its usable special attack and godlike coverage that makes it a nightmare to wall because well, it's unwallable. Common special walls like Wishiwashi, Articuno, Audino and even the uncommon ones like Cryogonal, Eldegoss and Golbat are 2HKOed easily with minimal support/chip, heavily limiting its switchins. The few exceptions to this are Cramorant (which is pretty much the only good counter), Ferroseed (that can get bopped by Focus Blast and cant rly do anything back) and Type:Null, which gets worn down and relies on rest.
But why is that turn so important? Well, first of all, all the other abusers burn 1 turn of weather while setting up. This might not look like a huge deal but when you add that up with the fact that you actually get a free turn to actually go to a counter or pick a sack so you can revenge the said abuser it becomes a huge chance to grab momentum for the player facing rain. And then we get to issue #2, Ludicolo is bulky and harder to revenge with Priority than all the other abusers on common weathers. All the other abusers listed (with the exception of Qwilfish) are weak to at least one of Thwackey's (Or Grookey if you're Quantum Tesseract) Grassy Glide, Piloswine's (or Froslass') Ice Shard, or Gurdurr's Mach Punch. Also they're usually frail enough to not like taking Kangaskhan's combo of Fake Out+Sucker Punch (Kabu and Poli don't care that much for this one). Ludicolo doesn't take Choice Band Grassy Glide well though, so i'll give it that.
That pretty much sums up why I think Ludicolo is the issue instead of the playstyle as a whole. If I am wrong and the playstyle keeps being problematic, I am down for a Damp Rock ban, but for now it is definitely overkill in my eyes.
Also, no Water type that OHKOes Palpitoad can be balanced

​

Just gonna talk about these briefly. Centiskorch has limited hard counters such as Qwilfish and Altaria but its reliance on boots, awful speed and predictability makes it easy to punish with Knock or Toxic with pretty much anything that would be able to give it a free switchin. Frosmoth was somewhat borderline during last meta but with Articuno dropping and giving the tier another splashable hard counter to it I've been finding it really hard to use consistently and despite being strong is not by any means broken. Silvally-Ground is the most controversial of the 3 since like Centiskorch is has limited switchins with the added bonus of U-turning on them or luring the Grass-types like Tangela and Gourgeist with good special coverage. But it is also somewhat predictable, sits in a crowded speed tier which makes it easier to revenge, and lacks durability to be as strong as it looks on paper. Overall, I'd say Silv-Ground could be suspected in the future and I'd personally be down for it.

 

[Tuthur]

So, I also wanted to give my inputs to the discussions on the concerning elements and weather, in particular.

Taking tiering actions on archetypes is always very tricky as it's not about a specific element being broken, but rather a combination of several elements. I invite you to read the Drought in Lower Tiers Policy Review thread, since ZU is facing something similar to what other Lower Tiers faced pre-DLC1.

There are two main points from this thread I want to emphasize :

2. LOWER TIERS AND NON-POKEMON/CONDITIONAL BANS

As a general rule, non-Pokemon or conditional bans should only be occurring at the OU or site-wide level (and even then only rarely).

Tiers below OU are predicated on being restricted to a certain subset of Pokemon. This is reflected in everything from our general tiering philosophy to the PS teambuilder. When issues in our tiers arise, this means we should be looking at modifying this subset of Pokemon in order to address such issues, rather than looking at broader bans such as abilities or items.

In general, if you are leading a non-OU tier, before any non-Pokemon ban is considered, you will need to demonstrate that all other attempts at dealing with a potential issue were unsuccessful. And if an element is so broadly unhealthy that it deserves to be banned across the board, that is probably a discussion that is beyond the scope of a single tiering council.

PU went ahead and banned Drought+Heat Rock. We did not agree with the idea that we had to try to ban individual mons first, that's way more collateral damage and nobody thought it would solve the issue. Our bans also don't impact any higher tiers so this doesn't resolve the issue, but it at least deserves a mention.

So, had we to take actions on rain or sun, we would need to either ban one Pokémon or prove that banning one wouldn't solve the issue, before banning Heat/Damp Rock.

Now, off with the tiering policy, I'm giving my thoughts on the weathers themselves.
Rain

These 5 Pokémon are in almost every rain team. The last member often being a Grass-resist like Garbodor, Altaria, Perrserker, Articuno or Noctowl that can help with Thwackey and some other threats. Ludicolo, Kabutops, and Qwilfish are, in my opinion, all equaly good. I think that the combination of these three forms a deadly offensive core that is extremely hard to defensive cover and almost impossible to offensively pressure, it is very restraining to build for these three and that's why I think the playstyle is broken and should be banned asap. czim explained pretty well in his post which is write above mine, why Ludicolo was super powerful. However, I have to disagree with it being better than Kabutops and Qwilfish. Ludicolo may be able to 2HKO the whole metagame under rain, it struggles to get OHKOes against bulkier threats. This means wasting Rain turns versus Ludicolo isn't that tough, unlike Kabutops and Qwilfish that can OHKO pretty much everything after a Swords Dance and some chip damages. Furthermore, Ludicolo gets outsped the fast scarfers: Manectric, Cinccino, and Alolan Persian, unlike the two Swords Dancer, meaning it has more offensive counterplay.
Had we to ban a Pokémon to solve the rain issue, which would it be? Kabutops could be easily replaced by Drednaw that trades a worse Speed tier for being able to OHKO Tangela with +2 Life Orb Megahorn, so it wouldn't change anything. Qwilfish is a more unique threat and there is no perfect replacement for it, however banning it would mean losing its defensive sets that are amazing in the tier and would just cause more chaos. This is not a strong argument to keep Qwilfish in the tier, in fact it is more to say that between banning two equally and irreplaceable rain abusers, I would rather ban the one that is not a top tier with its other sets. Is Ludicolo irreplaceable though? I think it is for the simple reason, no other rain abuser can threaten Water-types and Grass-types simultaneously, while being a reliable rain setter. The closest replacement would be Articuno and Raichu that are far easier to revenge kill because they lack Swift Swim and that are far less threatening because they lack STAB on Water moves. All in all, just like czim, I think Ludicolo is the best choice for a rain abuser ban.
However, a little voice in my head tells me banning Ludicolo wouldn't solve the issue and rain would still be too much. We have tons of possible replacements (Articuno, Drednaw, Golduck, Poliwrath, and Raichu just to name a few) that could break Ludicolo less rain. If so, the correct move would be to ban Damp Rock just like PU banned Heat Rock before banning abusers. At the moment, I am more leaning to ban Ludicolo over Damp Rock, because Ludicolo less Rain teams are still almost non existent and I don't want to base my vote on theorymoning. I'll test Ludicolo less rain over the following days, because banning Ludicolo over Damp Rock could make us lose valuable weeks.

Sun

Unlike rain, I am actually not convinced sun is broken. Only Shiftry is outstanding in sun teams, since the other breakers are very fine. The main issue is that Shiftry is impossible to wall after a Growth under sun and is only revenge killed by priorities like Kangaskhan's repeated Fake Out, Gurdurr's Mach Punch and Piloswine's Ice Shard. The few checks to Shiftry are easily weakened by the other abusers. Overall, sun seemed like a hit or miss playstyle most of the time, but it appears to have more hit matchups than miss at the moment. Is it because it is new? Or is it because Shiftry is stupid? To be honest, I haven't made my mind on it yet. The only thing I can tell is that Shiftry is what makes sun so good currently, thus we can't justify banning Heat Rock and it's all on banning Shiftry or not, regardless of its sets outside of sun teams.


I have been very pro ban on Centiskorch, however I have changed my mind recently. With the rise of Utility Rapidash and Rock-moves being easier to justify with Articuno in the tier, Centiskorch isn't as threatening as it used to. I still think it is a top mon and that we should keep an eye on it, however it's not as great as it used to be and is definitely not quickbanworthy and I don't think suspect worthy.


Most teams naturally fit several checks to Frosmoth and it is very hard for it to sweep with Quiver Dance. I think it's the less problematic Pokémon discussed even if I understand the concerns.


Silvally-Ground is extremely tough to answer without Tangela as most Ground resists are nailed by Rock coverage and are slower than Silvally-Ground. U-turn is also able to chip checks like Alolan Persian and Uxie, while outright demolishing Grass-types that aren't physdef Eldegoss or Tangela. It is not as concerning as weather but it definitely should stay under radar and get suspect tested as soon as we finish with weather.

 

[Pabloaram]

In my opinion, the two weather are diferent in the way of who o what needed to be ban.
When rain has so many abuser (Ludi being the stronger in the special end) they are interchangeable, like kabu for drednaw for instance, meaning that banning a abuser or two isn't game breaking or anything. This is way i am pro ban on Damp Rock. This make full rain team not a "viable" playstile but thing like Ludicolo can still use Rain Dance set somewhat efficiently.
In the other side, Sun has 1 only real problem: Shiftry. Shiftry has no posible counterplay at +2 other than priority, wich make him the most opresive aspect of Sun teams. My ban is 100% Shiftry. The rest of abuser aren't as hard to wall making Sun team "viable" - coinflip at least- with Shiftry out of the picture.

The other three: Both bug (Centi and Moth) isn't as problematic rn. The presence of Cuno make running Rock coverage a must in team making Centi not as treatening and Cuno inself being a pretty good check to Frostmoth.
GroundVally, in the other hand, need to go, not now bc the weather are more important/problematic but sometime after he need to go aswell

 

[kay]

So with most of the UMPL games coming to a close this week for ZU, I wanted to take a second to highlight some of the meta shifts we've been seeing, both with what was brought and what's seeing a lot more play.

Cramorant was the hero this week of UMPL. Its something I've been spamming the past week and it really caught on for its ability to check extreme threats in the tier like Centiskorch, Frosmoth, scouted scarf Sawk, Tales, and Basculin. And while it wont hold them back forever, it gives you a check to play for against some of the hardest hitters in the tier which can be the difference between losing and winning which can really take the pressure off your defensive core considering it also compress this into your hazard removal slot. Surf + BB + Gulp Missile is also extremely hard to play against because just by breaking this you're also breaking your own team which makes this a pain to revenge kill or force out given almost all our water resists right now people are running lose to it. It might look a little shaky on paper but anyone whose played against a well played Cramorant knows just how much hell you're in for some times.

bulky Cram

Cramorant @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Gulp Missile
EVs: 248 HP / 204 Def / 40 SpD / 16 Spe
Timid Nature
- Surf
- Brave Bird
- Defog
- Roost

nascar Cram

Cramorant @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Gulp Missile
EVs: 248 HP / 8 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Surf
- Brave Bird
- Defog
- Roost

These are the two EV sets I've been running and would recommend people use. The bulky set is EVd to out speed skorch with the speed, 40 sp.d avoids the 2hko from Ninetales +2 Energy Ball, and the rest in physdef helps you switch in better against Centiskorch and Sawk. The nascar set on the other hand is much better in the cram mirror and also out speed Skuntank which can help you if you're really struggling against it as you'll live a +2 sludge which means you're getting 2 rounds of Surf + Gulp Missile hits which is more than enough to deal with it.

So while we all know Rotom is extremely good, what everyone until recently didn't know was just how good non choiced sets were because of their ability to hard abuse all the ground types, notably Silvally-ground. Much like Cramorant, Sitrus berry Rotom with Wisp Hex Defog has been something that has over preformed for me and caught on after catching quite a few Vally-ground's with burns while they were expecting a scarf set and used Silvally-ground as a middle ground switch in. Its also able to break past both the Stunfisk, Piloswine, Rhydon, and even the god mon Palp with Wisp + Hex over the course of a game, and that pressure allows you to freely volt around with no worry against a lot of teams. Sitrus has been the go-to item thanks to its ability to bluff scarf while also helping you keep taking Silvally-ground U-turns and Garbodor Gunk shots throughout a match but items like Boots, Spell Tag, Colbur, and even Lefties are extremely good too.

Its not just limited to hex wisp sets because sub NP largely abuses the same ground types but in a more direct manor as you're able to use both Vally-ground and Stunfisks as set up fodder and have an incredible match up into fat and stall teams. I think the more we're seeing non choiced Rotom come up, the less we're going to see Vally-ground outside of dedicated Spike stack.

The infamous Tangdash core that's been hyped up a lot these past 2 weeks, and for good reason. Tangela is at the core of the metagame and utility Rapidash almost perfectly covers for Tangela's weaknesses and can pivot your defensive core into a really harsh grind game if your offensive core can't quite break through. But lately even bulky SD rapidash has even come up in place of the Toxic sets to have a more proactive game plan while still keeping all the same defensive niche that the toxic sets have, just with a more complex game plan vs Centiskorch.

Its mind blowing to me this mon isn't more popular. While it does see use, its really not enough because if there's one mon in the tier I had to call sleeper OP its this. While its game plan is rather straightforward of set up and sweep, there's actually so much flexibility in its set that you have to account for when playing against it and all of them have different counter play. I'd say the "standard" set is CM + Acid armor with Stored power and Rest but you have options like Dgleam over Stored Power, Mystical Fire over Acid Armor, Recover over Rest, and even Chesto berry as an item. Due to all of this you can't even really just slap a dark type on a team and feel fine vs Cremie as you'll just instantly lose if they're the Dgleam sets and steels that might be a middle play vs both Dgleam and Stored power might just lose to Mystical Fire. And once this gets going if you're not packing the right counter you'll almost always lose within 1-2 turns unless you manage to crit it. More people need to abuse how flexible this is.

 

[5gen]

Hello all, I'm here to announce that the ZU Council will be voting on Damp Rock and Shiftry (Sunday deadline). Here is the voting sheet we will be using.

Rain has proven to be a major issue and building constrain in the current metagame due to how effective and consistent rain sweepers are. Rain has a variety of sweepers such as Ludicolo, Kabutops, Qwilfish, and Drednaw that are very difficult for teams to prepare for and make rain relatively consistent. As such, rain has a constraining effect on the metagame and nearly everyone considers that an aspect of rain must be addressed.

In the current generation, there is precedent to address either the item (Damp Rock) or the sweeper(s) (i.e Ludicolo). Because of this, council had to deliberate, discuss, and vote on how we want to address rain. To remove Damp Rock would be to strongly nerf rain as a play style. Numerous posts in this thread have went into detail and present strong arguments to target Damp Rock in particular. To summarize, the argument to ban Damp Rock over a sweeper such as Ludicolo is that rain has a multitude of effective sweepers ( such as Poliwrath (Belly Drum or LO special), Golduck, and Electric-types like Raichu) that that may fill the void and continue to be an issue. Moreover, another part of the argument is which sweeper should be targeted and will it really make rain manageable?

The other option was to target Ludicolo over Damp Rock. The argument here is that Ludicolo is the most threatening aspect of rain and its removal would make rain manageable because it would (in theory) give teams more flexibility in how they prepare for rain. For example, that removing Ludicolo would make soft checks to rain like Jellicent, Wishiwashi, Poliwrath, CB Thwackey, Tangela, etc more effective and easier to fit. Another part of the argument against banning Damp Rock is that rain is not so threatening that it should be nerfed completely before addressing any sweeper. Speaking on behalf of myself and not the council, I believe this is a valid and compelling argument. While rain is pretty constraining and relatively consistent, it is not so dominant that it has a super high success rate. I also find Ludicolo to be the most threatening aspect and limiting factor of rain. Removing it could free up counterplay enough to make rain manageable (aforementioned soft checks). However, there's also Drednaw who can break through pretty much anything. That being said, you get into an argument of how constraining is rain (i.e amount of sweepers available to rain and how constraining rain makes team building), which makes the whole discussion more layered.

We will also be voting on Shiftry mainly for its sun sweeper set. On sun, Shiftry outspeeds most of the boosted metagame and is considerably difficult to switch into. Between Knock Off, Solar Blade, and Heat Wave, few Pokemon can check Shiftry defensively. However, sun as a play style is relatively inconsistent and Pokemon like Alcremie, Gurdurr, Colbur Uxie, Kangaskan, Skuntank, etc can soft check Shiftry and help players play around it.

Anyway, looking forward to this vote and what people have to say. Sheet here again for reference.

 

[Pabloaram]

Lets go!!!!

 

[5gen]

Results are in for the Damp Rock and Shiftry vote: Damp Rock is banned with a 5-1 majority and Shiftry remains unbanned with unanimous votes. Here is the voting sheet, Apagogie's reasoning will be edited in. Tagging Kris or Marty to implement, thank you.

Damp Rock is now banned from SS ZU

With rain pretty much nerfed, teams have one less powerhouse to prepare for and this also frees up how teams can prepare for offensive Water-types in general. How do you think this will impact the metagame? Looking forward to new posts. Keep in mind that one-liners and posts that derail the thread will be deleted.

 

[Apagogie]

I just want to preface this post in saying to do not forget to check the post just above. Damp Rock has been banned in ZU.

VS

Review UMPL : Tuthur vs Quagsgone ​

I will spend a few minutes (from my limited amount of free time at the moment) to discuss the UMPL battle between Tuthur and quagsgone. This battle is a really good picture of the current metagame, in my opinion, and showcases the current dynamism of ZU, the hazards game, the centralization of Tangela, and the strength and limits of Thievul.

Tuthur's team can be called a dark spam featuring a lot of common mid-tier threats; notably Golbat, Morpeko, and Thievul. From team preview, it's pretty obvious that Basculin is Scarfed because having 3 fast and frail breakers doesn't make much sense. The team is also very Rapidash weak without Scarf Basculin. Quagsgone's team, on the other hand is pretty mainstream, and can be categorized as a fat Kangaspikes. I'm personally not convinced about the use of Piloswine in this team, but Totodile (who is the builder) told me it was to have an electric immunity and a priority user.... which is fair I guess but it makes the team pretty weak against breakers and invites them in easily. The Rotom set is difficult to guess from team preview; it can be either specs, Sub + NP, or scarf. While the first two improve the stall match up, Tuthur isn't known to often use stall. This is especially the case after having a really poor battle against tjay the previous week with a really fat team, so a scarf set to give speed control, even if not optimal, is a possible scenario.

We notice that Quagsgone doesn't have a single dark resist against a pseudo-dark spam. Tangela deals comfortably with Morpeko, though, so Tuthur will have to rely on Thievul to make progress. Quagsgone's hazards game rely on Coalossal and Piloswine, both of which have a good match up against Ferroseed and Golbat respectively. However, none of them gets recovery so all damage taken makes progress. The Kangaskhan matchup can be good with rocks up, but Golbat walls it otherwise. Rotom, which will be revealed to be NP Sub, has a good match up even if Tuthur can afford to take one or two hits with Morpeko. Scarf Basculin, which is special in this team, has to weaken Wishiwashi and Tangela to be useful and is pretty pointless otherwise.

The battle happened. Here is the replay:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8zu-1341524906
Quagsgone won this game pretty comfortably. What is interesting is not the game in itself but why (in my opinion), Tuthur didn't have any good winpath in this battle as long as Quagsgone played correctly. Let's talk about positionning and the factors which lead to this result.


Part 1 : A demon called Thievul

When people start to play ZU, a common question is why play ZU over another tier? Romanticism for forgotten mons is certainly what attracts most people, but it is also true that ZU hides some weird mechanics that you would find nowhere else. One of them is the ability Stakeout, which is, from my knowledge, not available in any other tier since it's also banned in Balanced Hackmons.

Stakeout is what I personally call a pseudo-trap ability. Fundamentally, I dislike every form of trapping because switching is what makes this game a bit competitive in preventing the most devastating effects of matchups and allows to balance strengths and weaknesses of your Pokémon. If switching is not allowed, you don't have a team, but rather six individual Pokemon. Stakeout is one of these abilities which makes in my humble opinion the game less competitive. I will explain quickly the unhealthy aspect of this ability, how it makes Thievul dangerous but also how this ability also plays against it and makes it unreliable as a breaker.

Thievul is a demon when it can force a dilemma of stay & die or switch & die. Simply speaking, if you don't have one of the few hard counters, the option of switching is not tolerated against thievul due to the fact that it would annihilate whatever you would want to send in. Worse than that, as long as you choose to lose a mon on the switch, it can recreate this situation as many times as the opportunities allow it. This mon forces you to stay in – it’s the only solution to break the loop. This can be really unhealthy if you cannot afford to weaken the mon currently on the board and that is what makes Thievul a dangerous mon. However, this is also what makes Thievul unreliable as a breaker. Thievul is a mon with 87 SpA hitting with an 80 BP move. If the opponent stays in, its damage input is good but not impressive and rarely sufficent to break defensive cores. Thievul is always in a paradoxical situation where it wants to force the opponent to switch but the nature of its ability prevents switch ins.

I think the replay shows perfectly the strength and the limits of Thievul. When I talked with Quagsgone about this battle, he told me he had a bad Thievul matchup, but I don't entirely agree with this - I think the Thievul matchup was okay. It's true that Quagsgone didn't have any hard Thievul counter or a dark resist, as well as a very slow team which enables this kind of mid-tier breaker. However, Thievul couldn't force any free switch or any free kill early game. Piloswine tanks a hit as long as it is above 50% health and kills it with EQ + Ice shard, SpD Coalossal takes 30% from Dark Pulse, the Wishiwashi matchup is a coinflip but generally unfavorable for Thievul, and Kangaskhan OHKOs it with Double-Edge. The game featured two matchups favorable to Thievul, which were Tangela (where it still has to risk its Choice Specs being Knocked or being put to sleep), and Rotom. Against Rotom, however, it risks taking about 50% damage from Thunderbolt, which makes it hard to get any more trade value from it.

Tuthur managed to get two kills in this game from positioning his Thievul twice against Rotom. I don't think Tuthur played that sequence particularly poorly - he tried to find opportunities to get kills in the early game; it was his only way to make progress considering his two breakers had a hard time. The problem is that once Thievul was weakened, it couldn't force any other kill as long as the opposing team was decently healthy. I also want to highlight that Quagsgone played conservatively with his Tangela, to avoid any odds of a Dark Pulse flinch with Thievul. He systematically switched his Coalossal instead of Tangela into Morpeko, which was really good play in my opinion. Quagsgone simply didn't choke this game and not choking was enough to deny most possible winpaths with Thievul.


The only chance Tuthur had was to find a way to weaken quagsgone's team without using Thievul, and his two other offensive mons were barely useful for this. One way of accomplishing this was via hazards but this was also a tedious task.


Part 2 : Dealing with hazards


Hazards are broken in ZU. This is due to several factors which can be summarized in two parts - how good our setters are and how meh the removers are. Garbodor and Qwilfish are the most common ones notably due to their ability to soft check a large part of our metagame, especially Centiskorch and Thwackey. On the other hand, our defoggers are all pretty passive and abusable like Articuno and Altaria. Don't get me wrong, these mons are not bad, but they are simply easy to exploit due to the number of mons they give free momentum to, making them pretty vulnerable to double switches or being forced to defensively Roost.

In this game, we saw some uncommon setters & defogers but the logic stays the same. Tuthur uses a core of Uxie + Ferroseed + Golbat for hazards. As he is using a dark spam with two big breakers, he can’t opt for a mono boots team and is forced to get a hazard remover. With Ferroseed and Golbat, he controlled the hazards game relatively well. Golbat plays the role of the passive defogger, but Tuthur opted for U-Turn, probably to be more flexible overall and especially to position his breakers. However, we can note that Quagsgone’s team is very weak to toxic, and it would have maybe changed the outcome of the game if Golbat had Toxic.

Quagsgone had a really good advantage in using Piloswine + Coalossal. Piloswine is less seen nowadays but it has a positive matchup against Altaria&Golbat, which would have allowed it to be more useful in this game if it hadn’t been tricked turn 1. I really like Coalossal, which was considered mediocre in the past, but is seen more often nowadays and for good reasons. It is one the few Centiskorch answers, and it really shined in this matchup in being able to Spike, spin and pressure Ferroseed with a fire move.

Tuthur’s only way to win was to force Coalossal and Piloswine to be progressively weakened, and that's what he tried in tricking with Uxie. However, with his offensive core disabled and his defensive core losing against Quagsgone's, he quickly found himself in the opposite situation where he was trading to try to cgain momentum. If this was not enough, Coalossal could spin against Tuthur’s entire team (barring Basculin) without being really punished. Also, Golbat directly invted an NP Rotom which was making constant progress.

In this situation, Tuthur’s gameplan could have been to try to create a situation where hazards were only on quagsgone's side, which was (as we discussed) really difficult to do in practice, due to the poor matchup against the opposite hazard controllers. After that, he would have had to volt-turn continuously between morpeko and basculin to try to either weaken the coalossal or to catch tangela and to try to flinch it with Thievul. This situation is possible at least in theory but in practice, it was improbable, as all damage taken would put Tuthur closer and closer to being swept by Kangaskhan (and Quagsgone is a good player who doesn't choke).

I won't say that both players played every turn optimally but I think they played it quite well overall. It was also relevant to showcase the state of current ZU.


Part 3 : Tangela, the best Pokemon in ZU?

This part will be shorter than the two previous one and is more to engage discussion. Do you think Tangela is the best Pokemon in ZU? At the moment, it is, at least in my opinion. I think it is really advised to use it in every playstyle from stall to bulky offense due its ability to perfectly counter the most important threats of our current metagame. These include Silvally-Ground, Kangaskhan, Thwackey, Kabutops/Drednaw before the Damp Rock ban, and as we have seen today, also uncommon mons such as Morpeko. It is also the definition of a Pokemon that can make progress without being punished. Knock Off, Toxic, Sleep Power, and Leaf Storm are hard to answer and very punitive when all damage taken is healed in three switchs since Regenerator is a broken ability. I will personally vote it to be ranked S in the next VR update, and I'm curious to see what you all think about it.


Zee you later ~

Thank you Zayele to have corrected the grammar of this post.

 

[kay]

This is going to be a bit more of food for thought post than I'm normally used to making but especially during this UMPL I figured this would be something a lot of ZU players could benefit from so I figured I'd make a post on it.

So with rain gone and defensive cores currently playing the game "how much role compression can we fit together" with things like Cramorant, Rapidash, and Tangela taking on multiple defensive roles in a team, I think offense can make a huge comeback in the metagame if people stop looking at offensive Pokemon as stand alone offensive mons and start looking at dedicated offensive cores like we do in the same way as defensive cores. Right now a lot of teams just put on whatever offensive mons offer the most defensive utility and try to integrate them as an extension of their defensive core. And while I think we did have to do this while rain was a thing, with it now being out of the equation I think teams can afford to get much faster and much more offensive.

The main reason I think offense can come back, especially on a tournament level, isn't actually because of the rain ban. Its because of something I touched on earlier; the massive role compression teams are doing.
So an example of this would be how people are currently using Tangela as their teams fighting resist which normally works fine in a vacuum but when you pair something like a scarf Sawk with a Kangaskhan you can actually start to out pressure Tangela as your Sawk forces it into the position of it getting knocked and after a knock off Kangaskhan can actually break past it.
There are multiple other examples of this like how you can muscle past a Cramorant or Rapidash by knocking it with Skorch, and with rocks up you can actually break past both of them using a Frosmoth or any other offensive ice type. Or how people rely on bulky ground types for blanket electric resists and for Skunktank so you can use something like a hex Rotom to break them open for Skuntank or offensive Garbodor.
But people aren't thinking of offensive Pokemon in terms of offensive cores and we see this when people start running things like toxic on offensive Kangaskan to cripple Tangela despite having options to very easily play for knocking Tangela.

I think once players get used to running offense again and start thinking of offensive Pokemon in terms of cores aimed at breaking open the current compression points defensive and balance teams are relying on, we're going to see a huge growth again in the meta. This takes a bit of scouting and is mostly advice aimed at the tournament scene because you can track what kind of defensive cores people rely on and really pinch and pressure them, so don't get too comfy with Tangdash or Cramorant teams because they're not the end all be all solutions to the meta.

 

[JdRDMS]

Reminder that RU has banned Light Clay, so it's banned here too. This likely means that frailer set-up sweepers like Shiftry, Butterfree, Frosmoth, and Boltund may have a harder time with their set-up sets if they want to set up earlier in the match. However, this change probably won't be that meta-changing overall as screens as a playstyle wasn't super common in ZU.
*This post was approved by 5gen*

 

[Dr Ya Yeet]

Hey there
Let's talk about teenage rillaboom and it's friends, especially a certain baloon.

Drifblim @ Grassy Seed
Ability: Unburden
EVs: 252 HP / 4 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Calm Mind
- Strength Sap
- Shadow Ball
- Thunderbolt

This is what I run, the spread can proly be optimised a bit, but the moves are always the same. It's main job is to come in by using its good resistances and immunities and massive HP with a boost in defense, activate unburden, boost up, and sweep. And this wouldn't have been bad , if not for strength sap, low-key the absolute most annoying move ever. It allows it to turn ferocious physical attackers like Kangaskhan into setup fodder, which is kinda crazy. From there, it can spam stab shadow balls, which are always hard to switch into. Normal types like Audino can't damage it, and cincinno gets outsped and rock blast can be strength sapped off. Dark types like skunktank can't handle it after a cm, and get 2 shot by tbolt after hitting it once. It doesn't help that it resists grassy glide, sucker punch can easily be played around, fake out is kinda weak, and if not worn down then even banded aj from basc can be lived and sapped off. Its speed tier is untouchable after unburden, and outspeeds stuff like scarf basc.

Now to stuff that can actually handle it. Unaware pyuku kinda doesn't give a damn about tbolt or cm, neither does it have the attack stat to be exploited by strength sap and can simply toxic then recover spam. Sap sipper miltank is similar, although it has to be careful about boosted tbolts, but if played correctly you'll be fine. I even saw haze articuno, proly the hardest counter to grassy terrain teams,if they lack a fire type breaker like Ninetales. I'm proly missing a lot of other checks. The best way to keep this demon contained is just don't let it setup. Don't give it opportunities, pressure it with special attackers like Manetric and rotom. However, that's the thing. You constantly have to be on your toes to not let it come in and setup in your face, and idk if I want that in my games.
Ok
Now, even though this post was focused on Drifblim, idk if it's the culprit here. Much like Damp rock and ludicolo, Balloony needs thwackey's grassy terrain to pose any sort of a threat. Grassy terrain enables many other dangerous sweepers like Galardash, alcremie, thievul etc and skull crushing breakers like Flapple(at least 80% of the time lol). It also doesn't help that these teams naturally have strong priority,making faster mons like say cincinno not as threatening (that thing has a balloon phobia anyway lol). Soooo you know what I'm getting at. Monke good but teenage rillaboom, uh maybe not for zu.
Btw, here are some replays
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8zu-1347576295-cgxea9eii9fyngrh4itexfrqsbywxkvpw
(This is me getting swept)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8zu-1346939584-yos4up34u0x7thyjhdn9voidbofawmupw
(This is me sweeping )

Zeeyou around (god I make bad jokes)

 

[risin_glory]

EVs: 252 HP / 4 SpA / 252 Spe

iirc max spa is the most standard cuz its calcs are cool. is max hp output enough, especially when common alcremie easily beats it if used at correct time?