Metagame SV OU Metagame Discussion

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What do you guys think about defensive Investment in Lokix? It doesn't need the speed stat too much as it will just use priority most of the time and it can't be OHKO'd by Moon when it's +1, whilst First Impression + 2 Sucker Punches can break Sub and kill Moon

Just one calc, I bet it can do more than that which I haven't found yet
 
Due to the PP nerfs on recovery moves, they have been less useful for long term sustainability. I was wondering has anyone else been testing out Chesto/Rest sets for short term sustainability?
 
Let’s not derail on this tangent. I think the useful life of this subtopic of conversation is over

what do people think about Iron Bundle?
(very late reaction sorry)
I love Iron Bundle and I think it has a chance at being a healthy presence with the Booster Energy update. Modest Agility (cleaner) and Timid booster (cleaner/revenge killer) sets should be manageable now. Freeze-dry helps contain Palafin to a degree, which is massively important at this stage.

Specs will become more of an issue now and I haven't seen much viable counter-play to this yet. Its higher maintenance and prediction reliant, so most haven't bothered so far, but as people start building teams around it I can't forsee what the response will be.

It can use tera well but it doesn't double its viability like it does for something like Roaring Moon, so I don't foresee it spiralling out of control too quickly. It's incredibly good, but I think its a risky Jenga piece to pull out right now.


DD Ghost tera Dragapult with Will-o-wisp has been tearing teams apart for me. I have no idea how one goes about handling this one. On a related note, is Sword of Ruin's effect blocked by Clear Body? I wouldn't have thought so going off the description, but I've been repeatedly surprised by how little a burned Chien-Pao does with sucker.
 
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Honestly, speaking of Lando, i think with almost no utility moves in his arsenal, he is no longer the solution to all problems, but i think theres still a place for it with some sets
Choice Scarf Lando with taunt
Choice Band Lando
Bulky Uturn Spam with rocks
Suicide Lead with rocks

with no longer access to defog, knock off and toxic, he needs to take on a more offensive role, and this is gonna make him a bit more predictable, also, if tera is still by that time, you can be ceratin terra blast ice will be seen just to scare him

EDIT: I ALSO FORGOT, DO NOT RELEASE LANDO-I TO OU, NOTHING HAS CHANGED, HE IS STILL BROKEN, THIS HAS BEEN HAPPENING SINCE GEN 5, PLEASE NOT AGAIN
wuuuuut i mean u didnt mention SD lando-t, choice scarf lando-t is just gonna be 4 attacks like back in the days, and prob gonna be a good wall. Lando-t is not broken at all lol what makes u think that at all
 
Lando-t is not broken at all lol what makes u think that at all
They said Lando-I(ncarnate) is broken, not T. This is probably true as Incarnate is less concerned with the lost utility moves than Therian (although losing Knock still sucks), but honestly it wouldn't even be the most broken thing in the current meta. Personally I'd be interested in seeing where the overall power level of the meta ends up settling before really considering dropping any previously Ubers mons.
 
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DD Ghost tera Dragapult with Will-o-wisp has been tearing teams apart for me. I have no idea how one goes about handling this one. On a related note, is Sword of Ruin's effect blocked by Clear Body? I wouldn't have thought so going off the description, but I've been repeatedly surprised by how little a burned Chien-Pao does with sucker.
I handle DD Dragapult with PhysDef invested Dark Tera Skeleridge. Will-o-wisp and Unaware ensures that it'll always survive hits from Dragapult and Slack Off to full HP

For Clear Body, I don't think it accounts for the "for Ruin" abilities, since lowering a stat with Intimidate for example is different compared to Sword of Ruin in terms of mechanics. Hopefully someone can find out!
 
They said Lando-I(ncarnate) is broken, not T. This is probably true as Incarnate is less concerned with the lost utility moves than Therian (although losing Knock still sucks), but honestly it wouldn't even be the most broken thing in the current meta. Personally I'd be interested in seeing where the overall power level of the meta ends up settling before really considering dropping any previously Ubers mons.
oh,.... early morning brain fart
 
Paldean tauros are amazing intumidate users rn aswell to be honest, one the bird and palafin are gone we will prob see em more
I've experimented with the P-Tauroses, and while they're a fun tech against screens or Chien-Pao, I don't think they're particularly worth using most of the time; they simply don't do enough to take advantage of Intimidate against well-built teams IMO. Water feels pretty mediocre; there's too much out there that hard walls Water/Fighting coverage, it fails to achieve much against Palafin and it's vulnerable to revenge killers who don't have to fear its Aqua Jets. While Fire is probably better offensively with its typing and access to Wisp, there's even less that it can come in on, and it still doesn't have the longevity that it really needs.
 
Dondozo counters the bulk up Palafin set, it handles Roaring Moon as long as you don't switch in on acrobatics. It takes care of the snow leopard, great tusks, physical iron valiant... dondozo pretty good right now, with pretty much only iron bundle and other spatk'ers giving it grief.
 
Okay so let's look at which pokemon pick up wins from the potenial bans of Iron Bundle and Palafin-H

Quaquaval: Palafin-H previously overshadowed the funny peacock duck due to accomplishing what it wants to accomplish more easily through bulk up jet punch. Also iron bundle doesn't help Quaquaval either, considering that Bundle won't let Quaquaval set up. Now, without palafin-H or iron bundle, we should see a lot more Quaquaval running around in the higher ladders with teammates that can handle its checks/counters, as Quaquaval does palafin-H's job a bit worse, and is far easier to deal with because of that. Will probably be something you need to look out for on the ladder moreso once Palafin-H goes. Quaquaval was good before despite being overshadowed and will only get better once Palafin-H goes, which means having counterplay for it will be necessary.

Roaring Moon: Iron Bundle going means that Roaring Moon has more opportunity to get off dragon dances. Pretty Straightforward W for Roaring Moon.

Great Tusk/Iron Treads: Become much easier to bring in without specs iron bundle throwing off freeze-dry and palafin-h launching off stupidly powerful jet punches, hydro pump, and ice beam at every corner. Great Tusk and Iron Treads can do their offensive utility stuff more easily now.

Dragonite: Easier to bring in Multiscale Dragonite once Iron Bundle goes. Less ice types make Dragonite's life easier.

Meowscarada: Easier to bring in, doesn't have to worry about being speedcrept by iron bundle once it goes.

Dragapult: No longer has to worry about coming in on bundle and doesn't have to worry about being outsped in terrain.

Garchomp: Less ice types mean more opportunities to bring in Garchomp.

Alomomola: Iron bundle can't smack it around anymore with freeze dry, allowing it to come in and provide support more often. Does not like the loss of palafin-H though.

Breloom: No longer worries about not beating bundle, can run more stuff.

I am sure there are more that would benefit from Iron Bundle and Palafin-H being gone but those are the ones that come to mind.
 
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If Palafin were to be banned, it would stink for these two and Amoonguss imo. I don’t think Pex is particularly good compared to Dondozo right now altogether tbh.
Yeah I am saying for bundle not Palafin really. Slowking and Pex would love bundle being gone. (Palafin-H going would be bad for them though.)

Yeah Pex, Slowking, and Amoonguss would all appreciate bundle going, but at the same time hating losing something they can counter/check...
 
Chiyu continues to be a ridiculous, undertalked about threat

Chi-Yu @ Choice Specs
Ability: Beads of Ruin
Tera Type: Water
EVs: 252 SpA / 4Df / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Dark Pulse
- Flamethrower
- Overheat/Fire Blast
- Psychic

There is more or less 0 reliable switch ins to this mon. Even cornerstones like blissey will get worn down by flamethrower as they spam 8 softbloills to try to stay alive. Considering i've seen a lot of shadow ball blissey, its a losing matchup for them. Max/Max clodsire has a high chance to be 2hko's by flamethrower and obviously psychic will. Dark pulse is just a fantastic spammable move which will 1-2hko most of the metagame including frail resists. Bulky ttar is the best answer to this, if it doesnt have tera fighting tera blast, but ttar is very abusable with its low offensive impact and spikes/rocks-combined with its low usage in my experience not worth running.

Chiyu also has alternative sets like scarf, sub NP, will-0-wisp, and a few other viable options like tera fighting if ttar finds his way to prominance.

Tera water guarantees survive a banded water jet punch from the fin even after 1 round of Sr. Due to this, chiyu resists all commons priority; BP, sucker, shadow sneak, and jet punch [although you do run into first impression here and there form lokix and slither wing]. This heavily reminds me of early relase of lele last gen, was slept on for a little bit before people realize click button get kill is a good strategy. One of the most spammable mons since pre fairy specs dracos.

Spamming this got me top 100 in less than 80 games and 72+ gxe.

Addionally, he can be paired with another S tier threat right now IMO in specs dragapult. Have fantastic offensive and defensive synergy is truly a beautiful thing when looking at two mons. Ive never been a fan of going heavy with specs mons, but with how spammable shadow ball/draco/darkpulse/flamethrower are, Its frankly fine. Theres so few good steels and next to no good fairys in the meta right now.
 
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Chiyu continues to be a ridiculous, undertalked about threat

Chi-Yu @ Choice Specs
Ability: Beads of Ruin
Tera Type: Water
EVs: 252 SpA / 4Df / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Dark Pulse
- Flamethrower
- Overheat/Fire Blast
- Psychic

There is more or less 0 reliable switch ins to this mon. Even cornerstones like blissey will get worn down by flamethrower as they spam 8 softbloills to try to stay alive. Considering i've seen a lot of shadow ball blissey, its a losing matchup for them. Max/Max clodsire has a high chance to be 2hko's by flamethrower and obviously psychic will. Dark pulse is just a fantastic spammable move which will 1-2hko most of the metagame including frail resists. Bulky ttar is the best answer to this, if it doesnt have tera fighting tera blast, but ttar is very abusable with its low offensive impact and spikes/rocks-combined with its low usage in my experience not worth running.

Chiyu also has alternative sets like scarf, sub NP, will-0-wisp, and a few other viable options like tera fighting if ttar finds his way to prominance.

Tera water guarantees survive a banded water jet punch from the fin even after 1 round of Sr. Due to this, chiyu resists all commons priority; BP, sucker, shadow sneak, and jet punch [although you do run into first impression here and there form lokix and slither wing]. This heavily reminds me of early relase of lele last gen, was slept on for a little bit before people realize click button get kill is a good strategy. One of the most spammable mons since pre fairy specs dracos.

Spamming this got me top 100 in less than 80 games and 72+ gxe.

Chi yu sounds like the second coming of tapu lele oh no...
 
We banned two Pokemon that made the game unplayable. If that’s too much for you, then I am sorry, but there’s not much we can do for you.

Also, last generation closed more offensive than balanced, but go off I guess.
I dont think mane made the game even remotely unplayable. it was incredibly restrictive on team building but certainly you could come prepared for it and I never felt I was at a great disadvantage when facing one; also never went the route of terra normal or other gimmicks people started running. When using it, kind of the same, most of the higher ladder players came prepared. Due to the increase of clodsire, psyshock became staple which greatly limited set variety to the point the only set I felt worth running was specs. Sub cm sets were still great as revenge killers but rarely were sweeping teams due to the incredibly high usage of priority mons. Although its obvious mane was morphing the metagame and centralizing, it wasn't unplayable.

Houndstone was just obnoxius and I'm glad its gone before it truly caught on ala exca gen 5.
 
I agree and am fine with the ban, but theres been very few meta's i thought were unplayable #1 for me was skymin in ou gen 4
 

Dead by Daylight

facing the music
is a Pre-Contributor
What Should Be Done With Terastallization?

Terastallization is the defining "Generational Gimmick" of Gen IX. In my opinion, it's an interesting mechanic that affords enormous latitude for creativity in teambuilding. However, people are also right for saying that it may potentially be unbalanced and/or uncompetitive. This mechanic does greatly increase matchup volatility and has potential to completely invalidate the concept of traditional "checks and counters." Even though I think the mechanic is interesting, I do think that completely unfettered access to Terastallization is probably bad for the metagame. Thus far, I've seen the following solutions proposed by various players:

1. Ban Terastallization

This is the simplest solution, and while Tera is certainly a fun and interesting mechanic, I wouldn't necessarily feel too bad about seeing it go if the result is a more competitive metagame. This would return the metagame more towards a Gen 8 feel, which many players are far more comfortable with.

2. Have a separate "Tera" ladder

This would be a compromise solution with 1) and possibly 3), where Tera is banned on the main ladder but a separate ladder exists where players can still try out the mechanic if they so desire. If Tera indeed turns out to be an uncompetitive mechanic, a solution could be to disallow it on the main ladder but still give players that want to try it out the chance to use it in a side metagame. This comes at a cost of potentially splitting the playerbase, but I'm sure players who love the game would probably play both metagames. I think it's always nice to see novelty and playing the same meta over and over gets stale for me.

3. Reveal Tera-types at team preview

I've suggested this, as have many others, and I think it would certainly help reign in the unpredictability of the mechanic greatly. I think Tera would be far more manageable with this information. With Tera-types revealed at preview, a player can't just Tera-Fairy their DD Dragapult in the mirror match and 6-0 the opponent's team. Granted, this may not necessarily be a perfect solution, since, as some have pointed out, it can still introduce awkward 50/50 situations whether the opponent Teras or not. Also with some Tera abusers like Palafin you know what the Tera-type will be 99% of the time but that doesn't necessarily make it any easier to deal with.

I don't think Tera is as over-the-top busted as Dynamax (which was deemed to be an AG level strategy alongside Mega Rayquaza and Baton Pass chains). It's probably ok to at least give it a fair shake in the first few weeks of the meta. Of course, any decision regarding this mechanic shouldn't be made lightly and the playerbase as a whole should try to come to a consensus. I'm sure there are proposals that I haven't covered. Everyone is welcome to suggest their ideas.
As an outspoken opponent to Terastallization (coming from the Monotype community, where, y’know, it’s hard to actually make work), I’d like to see 3; however, that’s in an ideal world. If we can’t solve the problem in front of us, then I’ll be happy going into a Gen 8 style metagame.

I dont think mane made the game even remotely unplayable. it was incredibly restrictive on team building but certainly you could come prepared for it and I never felt I was at a great disadvantage when facing one; also never went the route of terra normal or other gimmicks people started running. When using it, kind of the same, most of the higher ladder players came prepared. Due to the increase of clodsire, psyshock became staple which greatly limited set variety to the point the only set I felt worth running was specs. Sub cm sets were still great as revenge killers but rarely were sweeping teams due to the incredibly high usage of priority mons. Although its obvious mane was morphing the metagame and centralizing, it wasn't unplayable.

Houndstone was just obnoxius and I'm glad its gone before it truly caught on ala exca gen 5.
Adding onto Finchinator’s post on this, Flutter Mane was not making the game unplayable; rather, it made it centralize on one Pokémon and dedicate multiple checks to it on a team if you didn’t want to lose by predicting the wrong set. Shed Tail was what pushed it way over the top for me: if you got it a free Sub, then you basically lost the game due to the sheer amount of damage that it put out or just the time to set up a Calm Mind or two to eviscerate your team even more.

Houndstone seems to represent a major issue with tiering policy, and that is “ban the ‘mon but not the move.” Fishious Rend was understandable: Dracovish was the only good abuser. However, can we not preemptively see the problems that will emerge? Or are we going to just say “Okay, another perfect abuser of an obviously broken move doesn’t exist right now, so we’ll ban something that may have had a niche in lower tiers”?
 
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As an outspoken opponent to Terastallization (coming from the Monotype community, where, y’know, it’s hard to actually make work), I’d like to see 3; however, that’s in an ideal world. If we can’t solve the problem in front of us, then I’ll be happy going into a Gen 8 style metagame.
May I ask why not option 2 if not 3?
What Should Be Done With Terastallization?

Terastallization is the defining "Generational Gimmick" of Gen IX. In my opinion, it's an interesting mechanic that affords enormous latitude for creativity in teambuilding. However, people are also right for saying that it may potentially be unbalanced and/or uncompetitive. This mechanic does greatly increase matchup volatility and has potential to completely invalidate the concept of traditional "checks and counters." Even though I think the mechanic is interesting, I do think that completely unfettered access to Terastallization is probably bad for the metagame. Thus far, I've seen the following solutions proposed by various players:

1. Ban Terastallization

This is the simplest solution, and while Tera is certainly a fun and interesting mechanic, I wouldn't necessarily feel too bad about seeing it go if the result is a more competitive metagame. This would return the metagame more towards a Gen 8 feel, which many players are far more comfortable with.

2. Have a separate "Tera" ladder

This would be a compromise solution with 1) and possibly 3), where Tera is banned on the main ladder but a separate ladder exists where players can still try out the mechanic if they so desire. If Tera indeed turns out to be an uncompetitive mechanic, a solution could be to disallow it on the main ladder but still give players that want to try it out the chance to use it in a side metagame. This comes at a cost of potentially splitting the playerbase, but I'm sure players who love the game would probably play both metagames. I think it's always nice to see novelty and playing the same meta over and over gets stale for me.

3. Reveal Tera-types at team preview

I've suggested this, as have many others, and I think it would certainly help reign in the unpredictability of the mechanic greatly. I think Tera would be far more manageable with this information. With Tera-types revealed at preview, a player can't just Tera-Fairy their DD Dragapult in the mirror match and 6-0 the opponent's team. Granted, this may not necessarily be a perfect solution, since, as some have pointed out, it can still introduce awkward 50/50 situations whether the opponent Teras or not. Also with some Tera abusers like Palafin you know what the Tera-type will be 99% of the time but that doesn't necessarily make it any easier to deal with.

I don't think Tera is as over-the-top busted as Dynamax (which was deemed to be an AG level strategy alongside Mega Rayquaza and Baton Pass chains). It's probably ok to at least give it a fair shake in the first few weeks of the meta. Of course, any decision regarding this mechanic shouldn't be made lightly and the playerbase as a whole should try to come to a consensus. I'm sure there are proposals that I haven't covered. Everyone is welcome to suggest their ideas.
I'd like to see 3 tried, but ultimately I think 2 will be the endgame. Once again, I don't think the playerbase split should be as big a worry as people make it out to be. I think not only is there just simple precedent for it from a game design perspective (I mentioned FPSes in my original post advocating, but plenty of other games such as RTSes and MOBAs also have split Ranked/Casual ladders), but also it's more of an appeal to what different people like and want. Competition will still thrive on its own, and may even be fostered by newbies who have that kneejerk "bans bad" impulse only to find that a Tera ladder isn't truly satisfying them or that they wanna go in deeper. And in turn, it's liable to give a space for those who enjoy Gen 9 as a competitive game another option for when they still wanna play 'mons, but don't wanna risk ELO on a downswing. Finally, as someone who didn't like Gen 8's meta by the end, I do think the changes of nerfing defensive play will help prevent the rut I feel Gen 8 fell into of getting exhausting without the super-offensive gimmick.
 

Dead by Daylight

facing the music
is a Pre-Contributor
May I ask why not option 2 if not 3?
The issue I see with 2 is that OU is the standard that other tiers look to. I’m not saying that the tier leaders are subservient or anything, but haven’t we seen blanket bans cover every single tier that come from OU? Either way, I realize the benefits of 2, and to be fair, I forgot the option existed.
 
The issue I see with 2 is that OU is the standard that other tiers look to. I’m not saying that the tier leaders are subservient or anything, but haven’t we seen blanket bans cover every single tier that come from OU? Either way, I realize the benefits of 2, and to be fair, I forgot the option existed.
I guess, it's just that this split-off meta would be something we'd have to fully admit is less there for competition and more there for fun.
 
IF iron bundle is removed from the game, I think two pokemons that benefit the most will be roaring moon and dragapult. the latter in particular is a closeted absolute top-tier viabile OU that really should be explored upon. I think the post below summarizes my thoughts really well for sure.

:sv/dragapult:

I'd like to bring up Dragapult. When I last covered Dragapult here, it was before the bans, so I'd like to cover its status in the metagame post-Flutter Mane and Post-Houndstone bans, since the former warped the meta around it a lot, while the latter did to some degree.

Question 1: How much did Dragapult gain from the bans?
Dragapult, IMO, got one of the biggest Ws out of the bans, especially Flutter Mane. First of all, two of its most important rivals in the best Ghost-type race have been removed, putting in it prime position to become a top option once more of being a useful Ghost-type for teams. Second, Dragapult also lost one of its most important checks, since Flutter Mane was able to outspeed and force it out. Lastly, Dragapult now has probably the best Speed tier in the metagame, being able to outspeed base Roaring Moon and Cyclizar, and outspeeding the former was something that base Speed Flutter Mane couldn't do.

Question 2: How is Dragapult important in the current metagame?
I'd say Dragapult's main importance is being able to counter the Cyclizar Shed Tail trend. Thanks to Infiltrator, Dragapult is able to do either one of two things (I'll be using the DD set since it's the best set for Dragapult so far.): It can either Dragon Dance on a predicted Shed Tail to refute it and later sweep, or it can just Dragon Darts on Cyclizar to end the Shed Tail gameplan before it begins. Dragon Dance Dragapult is scary for a sweeper given its Speed and Attack stats, its STAB combination being almost unresisted, and it's even scarier thanks to its Tera potential. Dragapult can also serve as a good option as a spinblocker, given how Rapid Spin is more common than Defog in this generation, and that Dragapult is one of the few actually OU-level Ghost-types.

Question 3: The Verdict?
I'd say Dragapult is currently a very important anti-meta meta option. Heck, by playing Gen 9 OU, I can also say it's quite underrated, which is quite a hot take considering how well Dragapult performed last generation. However, by looking at Dragapult's place in a post-first wave ban metagame, you get my point.
 

Dunfan

formerly Dunsparce Fanboy
I'd like to see 3 tried, but ultimately I think 2 will be the endgame. Once again, I don't think the playerbase split should be as big a worry as people make it out to be. I think not only is there just simple precedent for it from a game design perspective (I mentioned FPSes in my original post advocating, but plenty of other games such as RTSes and MOBAs also have split Ranked/Casual ladders), but also it's more of an appeal to what different people like and want. Competition will still thrive on its own, and may even be fostered by newbies who have that kneejerk "bans bad" impulse only to find that a Tera ladder isn't truly satisfying them or that they wanna go in deeper. And in turn, it's liable to give a space for those who enjoy Gen 9 as a competitive game another option for when they still wanna play 'mons, but don't wanna risk ELO on a downswing. Finally, as someone who didn't like Gen 8's meta by the end, I do think the changes of nerfing defensive play will help prevent the rut I feel Gen 8 fell into of getting exhausting without the super-offensive gimmick.
I wholeheartedly agree with this.
Also an important aspect of Tera is that it increases the importance of prediction and timing while reducing the impact of team matchups.
Even with a massive disadvantage at team preview, you will not necessarily lose to a team that hardcounters yours even if you play well.
This in turn deals with the problem of scouting which makes teambuilding extremely short lived while giving an unfair advantage to players who are allowed to see other players' alts using Scrappie's .alts command. (in other words, this thing rigs, for some incomprehensible reason, the game towards users who got promoted to %driver or above, while hurting everyone else)
In the current situation, option 2 also seems best to me. And in the case where bot access would be freed for everyone, I'd be fine with options 1 and 3 as well.
I apologize if it's not a metagame-oriented reason as much as it is a Showdown issue. But if the issue is to persist indefinitely on Showdown's side, then option 2 is the only acceptable fix!
 
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I want to a highlight a mon I have been having a lot of fun with recently. Glimmora has been awesome as a hazard stacker due to the combination of ability+movepool. It also hits hard enough that I have been able to surprise some people with the rock/poison coverage. Pair it with Gholdengo and you an easy core to build an offensive team around


Glimmora @ Focus Sash
Ability: Toxic Debris
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Stealth Rock
- Spikes
- Power Gem
- Sludge Bomb
 
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