Announcement Apple - Voltorb-Hisui Suspect Test

I will voting DNB because I do not believe Voltorb-H is broken. I do think there is a CHANCE that we get a fun meta out of banning it (I think it's quite possible, for example, that Elekid assumes the role Voltorb-K had before Home). However, I think the meta we have now is plenty skillful and fun to play. The least competitive aspect of Voltorb-H is Static, but unfortunately we can't ban every contact status ability. It's a very strong mon that demands compromises in builder (13 SpD Mienfoo, Foongus, Tera Dragon) and with Tera Ice can be extremely hard to handle. However, those compromises are not that much more severe than a mon like Vullaby that is, in my opinion, clearly, not broken. I also think that some of the things that abuse Voltorb-H (Torchic, Trapinch, scarfers) remain underexplored or underutilized. I won't be terribly sad to see Voltorb-H go if the community votes that way, but I do not think it needs to go.
 
Hey, I was reading the thread, and I was pretty surprised to see that a lot of people are thinking/confirming that they will not ban torb.

In my honest opinion, torb is a really strong Mon. Beign the fastest Mon in the meta, and beign a very dominant presence all around.

Now, we clearly have mons that could be considered more broken rn in the meta, like some say foo is more broken, torchic is very broken, even stunky is extremely strong, but what many not realize is that torb dominance doesn't come from him beign able to kill the entire meta, it comes down to his checks.

His checks limits to:

Foongus, an actual good Voltorb check, that has to get chipped/lose lorb to die to tera blast

Voltorb, since he resists his own stabs

Spdef foo, which is a soft check, that gives it a free chance to giga drain on the turn switch in

Wattrel, which has the downside of you running wattrel

Grookey, which isn't very good in this meta, and doesn't even check torb that well.

His other checks are based on tera dragons, but you see my point, torb is hard to check, and forces some stuff that you would not want to run if he wasn't there

Now, and this is probably the reasson why some people are thinking about not banning Voltorb, and it was mentioned above by ghost, is what it is enabling if he is banning, specifically vulla.

Vulla will be extremely good if torb is gone, but it isn't like we already don't have other ways to deal with it

Tinkatink is a tool we got in this gen, and it is v good at countering vulla. Sd foo is a very good tool at countering vulla, rock blast mons like digglet-alola outspeed and kill it, elekid still a thing that can do the torb job at checking it, but I agree, vulla will be very hard to to check in the new meta, with the np set specifically

My conclusion: I think torb is a force to be reccon with, and I think it should be banned. Sorry for the long post, but I really think I should comment on this. If you played the meta, you know how dominant torb is, and how hard it is to counter it.

Also, a final note: if torb is not banned, I think only torchic should be banned. I don't think banning anything else would change the metagame for the best

Thank you for reading
 
Oh no, we only have... checks notes five answers to a top 2 mon in the meta, plus Terastalization? The horror! This list is missing Toed + scarfers and/or trappers and/or Torchic + non-Tera Dragon options like Tera Flying Chinchou and Tera Ground lures, anyway...
What trappers check Voltorb? It can slow volt switch on goth giving momentum. If you tera trapinch they can just volt switch to get out. If you don’t Tera the trap inch you get Giga drained. Yes Tera can be used for checks but being forced to sink your Tera for a check is not healthy.
This is what puzzles me about the pro-Voltorb ban argument: Everyone is in agreement that Voltorb-Hisui is either one of the best or straight up the best pokemon in the metagame. The best pokemon in any metagame require careful counterplay. Why is it surprising that teams are punished when they try to slap Tera Dragon on a few mons and call it a day? You have to run answers to the strongest mon in the tier...
This is the LC equivalent of people saying “just use ice beam” when zygarde got banned from OU.
Like I've said before, I don't have extensive familiarity with LC history, but even in general Smogon terms I can't really think of any other precedence for a mon this answerable to be banned in a metagame this sane.
I’m sorry but these points made feel like during the finals when a reporter asked Erik Spoelstra if the heat were trying to try and force Jokic to be a shooter or a passer. Basketball fans know what happened next.

I’m still not necessarily sold on banning Voltorb but I think we need to be real with ourselves on where it stands in the meta. It feels like you are saying you can take advantage of torb defensively. With most of these checks listed, Voltorb can still volt switch out for free.

 
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Oh no, we only have... checks notes five answers to a top 2 mon in the meta, plus Terastalization? The horror! This list is missing Toed + scarfers and/or trappers and/or Torchic + non-Tera Dragon options like Tera Flying Chinchou and Tera Ground lures, anyway...
This was so arrogant for no reasson, and you Also Just prove my point. Trapinch doesnt Trap protect torb, toed is not a reliable check to torb, and using It to chip torb makes you weak to the other mons he is supposed to check. Torchic is a decent counter to torb, but torchic is also a problem on itself, and it just revenges torb, with some difficulty. Scarfers, again, can only revenge torb, and it is not like torb does not have teammates that can switch in on this scarfers. If anything, scarfers are only good to take torb from surprise. And for last, chinchou is not good on the meta, because you force your torb check to tera, and this opens the game to the other 4 mons. And pls read my message again, you clearly didn't realize that the point of the checks listed are the fact that most of them don't check torb that well, but soft check him to try to deal with it
 
What trappers check Voltorb? It can slow volt switch on goth giving momentum. If you tera trapinch they can just volt switch to get out. If you don’t Tera the trap inch you get Giga drained. Yes Tera can be used for checks but being forced to sink your Tera for a check is not healthy.
small nitpick just to gather likes and have people have completely informed opinions: trapinch does indeed trap voltorb as long as voltorb isnt at 100% and isnt willing to tera out of it, with priority First Impression. Also gothita is not reliable into voltorb, since it does less than 50% with psychic, but nothing stops it from picking it up if its in range
 
small nitpick just to gather likes and have people have completely informed opinions: trapinch does indeed trap voltorb as long as voltorb isnt at 100% and isnt willing to tera out of it, with priority First Impression. Also gothita is not reliable into voltorb, since it does less than 50% with psychic, but nothing stops it from picking it up if its in range
Fair point, also gotta point out tho that the voltorb can’t be running protect which is fairly common. But if those are true, yes trapinch will be a check to a Voltorb not at 100%
 
Oh no, we only have... checks notes five answers to a top 2 mon in the meta, plus Terastalization? The horror! This list is missing Toed + scarfers and/or trappers and/or Torchic + non-Tera Dragon options like Tera Flying Chinchou and Tera Ground lures, anyway...

This is what puzzles me about the pro-Voltorb ban argument: Everyone is in agreement that Voltorb-Hisui is either one of the best or straight up the best pokemon in the metagame. The best pokemon in any metagame require careful counterplay. Why is it surprising that teams are punished when they try to slap Tera Dragon on a few mons and call it a day? You have to run answers to the strongest mon in the tier...

You can argue that Voltorb is too oppressive in the builder... eh, I think that at the very least Foo/Vull/Stunky/Torchic are equally as restrictive, but I understand the argument. However, I really don't get the complaint that the pokemon itself is hard to check- that might as well be the dictionary definition of a strong offensive threat. Bannable offensive threats are typically problematic because of a critical lack of counterplay (which is not true, especially because Torb can't even beat half the metagame in a straight 1v1) or because they break through their answers with very little effort/skill (matchup fishing).

Like I've said before, I don't have extensive familiarity with LC history, but even in general Smogon terms I can't really think of any other precedence for a mon this answerable to be banned in a metagame this sane.
I mean this with all due respect but saying we have 5 answers to Voltorb is really missing the point of Fernanch's message. Many of these mons are unreasonable for a lot of teams to fit on many teams, or just outright aren't stable checks. Foo, Torb, and Grookey can easily get overwhelmed if they have any other defensive responsibility within a matchup, while Wattrel demands removal. So unless you want to run the same Toedscool or Foongus structures every game, you are most likely going to struggle with Voltorb on some level. Even these structures can struggle in the lategame after Gothita has taken its course or Toedscool is just chipped enough for Voltorb to break through. This is all before addressing offensive teras.

Truthfully the bigger issue with the meta at hand though is how constricted it is in the builder. Drifting did a much better job outlining these issues here so I won't regurgitate what has already been said.
Voltorb is a pretty interesting case, as the reason it should be banned (and yes, to cut to the chase I think it should be) isn’t as in-your-face as something like Scraggy or Snivy, but if you dig a little deeper it quickly becomes apparent hiw malignant of an effect it has both in the builder and in the game itself, the culmination of both factors making the tier a lot worse.

In the builder, the current “meta” team consists of:

Mienfoo :mienfoo:
Vullaby :vullaby:
Mienfoo Switch-in :foongus: :mareanie:
Vullaby Switch-in: :glimmet: :tinkatink:
Voltorb-Hisui :voltorb-hisui:
And the one free slot, which almost always ends up being a ground-type :mudbray: :toedscool: :diglett-alola: :trapinch: but can also be some other offensive tool :torchic: :stunky: :gothita:

Obviously you can deviate from this, such as swapping Voltorb for a Torchic instead, or Mudbray as a dubious Vull counter, but clearly this is is the structure that most teams fall into, cookie cutter gonna cookie cut, but as a result the obvious issue here is how restrictive and honestly kinda bland building is with the holy trinity of Mienfoo, Vullaby and Voltorb co-existing. Other SV metas haven’t been like this, and pre-vull SS wasn’t like this either, the overload of tier defining threats on every team makes the builder suffocating.

The other major issue here is that, if you don’t have Foongus, the only pokemon that can really handle Voltorb is U-Turn Mienfoo. The problem is that worst case scenario, Voltorb hits a Volt Switch on the switch (what a tongue twister) into something like Stunky or Gothita, and even if they don’t, due to Voltorb’s uncontested speed, it can just use a STAB as Foo comes in and then Volt Switch out again, out damaging Regenerator, and contributing to the boring pivotfest slop meta that Hacker described earlier. Even if you do have Foongus, that Pokemon has the same issue, just being a major momentum sink and liability vs Vullaby if you get Volt Switched on.

It’s part of a greater issue where Voltorb basically prevents or greatly disrupts the ability to identify and make skilful midgrounds, admittedly in conjunction with other pokemon. Voltorb is so fast and it’s STAB combination so deadly, that if it ever pivots in against say, a Mudbray, then they can either stay in on Giga Drain and lose, switch to Mienfoo on Volt Switch and lose to scarf Goth, or switch to their own Voltorb and lose to your own Mienfoo clicking U-turn for free momentum. There is literally no compromising play there, they just have to guess by either clicking Earthquake on Volt Switch or going into Mienfoo and praying for Giga Drain. This type of 50/50 guessing is nothing new, wallbreakers have been making you flip a coin in Pokemon forever, but typically most wallbreakers, like Mega Medicham or Hoopa-U are held back by being relatively slow and being momentum sinks, neither of which are obviously true about Voltorb, it has all the wallbreaker strengths and none of the weaknesses.

The only technical compromise is like Wattrel, but let’s be honest when we say that Pokemon is very mid (though still kinda underrated tbf), almost entirely kept in employment by Voltorb, loses most of its value when rocks go up and loses to many Voltorb Teras anyway. Speaking of Tera, Voltorb easily has the most tera diversity of any notable LC mon, with Fire and Psychic being very common, Ice getting better as Toed gets more popular (as the goat predicted), and other types like Electric, Rock and Fairy all having seen tournament usage off the top of my head. More understated though is how Voltorb’s presence restricts the Tera choices many other pokemon have, with notable examples being Dragon on Mienfoo and Foongus and Electric on Vullaby. This restricted freedom eliminates many of the power and utility Tera has as a mechanic, and has some terrible effects we can see in metagames past and present: For example, something like Mienfoo being unable to run Tera Water was a major cause of the (now mostly died out) ban Shellder movement we saw recently, as the tools needed to handle both Voltorb and Shellder were for the most part entirely distinct.

Apart from these pseudo-compulsory teras, the other major counterplay developed for Voltorb is hazards, which certainly in theory do limit Voltorb’s ability to pivot, especially if it turns into a Fire-type. This is likely why we’ve seen spikestack strategies largely engulf the meta as of late. However, between Voltorb’s respectable bulk and Giga Drain, it has surprising resilience, and the total lack of spin blockers in the tier (some formerly viable ones like Drifloon having been invalidated in large part by Voltorb itself) makes removing these hazards extremely easy for the Voltorb user, as most hazard setters don’t have the resilience or sustainability to get em up multiple times in one game (the closest being Tink, which is probably why it has risen as the premier Rocker/Vull Counter as of late along with threatening Ice Hammer).

To prove that I’m not just making shit up, we can look at the first week of SCL, the highest echelon of the tier and one I’ve obviously been following from the inside for years now.

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen9lc-790538
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen9lc-790840
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen9lc-790231
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen9lc-790094
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen9lc-790264

In most, though not all of these games, we see Voltorb generally being one of the last Pokemon to go down on its teams, and almost always playing an extreme pivotal (pun not intended) role in endgames as the Pokemon receving Tera in a majority of games. When it is enabled by Toedscool especially, a pivot Pokemon like this, which you would expect to die somewhat quickly in a spikestack meta, is staying alive to influence endgames extremely consistently, indicating its longevity. These aren’t even the best games to showcase it’s late game influence either, just random replays I grabbed; everyone reading this has almost surely seen, performed and experienced countless reverse sweep comebacks with Voltorb-Hisui, it’s one of the main things this Pokemon is known for doing.

This by the way, is not even mentioning the obviously degenerate parts of Voltorb, such as Static and Speed ties, whether it be trying to lose Volt Switch ties or win Tera Blast ties. The Pokemon is just too versatile and good at everything at the expense of a diverse and enjoyable metagame to be worth keeping around in my opinion.

This concludes the newest iteration of the Drifting LC Thought Leader manifesto. Please direct all questions to my secretary Hacker.

(PS: I was right about Toedscool all along)
 
Blegh I said some stupid shit when I should've been going to sleep and now I have to deal with it the following evening
Hopefully this teaches me to either shut the fuck up or think about a post for more than 10 minutes
This was so arrogant for no reasson
Yeah, 100%, sorry about that. I don't even have any explanation for what happened I just wasn't thinking at all.

You clearly didn't realize that the point of the checks listed are the fact that most of them don't check torb that well, but soft check him to try to deal with it
I’m still not necessarily sold on banning Voltorb but I think we need to be real with ourselves on where it stands in the meta. It feels like you are saying you can take advantage of torb defensively. With most of these checks listed, Voltorb can still volt switch out for free.
I agree that Voltorb basically always makes progress and/or sustains momentum- I think that's the strongest part of the mon by far. What I was trying (failing) to say is that Voltorb has enough answers to the point that it can't just get around one of them and immediately unleash itself in the game. The deeper idea behind this (which I cleverly did not explain at all) is that Voltorb loses outright 1v1s to a lot of the meta and doesn't switch in comfortably to much at all. Of course in like 90% of games it can at minimum find a Vullaby to target, but it isn't quite as easy as it seems to find a spot to switch it in over and over again throughout a game, meaning that the soft-checks tend to extract enough value out of the sequences to manage the mon. IMO the high pace of LC and widespread Evio reliance tends to force constant concessions, and Voltorb's motif of doing that but even more isn't so unreasonable in that regard.

Yes Tera can be used for checks but being forced to sink your Tera for a check is not healthy.
I agree that having to pop Tera proactively just to check a mon is terrible for the game. However, I think it has to be noted that Voltorb itself also tends to rely on Tera to actually break a few of its answers (most obviously Foongus) instead of just Volting into something else. Going for a defensive Tera in the early game just to get Volt Switched on is technically a "check" but is obviously not productive gameplay, but I'd argue that mid to late-game reactive Teras to wall off Voltorb once its team has been stripped of some of its breaking power is fairly normal as far as Terastalization use is concerned. (Also this is obviously not a very splashable strategy but running a Tera Ground lure and killing the mon for free is also pretty in-line with offensive Tera usage)

Truthfully the bigger issue with the meta at hand though is how constricted it is in the builder. Drifting did a much better job outlining these issues here so I won't regurgitate what has already been said.
I wouldn't say this is particularly a Torb issue, though- the major threats of LC all require fairly specific answers, and imo something like Mareanie rising in usage in direct defiance of Voltorb proves that the it isn't really the key to the limited builder. If you find the meta intolerable enough that you want to blow it open and have something new, then banning Voltorb would certainly be a step in that direction, but only in that it removes a single name off the list of concerns. The builder crunch is something intrinsic to the meta as a whole, and although Voltorb is naturally part of that due to the fact that it is very good in said meta, the overall trends here can't be considered "Voltorb problems" alone.

In other words: Voltorb isn't the reason people think the teambuilder is restrictive. The meta is restrictive, and Voltorb happens to be (one of the three) major pieces of the meta. Does that make it banworthy? Uhh... If I know what's good for me I'm going to step off this thread until the voting starts and make up my mind without needlessly antagonizing the rest of the playerbase.
 
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