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This core is based off immunities, Corviknight is optional since you're already immune to ground, but I highly suggest it. Primordial Sea makes fire type moves useless on Gholdengo and Corviknight , Volt Absorb for Corviknights electric weakness and possible free recovery. Earth Eater negates Rotom-Wash and Gholdengos ground weakness. Having the ability to trick a Choice Scarf onto a potential setup mon is very useful, aslong as having a very fast Volt Switch, makes Rotom-Wash a very useful mon for this core. Oh, and Primordial Sea boosts the already powerful Hydro Pump. Volt Absorb Corviknight is one of my personal favorite sets for Corviknight , as people usually assume it runs Well Baked Body. It completely walls any Sandy Shocks set, punishes U-turns, and is one of the best hazard removers. Gholdengo is very powerful with the combination of Nasty Plot and Make It Rain. A +2 Gholdengo Shadow Ball 2HKOs a physically defensive Corviknight , and takes barely any damage from it, the only set that can hurt it is Bulk Up and Power Trip. I'm sure this core has many weaknesses, and is kind of ruined when just one mon faints, but I wanted to share it here for anyone who would like to use it and give their thoughts on it.
EDIT:
Teammates I found worked really well: Baxcalibur , Meowscarada , Kingambit , Cinderace , and Volcarona .
Broke into top 50 with this team. the idea is hazard stack and then blocking nearly all spinners/defog with garg and gholdengo. scrappy tusk to beat opposing earth eater gholdingo/ skeledrige allowing prankster wisp/encore to beat setup sweepers.
Garganacl @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Good as Gold
Tera Type: Rock
EVs: 224 HP / 220 Def / 36 SpD / 28 Spe
Impish Nature
- Salt Cure
- Iron Defense
- Recover
- Body Press
killo is easily handled by regen hydreigon. I did start runnning more spdef on garg for Noivern, but it is difficult to handle. what checks are people currently running for it, any decent punk rock users?
Hazardless HO wow no stealth rocks / hazards this team must be ass well ladder let me get away with not only that but normal tera blast polteageist (have yet to run pixilate) and the goated tusk set :
Baxcalibur @ Loaded Dice
Ability: Technician
Tera Type: Dragon
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Dragon Dance
- Icicle Spear
- Ice Shard
- Earthquake
generic technician bax set. we know its qualities, killing corv at +1 most of the time, living aerilate dnite's espeed or hatterene's draining kiss at full health, etc.
:
Polteageist-Antique @ Focus Sash
Ability: Armor Tail
Tera Type: Ghost
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Shell Smash
- Shadow Ball
- Stored Power
- Tera Blast
who let me use tera blast? anyway it hits meowscarada and lets it do some damage to roaring moon, but the funny is using pixilate over priorimmune and killing moon in one hit
:
Great Tusk @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Unaware
Tera Type: Ground
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Headlong Rush
- Knock Off
- Rapid Spin
- Bulk Up
what did i create. beats bu corvi, other tusks, lives timid make it rain from gholden, still loses to a few threats and whatnot
:
Hatterene (F) @ Leftovers
Ability: Triage
Tera Type: Psychic
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SpA / 4 SpD
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Calm Mind
- Draining Kiss
- Stored Power
- Mystical Fire
average hatterene set, i like stored power to hit wbb mons
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Sandy Shocks @ Life Orb
Ability: Hadron Engine
Tera Type: Electric
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Earth Power
- Thunderbolt
- Volt Switch
- Flash Cannon
with lo, you dont need to worry abt the corvi going into tusk. now you can just epower it without predicting!!!
if u need me to elaborate on the mons, feel free to ping me in the om room when im online / on the om disc (do provide context)
overall: this set utilizes protean noivern to allow usage of both noivern and dnite on the same team, which is actually incredibly useful as it givves you 2 notoriously powerful win conditions once either of them have their counters removed, in addition this utilizes 5 pivots in order to gain momentum and all 3 of the oras weather abilities to constantly override opposing weather, which is very prominant in the current metagame with the likes of opulse and sand stream garg, as well as the oras weathers themselves
Noivern: while one's first guess may be that this is a weaker version of aerialate noivern used to bypass ability clause they would be mistaken, while bburst has weaker bp and is overall worse the typing allows it to hit electric types harder, allowing it to make work of sandy shocks and rotom in ways aerialate cant, but thats really just icing on the cake, the real star of the set is getting stab on your coverage, allowing you to deal with gargnacl with focus blast (if you dont miss) and goldenego with dark pulse, which would normally hard counter noivern, albeit requiring a bit of prediction.
Iron treads, corviknight, and dragonite: these run pretty standard sets so theres not much notable except for corviknight running iron defense over defog because body press corv needs it to wall dnite
Quaquaval: Im going to be honest, I originally thought i was just being chicken when i decided to run aqua step over wave crash, but it turns out, having what is essentially a dragon dance boost in addition to weather and stab is really powerful even when choice locked, this can sometimes sweep if immunities and bulky resists are taken care of
Iron moth's firey dance+discharge combo lets it have a guarenteed super-effective attack against corviknight, the most popular mon in the meta, and also functions as the team's hazard setter with toxic spikes
Noivern is an extremely linear wallbreaker; you have a hard wall to it, or fold to it. I like Sand Stream Garganacl, but you shouldn’t have to run it. While it started the generation with a fairly middling Speed tier, many of the faster threats are now gone, allowing it to force out many offenisve threats as well like Cinderace, Gengar, and Greninja. The sheer power and coverage of Aerilate Boomburst doesn't leave much room for midgrounding; you can either stomach the attack, or get KOed. It also has tools like Super Fang, Taunt, and U-turn to still put in work against its true walls, and Roost to provide longevity. Noivern is overly restrictive on defensive cores, and therefore yeeted.
Orichalcum Pulse is equivalent in power to Water Bubble, but also provides an Adaptability-level boost on coverage moves as well, enabling some very disgusting calcs like Cinderace 2HKOing defensive Garchomp. It had two primary users, Cinderace and Emo Ghost, but could still be used on other threats like Tauros, Slither Wing, and more. All of these Pokemon have other, healthy sets, pointing to Fire Bubble as the main culprit. The incredibly high usage of Well-Baked Body, especially on Corviknight, points to how overbearing of an ability it is; it has the same amp on resisted Fire moves as Tinted lens while obliterating everything else, leading to an immunity-or-bust method of countering it. Hence, yeeted.
orichalcum pulse provides an additional boost to attack (it sets the sun and boosts the bearer's attack by 33% in sun), and (more fringe but still useful) allows other teammates to benefit from sun with the reduced water damage and higher healing on moves like synthesis.
Hadron Engine provides a smaller boost (since Terrain is only 1.3x compared to weather’s 1.5x), we have fewer good special Electrics than physical Fires, and Fire-type coverage has no non-ability immunities. While Hadron Engine is good, I would not say it’s next on our list.
I doubt it, there has been much less usage so far. Electric terrain isn’t great, its secondary effect is unusable in this OM, and electric types are not great overall, with the exception of Sandy Shocks, which has low general usage.
I kinda regret not posting about it earlier but I disagree that OPulse was an issue in the context of Fire-types being overbearing in the tier. The only really broken abuser of OPulse was Cinderace, since it had U-turn + a great Speed tier + SD to capitalize on the many switches it forced, putting a strain on teambuilding. Every other OPulse user was mid at best (the Ceruledge section of LordBox's post had a lot of threatening calcs, but that doesn't change the fact that it's a slow Mon with 4 relevant weaknesses that needed good positioning AND Rocks off to actually do anything) or a fringe breaker at worst (I like Fire Bull but it kinda sucks, same goes for Slither Wing). The quickban reasoning for OPulse kinda proves my point; it's merely 5 sentences long, makes a brief mentions that Cinderace can 2HKO a mon no one uses (btw Cinderace needs Ada Band to actually secure the 2HKO, or else it's only a 38% chance for Jolly Band, and a 0% for Boots), and then implies that something like Fire Bull is also broken because OPulse, which isn't a super convincing argument for banning OPulse imo, while specifically separating Cinderace from the rest as problematic.
I talked about with Isaiah before but I feel like there's a Fire-type issue within the tier, where there are 4-5 offensive Fire-types around equal levels of viability, and all of them lack overlapping counterplay, which forces, say, a PhyDef Fire immunity + a SpDed Fire resist on every team in order not to lose. This sounds easy enough on paper, but in practice it's quite troublesome to manage along with the near-mandatory Regen Great Tusk slot and some anti-HO counterplay, making teambuilding feel linear and constrained. I think this issue lies not upon OPulse but rather two mons: Cinderace and Iron Moth. I've talked about Cinderace before but to reiterate, it's a strong wallbreaker where counterplay is common but limited to a select few mons/abilities. It's quite easy to prep for, but if you don't prep for it, it's highly likely you'll lose. In anything I feel that Cinderace was underexplored with OPulse around, sets like DesoLand, Turboblaze, and Magic Guard could turn traditional counterplay on its head, but no one used them because OPulse Cinderace was ultra broken on its own. Iron Moth may seem strange to mention but I honestly believe it has only 3-4 switchins in the whole tier, and only one that is viable enough to use on teams consistently (WBB Kingambit). SFLO is a menace because even though it's weak to Rocks, it's got a great speed tier and coverage for everything. RegenVest Roaring Moon? Dazzling Gleam. WBB Corv? Discharge. Sand Stream Garg? Energy Ball. Between SFLO and DesoLand, it feels like an Iron Valiant situation, where the counterplay is hope and pray it doesn't have the coverage move that eviscerates your switchins. Personally I would have QBed Iron Moth and suspected Cinderace to see if that solved the issue, but hey, I guess unnecessarily nerfing a bunch of mons technically solves the issue as well.
Also I'm surprised Great Tusk wasn't on the voting slate, it's more broken than anything currently on there.
To clarify cause this has come up a few times; there was also significant council support to suspect Great Tusk, but we only want to run one suspect at a time, and Gholdengo had more support. It would not surprise me if a Great Tusk suspect followed soon after.
With the ban of Noivern and Gholdengo being suspected, I feel like we have to get rid of Garganacl. Garganacl’s SpD is the lower of its defenses, and these special threats were some of the best in this OM, leaving Garganacl an even harder threat to counter. OPulse is banned as well, leaving Cinderace a much less powerful counter to Garganacl.
With the ban of Noivern and Gholdengo being suspected, I feel like we have to get rid of Garganacl. Garganacl’s SpD is the lower of its defenses, and these special threats were some of the best in this OM, leaving Garganacl an even harder threat to counter. OPulse is banned as well, leaving Cinderace a much less powerful counter to Garganacl.
not really, garg is checked by a few mons right now, notably tusk, mguard gholdengo, covert cloak gholdengo, etc. many mons also pack eq as their preferred form of coverage, and garg will soon lose a bit of popularity with the lack of noivern to check.
I kinda regret not posting about it earlier but I disagree that OPulse was an issue in the context of Fire-types being overbearing in the tier. The only really broken abuser of OPulse was Cinderace, since it had U-turn + a great Speed tier + SD to capitalize on the many switches it forced, putting a strain on teambuilding. Every other OPulse user was mid at best (the Ceruledge section of LordBox's post had a lot of threatening calcs, but that doesn't change the fact that it's a slow Mon with 4 relevant weaknesses that needed good positioning AND Rocks off to actually do anything) or a fringe breaker at worst (I like Fire Bull but it kinda sucks, same goes for Slither Wing). The quickban reasoning for OPulse kinda proves my point; it's merely 5 sentences long, makes a brief mentions that Cinderace can 2HKO a mon no one uses (btw Cinderace needs Ada Band to actually secure the 2HKO, or else it's only a 38% chance for Jolly Band, and a 0% for Boots), and then implies that something like Fire Bull is also broken because OPulse, which isn't a super convincing argument for banning OPulse imo, while specifically separating Cinderace from the rest as problematic.
I talked about with Isaiah before but I feel like there's a Fire-type issue within the tier, where there are 4-5 offensive Fire-types around equal levels of viability, and all of them lack overlapping counterplay, which forces, say, a PhyDef Fire immunity + a SpDed Fire resist on every team in order not to lose. This sounds easy enough on paper, but in practice it's quite troublesome to manage along with the near-mandatory Regen Great Tusk slot and some anti-HO counterplay, making teambuilding feel linear and constrained. I think this issue lies not upon OPulse but rather two mons: Cinderace and Iron Moth. I've talked about Cinderace before but to reiterate, it's a strong wallbreaker where counterplay is common but limited to a select few mons/abilities. It's quite easy to prep for, but if you don't prep for it, it's highly likely you'll lose. In anything I feel that Cinderace was underexplored with OPulse around, sets like DesoLand, Turboblaze, and Magic Guard could turn traditional counterplay on its head, but no one used them because OPulse Cinderace was ultra broken on its own. Iron Moth may seem strange to mention but I honestly believe it has only 3-4 switchins in the whole tier, and only one that is viable enough to use on teams consistently (WBB Kingambit). SFLO is a menace because even though it's weak to Rocks, it's got a great speed tier and coverage for everything. RegenVest Roaring Moon? Dazzling Gleam. WBB Corv? Discharge. Sand Stream Garg? Energy Ball. Between SFLO and DesoLand, it feels like an Iron Valiant situation, where the counterplay is hope and pray it doesn't have the coverage move that eviscerates your switchins. Personally I would have QBed Iron Moth and suspected Cinderace to see if that solved the issue, but hey, I guess unnecessarily nerfing a bunch of mons technically solves the issue as well.
Also I'm surprised Great Tusk wasn't on the voting slate, it's more broken than anything currently on there.
The question that must be asked is: how to find counterplay for Orichalcum Pulse users? The answer is: use a counter (Dondozo or immunity) (just as, for Noivern, the only way was to have one of the few playable counters). Cinderace is significantly stronger than Ceruledge, Tauros-Paldea-Fire and Slither Wing, so arguably there is little reason to use these instead; but the situation in the builder remains the same: let's say I know for a fact that my opponent will not have Cinderace, am I happy to play without a Fire immunity and potentially have no counter to the other physical fire types? If I want to give myself a chance to win in all situations, no. A team without a Fire immunity (or Dondozo) is very unlikely (i.e.: baring some tremendous constraints) to withstand any of the previously mentioned Fire types boosted by OPulse.
Fire types have always been centralizing in AAA, and probably always will be. The most significant reason for this is certainly Desolate Land. Banning OPulse only alleviates the constraint they place on teambuilding, by allowing a range of lighter counterplay options.
The question that must be asked is: how to find counterplay for Orichalcum Pulse users? The answer is: use a counter (Dondozo or immunity) (just as, for Noivern, the only way was to have one of the few playable counters). Cinderace is significantly stronger than Ceruledge, Tauros-Paldea-Fire and Slither Wing, so arguably there is little reason to use these instead; but the situation in the builder remains the same: let's say I know for a fact that my opponent will not have Cinderace, am I happy to play without a Fire immunity and potentially have no counter to the other physical fire types? If I want to give myself a chance to win in all situations, no. A team without a Fire immunity (or Dondozo) is very unlikely (i.e.: baring some tremendous constraints) to withstand any of the previously mentioned Fire types boosted by OPulse.
Fire types have always been centralizing in AAA, and probably always will be. The most significant reason for this is certainly Desolate Land. Banning OPulse only alleviates the constraint they place on teambuilding, by allowing a range of lighter counterplay options.
I'd just like to add onto this that I don't think Ceruledge was really significantly worse than Cinderace, although in terms of teams I could slap it on Cinderace would probably be much better yeah. However, Ceruledge as a breaker really was insane. Yeah it could be annoying to manoeuvre around but coupled with decent partners and a play or two, it was a very terrifying breaker, none of WBB Corv, Ghold or Garg actually walling it at all (OHKO's on all, except Corv at +2, but Corv is exceptionally close to an OHKO). Shadow Sneak also let it potentially smack around frailer offensive answers as well like Noivern and Kilo, granted they are both rolls, but is still something to note.
This is my callout post on baxcalibur and houndstone
lets start out with the dog, scarf houndstone is basically a "prepare for this or die" pokemon, now, perhaps the same caould be said of most pokemon, but houndstone can reverse 6-0 teams that dont have anything that can deal with it, it frankly feels like aaa's version of sturdinja for anyone who remembers when that was legal in BH, Sure you can outspeed it or hit it with strong enough (or multiple) priority, but basically only ting liu and physdef garg can actually wall it effectively, sure intimidate corv can survive a hit but that forces intimidate and can only do 40-47 in return, avaluff is also something able to survive one hit but that not exactly a good mon
heres some calcs on this topic:
• -1 252 Atk Supreme Overlord 5 allies fainted Houndstone Last Respects vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Corviknight: 286-337 (71.5 - 84.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
• 252 Atk Supreme Overlord 5 allies fainted Houndstone Last Respects vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Orthworm: 340-402 (98.8 - 116.8%) -- 93.8% chance to OHKO
• 252 Atk Supreme Overlord 5 allies fainted Houndstone Last Respects vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Toxapex: 328-387 (107.8 - 127.3%) -- guaranteed OHKO
and to acknowledge houndstone's faults
• 252 Atk Supreme Overlord 5 allies fainted Houndstone Last Respects vs. 252 HP / 252 Def Purifying Salt Garganacl: 202-238 (50 - 58.9%) -- 73.4% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
• 252 Atk Supreme Overlord 5 allies fainted Houndstone Last Respects vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Ting-Lu: 253-298 (49.2 - 57.9%) -- 59% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
• 252 Atk Supreme Overlord 5 allies fainted Houndstone Last Respects vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Great Tusk: 366-432 (84.3 - 99.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
the problem with houndstone's defensive is they have similarweaknesses, so you can just team up houndstone with the likes of greninja and/or meowscarads to deal with those, scarf variants of such also helping against houndstone's other counter in scarf users
now onto bax
technician loaded dice bax wins a lot of games off a single ddance against a wall, and cant be walled back so easily, you *must* have either delta stream/thick fat (the latter of which is generally worse than the former) corviknight or an EE/levitate/air balloon that resists ice if you want a chance of defensively countering/checking bax, as bax can make quick work of everything else with a boosted icicle spear or eq against resists that arent ground immune.
Bax has the repeated issue of being outsped and killed by scarf users, but bax can also run a technician boosted ice shard which can one shot some of the scarf users (like sandy shocks and non-dazzling meowscarada), a problem not even noivern could overcome due to choice lock
while choice scarf is a great item, i dont believe it should be *forced* to not die to things like this
this concludes my callout post on these two beasts and i hope to see action taken against them after we deal with joe (especially since joe was one of the aforementioned things that can deal with bax)
This is my callout post on baxcalibur and houndstone
lets start out with the dog, scarf houndstone is basically a "prepare for this or die" pokemon, now, perhaps the same caould be said of most pokemon, but houndstone can reverse 6-0 teams that dont have anything that can deal with it, it frankly feels like aaa's version of sturdinja for anyone who remembers when that was legal in BH, Sure you can outspeed it or hit it with strong enough (or multiple) priority, but basically only ting liu and physdef garg can actually wall it effectively, sure intimidate corv can survive a hit but that forces intimidate and can only do 40-47 in return, avaluff is also something able to survive one hit but that not exactly a good mon
heres some calcs on this topic:
• -1 252 Atk Supreme Overlord 5 allies fainted Houndstone Last Respects vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Corviknight: 286-337 (71.5 - 84.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
• 252 Atk Supreme Overlord 5 allies fainted Houndstone Last Respects vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Orthworm: 340-402 (98.8 - 116.8%) -- 93.8% chance to OHKO
• 252 Atk Supreme Overlord 5 allies fainted Houndstone Last Respects vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Toxapex: 328-387 (107.8 - 127.3%) -- guaranteed OHKO
and to acknowledge houndstone's faults
• 252 Atk Supreme Overlord 5 allies fainted Houndstone Last Respects vs. 252 HP / 252 Def Purifying Salt Garganacl: 202-238 (50 - 58.9%) -- 73.4% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
• 252 Atk Supreme Overlord 5 allies fainted Houndstone Last Respects vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Ting-Lu: 253-298 (49.2 - 57.9%) -- 59% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
• 252 Atk Supreme Overlord 5 allies fainted Houndstone Last Respects vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Great Tusk: 366-432 (84.3 - 99.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
the problem with houndstone's defensive is they have similarweaknesses, so you can just team up houndstone with the likes of greninja and/or meowscarads to deal with those, scarf variants of such also helping against houndstone's other counter in scarf users
now onto bax
technician loaded dice bax wins a lot of games off a single ddance against a wall, and cant be walled back so easily, you *must* have either delta stream/thick fat (the latter of which is generally worse than the former) corviknight or an EE/levitate/air balloon that resists ice if you want a chance of defensively countering/checking bax, as bax can make quick work of everything else with a boosted icicle spear or eq against resists that arent ground immune.
Bax has the repeated issue of being outsped and killed by scarf users, but bax can also run a technician boosted ice shard which can one shot some of the scarf users (like sandy shocks and non-dazzling meowscarada), a problem not even noivern could overcome due to choice lock
while choice scarf is a great item, i dont believe it should be *forced* to not die to things like this
this concludes my callout post on these two beasts and i hope to see action taken against them after we deal with joe (especially since joe was one of the aforementioned things that can deal with bax)
while i will agree that bax is crazy, and i can only see it better without gholdengo in the tier, i will argue that houndstone is completely fine.
houndstone ends up as a sitting duck for the first 10-20 ish rounds of the game (possibly less), while the idea of a sweeper that can kill nearly anything, for the first few turns, it is not just a 5-6 mu, but a 4-6 mu if using webs, or a 4.5-6 mu due to sandy being required for slush rush. sure, you can argue that stone could use weather speed x2, but opulse isnt here anymore and what good plain weather setters are there? the list stays at slowking and screens + chilly reception but thats all. whats stopping a baxcalibur from dragon dancing on a switch and proceeding to sweep you instead? while houndstone is promising, youd need a lot of setup, enough offensive pressure to never let ur webs get defogged away / your eterrain does not run out in time for houndstone to start working. this is not counting priority from the likes of kingambit, hatterene, baxcalibur, dragonite, etc and the fact that faster scarfers exist to not give houndstone a chance (meowscarada). if anything, houndstone is similar to polteageist, setup (webs, eterrain) and kill or lose the mon.
Now before I say anything, I'd like to clarify I reallyreally don't want to make this post because this thing is quite literally holding up all my teams defensively and as offensive breaker (which is the main point I'll be talking about here). However, after some more thinking, reflection and abusing other sets (particularly all-out offensive) after my initial post on it I've come to agree that Gholdengo is probably overbearing for the meta and should be banned.
People have already discussed a fair bit about Gholdengo's immense defensive utility. Earth Eater, Well-Baked Body, Bulletproof all being plenty viable and able to remove what would otherwise be solid checks, Siamato goes in-depth about it in his post so I won't talk too much about it here. The main issue just for this aspect is that it can viably run any of these which can invalidate checks, and it can feel like a guessing game as to what checks will actually work against it and Gholdengo is NOT a mon you won't to be giving a free turn at willy nilly, given it also has a very potent 133 SpA + NP + Sub + STAB SBall and a STAB 120BP move and can also blow that potential check to sky heaven if you do guess wrong. Particularly Well-Baked Body can punish you very hard if you misplay into it, notably letting Ghold with MIR beat Bulky RMoon 1v1 with a +2. That being said, guessing the Ghold set often isn't actually something like a 50/50 and I find guessing the defensive set I can do fairly consistently on a game-to-game basis and I don't feel it that punishing misplaying into a EE/Bulletproof, WBB can be more irritating but still has its checks. But that being said I run RegenVest RMoon or another dedicated Ghold check on like 80% of my teams so perhaps that's more a symptom.
Despite its defensive prowess I really believe that the main issue with Ghold currently are its all-out offensive sets in tandem with its defensive sets. People seem to focus on its defensive utility, which I'll grant is superb and amazing but that aforementioned higher-than-Gengar SpA stat, NP, and STABs on SBall and a 120 BP move already being great non-invested, now run it all the way to the max and you find some very scary offensive sets. Steelworker/Steely-Spirit allow Gholdengo nuke many things, even the supposed check Bulky RMoon (and others like Ting-Lu, which is admittedly a fake check, and even Kingambit), MGLO can do similar things against RMoon while also packing some neat utility and eating SpD Garganacl for breakfast and Beads of Ruin Specs you can soon find nothing is able to switch into it. DGleam hitting RMoon, MIR smashing SpD Garg, Psyshock decimates Iron Moth and FBlast makes Kingambit stop existing. Scarf also is an option that can cripple any extreme walls like the rare Blissey looking to wall you as well as well as dealing with some common offensive answers like non-Scarf Meowscarada/Greninja.
These all-out offensive sets alone could make Gholdengo a fantastic and very threatening mon and could apply quite a lot of pressure when teambuilding but however this is further combined by its also plenty viable defensive sets which you further need to account for. Got a RegenVest RMoon? Nice, but you fail to sustain yourself against all-out offensive Ghold (as NToTheN unfortunately found out when their Vessel of Ruin Roaring Moon got oneshot by a +2 MIR and found out for myself when playing against MGLO). Got yourself a sturdy revenge killer like Iron Moth or Gengar? Run into WBB or Bulletproof and oops, you're gone! While playing around the set in-game I haven't much issue in personally, but building around Gholdengo at a high-level I find too overbearing. There essentially being no blanket check for Gholdengo outside of a few niche options like Bulletproof Ghold itself (which can get overwhelmed by all-out offensive Gholdengo if not max SpD, of which it can still be overwhelmed even then) and almost forcing 2 checks on any team that isn't aggressive enough to have enough offensive answers to not care. And while I haven't had too much issue playing around Gholdengo myself, I also make sure to heavily prepare my team against it with the likes of BProof Gholdengo, RegenVest Moon and Scarf Greninja (often the two paired with each and one another), granted these are good and decent options for a good chunk of teams but forcing (imo) this is kind of dumb and I fear the day more people really start exploring lure/all-out offensive Gholdengo sets.
I'd also like to echo Siamato again, that while this mon holds up a lot of teams defensively and keeps a lot of threats like Bax in check, just because it does that shouldn't override the unhealthy effects the mon has on the metagame, although I do agree Gholdengo has had a positive affect on the meta for its part. We'll probably be in for another long time of a wild ride of a meta post Gholdengo given what it checks but I do believe in the long-term it would probably be better. Also, uh, if Gholdengo does get banned, can someone please help me recover from the trauma?
TL;DR Gholdengo should be banned due to its sheer versatility allowing it to run an insane multitude of sets which can put too much pressure on the teambuilder imo + the mindgames Gholdengo can promote guessing its defensive sets (although I believe this is a lesser worry).
+2 252+ SpA Metal Coat Steelworker Gholdengo Make It Rain vs. 112 HP / 0 SpD Kingambit: 450-531 (121.9 - 143.9%) -- guaranteed OHKO (lol what IS this calc)
+2 252+ SpA Metal Coat Steelworker Gholdengo Make It Rain vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Roaring Moon: 375-442 (90.5 - 106.7%) -- 43.8% chance to OHKO (0 Atk Roaring Moon Crunch vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Gholdengo: 240-284 (76.1 - 90.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO)
252+ SpA Life Orb Gholdengo Steel Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Roaring Moon: 160-188 (38.6 - 45.4%) -- guaranteed 3HKO (put down Rocks and they're in for a world of hurt)
+2 252+ SpA Life Orb Gholdengo Steel Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Vessel of Ruin Roaring Moon: 355-419 (85.7 - 101.2%) -- 6.3% chance to OHKO
252+ SpA Life Orb Gholdengo Psyshock vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Iron Moth: 382-452 (104.9 - 124.1%) -- guaranteed OHKO
+2 252+ SpA Life Orb Gholdengo Steel Beam vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Gholdengo: 357-421 (94.4 - 111.3%) -- 68.8% chance to OHKO
252+ SpA Life Orb Gholdengo Steel Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Ting-Lu: 277-328 (53.8 - 63.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
0 Atk Roaring Moon Crunch vs. +2 252 HP / 252+ Def Gholdengo: 86-104 (22.7 - 27.5%) -- possible 5HKO after Leftovers recovery (WBB allowing defensive Ghold to beat Roaring Moon, although idk if it needs max physdef)
____________________________________
While I'm still on the topic of banworthy and sus mons, I'd just like to bring up and talk about some of the future suspect and potential banworthy mons in the current meta.
Gengar @ Life Orb
Ability: Sheer Force
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Shadow Ball
- Focus Blast
- Nasty Plot
- Dark Pulse / Hex / Energy Ball / Sludge Bomb / Will-O-Wisp / Thunderbolt
While this one has flown under the radar for many, this mon in my experience is certainly still as powerful as ever. In terms of reliable walls, there are like none except perhaps Vessel of Ruin Clodsire? (Purifying Salt if real) SpD Garg, Ting-Lu and RegenVest RMoon get trashed by a +2 FBlast, BProof Ghold is solid for most but still can be decked by the wrong 4th move and SpD Corv similarly can be decked by TBolt or simply through Sheer Force. This thing is limited by its speed and frailty at the moment so perhaps may not be the most overtly broken thing out there, but is a very threatening breaker that isn't that slow that I could see be overbearing to deal with defensively depending on how the meta shifts.
I called this thing out before the meta even began and my thoughts remain similar. This thing has absurd sweeping potential and as Siamato noted "Shed Tail, switch on Bax and win the game (roughly 80% of my games)." with this thing getting a free DD or two putting a lot of teams in a very compromised position. Standard defensive walls like Tusk, Corv and Garganacl simply cannot handle this thing at all alone at least (hell even Delta Stream Corv isn't 100% solid). If you REALLY want to go for overkill, run SD as a pure breaker. Allowing it to potentially overwhelm Gholdengo and Gambit (EE) after an SD on the switch and some decent chip and everything else just like, dies. Even a Dondozo I found got 2HKO'd by my Bax after I forced it to sleep earlier and knocked lefties, which is, really, REALLY absurd even if I got lucky and it was Fluffy. If Gholdengo goes, one of the like 2 actual reliable answers to this thing, then I'm 100% up for just QB'ing this thing, although even now I'd support it as well.
Great Tusk @ Leftovers
Ability: Regenerator / Scrappy
Tera Type: Ground
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SpD
Adamant Nature
- Bulk Up / Stealth Rocks
- Earthquake / Close Combat
- Knock Off
- Rapid Spin
While for me personally, the Jury is still out, I've seen quite a bit of discussion towards a potential Tusk suspect and I can somewhat see why at least. Regenerator allows Tusk to essentially stay around forever given you play it well enough, has infinite utility with Rapid Spin for removal, KOff for obvious reasons and BU + Spin allows it serve as a potent wincon if you're not careful as well. Scrappy while giving up your HP Regen, frees up Regen slot and allows you to comfortably smash defensive Ghold while having unblockable spin, otherwise functionally same as before. It can certainly sit on a lot of teams and really dominates the Regenerator slot given its sheer utility. Isaiah can summarise and explain the case for it much better though, so hey if you're curious, you can always ask in the OM discord!
Looking back on everything, this meta is actually pretty absurdly packed with offensive threats. DD Bax, SFLO Gengar, all-out offensive Gholdengo, Scrappy Tusk, usual Fire abusers and even things like Houndstone (which is still sus to me, but I suppose I'm in the minority) make it nearly impossible to viably run stall and balance teams almost always have to cram some form of speed control or offensive pressure or just risk crumpling, or at least that's how I find it so far. But hey, upcoming suspects are a step in the right direction. Well at least I think so, if that means anything.
Now before I say anything, I'd like to clarify I reallyreally don't want to make this post because this thing is quite literally holding up all my teams defensively and as offensive breaker (which is the main point I'll be talking about here). However, after some more thinking, reflection and abusing other sets (particularly all-out offensive) after my initial post on it I've come to agree that Gholdengo is probably overbearing for the meta and should be banned.
People have already discussed a fair bit about Gholdengo's immense defensive utility. Earth Eater, Well-Baked Body, Bulletproof all being plenty viable and able to remove what would otherwise be solid checks, Siamato goes in-depth about it in his post so I won't talk too much about it here. The main issue just for this aspect is that it can viably run any of these which can invalidate checks, and it can feel like a guessing game as to what checks will actually work against it and Gholdengo is NOT a mon you won't to be giving a free turn at willy nilly, given it also has a very potent 133 SpA + NP + Sub + STAB SBall and a STAB 120BP move and can also blow that potential check to sky heaven if you do guess wrong. Particularly Well-Baked Body can punish you very hard if you misplay into it, notably letting Ghold with MIR beat Bulky RMoon 1v1 with a +2. That being said, guessing the Ghold set often isn't actually something like a 50/50 and I find guessing the defensive set I can do fairly consistently on a game-to-game basis and I don't feel it that punishing misplaying into a EE/Bulletproof, WBB can be more irritating but still has its checks. But that being said I run RegenVest RMoon or another dedicated Ghold check on like 80% of my teams so perhaps that's more a symptom.
Despite its defensive prowess I really believe that the main issue with Ghold currently are its all-out offensive sets in tandem with its defensive sets. People seem to focus on its defensive utility, which I'll grant is superb and amazing but that aforementioned higher-than-Gengar SpA stat, NP, and STABs on SBall and a 120 BP move already being great non-invested, now run it all the way to the max and you find some very scary offensive sets. Steelworker/Steely-Spirit allow Gholdengo nuke many things, even the supposed check Bulky RMoon (and others like Ting-Lu, which is admittedly a fake check, and even Kingambit), MGLO can do similar things against RMoon while also packing some neat utility and eating SpD Garganacl for breakfast and Beads of Ruin Specs you can soon find nothing is able to switch into it. DGleam hitting RMoon, MIR smashing SpD Garg, Psyshock decimates Iron Moth and FBlast makes Kingambit stop existing. Scarf also is an option that can cripple any extreme walls like the rare Blissey looking to wall you as well as well as dealing with some common offensive answers like non-Scarf Meowscarada/Greninja.
These all-out offensive sets alone could make Gholdengo a fantastic and very threatening mon and could apply quite a lot of pressure when teambuilding but however this is further combined by its also plenty viable defensive sets which you further need to account for. Got a RegenVest RMoon? Nice, but you fail to sustain yourself against all-out offensive Ghold (as NToTheN unfortunately found out when their Vessel of Ruin Roaring Moon got oneshot by a +2 MIR and found out for myself when playing against MGLO). Got yourself a sturdy revenge killer like Iron Moth or Gengar? Run into WBB or Bulletproof and oops, you're gone! While playing around the set in-game I haven't much issue in personally, but building around Gholdengo at a high-level I find too overbearing. There essentially being no blanket check for Gholdengo outside of a few niche options like Bulletproof Ghold itself (which can get overwhelmed by all-out offensive Gholdengo if not max SpD, of which it can still be overwhelmed even then) and almost forcing 2 checks on any team that isn't aggressive enough to have enough offensive answers to not care. And while I haven't had too much issue playing around Gholdengo myself, I also make sure to heavily prepare my team against it with the likes of BProof Gholdengo, RegenVest Moon and Scarf Greninja (often the two paired with each and one another), granted these are good and decent options for a good chunk of teams but forcing (imo) this is kind of dumb and I fear the day more people really start exploring lure/all-out offensive Gholdengo sets.
I'd also like to echo Siamato again, that while this mon holds up a lot of teams defensively and keeps a lot of threats like Bax in check, just because it does that shouldn't override the unhealthy effects the mon has on the metagame, although I do agree Gholdengo has had a positive affect on the meta for its part. We'll probably be in for another long time of a wild ride of a meta post Gholdengo given what it checks but I do believe in the long-term it would probably be better. Also, uh, if Gholdengo does get banned, can someone please help me recover from the trauma?
TL;DR Gholdengo should be banned due to its sheer versatility allowing it to run an insane multitude of sets which can put too much pressure on the teambuilder imo + the mindgames Gholdengo can promote guessing its defensive sets (although I believe this is a lesser worry).
+2 252+ SpA Metal Coat Steelworker Gholdengo Make It Rain vs. 112 HP / 0 SpD Kingambit: 450-531 (121.9 - 143.9%) -- guaranteed OHKO (lol what IS this calc)
+2 252+ SpA Metal Coat Steelworker Gholdengo Make It Rain vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Roaring Moon: 375-442 (90.5 - 106.7%) -- 43.8% chance to OHKO (0 Atk Roaring Moon Crunch vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Gholdengo: 240-284 (76.1 - 90.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO)
252+ SpA Life Orb Gholdengo Steel Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Roaring Moon: 160-188 (38.6 - 45.4%) -- guaranteed 3HKO (put down Rocks and they're in for a world of hurt)
+2 252+ SpA Life Orb Gholdengo Steel Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Vessel of Ruin Roaring Moon: 355-419 (85.7 - 101.2%) -- 6.3% chance to OHKO
252+ SpA Life Orb Gholdengo Psyshock vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Iron Moth: 382-452 (104.9 - 124.1%) -- guaranteed OHKO
+2 252+ SpA Life Orb Gholdengo Steel Beam vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Gholdengo: 357-421 (94.4 - 111.3%) -- 68.8% chance to OHKO
252+ SpA Life Orb Gholdengo Steel Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Ting-Lu: 277-328 (53.8 - 63.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
0 Atk Roaring Moon Crunch vs. +2 252 HP / 252+ Def Gholdengo: 86-104 (22.7 - 27.5%) -- possible 5HKO after Leftovers recovery (WBB allowing defensive Ghold to beat Roaring Moon, although idk if it needs max physdef)
____________________________________
While I'm still on the topic of banworthy and sus mons, I'd just like to bring up and talk about some of the future suspect and potential banworthy mons in the current meta.
View attachment 493606
Gengar @ Life Orb
Ability: Sheer Force
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Shadow Ball
- Focus Blast
- Nasty Plot
- Dark Pulse / Hex / Energy Ball / Sludge Bomb / Will-O-Wisp / Thunderbolt
While this one has flown under the radar for many, this mon in my experience is certainly still as powerful as ever. In terms of reliable walls, there are like none except perhaps Vessel of Ruin Clodsire? (Purifying Salt if real) SpD Garg, Ting-Lu and RegenVest RMoon get trashed by a +2 FBlast, BProof Ghold is solid for most but still can be decked by the wrong 4th move and SpD Corv similarly can be decked by TBolt or simply through Sheer Force. This thing is limited by its speed and frailty at the moment so perhaps may not be the most overtly broken thing out there, but is a very threatening breaker that isn't that slow that I could see be overbearing to deal with defensively depending on how the meta shifts.
I called this thing out before the meta even began and my thoughts remain similar. This thing has absurd sweeping potential and as Siamato noted "Shed Tail, switch on Bax and win the game (roughly 80% of my games)." with this thing getting a free DD or two putting a lot of teams in a very compromised position. Standard defensive walls like Tusk, Corv and Garganacl simply cannot handle this thing at all alone at least (hell even Delta Stream Corv isn't 100% solid). If you REALLY want to go for overkill, run SD as a pure breaker. Allowing it to potentially overwhelm Gholdengo and Gambit (EE) after an SD on the switch and some decent chip and everything else just like, dies. Even a Dondozo I found got 2HKO'd by my Bax after I forced it to sleep earlier and knocked lefties, which is, really, REALLY absurd even if I got lucky and it was Fluffy. If Gholdengo goes, one of the like 2 actual reliable answers to this thing, then I'm 100% up for just QB'ing this thing, although even now I'd support it as well.
View attachment 493610
Great Tusk @ Leftovers
Ability: Regenerator / Scrappy
Tera Type: Ground
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SpD
Adamant Nature
- Bulk Up / Stealth Rocks
- Earthquake / Close Combat
- Knock Off
- Rapid Spin
While for me personally, the Jury is still out, I've seen quite a bit of discussion towards a potential Tusk suspect and I can somewhat see why at least. Regenerator allows Tusk to essentially stay around forever given you play it well enough, has infinite utility with Rapid Spin for removal, KOff for obvious reasons and BU + Spin allows it serve as a potent wincon if you're not careful as well. Scrappy while giving up your HP Regen, frees up Regen slot and allows you to comfortably smash defensive Ghold while having unblockable spin, otherwise functionally same as before. It can certainly sit on a lot of teams and really dominates the Regenerator slot given its sheer utility. Isaiah can summarise and explain the case for it much better though, so hey if you're curious, you can always ask in the OM discord!
Looking back on everything, this meta is actually pretty absurdly packed with offensive threats. DD Bax, SFLO Gengar, all-out offensive Gholdengo, Scrappy Tusk, usual Fire abusers and even things like Houndstone (which is still sus to me, but I suppose I'm in the minority) make it nearly impossible to viably run stall and balance teams almost always have to cram some form of speed control or offensive pressure or just risk crumpling, or at least that's how I find it so far. But hey, upcoming suspects are a step in the right direction. Well at least I think so, if that means anything.
Now before I say anything, I'd like to clarify I reallyreally don't want to make this post because this thing is quite literally holding up all my teams defensively and as offensive breaker (which is the main point I'll be talking about here). However, after some more thinking, reflection and abusing other sets (particularly all-out offensive) after my initial post on it I've come to agree that Gholdengo is probably overbearing for the meta and should be banned.
People have already discussed a fair bit about Gholdengo's immense defensive utility. Earth Eater, Well-Baked Body, Bulletproof all being plenty viable and able to remove what would otherwise be solid checks, Siamato goes in-depth about it in his post so I won't talk too much about it here. The main issue just for this aspect is that it can viably run any of these which can invalidate checks, and it can feel like a guessing game as to what checks will actually work against it and Gholdengo is NOT a mon you won't to be giving a free turn at willy nilly, given it also has a very potent 133 SpA + NP + Sub + STAB SBall and a STAB 120BP move and can also blow that potential check to sky heaven if you do guess wrong. Particularly Well-Baked Body can punish you very hard if you misplay into it, notably letting Ghold with MIR beat Bulky RMoon 1v1 with a +2. That being said, guessing the Ghold set often isn't actually something like a 50/50 and I find guessing the defensive set I can do fairly consistently on a game-to-game basis and I don't feel it that punishing misplaying into a EE/Bulletproof, WBB can be more irritating but still has its checks. But that being said I run RegenVest RMoon or another dedicated Ghold check on like 80% of my teams so perhaps that's more a symptom.
Despite its defensive prowess I really believe that the main issue with Ghold currently are its all-out offensive sets in tandem with its defensive sets. People seem to focus on its defensive utility, which I'll grant is superb and amazing but that aforementioned higher-than-Gengar SpA stat, NP, and STABs on SBall and a 120 BP move already being great non-invested, now run it all the way to the max and you find some very scary offensive sets. Steelworker/Steely-Spirit allow Gholdengo nuke many things, even the supposed check Bulky RMoon (and others like Ting-Lu, which is admittedly a fake check, and even Kingambit), MGLO can do similar things against RMoon while also packing some neat utility and eating SpD Garganacl for breakfast and Beads of Ruin Specs you can soon find nothing is able to switch into it. DGleam hitting RMoon, MIR smashing SpD Garg, Psyshock decimates Iron Moth and FBlast makes Kingambit stop existing. Scarf also is an option that can cripple any extreme walls like the rare Blissey looking to wall you as well as well as dealing with some common offensive answers like non-Scarf Meowscarada/Greninja.
These all-out offensive sets alone could make Gholdengo a fantastic and very threatening mon and could apply quite a lot of pressure when teambuilding but however this is further combined by its also plenty viable defensive sets which you further need to account for. Got a RegenVest RMoon? Nice, but you fail to sustain yourself against all-out offensive Ghold (as NToTheN unfortunately found out when their Vessel of Ruin Roaring Moon got oneshot by a +2 MIR and found out for myself when playing against MGLO). Got yourself a sturdy revenge killer like Iron Moth or Gengar? Run into WBB or Bulletproof and oops, you're gone! While playing around the set in-game I haven't much issue in personally, but building around Gholdengo at a high-level I find too overbearing. There essentially being no blanket check for Gholdengo outside of a few niche options like Bulletproof Ghold itself (which can get overwhelmed by all-out offensive Gholdengo if not max SpD, of which it can still be overwhelmed even then) and almost forcing 2 checks on any team that isn't aggressive enough to have enough offensive answers to not care. And while I haven't had too much issue playing around Gholdengo myself, I also make sure to heavily prepare my team against it with the likes of BProof Gholdengo, RegenVest Moon and Scarf Greninja (often the two paired with each and one another), granted these are good and decent options for a good chunk of teams but forcing (imo) this is kind of dumb and I fear the day more people really start exploring lure/all-out offensive Gholdengo sets.
I'd also like to echo Siamato again, that while this mon holds up a lot of teams defensively and keeps a lot of threats like Bax in check, just because it does that shouldn't override the unhealthy effects the mon has on the metagame, although I do agree Gholdengo has had a positive affect on the meta for its part. We'll probably be in for another long time of a wild ride of a meta post Gholdengo given what it checks but I do believe in the long-term it would probably be better. Also, uh, if Gholdengo does get banned, can someone please help me recover from the trauma?
TL;DR Gholdengo should be banned due to its sheer versatility allowing it to run an insane multitude of sets which can put too much pressure on the teambuilder imo + the mindgames Gholdengo can promote guessing its defensive sets (although I believe this is a lesser worry).
+2 252+ SpA Metal Coat Steelworker Gholdengo Make It Rain vs. 112 HP / 0 SpD Kingambit: 450-531 (121.9 - 143.9%) -- guaranteed OHKO (lol what IS this calc)
+2 252+ SpA Metal Coat Steelworker Gholdengo Make It Rain vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Roaring Moon: 375-442 (90.5 - 106.7%) -- 43.8% chance to OHKO (0 Atk Roaring Moon Crunch vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Gholdengo: 240-284 (76.1 - 90.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO)
252+ SpA Life Orb Gholdengo Steel Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Roaring Moon: 160-188 (38.6 - 45.4%) -- guaranteed 3HKO (put down Rocks and they're in for a world of hurt)
+2 252+ SpA Life Orb Gholdengo Steel Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Vessel of Ruin Roaring Moon: 355-419 (85.7 - 101.2%) -- 6.3% chance to OHKO
252+ SpA Life Orb Gholdengo Psyshock vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Iron Moth: 382-452 (104.9 - 124.1%) -- guaranteed OHKO
+2 252+ SpA Life Orb Gholdengo Steel Beam vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Gholdengo: 357-421 (94.4 - 111.3%) -- 68.8% chance to OHKO
252+ SpA Life Orb Gholdengo Steel Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Ting-Lu: 277-328 (53.8 - 63.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
0 Atk Roaring Moon Crunch vs. +2 252 HP / 252+ Def Gholdengo: 86-104 (22.7 - 27.5%) -- possible 5HKO after Leftovers recovery (WBB allowing defensive Ghold to beat Roaring Moon, although idk if it needs max physdef)
____________________________________
While I'm still on the topic of banworthy and sus mons, I'd just like to bring up and talk about some of the future suspect and potential banworthy mons in the current meta.
View attachment 493606
Gengar @ Life Orb
Ability: Sheer Force
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Shadow Ball
- Focus Blast
- Nasty Plot
- Dark Pulse / Hex / Energy Ball / Sludge Bomb / Will-O-Wisp / Thunderbolt
While this one has flown under the radar for many, this mon in my experience is certainly still as powerful as ever. In terms of reliable walls, there are like none except perhaps Vessel of Ruin Clodsire? (Purifying Salt if real) SpD Garg, Ting-Lu and RegenVest RMoon get trashed by a +2 FBlast, BProof Ghold is solid for most but still can be decked by the wrong 4th move and SpD Corv similarly can be decked by TBolt or simply through Sheer Force. This thing is limited by its speed and frailty at the moment so perhaps may not be the most overtly broken thing out there, but is a very threatening breaker that isn't that slow that I could see be overbearing to deal with defensively depending on how the meta shifts.
I called this thing out before the meta even began and my thoughts remain similar. This thing has absurd sweeping potential and as Siamato noted "Shed Tail, switch on Bax and win the game (roughly 80% of my games)." with this thing getting a free DD or two putting a lot of teams in a very compromised position. Standard defensive walls like Tusk, Corv and Garganacl simply cannot handle this thing at all alone at least (hell even Delta Stream Corv isn't 100% solid). If you REALLY want to go for overkill, run SD as a pure breaker. Allowing it to potentially overwhelm Gholdengo and Gambit (EE) after an SD on the switch and some decent chip and everything else just like, dies. Even a Dondozo I found got 2HKO'd by my Bax after I forced it to sleep earlier and knocked lefties, which is, really, REALLY absurd even if I got lucky and it was Fluffy. If Gholdengo goes, one of the like 2 actual reliable answers to this thing, then I'm 100% up for just QB'ing this thing, although even now I'd support it as well.
View attachment 493610
Great Tusk @ Leftovers
Ability: Regenerator / Scrappy
Tera Type: Ground
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SpD
Adamant Nature
- Bulk Up / Stealth Rocks
- Earthquake / Close Combat
- Knock Off
- Rapid Spin
While for me personally, the Jury is still out, I've seen quite a bit of discussion towards a potential Tusk suspect and I can somewhat see why at least. Regenerator allows Tusk to essentially stay around forever given you play it well enough, has infinite utility with Rapid Spin for removal, KOff for obvious reasons and BU + Spin allows it serve as a potent wincon if you're not careful as well. Scrappy while giving up your HP Regen, frees up Regen slot and allows you to comfortably smash defensive Ghold while having unblockable spin, otherwise functionally same as before. It can certainly sit on a lot of teams and really dominates the Regenerator slot given its sheer utility. Isaiah can summarise and explain the case for it much better though, so hey if you're curious, you can always ask in the OM discord!
Looking back on everything, this meta is actually pretty absurdly packed with offensive threats. DD Bax, SFLO Gengar, all-out offensive Gholdengo, Scrappy Tusk, usual Fire abusers and even things like Houndstone (which is still sus to me, but I suppose I'm in the minority) make it nearly impossible to viably run stall and balance teams almost always have to cram some form of speed control or offensive pressure or just risk crumpling, or at least that's how I find it so far. But hey, upcoming suspects are a step in the right direction. Well at least I think so, if that means anything.
Great post completing well mine there! If you don't know yet what to vote I suggest you take a look at both in order to better understand why Gholdengo might be too much and why banning it could be positive in the long run. Here we will discuss 3 mons including Gholdengo.
To begin with, I want to discuss something that appeared clear to me as an issue with the current metagame. The rising death star:
Roaring Moon @ Assault Vest
Ability: Regenerator
Tera Type: Dragon
EVs: 248 HP / 8 Atk / 252 SpD
Careful Nature
- Crunch
- Dragon Claw / Dragon Tail / Stone Edge
- Earthquake
- U-turn
Okay let's be real, this mon is currently another glue preventing the metagame to explode and why it's rising a lot recently. It's almost the only "safe" switch-in to Gholdengo and Iron Moth while also checking dangerous things like Gengar, Sandy Shocks, Greninja, Chi-Yu, Kilowattrel or Armarouge. I think the mon itself is quite mid because realistically any Dragon type sufficiently bulky with a pivot move could do almost the same job but forced to note Roaring Moon is our only option (although you can try Hydreigon with larger coverage option and doing similar job).
However, the fact it is almost the only thing able to deal a little bit with broken special threats in the current metagame without being garbage is indicative of an issue about how centralizing are the current threats with extremely limited counterplay.
As a matter of fact, I'm using the SV AAA Money Tour R2 stats made by Tea Guzzler (full credits to him for the below table).
Rank
Pokemon
Usage
1
Corviknight
82 (64.06%)
2
Great Tusk
78 (60.94%)
3
Gholdengo
62 (48.44%)
4
Garganacl
35 (27.34%)
5
Roaring Moon
34 (26.56%)
6
Baxcalibur
33 (25.78%)
7
Iron Moth
32 (25.00%)
8
Dragonite
26 (20.31%)
9
Chien-Pao
25 (19.53%)
10
Greninja
22 (17.19%)
11
Sandy Shocks, Scream Tail
20 (15.62%)
12
Kingambit
18 (14.06%)
13
Hatterene, Quaquaval
15 (11.72%)
14
Garchomp
14 (10.94%)
15
Houndstone
13 (10.16%)
What we saw is that, 3 mons get more or around 50% usage meaning that a team over two is using the 3 same mon. Half teams are built using half your teamslots for the 3 same mons, Corviknight, Great Tusk and Gholdengo.
Of course we must remain critical about these stats because tournament tend to not accurately picture the metagame sometimes due to samples spam particularly. However, from this stats, the conclusion is quite obvious: the metagame has never been that centralized. And ofc, such level of centralization isn't a good indicator of the metagame health both in terms of balance and diversity.
If Corviknight is still AAA's king because it offers so much defensively, both Gholdengo and Great Tusk are quite borderline mon while also being cornerstones of the metagame at the moment.
Okay but what's the point of talking about Roaring Moon rising, telling us the metagame is super centralized and Gholdengo?
The point is, keeping Gholdengo in the metagame will definitely not fix things. Roaring Moon will probably continue to rise up to a point it will maybe become the specially defensive Pokemon of the metagame (above Garganacl) because, considering how many special threats are in the current metagame and how difficult they are to handle, you almost have no choice.
However, it's quite obvious if a mon starts to be everywhere, we're going to exploit that. And in fact, it's not that hard to abuse Roaring Moon and make your brokens work against it.
By using the 3 brokens (eventually working with one another):
Roaring Moon may be the best overall Gholdengo's check, it can make progress against it or help partners to make it. How?
Thunder Wave spreads yellow magic moment eventually allowing Gholdengo to use Roaring Moon as setup fodder especially over long games. Because Roaring Moon's speed is also an element making it cool (I believe quite fast Roaring Moon AV is good), it can even more be at the mercy your Gholdengo or Gengar and Iron Moth we will see below.
Steel Beam MGLO and Steel Worker/Adapta Make It Rain does quite a lot to Roaring and with SR ups, you have these calcs:
252+ SpA Life Orb Gholdengo Steel Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Roaring Moon: 160-188 (38.6 - 45.4%) -- 14.1% chance to 2HKO after Stealth Rock
252+ SpA Choice Specs Adaptability Gholdengo Make It Rain over 2 turns vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Roaring Moon: 350-414 (84.5 - 100%) -- 81.3% chance to 2HKO after Stealth Rock
+2 252+ SpA Metal Coat Steelworker Gholdengo Make It Rain vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Roaring Moon: 375-442 (90.5 - 106.7%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock
+2 252 SpA Metal Coat Steelworker Gholdengo Make It Rain vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Roaring Moon: 342-403 (82.6 - 97.3%) -- 68.8% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
And ofc as you all know, Roaring Moon is unable to OHKO Gholdengo meaning that yeah, all this scenario for which Gholdengo is beating Roaring Moon are perfectly real.
If we want to enter the gimmick/prep territory, ofc you can try SF LO Focus Blast Gholdengo also able to OHKO AV Roaring Moon at +2 and Kingambit btw. Dazzling Gleam Beads of Ruin also pretty much annihilate it because yeah, Gholdengo learns it.
What we're seeing there is that yeah Roaring Moon is one of the best Gholdengo check but seeing that, you should understand how precarious it is.
Because you get LO to support your offensive moves and Steel Beam insane power, you can drop Nasty Plot for Thunder Wave and definitely become a threat for Roaring Moon and Iron Moth, 2 common checks to this variant long terms.
If LordBox talked about Baxcalibur, Gengar and Great Tusk as other things we should definitely care about in terms of threat to the metagame balance with which I agree, he forgot this mon to me.
Since the Iron Bundle ban, this mon progressively shifted from defensive to bulky offensive or fully offensive sets. And we now start to understand how powerful Iron Moth is on its own no longer being relegated to the rank of "bulky Desolate Land Fire with recovery".
First, people finally understood how powerful Discharge can be allowing to spread yellow magic and pass through what were considered as counter some months ago, WBB Corviknight or Gholdengo. Honestly I completely stopped playing WBB Corvi although it's a great mon on paper because it was just losing to every Iron Moth running Discharge (almost all rn). If I think we still have ways to quite easily handle Desolate Land Iron Moth, that's definitely not the case for other ones.
SFLO is able to 2HKO WBB Gholdengo or Kingambit without relying to yellow magic moment to just break them. We have all this funny calcs:
252 SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Iron Moth Discharge vs. 248 HP / 4 SpD Gholdengo: 169-199 (44.8 - 52.7%) -- 84.4% chance to 2HKO after Stealth Rock
252 SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Iron Moth Discharge vs. 112 HP / 0 SpD Kingambit: 178-211 (48.2 - 57.1%) -- 91.8% chance to 2HKO after Stealth Rock and Leftovers recovery
252 SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Iron Moth Energy Ball vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Garganacl in Sand: 182-216 (45 - 53.4%) -- 89.5% chance to 2HKO after Stealth Rock and Leftovers recovery
252 SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Iron Moth Fire Blast vs. 248 HP / 252+ SpD Iron Moth in Harsh Sunshine: 164-192 (45.1 - 52.8%) -- 31.3% chance to 2HKO
252 SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Iron Moth Energy Ball vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Garchomp: 199-235 (47.3 - 55.9%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock
Okok but what's about breaking the pillar making everything collapse, Roaring Moon?
First let's say every non-SFLO Iron Moth with Discharge is able to paralysed Roaring Moon. Yeah you're gonna break it with Iron Moth this way but, now your WBB/Earth Eater or offensive Gholdengo with NP can break it more easily cleaning the path for Iron Moth and it.
Well, did you know that Iron Moth also learns Dazzling Gleam? Here a set I like and another reason why offensive Iron Moth is so scary:
Iron Moth @ Heavy-Duty Boots / Expert Belt
Ability: Hadron Engine
Tera Type: Fire
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Fiery Dance / Flamethrower / Fire Blast
- Discharge
- Dazzling Gleam
- Energy Ball / Morning Sun / U-Turn
Yeah Hadron Engine Iron Moth does almost the same damages as SFLO one on WBB Gholdengo/Kingambit with Discharge but you can para them. Dazzling Gleam takes care of any Dragon and especially Roaring Moon. Last slot is quite free if you're interested in hitting Garganacl or want some defensive or pivot utility.
252 SpA Expert Belt Hadron Engine Iron Moth Dazzling Gleam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Roaring Moon: 283-336 (68.3 - 81.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock. Extremely easy 2HKO.
252 SpA Expert Belt Hadron Engine Iron Moth Dazzling Gleam vs. 248 HP / 76 SpD Assault Vest Roaring Moon: 365-432 (88.3 - 104.6%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock. Here you have the calc on fast Roaring Moon (ie: above 350 to outspeed and OHKO Gengar and Iron Moth with EQ).
So yeah again, Iron Moth can either fish para for Gholdengo or Gengar to get an easier task breaking through or break it itself using Dazzling Gleam.
The last demon. LordBox already talked about it so I will not really come back on this mon but let's just see how it manages to break through AV Roaring Moon or help partners to do so.
Standard SFLO Gengar is already able to break Roaring Moon. However, it's a kind of 50/50 because it relies on hitting 2 Focus Blast in a row.
252 SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Gengar Focus Blast vs. 248 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Roaring Moon: 211-250 (51 - 60.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock.
Gengar learns Will-O-Wisp which is extremely useful against Roaring Moon or Garganacl considered as Gengar checks. A burned Roaring Moon is a Roaring Moon losing to any Gholdengo with NP.
Hey, do you see this pink move in Gengar's movepool? Ah yeah it's Dazzling Gleam again. Rip Roaring Moon. Yeah Gengar can run sets like Beads of Ruin / Hadron Engine Specs with Dazzling Gleam and just get rid of Roaring Moon pretty easily without relying on Focus miss.
Normalize Mean Look + Skill Swap is trapping Roaring Moon and kill it if it's a slow one.
Trick a Scarf or Specs can help a partner making progress.
Thunderbolt Hadron Engine allows to 2HKO Kingambit or Bulletproof Gholdengo btw.
So coming back to my point. Roaring Moon is almost the only defensive mon to handle this 3 demons but, as we saw, it's definitely a precarious answer that can in fact lose against them. Therefore, we should not believe the metagame is in a decent state right now and we definitely must keep our eyes on these things because they might not be balanced given their versatility and the state of the existing defensive answers.
I understand people saying banning Gholdengo isn't the right choice given its defensive utility in the current metagame but I think you guys should take a look further. You only look at the top of the iceberg. And as I said in my other post in the suspect thread, I don't think we fully explored Gholdengo yet making it even more terrifying considering what it already does.
Gholdengo is an issue on its own and we can't afford to let it in the metagame because it helps making some things manageable. If the metagame balance really depends on Gholdengo, I think the situation is definitely extremely preacarious. We better ban it and move forward with other bans to finally reach an acceptable metagame in terms of balance and diversity.
If Baxcalibur becomes uncontrollable (already borderline tbh) because we ban Earth Eater Gholdengo, well, we will ban Baxcalibur then. Same for Iron Moth or Cinderace if we remove WBB Gholdengo. Same for Gengar if we remove Bulletproof Gholdengo. But we can't assume the metagame balance only depends on Gholdengo being able to run a set or another lol. We have to ban it and move forward to me.
Man, I'm on a roll with these now aren't I? Originally I was going to wait until it could get quickly QB'd since iirc you can't during a suspect, or at least that's what I heard? Anyway, onto the main point. Baxculibur NEEDS to get the fuck out of this tier as soon as it can. No ifs, probably or buts, this thing is ABSURDLY broken, especially after testing the SD variant of this thing.
Very simply put, the breaking power of this thing is simply too absurd and puts wayyy too much pressure when teambuilding to account for this thing. Very often, despite having a seemingly solid or decent physical wall (say Intim Corv) you'll find you will just fall apart to Bax with no room to negotiate and need to cram a dedicated Baxculibur answer or die. This already is stupid to the extent it can do this to a very large amount of teams that aren't geared towards offense. Even offense needing to be careful about letting this get a DD up and still has Ice Shard to spam against frailer offensive answer.
So what defensive checks do we have for this thing anyway? You have only a few ""reliable"" defensive checks to the sheer sweeping power of this thing, mainly being Delta Stream Corv (this set just existing mainly to check Bax is evident of how stupid Bax is imo), Tablets of Ruin Dondozo and Earth Eater Gholdengo/Kingambit. Dragon Dance variants, generally, can find a tough time breaking through these, although isn't entirely unfeasible. However, this is until you factor Swords Dance into the equation.
Just for example, I faced a fairly high 1600 player on ladder running Fluffy Altaria, which for obvious reasons dies pretty brutally to Bax so they ran a Delta Stream Corv w/ IDef + BPress, pretty solid right? With a bit of simple pivoting and chip, leaving Corv at a still healthy 85~, I get Bax down against Blissey (in fairness if they didn't run the ultra-passive Blissey it would've been a bit more annoying to find opportunities) and SD up and eviscerate Corv, leaving it far too low to properly IDef in time and kill it, within like 10 turns and no real plays. Yeah dedicated check, what's that? But what's even more horrifyingly egregious is that Bax can beat TABLETS OF RUIN DONDOZO without much extra difficulty using SD. Same story, I play against a good player with some shuffling and pivoting, get a bit of chip onto Dondozo (leaving at it around 85 w/ lefties still btw) then get myself into a situation where I SD up on a switch and the exchange let me get to +4 and them to +2 and I managed to force them to constantly Rest until I break through as the 48 PP of Icicle Spear lets me fish for perfect 5 hits (or crits) to break it open. (Unfortunately no replays as the only one I remembered to get needed to be hidden)
This is, for anyone uninformed, the bulkiest physical wall in the tier, with a defense boosting ability, a defense boosting move AND I'm hitting it with a resisted move and breaking it without any ridiculous plays and lefties intact (granted, it's relying on Rest but still). How did anyone think this was ok LOL. Even Earth Eater Gholdengo can be overwhelmed, although requiring a bit substantially more chip (+2 252+ Atk Technician Baxcalibur Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Gholdengo: 270-315 (71.4 - 83.3%) -- approx. 2HKO after Leftovers recovery). I think these examples already show how stupid this is, and I don't even need to talk about anything neutral into Bax which will otherwise absolutely crumple. For a few of my own teams I used to cope against Bax running Intim Corv + Levitate Garg who could tank a hit and leave some chip to stop it (not that sacking these two mons was a good idea but hey I also had a good amount of offense mixed into there and this was for an emergency). SD? Don't even think about it. Not that it even loses that much into offense as it still retains an very powerful Ice Shard that can OHKO the likes of Kilowattrel, Gengar and Meowscarada.
Simply put, this mon is absurd in the pressure it can exert to force a dedicated defensive check unless risking an absolute sweep on any team that isn't really offense oriented and even those dedicated checks can get overwhelmed without requiring insane plays and should get QB'd for this. Oh yeah and this thing can easily abuse Screens/Shed Tail for setup opportunity and can similarly find many mons to force out like Tusk for the SD/DD (and for anyone saying this isn't reliable, if it means anything, I managed to easily sweep to 1700 simply abusing a generic balance structure with SD Bax in the mix)
is optional since you're already immune to ground, but I highly suggest it. Primordial Sea makes fire type moves useless on Gholdengo 
and Corviknight 
and Gholdengos 
set, punishes U-turns, and is one of the best hazard removers. Gholdengo 
, Meowscarada 
, Kingambit 
, Cinderace 
, and Volcarona 
.
Garganacl
Roaring Moon
Iron Moth
Chien-Pao
Greninja
Sandy Shocks, Scream Tail
Hatterene, Quaquaval
Garchomp
Houndstone
