BH Balanced Hackmons Suspects and Bans Thread

[Ren]

wheres the dislike button.

I swear every suspect results in a ban. Will this bring a "healthier" meta? it gets unbalanced and stallier each time, but people who no longer play the meta must decide its fate huh.

You need to have played the suspwct ladder to attain reqs. The suspect ladder is a reflection of the current meta. Anyone who has played 35 games of the current meta has an understanding of how it works, you cannot get reqs in 35 games just by clicking buttons without an understanding of how the meta works. Anyways, I'll go through the voter list one by one and show you that the vast majority of our players are players who play the meta.

voter list

Anaconja - plays the meta
Andrew Kim - idk
BlazingMane01 - plays the meta
CROW'S BANE -plays the meta
DF-Shock - plays the meta
DarkRisingRay - plays the meta
Disciple_1 - plays the meta
ElMustacho - plays the meta
GL Volkner
Greenheroes
Gurpreet Patel (Sent you a Friend Request) - plays the meta
Hassin627
Luckyboy123 - plays the meta
MAMP - plays the meta
MamoJustWins - plays every suspect
OM! - played the meta at the time of the voting
PinkDragonTamer - plays almost every suspect and played the meta extensively
SectoniaServant16 - does not play the meta often, but is an is (also knowledgable about the meta)
Semako - plays the meta
Storm Eagle - plays the meta
SuperSkylake - plays the meta
TRX - idk
Willdbeast - plays the meta
kaxzerZ - idk
loser2017 - plays the meta
morogrim - plays the meta
motherlove - played the meta, took a break, came back and started playing again before the suspect
sugarhigh - ^
tzop - plays the meta
xavgb - plays the meta
pazza - plays the meta
Pikachuun - plays the meta

So I'm not exactly sure what you mean. Did you forget to do your research? Because if you had taken a moment to consider what you're saying, I'm sure you'd have taken the time to go through the voter list and found that there are only 3 users who probably don't play the meta.

Oh, also - a stallier meta doesn't exactly mean a bad thing. If it inconveniences you, that's unfortunate but we don't cater to you. And.... Was the meta more unbalanced by the CFZ ban? The Pdon ban? The Magpull ban? The Water Bubble ban? All of those resulted in a healthier meta. If you don't have the patience for BH, you shouldn't play it. Play something else, but we're trying to make a healthier meta here, not one that caters to you.

 

[a loser]

Stall teams still struggle with Mega Kangaskhan regardless of Illusion. In fact Mega Kangaskhan might be stronger against Stall teams now because it can run Intimidate or Misty Surge.

I can't speak too much on this because I don't have lots of Kanga experience, but you can't tell me that stall teams won't enjoy sending imposter into Misty Surge or Intimidate Kanga and doing their own Guardian of Alola. Not saying that this mon is nerfed to death by this ban, but it definitely took away one of its edges on stall in its ability to improof.

You mean make stall worse? Because I highly doubt Water Bubble, Stakeout, or Psychic Surge makes stall better by any means. In fact I'd argue they do nothing short of make stall completely unviable. And Morogrim and Semako, both stall players, voted Ban, so your argument falls apart right there.

Semako voted ban because Illusion screwed up his stall, therefore he was trying to make stall better. But when you run 3 steels, you're kind of asking for a banded Precipice Blades from Illusion Garchomp. Also, Water Bubble and Stakeout were offensive abilities. Removing them definitely benefited defensive play.

I agree that most of the bans have resulted in a healthier meta, especially the early ones like Water Bubble and CFZ's, but if you look at the ban history list, almost every ban outside of Innards Out has helped defensive play styles. This is just to say that it does seem like the bans are attributing to a "stallier meta" rather than benefiting offense. But as in most competition, offense attracts the most attention and calls the most questions, so it is more likely to cause discussions of bans than a defensive ability like Poison Heal or Fur Coat (just examples of defensive abilities, not saying they are banworthy). Because of this, it looks like future bans are sure to take away offense, which will help out defense.

 

[tzop]

People prefer have 200 turn battle battle because they can put their 5 defensive mon who wall all the meta . That's why they ban illu because illu rekt their core . I have no fun anymore on this tier since the psychic surge ban . I play it during Ompl because volkner need some time for prep . other thing needed to ban instead of illu . .

Just please do something about te sleep Just look the replays

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen7balancedhackmons-789485414

 

[Pikachuun]

I can't speak too much on this because I don't have lots of Kanga experience, but you can't tell me that stall teams won't enjoy sending imposter into Misty Surge or Intimidate Kanga and doing their own Guardian of Alola.

something that i'm just gonna bring up now in terms of this point is that you definitely cannot casually do this, it can only be done on a predicted Shade/SToss or a safe switch because otherwise you'll be at 25% of your Imposter's max HP at most, and unless you're running Leftovers Imposter you won't be able to live the follow-up SToss if you lose the speed tie regardless of what you use to imposter (Blissey's max HP is 714, and 25% of that is 178.5, which is less than the 200 damage it would deal). This is especially brutal if said Kanga doesn't have any recovery (to my knowledge a fair chunk of them do, but shrug) because now your Imposter is sitting at 25% and can't fulfill its checking duties unless your opponent sends in a bulkmon to give it the chance to heal
while you may argue that makes kanga-m easy to wear down, if you actually run wish support (and make it work) there's a fairly high chance that it won't go down to just any old stall team

in terms of improofing, people have already been running kanga-m improofs, such as PH zy/god/ and giratina, before the illusion ban was happening. illusion is really a one-use thing on any mega so unless you're keeping it in forever (and m-kanga is one of those mons, from what i've seen, that this isn't the case for) you should probably have an improof ready

Just please do something about te sleep Just look the replays

in the replay provided, SL42 lost due to some hax regarding the sleep turns, sure, i'll admit that, but my interpretation of the reason he lost was because his team had no proper answers to the classic PH Xern + Magma Storm set outside of RegenVest Kyogre, which would've been chipped away to a low enough HP value that the 3-turn sleep probably wouldn't have mattered in the long run, depending on how both players played ofc
if the magearna was FF, even though it would be put to sleep by the xerneas, the match would've probably turned out a lot differently

 

[a loser]

something that i'm just gonna bring up now in terms of this point is that you definitely cannot casually do this, it can only be done on a predicted Shade/SToss or a safe switch because otherwise you'll be at 25% of your Imposter's max HP at most, and unless you're running Leftovers Imposter you won't be able to live the follow-up SToss if you lose the speed tie regardless of what you use to imposter (Blissey's max HP is 714, and 25% of that is 178.5, which is less than the 200 damage it would deal). This is especially brutal if said Kanga doesn't have any recovery (to my knowledge a fair chunk of them do, but shrug) because now your Imposter is sitting at 25% and can't fulfill its checking duties unless your opponent sends in a bulkmon to give it the chance to heal
while you may argue that makes kanga-m easy to wear down, if you actually run wish support (and make it work) there's a fairly high chance that it won't go down to just any old stall team

in terms of improofing, people have already been running kanga-m improofs, such as PH zy/god/ and giratina, before the illusion ban was happening. illusion is really a one-use thing on any mega so unless you're keeping it in forever (and m-kanga is one of those mons, from what i've seen, that this isn't the case for) you should probably have an improof ready

I'll just quickly say I never implied that imposter would hard switch into Kangaskhan. I think most people would agree that would be unwise. Just saying the lack of Illusion now gives people an option to bring in imposter and have it transform. And the improofing I was talking about in my post was mainly just the fact that imposter couldn't switch in initially while the illusion was still intact, not improofing with your own team.

 

[tzop]

in the replay provided, SL42 lost due to some hax regarding the sleep turns, sure, i'll admit that, but my interpretation of the reason he lost was because his team had no proper answers to the classic PH Xern + Magma Storm set outside of RegenVest Kyogre, which would've been chipped away to a low enough HP value that the 3-turn sleep probably wouldn't have mattered in the long run, depending on how both players played ofc
if the magearna was FF, even though it would be put to sleep by the xerneas, the match would've probably turned out a lot differently[/QUOTE]

Look how many offensif mon we have . your magic bouncer can't counter all . And don't say me safety googles is a counter when you can play knock off (Hello regigigas) and when lovely kiss never miss

 

[Storm Eagle]

I can't speak too much on this because I don't have lots of Kanga experience, but you can't tell me that stall teams won't enjoy sending imposter into Misty Surge or Intimidate Kanga and doing their own Guardian of Alola. Not saying that this mon is nerfed to death by this ban, but it definitely took away one of its edges on stall in its ability to improof.

Literally nothing switches in on Mega Kangaskhan. At all. Imposter is not an exception. If Imposter switches in it's because Kangaskhan has already gotten a KO or at the very least cut a mon's health down by 75% before they pivot. And I find that saying 'Illusion Mega Kangaskhan self-improofs' is an extremely weak argument as it's not self-improof as one of the strengths of Mega Kangaskhan is that it can heal up against stally mons and then break them. Mega Kangaskhan will get more than one use in game. Even with Illusion, never once did I find myself feeling fine without an improof for Kangaskhan. That is absurdly risky.

And another thing, Mega Kangaskhan didn't run Illusion to self-improof. It ran Illusion to be less predictable and to nuke specific targets upon switching in. It's still going to do it's job if you play it right.

Semako voted ban because Illusion screwed up his stall, therefore he was trying to make stall better. But when you run 3 steels, you're kind of asking for a banded Precipice Blades from Illusion Garchomp. Also, Water Bubble and Stakeout were offensive abilities. Removing them definitely benefited defensive play.

That was my point. None of those abilities were defensive at all. And Semako already loses to Mega Garchomp as it is, except he'll probably lose to it harder because they'll now run Mold Breaker or Adaptability. I don't exactly recall, but I believe Morogrim runs Fur Coat Chansey too--I know he runs two Chanseys, but if one of them is Fur Coat then he stands to lose harder to Mega Garchomp too.

I agree that most of the bans have resulted in a healthier meta, especially the early ones like Water Bubble and CFZ's, but if you look at the ban history list, almost every ban outside of Innards Out has helped defensive play styles. This is just to say that it does seem like the bans are attributing to a "stallier meta" rather than benefiting offense. But as in most competition, offense attracts the most attention and calls the most questions, so it is more likely to cause discussions of bans than a defensive ability like Poison Heal or Fur Coat (just examples of defensive abilities, not saying they are banworthy). Because of this, it looks like future bans are sure to take away offense, which will help out defense.

In retrospect this is why I have been reconsidering my stances on future bans. I actually agree with you here. But I believe that Illusion was something that not only hurt stall but also hurt balanced and even hyper offense teams. Sure, it may have hurt stall the most, but I genuinely believe Illusion impacted all playstyles negatively.

I'm not a stall player personally, but I will let you know that I've found stall to still be relatively balanced, if a tad weak actually. I try all playstyles and while I perform best with balanced offensive playstyles, I just can't find a huge place for stall as it always relies on either trapping and getting up hazards or preventing hazards and getting rid of Ghost-types for Shedinja. Both very high maintenance playstyles that require lots of support from teammates.

Regardless, I've been reconsidering my views. I used to think these were banworthy.

• Contrary
• Shell Smash
• Sungeist Geyser

Here's what I've been rethinking over the past few weeks.

• Ban Mega Mewtwo Y
• Ban V-Create
• Unban Primal Groudon
• Ban Power Trip and Stored Power

I'll list some arguments in each in a spoiler as not to clog up the thread.

Arguments for each of these.

Mega Mewtwo Y - One of the most centralizing Pokemon in the tier, Mega Mewtwo Y was fine in Gen 6 as it had a bit of difficulty hitting most Dark-types super-effectively without using Sheer Force Moonblast. In Generation 7, Fleur Cannon was introduced, which not only made Contrary significantly more potent, but allowed Mega Mewtwo Y to end up steamrolling past would-be checks solely because of Fleur Cannon all the while boosting it's Special Attack over the course of a few turns. I used to believe Contrary was the problem but after hearing arguments from others, namely Motherlove, I've been rethinking things and ultimately believe if Contrary is banned then what will happen is another Mega Mewtwo Y set will just fill the void and MMY's viability won't drop at all. Not to mention even though there was a slight push for the banning of Sungeist Geyser, Mega Mewtwo Y was the only truly frustrating user of it for the most part with the exception of BellyBurden Steel-types.

Mega Mewtwo Y has also made normally mediocre Bug-type Pokemon like Pheromosa and Mega Beedrill appear solely because they're one of the few Pokemon that can outspeed without a Choice Scarf and due to all Pokemon being allowed 252 EVs in every stat, Mega Mewtwo Y is ridiculously frustrating to knock out as Mega Diancie, Mega Rayquaza, and Black Kyurem can't actually knock it out from full with FakeSpeed. Pheromosa can't even OHKO Mega Mewtwo Y without a Choice Band and Tough Claws!

Ban V-Create / Unban Primal Groudon - V-Create stands to be a completely ridiculous move. With Contrary it's spammed to increase not only the user's Defenses, but the user's Speed. It also serves as a wallbreaking move with frightening potential. I truly believe Primal Groudon is only banned because of V-Create right now and if V-Create were banned then not only would Contrary get weaker, Primal Groudon would actually be balanced at that point.

I could be wrong in that perhaps Primal Groudon may still be too much for the tier. But Primal Groudon is still fairly slow and can be revenge killed easily with Mega Garchomp as it outspeeds. I predict Choice Band sets will be popularized which is why I believe Mega Garchomp will check Primal Groudon.

Ban Power Trip and Stored Power - This is one of my more controversial arguments. One thing people have asked to be suspected repeatedly is Shell Smash. Now, I have wondered why Shell Smash is an issue this Gen and not last Gen. It could be because of the extra EVs allowing you to invest into offenses and defenses, but that's not why I believe Shell Smash is an issue. So why do I believe Shell Smash is an issue? It's because of Power Trip and Stored Power. Stored Power was available since Gen 5 but Power Trip is a new move this generation. Every time you get a stat boost, the base power of Stored Power and Power Trip increases by 20 (from the base 20 power). Considering Shell Smash gives 6 boosts at the same time, in one turn you can have a base 140 power Psychic or Dark-type attack right off the bat. Many people use it with Dazzle-Smash. But Belly Drum also gives 6 boosts and makes Power Trip just as strong. You can also use Simple and then you get 12 boosts with Shell Smash and a base 260 power Stored Power and Power Trip. With Simple, if you boost once then you can have moves that are usually STAB that are stronger than Explosion with no drawbacks.

Why is this an issue? Because you can break past Unaware walls and any sort of passive Pokemon with ease, especially those who are ability-reliant. I've heard the counterargument of using Prankster Haze, but often times Prankster users are so passive that they often can't do anything significant to the Shell Smasher to begin with. Like Registeel or Mega Audino. The worst thing they'll do is hit you with Anchor Shot or a ridiculously weak Knock Off/Moonblast respectively. All the while the opposing Pokemon can attack your Registeel and Mega Audino and pressure them to heal, or they can switch out to a wallbreaker then they'll gain momentum while you're doing nothing but healing.

Imposter Chansey may be a solution but not without Choice Scarf. Eviolite is extremely risky as I've seen some Shell Smashers try to self-improof themselves in various ways like with super-effective coverage or even with Imprison. Imposter Chansey is not a solution to this and never will be. Therefore there aren't really any sort of dedicated checks to Shell Smashers who utilize Power Trip and Stored Power because of the wallbreaking abilities that the moves themselves provide.

 

[DarkRisingRay]

You need to have played the suspwct ladder to attain reqs. The suspect ladder is a reflection of the current meta. Anyone who has played 35 games of the current meta has an understanding of how it works, you cannot get reqs in 35 games just by clicking buttons without an understanding of how the meta works. Anyways, I'll go through the voter list one by one and show you that the vast majority of our players are players who play the meta.

voter list

Anaconja - plays the meta
Andrew Kim - idk
BlazingMane01 - plays the meta
CROW'S BANE -plays the meta
DF-Shock - plays the meta
DarkRisingRay - plays the meta
Disciple_1 - plays the meta
ElMustacho - plays the meta
GL Volkner
Greenheroes
Gurpreet Patel (Sent you a Friend Request) - plays the meta
Hassin627
Luckyboy123 - plays the meta
MAMP - plays the meta
MamoJustWins - plays every suspect
OM! - played the meta at the time of the voting
PinkDragonTamer - plays almost every suspect and played the meta extensively
SectoniaServant16 - does not play the meta often, but is an is (also knowledgable about the meta)
Semako - plays the meta
Storm Eagle - plays the meta
SuperSkylake - plays the meta
TRX - idk
Willdbeast - plays the meta
kaxzerZ - idk
loser2017 - plays the meta
morogrim - plays the meta
motherlove - played the meta, took a break, came back and started playing again before the suspect
sugarhigh - ^
tzop - plays the meta
xavgb - plays the meta
pazza - plays the meta
Pikachuun - plays the meta

So I'm not exactly sure what you mean. Did you forget to do your research? Because if you had taken a moment to consider what you're saying, I'm sure you'd have taken the time to go through the voter list and found that there are only 3 users who probably don't play the meta.

Oh, also - a stallier meta doesn't exactly mean a bad thing. If it inconveniences you, that's unfortunate but we don't cater to you. And.... Was the meta more unbalanced by the CFZ ban? The Pdon ban? The Magpull ban? The Water Bubble ban? All of those resulted in a healthier meta. If you don't have the patience for BH, you shouldn't play it. Play something else, but we're trying to make a healthier meta here, not one that caters to you.

So people who only play during suspects play the meta? I'm sure you're wrong about those who play but whatever I never expect you to be impartial or maybe you're just using the suspect ladder as your "evidence" while once a suspect is not in progress the ladder is a ghost town.
Yes I'm aware that some of those persons you mentioned are vocal in the BH community and played a lot during PREVIOUS gens but the truth is they don't bother to play on regular ladder anymore.

Stall doesn't inconvenience me alone, it inconveniences everybody. Don't you ever look at Bh matches and notice that few people are playing everyday and consistently. Nobody wants to sit through a 100-200+ turn match wasting their time. The ladder is one of the most inconsistent and it is tedious to climb or get matches near your level (Before you say I suck, if i only play low elo persons due to the lack of regular high ladder players, If win I gain +4 to 7 elo n if i lose Im drained 25-30 elo each match ).

CFZ clause was necessary, pdon ban meh, magpull ban was dumb n u know it, waterbubble i understand, Surge? ive never seen so many tail glow triage quazas in my life but as long as dazzle n QM exist i wont complain. "We" are not trying to make a healthier meta, stall gets better each time, anything that bops imposter gets looked at.

I know u well want me to stop playing BH, its fine. Some of these bans were making the meta less enjoyable anyways while other "pertinent" problems still exist.

If they didn't play the meta they wouldn't have gotten reqs. You know. Because you have to play the meta to get reqs. While I'll say that Illusion was more of a problem in a tour setting than on ladder, I do want to say that Illusion is no weaker on ladder than it is in tours.

I voted Ban because I do in fact believe this will bring a healthier meta. And no, Illusion will not make the meta more unbalanced or stallier. If anything, it makes Imposter a little bit stronger. Stall teams still struggle with Mega Kangaskhan regardless of Illusion. In fact Mega Kangaskhan might be stronger against Stall teams now because it can run Intimidate or Misty Surge.

Like with what I said to GLV, Just because you played during a suspect, doesn't mean you play on regular ladder to see the effects of these bans.

this doesn't make any sense. your "least important mon" is still going to get 2hkod by big kanga unless you have like prankster or shed (both of which lose to spikes).

also i'd argue that while illusion ban made imposter better, it didn't increase its use. imposter still only fills a specific niche in teambuilding. if imposter was bad on a team before illusion ban, it won't suddenly be good after the ban.

the bh and pu (or "main tier") ladders are really different. something important is that while pu and all the tiers above it have constantly shifting metagames as people discover new sets, the bh ladder usually stays the same except when new games come out.

also, in bh there are lots of ways to win on team preview against people with bad teams, like imposter, prankster haze, sweepers, etc. it's easy to get reqs if you don't make obvious misplays like hard switching imposter into gengar. that being said, the ban side has more established (and active) players supporting it, so thermp's argument doesn't hold up very well there.

he meant that banning the things makes stall better. stall sucked when water bubble was a thing, now it doesn't.


this is theorymon. if this mon did exist in this meta, it would (probably) be broken with imposter.

Yes they are established but be honest, do they play outside of tours n suspects?

Also I must apologize, I'm not always vocal on here so I may be responding to one thing you said but reply to your entire message.

Someone help/advise me on how to cut what people say and respond to those parts. Much appreciated.

 

[Storm Eagle]

Also I must apologize, I'm not always vocal on here so I may be responding to one thing you said but reply to your entire message.

Someone help/advise me on how to cut what people say and respond to those parts. Much appreciated.

Highlight the text you want to quote with the mouse. Then it'll give you an option to quote it. Keep going it if you want to multi-quote.

 

[cityscapes]

Also I must apologize, I'm not always vocal on here so I may be responding to one thing you said but reply to your entire message.

Someone help/advise me on how to cut what people say and respond to those parts. Much appreciated.

when you press the reply button, you know how the message pops up between a couple quote tags like this


[QUOTE="DarkRisingRay, post: 7882119, member: 384453"]message here[/QUOTE]

well, you can just modify the text between the quote tags to change the quoted message. for instance

[QUOTE="DarkRisingRay, post: 7882119, member: 384453"]deez nuts[/QUOTE]

becomes

deez nuts

also please don't post 4 times in a row. you can reply to multiple other posts in just 1 post

anyway in regards to how we've been banning mostly things that buff stall:

i've given this some thought, and it does seem kind of biased to me too. what we have to ask ourselves is this: if sufficient defensive counterplay is needed for something to stay in the meta, do we have sufficient offensive counterplay to prevent stall from taking over?

stall is definitely way stronger than anything else on the ladder, because it's custom built to handle the metagame by nature. but on the other hand, it really hasn't seen much success in ompl even when used by top players like highlighter.

then again, ompl teambuilding is typically more flexible, because you typically only have to handle 1 player, not the entire metagame. you can get away with hard building against stall if the other player is known to bring it sometimes. you can't do that on ladder.

additionally, unlike in standard tiers, there's much more variety in bh stall, making it sometimes into a matchup fest. if you bring chomp but they bring some fc mon that walls it, that's a major L.

i haven't laddered in a while and i'm tired so i won't really take a stance yet, but it's an interesting question i think.

 

[Rumors]

In my subjective experience, stall gains strength the higher you go on the ladder because people get too timid about losing ELO. Low ladder, people will spam the hell out of Simple Contrarian bullcrap that will nuke past your stall because who the hell runs Simple Smash Thunder Gengar and why are they not missing my Yveltal? Stuff like that. But once you get higher, it's a lot easier to account for a wide variety of meta threats with a strong defensive core and an Imposter or two, largely thanks to moves like Core Enforcer, Knock Off, and Spectral Thief robbing offense of momentum in one click.

Offense, meanwhile, tends not to have the sustain defensive Pokemon do and can't cover all the common defensive Pokemon in just four moves. As such, sooner or later, you're gonna run into the defensive combo you can't break without making a different defensive combo unbreakable.

In tournaments though, you can prepare for your opponent specifically. So, for example, if I were to battle myself, I'd probably not bring anti-Imposter because I rarely run it and could even risk bringing Imposter-weak Pokemon against myself. Meanwhile, against Flint, I'd prep for offense because I know that he detests playing stall, or at least used to. Stuff like that. But they know that I know, so I might bring Imposter to catch my opponent off guard and Flint might play more balanced. Hence, the tournament setting is less about typical team building and more of a preliminary chess-match of "I know you know that I know what you usually run" and trying to out think each other before there's even a team preview. As such, the usual stall cores won't really appear since, well, tournament players are already anticipating which ones their opponent prefers.


Anyway, if you feel stall is too strong, sleep clause or a ban on moves like Core Enforcer, Knock Off, trapping, and Spectral Thief are good ways to consider (or along those lines if you don't like those going away). Maybe U-Turn for sheer overcentralization. And those are things I'd generally favor because absolute, near-unavoidable denial of strategies is pretty bull crap, IMO.

Those aren't my votes for next suspect though, before anyone asks.

 

[Deleted User 91486]

With my three non-levitating steels, I might be weak to Mega Garchomp, but thanks to Misty Surge, weakening Dragon-type moves, Zygarde can check it, only banded Adaptability sets have a chance to 2HKO with precipice blades. Giratina also can check non-banded variants if Misty Surge is up, which will almost always be the case if played right.

 

[a loser]

Here’s what I’m thinking on current ban arguments.

Illusion

JK its been banned. Guess we should move on.

Sleep

The most viable way to ensure that you won't be put to sleep no matter what happens is, ironically, to constantly be sleeping with Comatose. Every other method of sleep prevention can be worked around somehow and teams determined to set sleep will find a way to do so. Whether its moldy Lovely Kiss, Knock Off + Purify + Spore (not endorsing this), or by whatever means, sleep can be set if you try hard enough. And once its set, you're left up to RNG to decide if its a power nap or sleeping until noon. While there are methods of sleep prevention, sleep in its current state is uncompetitive.

I think we all know fairly well how to prevent sleep by now (recap: Magic Bounce, abilities using Toxic/Flame orbs, Comatose, etc) so I won’t get into all that because it isn’t the issue. One sleeping mon is usually not a big deal. What would be nice, though, is a sleep clause. Imagine with me:

Opposing PH sweeper Xerneas come to the field against my Sheer Force MMY. I attack with Psychic and it spores me after losing a chunk of HP. Next turn, I switch MMY for Fur Coat Chansey while Xerneas Quiver Dances. The next moves will likely be Spore followed by Magma Storm, which traps a sleeping Chansey. Xerneas is free to set up more and chip away at Chansey meanwhile Chansey is deciding between using Haze/Topsy-Turvy, Metal Burst, and healing. But Chansey’s decision changes with each turn it remains asleep and Xerneas can easily read this and can waste a turn or two just to set sleep again. All the while, Chansey is losing HP and hoping it times its moves right. Played right, Xerneas can kill what should check/counter it.

With a sleep clause, the above situation is avoided and Fur Coat Chansey can check/counter set up Xerneas like it should be able to.

A sleep clause would bring strategy to what is now a pretty brainless operation (I say brainless because I’ve seen countless attempts to Spore foes without checking for goggles, scouting abilities, or even looking at the terrain first). When the number of mons you can put to sleep limited to one, the sleep setter would actually have to be strategic with setting sleep rather than spamming it. The sleep preventer also has to be strategic in deciding who is put to sleep. Look back at the example, but with a sleep clause this time. Now, MMY is asleep with 0 turns on the sleep counter and is potentially unable to do its job for the remainder of the battle depending on when it wakes. The tradeoff there is that Chansey can check and potentially eliminate a dangerous threat. To me, this sounds competitive.

So, a sleep cause brings strategy and competitiveness into an aspect of the game that is currently brainless and uncompetitive. Let’s make this happen.

Mold Breaker Moves

Sturdy Shedinja isn’t the only mon unhappy with Gen 7’s new moldy moves. Unaware and Fur Coat mons have reasons to complain as well.

This gen, Unaware is almost exclusively ran by Dark, Normal, and Water types due to the fact that they resist or are immune to these mold breaking moves. This means Unaware is less than ideal now on mons like Giratina, Aegislash, Slowbro-Mega, Lugia, Cresselia, and Xerneas (to name a few bulky mons with decent typing) because they are threatened by the Sungeist Geyser trio. This has a big effect on teambuilding too, as most balanced teams prefer to have Unaware mons. But bring a Fighting, Fairy, or Electric type alongside a boosting mon with moldy moves and this gen’s Unaware’s are put under lots of pressure. Throw in Belly Drum with moldy moves and you better hope you have a Prankster alive because Unaware is useless there.

Fur Coat is also less viable of an ability due to Sunsteel and Photon providing STAB for two mons who have the highest attack stats in the game. We all saw Giratina fall from being the premier MMX check when USUM came out and Sableye-Mega and Cresselia came back from the dead to try to check it.

Not only are Sungeist Geyer’s ability ignoring affects good, they also allow mons to basically have two abilities. Like, nice switch-ins:

252+ Atk Choice Band Tinted Lens Kartana Sunsteel Strike vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Registeel: 186-220 (51 - 60.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO (Laughs at non-Prankster)
252 SpA Choice Specs Tinted Lens Gengar-Mega Moongeist Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Yveltal: 218-258 (47.8 - 56.5%) -- 85.9% chance to 2HKO (Can’t Rev Dance if you’re dead)
252 Atk Choice Band Adaptability Mewtwo-Mega-X Photon Geyser vs. 252 HP / 252 Def Giratina: 304-358 (60.3 - 71%) -- guaranteed 2HKO (Laughs at Fur Coat)

Now I know Tinted Lens isn’t the very best ability for Kartana or Gengar, but these are decent examples of how moldy moves combined with certain abilities let you blow past would be checks.

Overall, I think that Sungeist Geyser are very strong and very useful but also have a big impact on teambuilding and viability of certain mons. The moldy trio at its worst is probably when it is combined with stat boosting (namely, Belly Drum and Shell Smash) because they can blow past would be checks in Unaware mons. This aspect makes me want them gone, but outside of boosting with Sungeist Geyser, I have few issues with the moves. A complex ban on boosting moves + Sungeist Geyser sounds highly unlikely though, so I’m not sure what to think.

Contrary

I like what Storm Eagle recently said about Contrary and MMY but I still think Contrary is the main issue. Contrary users are able to use the game’s most power moves available without their normal drawbacks. These stat boosts snowball and you end up with something extremely powerful and, if using V-Create, difficult to revenge kill. Unaware is not the best answer to contrary as the base power of the moves makes it tough for most mons to stomach two of them. I don’t even want to get too far into this one because it has been discussed a lot and I haven’t seen any decent arguments in favor of Contrary or anything convincing me it isn’t broken.

 

[Gregdawe]

Proposal to ban Imposter. It requires no skill, or tactics and has almost no counters.

You could be out playing someone by switching out building a Pokemon up, and then imposter just gives them all of the advantages you create with zero work or skill on their part.

It's an ability that imo is as bad as protean and I'd rather Primal Groudon unbanned than have this ability made legal.

 

[tzop]

Flint: "
Imposter is one of the few things in BH that you have a near 100% expectation of what you'll be facing because you design the set. The only variation is the amount of HP and the item. Imposter-proofing ("Improofing") is woven into the entire experience of BH and the power of imposter is entirely dependent on your own teambuilding.

Taking advantage of Judgment, Illusion, uncommon hard-counters to sweepers, and even its 20 pp movepool are all common and valid strategies.
The only way it'd be banned is if it gave an unfair advantage on top of copying what is on the field e.g. transforms and gets +1 in each stat."

 

[Gregdawe]

Flint: "
Imposter is one of the few things in BH that you have a near 100% expectation of what you'll be facing because you design the set. The only variation is the amount of HP and the item. Imposter-proofing ("Improofing") is woven into the entire experience of BH and the power of imposter is entirely dependent on your own teambuilding.

Taking advantage of Judgment, Illusion, uncommon hard-counters to sweepers, and even its 20 pp movepool are all common and valid strategies.
The only way it'd be banned is if it gave an unfair advantage on top of copying what is on the field e.g. transforms and gets +1 in each stat."

I'd argue it does give an unfair advantage as it is almost exclusively used on Chansey because of its HP, which isn't matched with the Pokemon it's copied, it remains at Chansey's rediculous levels.

What's worse is that a switch out, including baton pass, just resets the ability for it to come back later in the game for another crack after you've done your best to build another advantage.

Here’s what I’m thinking on current ban arguments.

Illusion

JK its been banned. Guess we should move on.

Sleep

The most viable way to ensure that you won't be put to sleep no matter what happens is, ironically, to constantly be sleeping with Comatose. Every other method of sleep prevention can be worked around somehow and teams determined to set sleep will find a way to do so. Whether its moldy Lovely Kiss, Knock Off + Purify + Spore (not endorsing this), or by whatever means, sleep can be set if you try hard enough. And once its set, you're left up to RNG to decide if its a power nap or sleeping until noon. While there are methods of sleep prevention, sleep in its current state is uncompetitive.

I think we all know fairly well how to prevent sleep by now (recap: Magic Bounce, abilities using Toxic/Flame orbs, Comatose, etc) so I won’t get into all that because it isn’t the issue. One sleeping mon is usually not a big deal. What would be nice, though, is a sleep clause. Imagine with me:

Opposing PH sweeper Xerneas come to the field against my Sheer Force MMY. I attack with Psychic and it spores me after losing a chunk of HP. Next turn, I switch MMY for Fur Coat Chansey while Xerneas Quiver Dances. The next moves will likely be Spore followed by Magma Storm, which traps a sleeping Chansey. Xerneas is free to set up more and chip away at Chansey meanwhile Chansey is deciding between using Haze/Topsy-Turvy, Metal Burst, and healing. But Chansey’s decision changes with each turn it remains asleep and Xerneas can easily read this and can waste a turn or two just to set sleep again. All the while, Chansey is losing HP and hoping it times its moves right. Played right, Xerneas can kill what should check/counter it.

With a sleep clause, the above situation is avoided and Fur Coat Chansey can check/counter set up Xerneas like it should be able to.

A sleep clause would bring strategy to what is now a pretty brainless operation (I say brainless because I’ve seen countless attempts to Spore foes without checking for goggles, scouting abilities, or even looking at the terrain first). When the number of mons you can put to sleep limited to one, the sleep setter would actually have to be strategic with setting sleep rather than spamming it. The sleep preventer also has to be strategic in deciding who is put to sleep. Look back at the example, but with a sleep clause this time. Now, MMY is asleep with 0 turns on the sleep counter and is potentially unable to do its job for the remainder of the battle depending on when it wakes. The tradeoff there is that Chansey can check and potentially eliminate a dangerous threat. To me, this sounds competitive.

So, a sleep cause brings strategy and competitiveness into an aspect of the game that is currently brainless and uncompetitive. Let’s make this happen.

Mold Breaker Moves

Sturdy Shedinja isn’t the only mon unhappy with Gen 7’s new moldy moves. Unaware and Fur Coat mons have reasons to complain as well.

This gen, Unaware is almost exclusively ran by Dark, Normal, and Water types due to the fact that they resist or are immune to these mold breaking moves. This means Unaware is less than ideal now on mons like Giratina, Aegislash, Slowbro-Mega, Lugia, Cresselia, and Xerneas (to name a few bulky mons with decent typing) because they are threatened by the Sungeist Geyser trio. This has a big effect on teambuilding too, as most balanced teams prefer to have Unaware mons. But bring a Fighting, Fairy, or Electric type alongside a boosting mon with moldy moves and this gen’s Unaware’s are put under lots of pressure. Throw in Belly Drum with moldy moves and you better hope you have a Prankster alive because Unaware is useless there.

Fur Coat is also less viable of an ability due to Sunsteel and Photon providing STAB for two mons who have the highest attack stats in the game. We all saw Giratina fall from being the premier MMX check when USUM came out and Sableye-Mega and Cresselia came back from the dead to try to check it.

Not only are Sungeist Geyer’s ability ignoring affects good, they also allow mons to basically have two abilities. Like, nice switch-ins:

252+ Atk Choice Band Tinted Lens Kartana Sunsteel Strike vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Registeel: 186-220 (51 - 60.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO (Laughs at non-Prankster)
252 SpA Choice Specs Tinted Lens Gengar-Mega Moongeist Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Yveltal: 218-258 (47.8 - 56.5%) -- 85.9% chance to 2HKO (Can’t Rev Dance if you’re dead)
252 Atk Choice Band Adaptability Mewtwo-Mega-X Photon Geyser vs. 252 HP / 252 Def Giratina: 304-358 (60.3 - 71%) -- guaranteed 2HKO (Laughs at Fur Coat)

Now I know Tinted Lens isn’t the very best ability for Kartana or Gengar, but these are decent examples of how moldy moves combined with certain abilities let you blow past would be checks.

Overall, I think that Sungeist Geyser are very strong and very useful but also have a big impact on teambuilding and viability of certain mons. The moldy trio at its worst is probably when it is combined with stat boosting (namely, Belly Drum and Shell Smash) because they can blow past would be checks in Unaware mons. This aspect makes me want them gone, but outside of boosting with Sungeist Geyser, I have few issues with the moves. A complex ban on boosting moves + Sungeist Geyser sounds highly unlikely though, so I’m not sure what to think.

Contrary

I like what Storm Eagle recently said about Contrary and MMY but I still think Contrary is the main issue. Contrary users are able to use the game’s most power moves available without their normal drawbacks. These stat boosts snowball and you end up with something extremely powerful and, if using V-Create, difficult to revenge kill. Unaware is not the best answer to contrary as the base power of the moves makes it tough for most mons to stomach two of them. I don’t even want to get too far into this one because it has been discussed a lot and I haven’t seen any decent arguments in favor of Contrary or anything convincing me it isn’t broken.

I'd argue against banning contrary simply because there are many tactical checks against it, and in some cases, those checks actually gave benefits by allowing contrary Pokemon to build up.

Spectral Thief + a typing switch in, or sturdy or focus sash is a really good tactic that makes for a good game. That's simply being out played with good planning.

 

[morogrim]

I'd argue against banning contrary simply because there are many tactical checks against it, and in some cases, those checks actually gave benefits by allowing contrary Pokemon to build up.

Spectral Thief + a typing switch in, or sturdy or focus sash is a really good tactic that makes for a good game. That's simply being out played with good planning.

The problem is, Spectral Thief is not a reliable Contrary check as the Contrary user is both dealing damage and boosting at the same time. If all you're doing is stealing those boosts, you're not recovering from the damage and the Contrary user will eventually score the KO (obviously if you decide you wanna recover, that means that the Contrary user will get to +2 and you will have to deal with that the following turn). Even worse is if you decide to switch into the said Contrary user to then use Spectral Thief, if you aren't immune to the move that the Contrary mon is using on your switchin, you're going to have to take a strong +2 move the next turn before using Spectral Thief.

That being said, the most reliable way to check Contrary atm is by using an Unaware mon which still isn't too reliable when you are taking STAB Psycho Boosts from a Mmy that has coverage options such as Fleur Cannon and Overheat/V-create. On top of all that, even if you find an Unaware mon that can take on the popular Contrary users such as Mmy and Mega Ray, you still have to deal with MgB, Spore, and LO variants of said Contrary users, which can easily beat the common Unaware answers such as Primal Kyogre and Zygarde-C. The only saving grace here (and the only arguments that have kept Contrary unbanned so far, at least imo) is that first off, Contrary users almost all suffer from 4MSS, which means that they can't carry Spore, MgB, defensive utility such as KS, STAB, and all the coverage at the same time. This means that most of the time, Contrary users can be picked off with priority moves from the likes of -ate users. Additionally, improofing Contrary mons can be quite difficult especially if they opt for MgB, which means that you'll need niche mons such as Meloetta to improof Mmy for example. It is for that exact reason that you don't see Contrary too often in high ladder since the players know that if they don't want to risk getting counter-swept by their own Contrary mon, they need to have solid improof options for it, which means that they need to sacrifice a teamslot in order to bring a niche improof mon which is usually not worth it.

example calcs

Examples of LO enabling Contrary mons to bypass the common checks:
252 SpA Life Orb Mewtwo-Mega-Y Psycho Boost vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Kyogre-Primal: 208-246 (51.4 - 60.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

252 SpA Life Orb Mewtwo-Mega-Y Psycho Boost vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Zygarde-Complete: 300-355 (47.1 - 55.8%) -- 76.6% chance to 2HKO
252 SpA Life Orb Mewtwo-Mega-Y Fleur Cannon vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Zygarde-Complete: 372-439 (58.4 - 69%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

Examples of why common checks are still pretty shaky improof options:
+2 252 SpA Mewtwo-Mega-Y Psycho Boost vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Unaware Kyogre-Primal: 160-189 (39.6 - 46.7%) -- 33.2% chance to 2HKO after Stealth Rock
+4 252 SpA Mewtwo-Mega-Y Moongeist Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Kyogre-Primal: 227-268 (56.1 - 66.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

+2 252 SpA Mewtwo-Mega-Y Fleur Cannon vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Unaware Zygarde-Complete: 286-338 (44.9 - 53.1%) -- 86.7% chance to 2HKO after Stealth Rock
+4 252 SpA Mewtwo-Mega-Y Moongeist Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Zygarde-Complete: 330-389 (51.8 - 61.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

with rocks up, Psycho Boost/Fleur Cannon into MgB is a guaranteed KO on these common Unaware mons if the Imposter copies +2

I also wouldn't call Sturdy or Focus Sash "really good tactics" as they are both completely nullified if hazards are up.

As for the Imposter argument, I really don't see your point when you say that Imposter gives an unfair advantage because "it is almost exclusively used on Chansey because of its HP." As already mentioned: "the only variation [for Imposter] is the amount of HP and the item." The ability is almost exclusively used on Chansey because Chansey is simply the best option for an Imposter mon; Imposter copies all stats except for HP so obviously the mon with the highest effective HP will be the best Imposter user, which is in this case Eviolite Chansey. The same logic could be used for any ability in the metagame; Mega Rayquaza is the best Aerilate user as it has the best offensive stats while also benefiting from Flying STAB, Mega Diancie is the best Pixilate user for the same reasons and so on. So it should come as no surprise that Aerilate is almost exclusively used on Mega Ray because of its stats. Sound familiar?

 

[a loser]

Proposal to ban Imposter.

Like, we literally just discussed the banning of imposter and/or eviolite on Chansey on the last page or so. In the future, try to look back at recent posts to make sure your question might not have already been answered. I agree imposter is annoying to face, but it can be prepared for with smart team building at least.

That being said, the most reliable way to check Contrary atm is by using an Unaware mon which still isn't too reliable when you are taking STAB Psycho Boosts from a Mmy that has coverage options such as Fleur Cannon and Overheat/V-create. On top of all that, even if you find an Unaware mon that can take on the popular Contrary users such as Mmy and Mega Ray, you still have to deal with MgB, Spore, and LO variants of said Contrary users, which can easily beat the common Unaware answers such as Primal Kyogre and Zygarde-C. The only saving grace here (and the only arguments that have kept Contrary unbanned so far, at least imo) is that first off, Contrary users almost all suffer from 4MSS, which means that they can't carry Spore, MgB, defensive utility such as KS, STAB, and all the coverage at the same time.

These are good points. 4MSS is a thing on Contrary users, which is nice. And yeah I haven't seen an Unaware mon reliably check a Contrary mon in a while. Unaware mons almost have to hope they opted for V-Create so they can steal some defensive boosts while hoping to tank their other coverage moves. Otherwise, things like Yveltal don't stand a chance against Fleur Cannon MMY.

And it might just be me, but some of my recent posts seem to have been derailed from a chance of discussion as they are followed up by things like "ban normalize" or "ban imposter." I feel like I made some decent points about a sleep clause in my last post and would love to hear some discussion on that.

 

[anaconja]

I'd wholeheartedly agree to a Sleep Clause. It forces defensive (and some offensive) mons to run Safety Goggles, which a) is essentially useless in any other situation (other than the one niche of not getting damaged by Sand and Hail), b) can be knocked off easily by walls and tanks, and c) is often circumvented by Lovely Kiss. Sleep turns from Spore, Lovely Kiss, and even memey No Guard sets can make or break the game, which I believe is uncompetitive.

 

[Rumors]

While I don't think it's the highest priority, I do think Sleep Clause needs to be addressed sooner or later and certainly won't oppose a suspect around it. If you don't prepare for sleep, you're gonna flat-out lose to it unless you luck out in sleep timers. And even then that doesn't always work. A player is essentially forced to bring multiples of Magic Bounce, Poison Heal, Comatose, Safety Goggles, or some of the less common sleep counters like Guts. And all of these can be worked around with common moves in Knock Off and Core Enforcer.

Sleep Clause is the precedent set by almost every single other metagame, so it would make the most sense to follow that precedent rather than springing for any sort of sleep ban.

 

[willdbeast]

I'd argue it does give an unfair advantage as it is almost exclusively used on Chansey because of its HP, which isn't matched with the Pokemon it's copied, it remains at Chansey's rediculous levels.

I can definitely see why this is an issue for discussion and I think the "unfair advantage" point in the original post on this matter is very strange when I can't see how being able to utilise Eviolite when the copied pokemon (usually) cannot do so itself is in any objective way different from the hypothetical "+1 in every stat". I might be just me but I can't see a clear line between an effective+1 in two stats and +1 in them all as well as the extra HP so I think this argument is odd since it says being better in this way is fine but in another way wouldn't be.

What I do think is a good reason for Imposter not being suspected is (at least as far as non-Lightball/Thicc Club etc. sets are concerned) that it's the easiest thing in the meta to check. You know before you even click "find battle" exactly what moves and ability it's going to have and have the item narrowed down to a select few with Eviolite and Choice Scarf as the most likely and you know that you have all the freedom in the world to make your team to beat this exact set of your choosing and then, once you're in a battle, you can rest assured that even if you have messed up everything else you have this covered. Now, compare this to checking any other set/strategy in BH; you know what is most common and what they are likely to have but you have no idea which of the many viable coverage or lure options they're going to opt for and you have to try and ensure you have at least some counterplay to every one of the plausible options they have. For example: you bring your soundproof Slowbro in an attempt to check Aerilate ray and most of the time it will do so. But then once in a while they'll have z-Draco Meteor and OHKO you or any number of other coverage options that invalidate your checks, so you need to build with 2 or 3 checks to the same (or very very similar) threats in order to be prepared and you have to do this for every common threat in the meta... probably including the pokemon your opponent is impostering. Now back to imposter: you know the moves and the ability so no scouting is necessary and you knew all this 3 weeks ago when you made the team and you included a check for it. Now maybe you disagree with me but I'd rather we were banning some of the many sets that have very few counters and can instantly delete a check with a small surprise rather than ban literally the only thing you can completely prepare for before the match starts.

As to the point it has "almost no counters" I'd say this is complete hogwash. You can take any set I've used and I'll give you a counter to it when it's impostered, probably a lot more than one too. Sure you don't have one pokemon that can counter the imposter of any pokemon ever but there's no reason to. Imposter pikachu is another matter and has completely different counterplays but idt anyone has specifically singled it out as broken so I wont address that.


As for sleep idk what to think. It definitely adds a lot of RNG into the game but so does Brightpowder or w/e so I can't see that being a strong argument in itself. Sleep, especially Lovely Kiss, limits counterplay to things to a huge degree and often makes the best check "luck" and it's not uncommon to see sets that run lovely kiss and the other three moves are enough to beat every common PH or bounce mon and rely on sleep turns for everything else which is kinda dumb. It definitely feels broken but idk what the best solution is or how to justify it to myself.

Contrary is just broken af lol. [insert well reasoned argument here] Luckily we don't see it too much because it is often unreliable.

 

[SuperSkylake]

I still believe that we ought to suspect v-create. When combined with contrary, V-Create, by virtue of raising both the speed and defenses of the mon, makes it harder or impossible to check by choice scarf and priority. It is also quite splashable as long as the contrary user has a high attack stat. Either of the Mega Mewtwos, mega Rayquaza, Mega Blazicon, and even mega Sceptile can use it (Though I will only advise Mega Sceptile to use it against someone who is known to use scarfers to check Contrary because it's attack is only 110 which is paltry). Basically V-Create severely limits the number of likely offensive checks to a contrary set and allows the mon to stay in far longer than it otherwise would.

As an example, without V-Create, you could use Sheer Force mMY with Ice Beam as a check Contrary Mega Rayquaza without Choice Scarf. with a single V-Create under its belt mega Rayquaza would outspeed MMY, and kill it with +2 Draco meteor. Mega Diancie can Revenge Mega Rayquaza (42% with Fake Out followed by 84% with Extreme Speed at the very minimum). A single +1 boost from V-Create allows mega Rayquaza to easily avoid the KO (28-33.5% with Fake Out folowed by 56-66% with Extreme Speed). This Contrary Rayquaza set is very difficult to check for offensive teams because they are forced to run something that would sap their momentum, such as Flash Fire Aegislash, if they want to handle it without saccing mons. Without V-Create they could probably get away with running a faster revenge killer such as the afformentioned MMY with ice Beam. It's not easy for defensive teams either because Draco Meteor is such a strong STAB move that any Unaware that doesn't resist it is probably being 2hKOed anyway.


To those who say that Imposter can punish V-Create users heavily because the move also amplifies their own defenses, remember that V-Create does have an immunity ability in Flash Fire, it is relatively simple to Improof, and the Imposter loses tons of momentum. If it switched directly into an attack, it also just lost HP. Whether a strategy is easy or difficult to improof should only be a small factor when arguing whether something is suspect worthy.

Relevant calcs:

252 Atk Pixie Plate Pixilate Diancie-Mega Fake Out vs. 252 HP / 252 Def Rayquaza-Mega: 176-210 (42.5 - 50.7%) -- 2% chance to 2HKO
252 Atk Pixie Plate Pixilate Diancie-Mega Extreme Speed vs. 252 HP / 252 Def Rayquaza-Mega: 348-410 (84 - 99%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 Atk Pixie Plate Pixilate Diancie-Mega Fake Out vs. +1 252 HP / 252 Def Rayquaza-Mega: 116-140 (28 - 33.8%) -- 0.8% chance to 3HKO
252 Atk Pixie Plate Pixilate Diancie-Mega Extreme Speed vs. +1 252 HP / 252 Def Rayquaza-Mega: 234-276 (56.5 - 66.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

What if V-Create were unavailable? If a Contrary user uses one of his turns clicking Ice Hammer or Dragon Ascent or Close Combat to bolster his defenses or speed, his attacks did not become more powerful that turn. So the same thing that walled it last turn could wall it this turn as well. If they decided to go for an attack, then they didn't gain speed so they can still be revenged by faster attackers. (We'll talk about superpower in a moment).

The only other move that increases both attack power and defenses/speed is Superpower, but it seems to only be an actually good choice for Mega mewtwo-X due to being STAB, and Mega Rayquaza to hit mega Ttar. If V-Create were removed, Superpowre would become far more common in order to hit Steel-types. It's true that Mega Diancie would still be unable to revenge kill mega Rayquaza from 100% with fakespeed after a single superpower, but at least it would not have gained speed during the exchange, so it would still be open to other revenge killers.

V-Create and contrary Mega Mewtwos follows a similar argument. Because of their high speed many offense-minded players have resorted to using faster attackers, such as Mega Beedrill, Pheramosa, Choice Scarf Adapt mega Gengar, or Choice Scarf U-turn users to check them. After a single V-Create all of these checks are totally invalidated; they'll just be outsped and killed. Without it, these checks are still mostly valid. Removing V-Create from these users would stop them from sweeping through entire teams, which is the main reason why I consider the move to be broken.

Moving away from Contrary, V-create is also broken because of its base power of 180. It's like having the power of a crystal-fee signature z-move, but with 8 pp. Terrifying wallbreaking tool. The next most powerful viable moves are Head Smash, Doom Desire and Psycho boost. Head Smash's accuracy is unreliable, the recoil is huge (50%) and it is resisted by Steel-types; Doom Desire hits 2 turns after being used which means that the user must stay in during those turns to take advantage of any boosting ability or items; and Psycho Boost is totally ineffective against dark types and is resisted by the very common Steel and Psychic types. V-Create suffers from none of these problems and very powerful to boot. I'm not going to bother posting any calcs; you all know just how strong V-Create is. It mandates at least one mon that's able to take them over and over. With Tinted Lens it and some entry hazards it can even break through those. No shortage of Fire moves are available to replace it if it were to go. V-Create can also benefit from many boosting abilities including Contrary, Tough Claws, Tinted Lens, Mold Breaker to pass Flash Fire, and Desolate Land. And lowering speed and defenses isn't a huge problem if you use it as your opponent switches out.

 

[anaconja]

lul dead thread

Something I wanted to bring up is Contrary, and I'm sure many people want to as well.

Yes, I realize that it has been discussed multiple times on this thread, which is all the more reason why we should probably suspect this monster of an ability.

Its appeal is that it boosts while it attacks, making it basically unwallable with Prankster mons (one of the best checks to setup). Yes, those mons can use Prankster Entrainment, but they're already strapped for moves with Haze, recovery, and a pivoting move/trapping move.

The main abusers are the two Mewtwo Megas, but mons like Sceptile-Mega (see motherlove's cursed team in the samples) and Rayquaza-Mega also see some use on ladder. Besides Sceptile-Mega, all of them have incredible mixed offensive stats that allow them to run movesets that can lure and 2HKO potential walls.

MMY calcs

252 SpA Contrary Mewtwo-Mega-Y Psycho Boost over 2 turns vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Registeel: 251-296 (68.9 - 81.3%) -- not a KO
252 SpA Contrary Mewtwo-Mega-Y Psycho Boost over 2 turns vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Kyogre-Primal: 321-379 (79.4 - 93.8%) -- not a KO
252 SpA Mewtwo-Mega-Y Psycho Boost vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Unaware Kyogre-Primal: 160-189 (39.6 - 46.7%) -- 33.2% chance to 2HKO after Stealth Rock (note that Moongeist Beam is not actually required to beat Unaware)
252 SpA Contrary Mewtwo-Mega-Y Psycho Boost over 2 turns vs. 252 HP / 252 SpD Eviolite Chansey: 475-560 (67.4 - 79.5%) -- not a KO

MMX calcs

252 SpA Contrary Mewtwo-Mega-X Fleur Cannon over 2 turns vs. 252 HP / 252 SpD Zygarde-Complete: 786-928 (123.5 - 145.9%) -- guaranteed KO in 2 turns after Leftovers recovery
252 Atk Mewtwo-Mega-X Ice Hammer vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Zygarde-Complete: 368-436 (57.8 - 68.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252 SpA Contrary Mewtwo-Mega-X Fleur Cannon over 2 turns vs. 252 HP / 252 SpD Giratina: 674-794 (133.7 - 157.5%) -- guaranteed KO in 2 turns
252 SpA Contrary Mewtwo-Mega-X Psycho Boost over 2 turns vs. 252 HP / 252 SpD Giratina: 542-640 (107.5 - 126.9%) -- guaranteed KO in 2 turns
252 SpA Contrary Mewtwo-Mega-X Psycho Boost over 2 turns vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Aegislash-Shield: 210-248 (64.8 - 76.5%) -- not a KO
252 Atk Mewtwo-Mega-X Superpower over 2 turns vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Audino-Mega: 268-317 (65.3 - 77.3%) -- not a KO

fug mega calcs

252 SpA Contrary Rayquaza-Mega Draco Meteor over 2 turns vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Aegislash-Shield: 219-259 (67.5 - 79.9%) -- not a KO
252 Atk Contrary Rayquaza-Mega Superpower over 2 turns vs. 252 HP / 252 Def Audino-Mega: 282-332 (68.7 - 80.9%) -- not a KO
252 Atk Contrary Rayquaza-Mega Superpower over 2 turns vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Eviolite Fur Coat Chansey: 554-654 (78.6 - 92.8%) -- not a KO
252 Atk Rayquaza-Mega V-create vs. 252 HP / 252 Def Xerneas: 205-242 (44.9 - 53%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Poison Heal
(252+ SpA Xerneas Moonblast vs. +2 252 HP / 252- SpD Rayquaza-Mega: 152-180 (36.7 - 43.4%) -- guaranteed 3HKO)

The main thing that breaks Contrary from Gen 6 to Gen 7 is the removal of EV limits, which makes Contrary sweepers (especially MMY) unable to be revenge killed by -atespeeders after a couple V-Creates, as well as the movement of -ate abusers from being revenge killers to being wallbreakers. With Fake Out often being traded in favor of better coverage or offensive support options, it weakens -ate as an offensive check to Contrary.

-ate calcs

252 Atk Pixie Plate Pixilate Diancie-Mega Fake Out + Extreme Speed vs. +2 252 HP / 252 Def Mewtwo-Mega-X: 260-308 (62.5 - 74%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 Atk Pixie Plate Pixilate Diancie-Mega Fake Out + Extreme Speed vs. 252 HP / 252 Def Mewtwo-Mega-Y: 325-384 (78.1 - 92.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 Atk Pixie Plate Pixilate Diancie-Mega Fake Out + Extreme Speed vs. +2 252 HP / 252 Def Rayquaza-Mega: 260-308 (62.8 - 74.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

The removal of EV limits also serves to weaken Imposter as a check to Contrary. Many sets use Spore and wear Safety Goggles, and with enough defense boosting, can live a hit and then sleep the Imposter. From there, sleep turns dictate the winner. Additionally, sets which do not utilize V-Create often use Focus Sash to live a single hit and then OHKO due to such a high stat boost.

Overall, Contrary is a huge threat to balanced and bulky teams due to it being versatile in boosting while attacking, as well as the abusers being just bulky enough to avoid 2HKOs from Fake Out + Extreme Speed boosted by -ate. I believe that it should be suspected and (hopefully) banned.

 

[Rumors]

The main thing that breaks Contrary from Gen 6 to Gen 7 is the removal of EV limits, which makes Contrary sweepers (especially MMY) unable to be revenge killed by -atespeeders after a couple V-Creates, as well as the movement of -ate abusers from being revenge killers to being wallbreakers. With Fake Out often being traded in favor of better coverage or offensive support options, it weakens -ate as an offensive check to Contrary.

I take issue with this point for a couple of reasons. Firstly, removal of EV limits also make Contrary unable to secure easy OHKOs to quickly snowball off of. For example, current meta vs 510-meta...

252 SpA Mewtwo-Mega-Y Psycho Boost vs. 252 HP / 252 SpD Giratina: 216-255 (42.8 - 50.5%) -- 2.3% chance to 2HKO

252 SpA Mewtwo-Mega-Y Psycho Boost vs. 252 HP / 128 SpD Giratina: 237-280 (47 - 55.5%) -- 76.2% chance to 2HKO


That's a huge difference on a meta-wall. Yes, I know it gets an attack boost next, but if Giratina were to hit Spectral, Haze, or Heart Swap on the same turn, it's many times more likely to survive to do something else, currently. Additionally, it's especially notable vs offensive Pokemon...

252 SpA Mewtwo-Mega-Y Psycho Boost vs. 252 HP / 252 SpD Mewtwo-Mega-X: 246-289 (59.1 - 69.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

252 SpA Mewtwo-Mega-Y Psycho Boost vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Mewtwo-Mega-X: 310-366 (87.8 - 103.6%) -- 25% chance to OHKO


Current meta, Xtwo is guaranteed to survive and retaliate as long as it doesn't switch into the attack. 510 meta, it auto-loses 25% of the time.


Second reason, there were no real problems with Contrary in Gen V and pre-510 Gen X/Y. It was annoying, but not a big deal. (..well, there was Contrary spam, but ability-clause came along to address that and other issues.) People would theorymon these "super evil deadly" Contrary sets that'd break all walls, but they never became meta over standard Contrary sets. Heck, many Contrary moves like Draco Meteor and Overheart had a higher base power in Gen V! In Gen V Kyurem-White's Draco Meteor was the move your Unaware wall absolutely had to avoid getting 2HKOed by to be viable, followed by its V-Create and Overheat.


So why was Contrary not a big deal previously? I still firmly believe it's Shedinja and Unaware walls becoming largely unviable. I mean, look at these Unaware calcs, using a Pokemon who was, at one time, hailed as "the best Unaware wall" but is no longer meta.

252 SpA Mewtwo-Mega-Y Psycho Boost vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Cresselia: 93-110 (20.9 - 24.7%) -- guaranteed 5HKO

252 SpA Mewtwo-Mega-Y Fleur Cannon vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Cresselia: 115-136 (25.9 - 30.6%) -- guaranteed 4HKO

252- Atk Mewtwo-Mega-Y V-create vs. 252 HP / 252 Def Cresselia: 137-162 (30.8 - 36.4%) -- 63.4% chance to 3HKO

252 Atk Mewtwo-Mega-X V-create vs. 252 HP / 252 Def Cresselia: 182-215 (40.9 - 48.4%) -- guaranteed 3HKO


And now look at them in the current meta...

+2 252 SpA Mewtwo-Mega-Y Moongeist Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Cresselia: 354-418 (79.7 - 94.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

+2 252 Atk Mewtwo-Mega-X Sunsteel Strike vs. 252 HP / 252 Def Cresselia: 203-239 (45.7 - 53.8%) -- 44.5% chance to 2HKO


At the very least, that's my theory on the Contrary issue. (And Simple and Shell Smash and Belly Drum. Those too.) I'm not inherently opposed to a Contrary suspect (mainly because I never liked the ability to begin with), but I feel like gunning for it is missing the root of the problem.

 

[cityscapes]

Current meta, Xtwo is guaranteed to survive and retaliate as long as it doesn't switch into the attack.

252 SpA Life Orb Mewtwo-Mega-Y Fleur Cannon vs. 252 HP / 252 SpD Mewtwo-Mega-X: 395-465 (94.9 - 111.7%) -- 68.8% chance to OHKO

same applies for giratina, all non regenvest variants get 2hkod even without life orb. trying to set up on full hp giratina is a bad idea regardless but i digress.

anyway considering your main argument, i disagree with the idea that contrary isn't broken now because it wasn't broken in the past.

even if we went and banned sunsteel/moongeist/photon, there are still things like dazzling preventing you from running topsy turvy (balance's counterplay to contrary in gen 6), unaware cress still being bad because of power trip, everyone running mold breaker pursuit for shed (it's already a thing if that's any indication) and more. it doesn't fix the problem.

mold breaker moves aren't the problematic element. the problem is contrary preventing prankster haze and being almost impossible to reliably take on defensively. btw if you use v create mmy can you actually quit mons please thanks -pheromosatl