Balanced Hackmons Suspects and Bans

Rumors · Apr 3, 2016

Like I said elsewhere, keep them open for discussion if someone manages to come up with a new, insightful argument that's not been done to death, but perhaps list the ones that have in the OP and blacklist those. If someone still brings them up, then they're obviously not reading the OP. ...in which case, blacklisting them wouldn't help either.

The Guy Who Has Many Alts · Apr 3, 2016

I believe that Protean deserves some sort of suspect test. The main reason why I believe this is that in BH, Protean users have access to every single move under the sun excluding the elusive Chatter and Copycat, which no Protean abuser need anyways. As of right now, the main coverage that Mewtwo Y in particular run is Ghost-Judgment and Secret Sword which not only makes imposter proofing it easy, but is capable of 2HKOing over 98% of the entire Pokemon population. There are very few Pokemons that not only can avoid the 2HKO but is also viable in the BH meta.

From the top of my head only Mega Audino, Yveltal, Shedinja and Ho-Oh have the ability to avoid the 2HKO from Mewtwo's Ghost + Fighting coverage.

Now there are less commonly used and more gimmicky checks like RegenVest Giratina, RegenVest Xerneas and Fur Coat Arceus but I'll just focus on the more commonly used checks.

Now as I mentioned at the beginning, BH allows every Pokemon access to 99.9% of all moves available. Now just from its main coverage, Protean abusers, I'll use Mewtwo Y for this statement, is able to reduce its checks to a mere 4. (Excluding gimmicky stuff) usually Mewtwo run King's Shield and so soft checking it with -Ate users is only possible with Spore.

The problem now is Mewtwo still have a free Moveslot it can use to 2HKO it's checks. For example:

Power Gem lets it kill Ho-Oh and Yveltal
Sludge Wave allows it to bypass Mega Audino
Spore allows it to beat RegenVest checks

So I believe that Protean is in need of a suspect because of its extreme versatility. From just 2 moves it can 2HKO almost every single Pokemon and it still has a free Moveslot after King's Shield that allows it to beat one of the very few Pokemons that can wall its Ghost + Fighting coverage.

I tried to not write long essays like the others did but this post still turned out quite long. Oh well. I hope I made my points clear without writing half an essay for every one.

P.S: the first 4 posts of this thread is probably longer than an entire SPL week thread lol.

E4 Flint · Apr 5, 2016

tldr to make it easy for anyone looking for the relevant posts

I am considering a protean ban (not mewtwo, raymega)
I am considering a ban on aerilate and pixilate (not refrigerate)
I am not going to enforce a baseline ELO to post here
I am not going to blacklist any serious discussion on imposter, shed or some other topic (trole /meme posts still qualify)
I am not banning imposter or shed based on the discussion given here.
Sleep Clause may be looked into, though possibly after the resolution of ate and Protean

The community's role now is to raise any objections to what I've said here, and begin reaching consensus about what options we want to have going forward for possible suspects (such as which one to suspect first, what should be suspected specifically and any of the points I have made here). I am looking to suspect Protean first.

Whatwasthatnoise said:
You rang?
So why am I making this argument?
Because I suspect that without these three, the abilities in question would not be broken.
Protean... That's a bit trickier. Protean, by definition, has no counters. If something has a high enough offensive presence, then only the moves chosen limit it. On the other hand, while you get STAB on everything your own STAB moves hit no harder than they normally would have. And without the raw power that the three mentioned above can bring to bear, then they're a lot easier to deal with.
I'll also make this argument, the same one I made for Parental Bond back in the day.
When choosing a Pokemon to fit a role, you have to ask yourself "Is there anything better that can fit this role?"
Right now, for offensive Pokemon, you will almost always find the answer to be "Yes, one of these three"
There is no way this is healthy for the metagame. It's PDon all over again; You can just run three of them and force people to try and check the same thing three times over.
TL:DR; The problem isn't with -ate or Protean, it's with the Mega Mewtwos and Mega Rayquaza.

Your post is commendable Whatwasthatnoise and brings up some great points but there are some things I do disagree with and ultimately I think your post ironically convinced me once and for all that Protean is the one that needs to be dealt with, especially based on the last few lines of the relevant parts of your post that I have quoted. First of all you mention that "without these three, protean would not be broken" which I think is false, because there are plenty of capable replacements. If you want fast attackers we have DeoA, AlakazamMega, SceptileMega, GengarMega, GardevoirMega, DiancieMega. Medium pacers include regular Mewtwo, Rayquaza and more. If you want bulky power hitters, there is Lati@sMegas, Gigas, Slaking, Groudon, ScizorMega, HeracrossMega, and again plenty of other options which have near comparable stats. This brings me to my second point, which is what you say here "when choosing a pokemon to fit a role" and I greatly agree with this. The thing is Protean turns the choice into one based purely on base stat and nothing else. Almost anything can have a niche when taking into account their unique stab combination with their base stat spread, and Protean invalidates that decision making completely. Furthermore, Protean is unpredictable and can be used on 'surprise' mons to take out other things that thought they could come in e.g. Giratina can OHKO registeel with Protean V-Create etc. Right now, the flavor of the week is the SwordJudgment KS set with coverage, but that can quickly change, and it is near impossible to create a wall for them all. I have done a lot of thinking about it and feel that Protean is the one that needs to go.

As for banning Protean as well as these three, I don't think that is a viable option, because like I have said before, any mon can be made to look invincible in calcs and theorymonning but I don't think that with Protean gone, it will be so difficult to stop these mons specifically, when preparing for setup, physical/special nukes and more such as using Unaware (which I do not think you have mentioned), Prankster, Fur Coat, AV walls and more. With the removal of protean, there may be newly viable defensive mons that can come in on the sets you have mentioned as well. I would like to see the interplay between the tier and these three mons in a post Protean world. However, I will definitely keep your evidence in mind for the future if we need to look at them more closely. Thanks for posting an insightful post like this.

Lcass4919 brought up the proposal to ban Pixilate and Aerilate while keeping Refrigerate and I think this is the best option available at the moment for a few reasons. The first and foremost is I do not want to ban a Pokemon unless it is absolutely the last resort, and I just don't see RayMega and DiancieMega to be the overwhelming dominant forces across multiple sets like I mentioned in the op, which is what the standard should be. I am still not fully sure that even Pixilate and Aerilate should be banned on them because I feel there are viable options available to stop them, and really the Specs RayMega set, which is underused, is the only one that should be considered somewhat broken. The second is there is an argument that says that Aerilate and Pixilate can be used on other mons besides the top 2 without being overwhelming for the tier, which I do not believe in. There are many capable replacements who can do just as well with coverage imo such as regular Ray, Yveltal, Xerneas and more, and the Specs set, which is the only one that nears brokenness imo can be run with CharMegaY and GardeMega as well. Furthermore, the main feeling I have is that Pixilate and Aerilate are simpler better offensively than Ice is in the metagame. There are also much less abusers of Fridge after Kyurem, than the others, and I don't think non-stab Refrigerate sets are even close to being broken. This is a somewhat shoddy explanation by my standards so I expect many counterarguments and I shall answer them as they come.

I will also not consider any clause of the kind "non-stab on ates" or anything similar because I think that falls into what I said in the op

The exception that I shall keep, at this point in time, is that a clause will not be put for a complex situation that disallows specific Pokemon from having specific moves, items, abilities or any combination thereof, as I feel that it will open a rabbit-hole with no ending, with discussions on which Pokemon would need limiting, which sets should be considered, similarity of moves and so forth.

Not only do I think that introducing such a thing would be elitist and discouraging to new players which we all were at some point, but also I think an ELO Clause to post here would be nearly impossible or impractical to enforce. There is no inbuilt mechanism and also how should we enforce it when the ladder activity varies so much, and a 1500 ELO score as an example, could mean completely different now than it did in the XY era and in the future as well? And what about when a server resets? How strict should it be? I did not have an alt with an ELO of 1500+ in BH for quite a while myself. I think the case-by-case analysis of posts would be best, and furthermore, I think it should be handled by the community helping each other out, instead of having the mindset of ridiculing and silencing people who post here. Everyone has the right to post here, though they have to earn the right to be taken seriously imo; that's my current stance.

This is fairly straightforward. None of us can predict the impact of anything on the ladder permanently. This is the same reason I don't put stock into rankings of mons in OMs. There is continually a process of creating new sets and mons and things that seem useless now may become extremely dominant later on. Some examples of this are Fur Coat Chansey (laughed at in XY), Doom Desire Dialga (Dialga was considered irrelevant when gen 6 came around with fairies and the introduction of Defog meaning a spinner that threatened Giratina was not required any longer) and more. Therefore, there does exist the small possibility that someone comes up with a new argument that shows that Imposter and Shedinja are broken without doubt in BH. I think this also plays into not being elitist; anything in the meta should be discussed and we shouldn't think that we have everything found out in the tier.

Having said the above about blacklisting imposter and shed, I do want to reiterate that currently I don't think there is enough evidence that they are broken. If you had read the OP, I even include them as examples of why they are NOT broken imo. They are fairly one dimensional. You can literally control 90% of an Imposter's set except their HP and their item, meaning it is one of the only abilities in the game that you know exactly what you're dealing with before even playing a game. Similarly for Shed, there is not much variation in what it can run, and it is not difficult to fit a few things to defeat them without resorting to niche abilities, moves or mons. It is not difficult to run hazards, run a ghost type, run something with residual damage, run status or something similar, and not doing so is willfully losing to shed, not it being op. I'm not sure what else is expected to happen when you come to a swordfight without a sword, besids losing a few limbs.

Funbot28 said:
I am not the greatest BH player to say the least, but I would like to leave some input on a necessary implementation ...

I really do believe that a Sleep Clause should be implemented in the tier, the amount of matches I played that I felt that I was at a disadvantage for not carrying either a Safety Goggles/Magic Bounce/Grass-type/PH user in order to deal with Spore is quite insane (however Magic Bounce and PH are common and nice abilities to run for other reasons than countering sleep, and Safety Googles and grass types don't protect against Dark Void). The thing that bothers me about sleep is that any offensive mon can just slap on a sleep inducing move that limits the effectiveness of some of its checks and counters (ie: Mega Rayquaza to Fur Coat Chansey), naturally this happens in standard play also but the fact that it can be done repeatedly in Bh is what pushes it over the edge imo. I would like to address the three points reasoning a implementation for a clause:

This may not be true per say when it comes to sleep as counterplay does exist like I mentioned previously, but the fact that it is so centralizing and demands defensive and stall teams to run one of the following options to deal with it is a little too much imo. There are countless teams in which I see Safety Goggles Mega Audino/Magic Bounce Registeel/PH Giratina and so on, and which they are forced to not carry more reliable items like Leftovers or Choice items (similar to Shed Shell in OU pre S-Tag ban). This type of centralization and saturation to counterplay this strategy is not a healthy element for the BH metagame in my eyes.

This also can apply to Sleep as most offensive mons rely on how many sleep turns the victim is forced to endure so that they can either weaken down the mon tremendously, setup on them, or bring in the appropriate check/counter of the victim. It really grants the abuser the flexibility and freedom to have at least 2-3 guaranteed "free" turns to do whatever they please if the opponent decides to not switch out (but in any case they can just put to sleep another mon with the current restrictions). It can render matches dependant on how many sleep turns the abuser is rewarded to do whatever they want and can be repeatedly done several times throughout the match. Another unhealthy element in my eyes.

So this is where I feel Sleep really applies the most. If your opponent does not decide to prepare for sleep at all when teambuilding (which is almost necessary at this point of the meta), they would be at a huge disadvantage. Many people would say "well in BH its natural to be needing to prepare for many threats like Imposter Chansey, Sturdinja, Aerilate Mega Ray, etc...) but in this case the move can be repetitively seen throughout more than one pokemon, which always tends to force the opponent to guess and determine when the sleep move would be abused. So its not like once Sturdinja is taken out that a stress is relieved off your shoulders as you can see Spore/Dark Void on more than one pokemon in this case. The stress and aggressive nature of this move seems to prolong throughout the majority of the match, leaving players needing to at least have more than one answer to it. This really is what makes it restrict teambuilding in a sense.

Tl;DR: Sleep is restricting teambuilding and a clause should be implemented in BH.

Not much to say here except that again this is a great post and definitely will get me thinking about it. Of course, sleep falls in the categories that I have mentioned, and you bring up great points, so the only counterargument I have is, I think there are enough things that can be considered not niche to combat sleep, such as Magic Bounce, status absorbers like Poison Heal and Magic Guard, and Safety Goggles which is easily splashable on any mon that defeats the main sleep spreader and by virtue of this, is just as reliable an item as those others that you have mentioned. In addition you do still have the niche mechanics such as Insomnia/Vital Spirit, Natural Cure and Sleep Talk available. I wil postpone discussion of Sleep Clause to after the Protean and -Ate discussions but my initial thoughts are you will have to show that Sleep is definitely beyond the bounds of what you can fit on a team without resorting to niche measures. Thanks for posting.

Imperator Romanum · Apr 6, 2016

Imposter Chansey suffers from the same things that Ditto does, imposter is only as powerful as your opponent allows it to be. Chansey is at the upmpst peak viability because the entire metagame is prepared for. They have to be, don't they? To differ it from ditto, Chansey will beat it's opposition 100% of the time if it isn't prepared for, and this makes the metagame entirely centralised around it, and not set up... This is good, this makes BH an entirely different game than any metagame.it had the upside of preventing Balanced hackmons from becoming entirely offensive!

No ban - Chansey/Imposter

So I want to fast forward but I'll go over Shedinja first. Shedinja is the counter-part to Chansey in that it's entirely immune to all forms of attacks, 90% of them atleast. Most offensive mons need to carry some form of passive damage to handle Shedinja. But this doesn't make it broken, it makes it hold a role almost exclusively to BH breakage point prevention,BPP it's role in the metagame isn't to wall. It's easy to beat, but it forces the pace down, prevents the metagame from reaching it's breaking point. There's three pokemon in OMs that hold this role. Bh Shedinja, Bh Chansey and No status Wobbufet. What they do is countering nothing, but preventing a negative centralisation.

No ban - Shedinja

Protean is a different story, it's an ability that means nothing counters it, as you can hit everything super effectively. However, I do not believe it should be banned as it's severely hampered by imposter and Shedinja. So stick with me, it's easy so say that it can run every coverage move under the sun and beat everything, because it can't you're forced to go through and imposter proof it, and this is where it loses its creative freedom. imposter can't carelessly put on Sacred fire, Preciples blades and something like Extreme speed. It's forced to choose combinations that prevent it from being imposter bait. This severely lowers its move set, to lets say: Ice, grass anf fire or ghost, fighting and normal or rock, ground and ice. It's wothout saying that to imposter proof yourself you're forced to run a plate, a pokemon on your team that's immune/resists your moves, like FF/Levitate Aegislash or Shedinja. This does severely restrict your moveset. Inbetween Chansey, Shedinja and Mega Rayquaza your freedom of moves are significantly restricted, it goes without saying that -Ate murders Protean users (MMx, MMy and Mega Ray) If they're not running king sheild, so okay, now you need to King sheild. But then you have Shedinja, which you also need to handle - so that's infestation. Half your moves used already, and then we have Spooky plate + Secret sword, so now you're immune to all three... But are you really that effective now? Without the coverage protean isn't all that much difficult to beat. And of course there's several counter measures to all of the "Imposter" proof sets. Saffety goggles M-Audino, Flash fire Aegislash, Shedinja, Fur coat and Imposter Chansey easily handle it. And theoretically it can beat these pokemon, but theoretically you can beat anything, that doesn't mean its broken. Mega Ray can run any coverage move it wants for its ate set, so can don ect. Here's my pros and cons list, so I think

No ban - Protean

PROS

CONS
1.5x Boost to all attacks

Imposter weak

Diverse sets

Shedinja weak

Hard to revenge kill with type changes

No creative freedom without team support

Cool coverage with team support

Needs team support

Priority weak(Ate)

No opinion on -Ate

Uselesscrab · Apr 6, 2016

AllJokesAside said:
Protean is a different story, it's an ability that means nothing counters it, as you can hit everything super effectively. However, I do not believe it should be banned as it's severely hampered by imposter and Shedinja. So stick with me, it's easy so say that it can run every coverage move under the sun and beat everything, because it can't you're forced to go through and imposter proof it, and this is where it loses its creative freedom. imposter can't carelessly put on Sacred fire, Preciples blades and something like Extreme speed. It's forced to choose combinations that prevent it from being imposter bait. This severely lowers its move set, to lets say: Ice, grass anf fire or ghost, fighting and normal or rock, ground and ice. It's wothout saying that to imposter proof yourself you're forced to run a plate, a pokemon on your team that's immune/resists your moves, like FF/Levitate Aegislash or Shedinja. This does severely restrict your moveset. Inbetween Chansey, Shedinja and Mega Rayquaza your freedom of moves are significantly restricted, it goes without saying that -Ate murders Protean users (MMx, MMy and Mega Ray) If they're not running king sheild, so okay, now you need to King sheild. But then you have Shedinja, which you also need to handle - so that's infestation. Half your moves used already, and then we have Spooky plate + Secret sword, so now you're immune to all three... But are you really that effective now? Without the coverage protean isn't all that much difficult to beat. And of course there's several counter measures to all of the "Imposter" proof sets. Saffety goggles M-Audino, Flash fire Aegislash, Shedinja, Fur coat and Imposter Chansey easily handle it. And theoretically it can beat these pokemon, but theoretically you can beat anything, that doesn't mean its broken. Mega Ray can run any coverage move it wants for its ate set, so can don ect. Here's my pros and cons list, so I think

I don't understand how you can seriously say "nothing counters it" and "I do not believe it should be banned" in a span of two sentences, first of all. But let me address each of these points in turn (I'm going to mostly discuss Protean Mega Mewtwo Y because that is the one that I believe to be slightly more dangerous in the current metagame):

1) "Severely hampered by Imposter and Shedinja": Mega Mewtwo Y's #1 set has a pretty surefire means of beating Imposter, and its #2 set often runs Magma Storm. Sometimes you won't know which one your opponent is using until it's too late. You might see a Mega Mewtwo Y use Secret Sword, think it's not Spooky Judgment, bring in Imposter, and then get destroyed. There is no reliable means of checking a Pokemon like this.

2) "you're forced to go through and imposter proof it": This statement applies to literally every offensive Pokemon in BH, for one. And not only does the Spooky Judgment set beat itself with no additional Imposter counters required, as do several other Judgment sets [e.g. my Fist Plate one :)], some of the type combinations that you characterized as "severely limiting its moveset" are among the best sets of coverage in the entire game. For instance, Ghost/Fighting is perfect neutral coverage, and it has a means of hitting Giratina, Registeel, Aegislash, Mega Slowbro, Chansey and many other relevant Pokemon super-effectively. The only common Pokemon that reliably counter this set are Mega Audino and, to a slightly lesser extent, Magic Guard Ho-oh and Sturdy Shedinja. But there's no way of knowing if your opponent may be using a Sludge Wave or slightly rarer Power Gem lure, or even an entirely different Life Orb set with stuff like Magma Storm that can destroy Audino and Shedinja. This level of unpredictablity means that your team's dedicated counter for Protean MMY may not stand a chance.

3) "your freedom of moves are significantly restricted": The examples you give here to make Proteans look bad are kind of bizarre. First of all, I do not consider King's Shield a notable sacrifice as it's basically been run on every single Protean set since the dawn of time. And yes, even if you run Infestation on a Spooky Plate set, you are "that effective." You still possess the important neutral coverage I detailed earlier. And you know what? A Pokemon doesn't have to be able to power through literally every defensive wall to be broken. The mere fact that you can be totally prepared for the common sets and still have absolutely no idea whether a Protean Mega Mewtwo Y will wreck your team is making me lean toward the belief that Protean is broken. It's not even a theoretical circumstance; the set you provided as an example, the supposedly ineffective one, already does well against two or three of those "counters" you listed (by the way Flash Fire Aegislash doesn't beat any common Protean set I know of, so I have no idea why you listed it here) — Pokemon you might be relying on to defeat Proteans. How many checks do you have to run on a team to beat it?

...and Protean Mega Mewtwo X and Protean Mega Rayquaza are a whole different animal. Maybe more on that later?

Rumors · Apr 6, 2016

E4 Flint said:
I am considering a ban on aerilate and pixilate (not refrigerate)

I agree and like what most of what you said, but I'll have to step forward and be the first to pose a counter-argument.

Removing Pixel and Air from -ates would certainly be helpful, but there's two issues with not removing Fridge.

1) -ate clause is already an attempt to hamper the abilities without removing them, and only to some success considering they're up for suspect yet again. Keeping Fridge would be doing the same thing twice, trying to break -ate's legs (again) without actually just killing it. This is the second time we've identified -ate as a problem. As such, it'd be better, IMO, to just rid ourselves of it and be done.

2) Fridge is still pretty strong. I think this would be easier to break down it down into sub-bullet points...

2a) Defensive Pokemon will be able to relax a bit, but you're still going to need your mandatory Fridge-check/counter because, while they might not be the mixed monsters Pixel Diancie and Air Ray are, Kyu-B's Boomburst is nothing to scoff at if it hits any non-resistant Pokemon, even uninvested.

0 SpA Refrigerate Kyurem-B Boomburst vs. 252 HP / 128 SpD Mega Audino: 169-199 (41.2 - 48.5%) -- guaranteed 3HKO

Just an example, not going to litter my post with a thousand calcs against every standard, niche, and theorymon. And I know, not quite a 2HKO but... lay down some rocks and the pressure is on. Registeel still stops it cold, but if we're all forced to run it still, then not a lot has changed. But additionally, Kyu-W's Extreme Speed, while not nearly as strong as Kyu-B's Boomburst, is still strong enough to pick off whatever survives a Boomburst.

252 SpA Refrigerate Kyurem-W Boomburst vs. 252 HP / 128 SpD Mega Audino: 268-316 (65.3 - 77%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

0 Atk Refrigerate Kyurem-W Extreme Speed vs. 252 HP / 128 Def Mega Audino: 97-115 (23.6 - 28%) -- 89.9% chance to 4HKO

Again, just an example, and not an assured 2HKO without some hazard pressure or a LO or Nevermelt Ice, but you see my point, I hope. And then... we'll have other potential abusers. You thought Mega-Ray won't be using -ate after losing access to Air? Think again.

0 SpA Refrigerate Mega Rayquaza Boomburst vs. 252 HP / 128 SpD Mega Audino: 162-191 (39.5 - 46.5%) -- guaranteed 3HKO

252 SpA Refrigerate Mega Rayquaza Boomburst vs. 252 HP / 128 SpD Mega Audino: 187-221 (45.6 - 53.9%) -- 46.9% chance to 2HKO

The power reduction is significant over Kyu-W's Boomburst, yeah, so it'll likely be more of a niche pick. But it's a heck of a lot faster and the damage is high enough it can still drop a bunch of pressure onto defensive walls with Boomburst. Let's not even talk about...

2b) Offensive Pokemon. Fakespeed wrecks anything that's not bulky, often in two hits.

252 Atk Refrigerate Mega Rayquaza Fake Out vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Mega Mewtwo Y: 97-115 (27.4 - 32.5%) -- guaranteed 4HKO

252 Atk Refrigerate Mega Rayquaza Extreme Speed vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Mega Mewtwo Y: 194-229 (54.9 - 64.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

Mega-Ray would come just a bit short. And, I know I gave this one 252/252 offenses, but I can't predict how a future Fridge Ray would have its most popular build. Either way, that's the weakest, niche pick of the three. Kyu-B is the main one talking about here since Kyu-W would be uninvested and mostly using E. Speed to pick off those that just survived Boomburst. And... I'm confident I don't need to post numbers showing Ytwo getting cleanly 2HKOed by standard Kyu-B. Or, really, most low to mid-bulky Pokemon in general. Heck, Kyu-B has enough bulk that stuff like 252 HP Regigigas struggles to avoid a 3HKO if it can't OHKO Kyu-B or neuter it with status.

2c) So, basically, to sum up point #2, defensive and offensive Pokemon would still be under a lot of pressure, largely in the team building phase. You'll only ever encounter one Fridge Kyurem, or niche non-Kyurem pick, per game, but you still need to prepare for them all lest one either wreck all your walls, wreck all your offensive Pokemon, or both. Uninvested Boombursts from Kyu-B are still scary strong, Kyu-W's Boombursts will still murder most walls not named Soundproof or Registeel, and Fakespeed will still pretty much auto-win any match-ups against middling or worst bulk offensive Pokemon.

Bonus 2d) If you thought you could just plop down Regenvest Kyogre and call it a day vs these, you're forgetting Kyu-B's lord and savior, Bolt Strike. I've not run the numbers, but I imagine Kyu-W's Seed Flare would also scare off most, if not all, Kyogre and other Water-types, particularly Soundproof Mega-bro.

So yeah... can we stop breaking -ate's legs and just kill it?

Kingslayer2779 · Apr 6, 2016

Its essay time. I'll be addressing Whatwasthatnoise's argument that its the Mons and not Protean that is broken.

i'm really not convinced that the mons are the issue here at all. Your post actually strengthened my original conviction that the mons aren't the issue. Although i'm not here to argue about Mega Rayquaza cause i'm not convinced he isn't the problem. No i'm here to talk about Protean and the Mega Mewtwos. I'm 100% convinced that Protean is inherently broken and that the Mega Mewtwos are not the issue. Before I explain why, we should talk about what the benefits of actually running Protean, which you seen to gloss over and underestimate. Protean gives any non-STAB move STAB. This might seem inconsequential because we so often take STAB for granted in Pokemon. Yet STAB is the absolute best attack bonus not named Huge/Pure Power and Parental Bond. There aren't too many easy ways to give your attacks a 50% power boost. Choice Items lock you to one move, Adapt only doubles STAB, Tinted Lens only boosts against resists, Sheer Force isn't as powerful and requires secondary effects, etc. So giving STAB to any move that already isn't that STAB is actually a huge deal. Additionally Protean provides relevant defensive utility with King's Shield, allowing most users to check -ates and other priority revenge killers. Thanks to the type change function of Protean there is literally no opportunity cost to running any combination of coverage move. Its incredibly easy to build an effective Protean set. Normally pure coverage sets without STAB might struggle to beat Pokemon they can't hit super effectively. It also doesn't help that we gained the EV Limit, so it even easier to kill things with STAB neutral coverage.

Both of these benefits are utilized to their fullest by the Mega Mewtwos. The Mega Mewtwos both have fantastic offensive stats but mediocre typings and average defensive stats. Protean breaks these mons by fixing their typing issues that otherwise does a pretty decent job of balancing them imo. Additionally the Mega Mewtwo's speed tier is much higher then any other offensive pokemon, so combined with the raw power of Protean, you basically are forced to use defensive pokemon to deal with them. And since Protean removes the cost of running whatever coverage you want, you can beat would be counters pretty easily. Its not even remotely challenging to build a set that beats the meta's current protean counters. Especially since the rampant power creep of Gen 6 and the ev limit shrunk the list of viable walls in bh by like half. It helps feed this cycle of "Protean runs coverage to beat the current walls, walls try to adapt, Protean adapts further." I mean the only Pokemon that actually stand a chance of standing up to Mm2y are Mega Audino, Chansey, Ho-Oh and random assault vest stuff. More on that in a second. Its this "too fast for offense, defensive utility for pirority, wallbreaking power with coverage" package that just makes Protean broken in a "broken" meta.

Its always important to make sure your more theoretical and paper based arguments hold up in a practical environment. The points i made above need to actually apply to the standard sets. The Standard Protean Mega Mewtwo Y sets are Moonblast / Earth Power/ Boomburst / King's Shield with Life orb and Judgement / Secret Sword / Quiver Dance / King's Shield with Spooky Plate. These both require different counters. The first set is only reliably countered by Chansey and some Assault Vest things. Thats it. The most standard, basic set, 2hkos almost the whole meta. The second set gives up some of the pure wall breaker power for the ability to sweep with Quiver dance and 1v1 Imposter. These sets can only be countered by Ho-Oh, Mega Audino, and Yveltal. Yes i didn't mention Shed for either. Its too easy to Pursuit trap Shed or set up rocks before pivoting to MM2y. And yes this isn't literally the only counters because this is BH and you can customize a mon like Xern to specifically beat one of these sets. But customizing a set just to beat one other set isn't too healthy if that set isn't inherently good. There is also a big issue with having 2 sets that are so similar but basically require two different counters. Say I have a Fur Coat Chansey and a defensive Poison Heal Mega Audino to counter the main Protean sets. i switch in Chansey on MM2y, and it Secret Swords. I'm pretty sure its a quiver Judgement set, so i switch to Mega Audino. It promptly unloads a Boomburst and severely damages Audino. Now i have to sack Audino to get Chansey back in safely, all because my opponent ran Boomburst over Quiver Dance, which is not at all uncommon. Basically since the two sets are so similar its extremely difficult to make the optimal play without having already scouted the set with imposter. And these are only the most common sets. The Guy who has Many Alts made a set with Chill Drive Techno Blast, Close Combat, and Gunk Shot to beat Steel+Audino+Tina Cores. There is so much practical potential for protean sets.

Banning the Mega Mewtwos would make Protean slightly less difficult to deal with, but banning Pokemon is supposed to be a last resort in BH because the Pokemon are just Stats+typing. Considering what Protean does, the Mega Mewtwos are just a statline. If they were banned Protean would just move on to Mega Gengar for special sets and something like Mega Gallade for physical. Mega Gengar would very likely still be an issue, as it already runs judgement/secret sword sets to great effectiveness. Its impossible to say for sure, but its likely we would have to ban Mega Gengar as well, when in reality we should have just banned Protean. And yes both Mewtwos can beat would be counters with coverage and boosting abilities but thats pretty much the reality of the current meta. Game Freak just gave us too much power creep and not enough bulk. Therefore i can only conclude that the best option for BH going forward is to ban Protean.

TL;DR

Protean is inherently broken because it removes the opportunity cost of running full coverage sets. With STAB on anything you can have powerful coverage attacks that also wallbreak fat neutrals.
The combination of Protean abuser's high speed, the defensive utility of King's Shield, and the power of all STAB coverage makes beating a Protean an absurdly difficult feat. It takes little skill to make and use an effective Protean set.
Protean still has more potential in the right hands. Spooky Plate sets were rare before GK ban and now dominate the meta. Something similar to this could easily happen again.
If we banned the Mewtwos and Mega Ray, then Mega Gengar and others would replace them and still be extremely effective. Therefore Protean needs to be banned.

E4 Flint · May 1, 2016

Hey guys!
As you may or may not know, Protean has been raised as something that needs to be looked at. You may see justification of it here and here.

I am launching a suspect on Protean, and this post will talk about the details of the process.
The suspect period will be two weeks; one will be the normal ladder with Protean enabled, and the next will be without Protean. Each week period shall have its own reqs and will require different alts. You must obtain the requirements in both weeks to be able to vote.

Phase1: Starting at 11:59 PM May 2nd CST USA until 11:59PM May 9th

You must create a new alt after the above date i.e. May 3rd
The alt must have "Pro" anywhere in the name but together. See example below
Code:
```
✔ Pro E4 Flint 
X PeanutButterHologram
```
The requirements will be done on the basis of COIL. The B value for this phase is 9, and the COIL requirement is 2770. This will ensure that a voter has not only played a specific number of games, but has had the required quality for taking part by taking your GXE into account. Here is how it works. It will take you N number of games to get reqs if you have a certain GXE. Some sample benchmarks are given below.
Code:
```
GXE    N
100    17
90     24
80     44
70     580
```
Note: You will not be able to vote if your GXE is below 70
To find out for yourself how much games it should take you, enter your personal GXE into the one in the equation here
After you have made reqs, you will post proof in a confirmation thread, and I shall add the link either here or in a subsequent post when it is created.
You will make your vote in a separate voter thread similar to the GKR voting thread which I will again post when created

Phase 2 will begin around a day after Phase 1 in order to give The Immortal some time to set up the no-Protean ladder. Details about Phase 2 will be given on or around May 10th in a subsequent post.

Thanks for your patience guys.

EDIT: Show proof of your eligibilty to vote here. Your vote will not be counted if you have not given proof in that thread.

morogrim · May 4, 2016

Here's my two cents on the matter:

Protean:

The thing about protean is that as said earlier, it only takes into account the base stats of the pokemon using it in this meta. In other words, since there are no limitations on movesets (any mon can use any move), any mon could use a perfect coverage moveset with protean. This leaves us with only one other parameter to look at when choosing our protean user: their stats. This is not really a new thing though in bh since the whole point of this meta is to use the pokemon that are the "best" at each role; we don't need to use a prankster liepard when we could use a prankster registeel, and we don't need to use v-create on only victini anymore when we could use it on pdon. The only difference between the rest of the bh meta and the protean users is that for protean users, only the stats need to be taken into consideration as their typing would be irrelevant as opposed to the rest of the meta where the pokemon typings also matter.

All of this being said, I feel like there are quite a few "counters" for protean users. But the problem is that for each protean user there is a different counter and there is never no way of telling which kind of protean user the mon is until their moveset is revealed. For example, the common mmy swordjudge set could be walled by mega audino and yveltal but the boomburst/moonblast/ground judge set will not be walled. Protean users can additionally beat -ate users thanks to ks (unless if the -ate user outplays the opponent or has a move like substitute or spore). What's more is that players need to be prepared for both physical protean users (mmx for example) and special protean users (such as mmy) as there are no mons that can check both kinds at once. In addition, one must consider the fact that in the world of bh protean users one of the most important stats is speed. Mega latios may be the most powerful special protean user in the game, but that means nothing when the spooky plate mmy can still ohko it. What this implies is that if you want a "guaranteed" method of beating the common protean users, you could just run a protean mega alakazam and ohko mmx and mmy with ease. But this in itself is implying a level of centralization as the player needs to include some sort of protean check in his/her team otherwise they won't be able to get too far with their respective teams. I have included my opinion on protean at the end of the -ate section since the two are related to each other.

-Ate:

The main difference between -ate users and protean is that when choosing a mon to run -ate with, the user looks at the base stats and the typing. Of course there are always people that run gimmicky things like pixilate mmx to throw opponents off guard but those choices are definitely not the most optimal (they are gimmicks afterall). -Ate users do however share this common trait with protean in that there really isn't any sure way to check all -ate sets with just one mon: Steel types can get destroyed by pblades/v-create/searing shot (levitate steel types lose to fire moves and flashfire loses to pblades, prankster/bounce loses to all of these), soundproof users lose to techno blast, and the list goes on. With that being said, I feel like if protean gets banned there would be a certain level of justification to also ban -ate users (not the same level because of the typing restriction that -ate users have as mentioned). What I really fear is that the banning of protean would open up the opportunity for the banning of other things: What if we decide to ban -ate users after protean? What if the banning of these two would lead to something else becoming too strong and banned as a result? Where do we draw the line? The reason why I love the bh meta is its versatility and the extremely wide range of possibilities that it has. When too many things get banned, at some point the meta will gradually lose this versatility and eventually become just another restricted meta. I am aware that this same question has been brought up in the past for the banning of other things, but I feel like it is necessary to bring it up once again so we can move forward with one eye looking at the past. My opinion is that protean and -ate are definitely stronger than the other offensive threats in the meta, but even so I would vote against banning both protean and -ate. Besides, why ban protean and -ate when there is something as cancerous as moody out there? (so much salt lel)

Imposter, Shed, and Sleep Clause:

To be completely honest, I feel like all 3 of these have way too many checks and counters to really be worthy of getting banned. In fact, I feel like the whole point of this meta is to imposter proof your offensive threats just because you can. But then again, that's just personal opinion. Shed also has many counters and is extremely unreliable to use as a tank because of all of these threats. If you get predicted one time that's game over for your sheddy. As for sleep clause, there are also way too many counters for it in bh: safety goggles completely counters spore and ph users and bouncers beat dark void (and spore). The only real problem is the mold breakers with dark void which is once again beaten by ph users and maybe lum berry users but that's about it. In short, I feel like the only real threat would be dark void + mold breaker which is still counterable.

TL;DR:

Imo, protean and -ate are stronger than most (if not all) the offensive threats of bh but still should not be banned. Imposter, shed, and sleep clause are fine but might want to look into mold breaker + dark void in the future (not really that much of a priority imo).

SpiderKoloPL · May 4, 2016

morogrim said:
(...)
Imposter, Shed, and Sleep Clause:

To be completely honest, I feel like all 3 of these have way too many checks and counters to really be worthy of getting banned. In fact, I feel like the whole point of this meta is to imposter proof your offensive threats just because you can. But then again, that's just personal opinion. Shed also has many counters and is extremely unreliable to use as a tank because of all of these threats. If you get predicted one time that's game over for your sheddy. As for sleep clause, there are also way too many counters for it in bh: safety goggles completely counters spore and ph users and bouncers beat dark void (and spore). The only real problem is the mold breakers with dark void which is once again beaten by ph users and maybe lum berry users but that's about it. In short, I feel like the only real threat would be dark void + mold breaker which is still counterable.

TL;DR:

Imo, protean and -ate are stronger than most (if not all) the offensive threats of bh but still should not be banned. Imposter, shed, and sleep clause are fine but might want to look into mold breaker + dark void in the future (not really that much of a priority imo).

One more think to note:
Mold-Void can be counterable also (from more popular sets) by Prankster (or just faster pokemon) with Substitute/Spore/Taunt/Dark Void.
From less popular - Guts with activator, Natural Cure (maybe? but you need to switch right after Sleeping move), Sleep Talk (again big question mark - to random move even when we can use just moves from moveset), Magic Coat...

We have counters against this combo, thats for sure. Still - Sleeping moves wihout any clause are anoying, and also Sleep status have huge part of RNG (you can wake up right after one turn, or after 3 turns...).

Also, I thinking about Shedinja, and... this pokemon have a lot of counters, thats true. but when we don't have ANY, it's imposible to beat in any way this little bug.
No Iinvestation or any traping and damagind move, Weather (when Lum berry), Status (when Safety googles), Mold Breaker, Hazard... and we lose against bug, what is untochable.
Also - Good Shedi set can avoid really ealsy threads like Rocky Helmet or Rought Skin (No contact moves), Switch by oponent to Mold Breaker (predicted Baton Pass), Even that stupid Investation in turn, when Investation LAND on Shedinja (just use Baton Pass in right time...).

When we have weapon against Shedinja, and stupidly doesn't lose it - we CAN win. When we put any hazard - we CAN win (expect oponents Defog/Rapid Spin). In other situation we propably lose.

Much Harder is with Imposter Chansey. Chansey is usually a little better, than pokemon what copy moveset, ability... Usually.
Here we can create some Imposterprood pokemons, what even when give movepool, Chansey can't use it with the same effectiveness like oryginal pokemon, because Plate Judgment, Because Hyperspace Fury on Hoopa (and only this move), because other item, than this pokemon need to be "better". Eviolite is really often usable item on this blob, but Lucky Punch sometimes peoples use against boosted staller (Quiver Dance any pokemon, Coil any pokemon and other stuff).
This pokemon also can really good make PP stall how long she can switch and "refresh" moveset.

I will write more later.

Lcass4919 · May 4, 2016

morogrim said:
Here's my two cents on the matter:

Protean:

The thing about protean is that as said earlier, it only takes into account the base stats of the pokemon using it in this meta. In other words, since there are no limitations on movesets (any mon can use any move), any mon could use a perfect coverage moveset with protean. This leaves us with only one other parameter to look at when choosing our protean user: their stats. This is not really a new thing though in bh since the whole point of this meta is to use the pokemon that are the "best" at each role; we don't need to use a prankster liepard when we could use a prankster registeel, and we don't need to use v-create on only victini anymore when we could use it on pdon. The only difference between the rest of the bh meta and the protean users is that for protean users, only the stats need to be taken into consideration as their typing would be irrelevant as opposed to the rest of the meta where the pokemon typings also matter.

All of this being said, I feel like there are quite a few "counters" for protean users. But the problem is that for each protean user there is a different counter and there is never no way of telling which kind of protean user the mon is until their moveset is revealed. For example, the common mmy swordjudge set could be walled by mega audino and yveltal but the boomburst/moonblast/ground judge set will not be walled. Protean users can additionally beat -ate users thanks to ks (unless if the -ate user outplays the opponent or has a move like substitute or spore). What's more is that players need to be prepared for both physical protean users (mmx for example) and special protean users (such as mmy) as there are no mons that can check both kinds at once. In addition, one must consider the fact that in the world of bh protean users one of the most important stats is speed. Mega latios may be the most powerful special protean user in the game, but that means nothing when the spooky plate mmy can still ohko it. What this implies is that if you want a "guaranteed" method of beating the common protean users, you could just run a protean mega alakazam and ohko mmx and mmy with ease. But this in itself is implying a level of centralization as the player needs to include some sort of protean check in his/her team otherwise they won't be able to get too far with their respective teams. I have included my opinion on protean at the end of the -ate section since the two are related to each other.

-Ate:

The main difference between -ate users and protean is that when choosing a mon to run -ate with, the user looks at the base stats and the typing. Of course there are always people that run gimmicky things like pixilate mmx to throw opponents off guard but those choices are definitely not the most optimal (they are gimmicks afterall). -Ate users do however share this common trait with protean in that there really isn't any sure way to check all -ate sets with just one mon: Steel types can get destroyed by pblades/v-create/searing shot (levitate steel types lose to fire moves and flashfire loses to pblades, prankster/bounce loses to all of these), soundproof users lose to techno blast, and the list goes on. With that being said, I feel like if protean gets banned there would be a certain level of justification to also ban -ate users (not the same level because of the typing restriction that -ate users have as mentioned). What I really fear is that the banning of protean would open up the opportunity for the banning of other things: What if we decide to ban -ate users after protean? What if the banning of these two would lead to something else becoming too strong and banned as a result? Where do we draw the line? The reason why I love the bh meta is its versatility and the extremely wide range of possibilities that it has. When too many things get banned, at some point the meta will gradually lose this versatility and eventually become just another restricted meta. I am aware that this same question has been brought up in the past for the banning of other things, but I feel like it is necessary to bring it up once again so we can move forward with one eye looking at the past. My opinion is that protean and -ate are definitely stronger than the other offensive threats in the meta, but even so I would vote against banning both protean and -ate. Besides, why ban protean and -ate when there is something as cancerous as moody out there? (so much salt lel)

Imposter, Shed, and Sleep Clause:

To be completely honest, I feel like all 3 of these have way too many checks and counters to really be worthy of getting banned. In fact, I feel like the whole point of this meta is to imposter proof your offensive threats just because you can. But then again, that's just personal opinion. Shed also has many counters and is extremely unreliable to use as a tank because of all of these threats. If you get predicted one time that's game over for your sheddy. As for sleep clause, there are also way too many counters for it in bh: safety goggles completely counters spore and ph users and bouncers beat dark void (and spore). The only real problem is the mold breakers with dark void which is once again beaten by ph users and maybe lum berry users but that's about it. In short, I feel like the only real threat would be dark void + mold breaker which is still counterable.

TL;DR:

Imo, protean and -ate are stronger than most (if not all) the offensive threats of bh but still should not be banned. Imposter, shed, and sleep clause are fine but might want to look into mold breaker + dark void in the future (not really that much of a priority imo).

sometimes it bothers me that people forget protean, ate, and mega evolution didn't exist in the generations before, therefore removing them wouldn't change from "bh norms" in any way, since these were never consistent staples to begin with. i get they are huge contenders atm, but removing them won't magically make this meta a boring ubers. lol. we have plenty of options, most of which are dead because abilities like ate and protean are just TOO good to not use, and completely force the meta in a specific gross state.

protean and ate shape the meta in a unhealthy way. moody doesnt shape the meta at all, as literally most "Checks" to it are already super common on teams. is moody broken? maybe. is moody more of a priority then protean? i don't think so personally, because moody again, is a bunch of 50/50's while ate and protean are both consistant 100%'s even when someone packs specific shit to stop it lol. people don't run unaware pokemon with haze to deal with moody because theres no real need to. moody might be a threat, but there are both defensive and offensive answers to it. protean and ate both have ways around offensive and defensive answers, on the same set. which is more then likely why its getting priority. the pokemon that shape the meta, struggle to have checks and counters associated with them AND still do extremely well, are the ones that need to be looked at first. ate and protean have this in spades, moody-dispite being super scary-does not. once people find out the amazingness that is taunt moody, then maybe then it will be considered for suspect in the future.

i think sleep clause is still something to consider even with all the checks and counters, as it really narrows the meta, anything can get around its counters with dark void. you could make a team of six voiders, and actually do really good on the ladder just because its impossible to sleep proof 6 mons. do i feel its "SUPER NESSISARY BECAUSE ITS UBER BROKEN AND SWEP ALL" no. do i feel like it will help the meta overall and help ease people into a great om? yes. think of the children flint! think of the chillllldreeeen~!

morogrim · May 4, 2016

Lcass4919 said:
sometimes it bothers me that people forget protean, ate, and mega evolution didn't exist in the generations before, therefore removing them wouldn't change from "bh norms" in any way, since these were never consistent staples to begin with. i get they are huge contenders atm, but removing them won't magically make this meta a boring ubers. lol. we have plenty of options, most of which are dead because abilities like ate and protean are just TOO good to not use, and completely force the meta in a specific gross state.

protean and ate shape the meta in a unhealthy way. moody doesnt shape the meta at all, as literally most "Checks" to it are already super common on teams. is moody broken? maybe. is moody more of a priority then protean? i don't think so personally, because moody again, is a bunch of 50/50's while ate and protean are both consistant 100%'s even when someone packs specific shit to stop it lol. people don't run unaware pokemon with haze to deal with moody because theres no real need to. moody might be a threat, but there are both defensive and offensive answers to it. protean and ate both have ways around offensive and defensive answers, on the same set. which is more then likely why its getting priority. the pokemon that shape the meta, struggle to have checks and counters associated with them AND still do extremely well, are the ones that need to be looked at first. ate and protean have this in spades, moody-dispite being super scary-does not. once people find out the amazingness that is taunt moody, then maybe then it will be considered for suspect in the future.

i think sleep clause is still something to consider even with all the checks and counters, as it really narrows the meta, anything can get around its counters with dark void. you could make a team of six voiders, and actually do really good on the ladder just because its impossible to sleep proof 6 mons. do i feel its "SUPER NESSISARY BECAUSE ITS UBER BROKEN AND SWEP ALL" no. do i feel like it will help the meta overall and help ease people into a great om? yes. think of the children flint! think of the chillllldreeeen~!

Of course the moody portion of my post was intended to be taken as a joke, I was merely saying how salty I was about moody not that it's broken. And yes, megas and such did not exist in previous generations but that really has nothing to do with the topic. Going by that logic, it would be fine to restrict the OU tier to only gen 1 mons since they didn't have gens 2-6 back then and everything that came after gen 1 hadn't changed the "norms." Also, as I stated in the first post, the reason why I'm personally opposed to banning protean and -ate is that I know for a fact that other things will become the new protean and the new -ate (the dead abilities which you spoke of) and then down the line those things might get suspected and this chain could repeat until the bh meta turns into a normal restricted meta.

Kingslayer2779 · May 4, 2016

morogrim said:
Here's my two cents on the matter:

Protean:

The thing about protean is that as said earlier, it only takes into account the base stats of the pokemon using it in this meta. In other words, since there are no limitations on movesets (any mon can use any move), any mon could use a perfect coverage moveset with protean. This leaves us with only one other parameter to look at when choosing our protean user: their stats. This is not really a new thing though in bh since the whole point of this meta is to use the pokemon that are the "best" at each role; we don't need to use a prankster liepard when we could use a prankster registeel, and we don't need to use v-create on only victini anymore when we could use it on pdon. The only difference between the rest of the bh meta and the protean users is that for protean users, only the stats need to be taken into consideration as their typing would be irrelevant as opposed to the rest of the meta where the pokemon typings also matter.

All of this being said, I feel like there are quite a few "counters" for protean users. But the problem is that for each protean user there is a different counter and there is never no way of telling which kind of protean user the mon is until their moveset is revealed. For example, the common mmy swordjudge set could be walled by mega audino and yveltal but the boomburst/moonblast/ground judge set will not be walled. Protean users can additionally beat -ate users thanks to ks (unless if the -ate user outplays the opponent or has a move like substitute or spore). What's more is that players need to be prepared for both physical protean users (mmx for example) and special protean users (such as mmy) as there are no mons that can check both kinds at once. In addition, one must consider the fact that in the world of bh protean users one of the most important stats is speed. Mega latios may be the most powerful special protean user in the game, but that means nothing when the spooky plate mmy can still ohko it. What this implies is that if you want a "guaranteed" method of beating the common protean users, you could just run a protean mega alakazam and ohko mmx and mmy with ease. But this in itself is implying a level of centralization as the player needs to include some sort of protean check in his/her team otherwise they won't be able to get too far with their respective teams. I have included my opinion on protean at the end of the -ate section since the two are related to each other.

-Ate:

The main difference between -ate users and protean is that when choosing a mon to run -ate with, the user looks at the base stats and the typing. Of course there are always people that run gimmicky things like pixilate mmx to throw opponents off guard but those choices are definitely not the most optimal (they are gimmicks afterall). -Ate users do however share this common trait with protean in that there really isn't any sure way to check all -ate sets with just one mon: Steel types can get destroyed by pblades/v-create/searing shot (levitate steel types lose to fire moves and flashfire loses to pblades, prankster/bounce loses to all of these), soundproof users lose to techno blast, and the list goes on. With that being said, I feel like if protean gets banned there would be a certain level of justification to also ban -ate users (not the same level because of the typing restriction that -ate users have as mentioned). What I really fear is that the banning of protean would open up the opportunity for the banning of other things: What if we decide to ban -ate users after protean? What if the banning of these two would lead to something else becoming too strong and banned as a result? Where do we draw the line? The reason why I love the bh meta is its versatility and the extremely wide range of possibilities that it has. When too many things get banned, at some point the meta will gradually lose this versatility and eventually become just another restricted meta. I am aware that this same question has been brought up in the past for the banning of other things, but I feel like it is necessary to bring it up once again so we can move forward with one eye looking at the past. My opinion is that protean and -ate are definitely stronger than the other offensive threats in the meta, but even so I would vote against banning both protean and -ate. Besides, why ban protean and -ate when there is something as cancerous as moody out there? (so much salt lel)

Imposter, Shed, and Sleep Clause:

To be completely honest, I feel like all 3 of these have way too many checks and counters to really be worthy of getting banned. In fact, I feel like the whole point of this meta is to imposter proof your offensive threats just because you can. But then again, that's just personal opinion. Shed also has many counters and is extremely unreliable to use as a tank because of all of these threats. If you get predicted one time that's game over for your sheddy. As for sleep clause, there are also way too many counters for it in bh: safety goggles completely counters spore and ph users and bouncers beat dark void (and spore). The only real problem is the mold breakers with dark void which is once again beaten by ph users and maybe lum berry users but that's about it. In short, I feel like the only real threat would be dark void + mold breaker which is still counterable.

TL;DR:

Imo, protean and -ate are stronger than most (if not all) the offensive threats of bh but still should not be banned. Imposter, shed, and sleep clause are fine but might want to look into mold breaker + dark void in the future (not really that much of a priority imo).

So you can up with all these fine reasons of why Protean is a problem for a meta but you don't want to ban because you are afraid it might reduce creativity? If anything Protean restricts creativity by being just better than most offensive sets. There isn't much reason to run things like Mega Man, Sheer Force, No Guard, etc because Protean is just better. But anyway thats not the real issue with your argument. Theres no guarantee that something like Protean will take over and centralize the meta to the point where its a problem. Its a slippery slope argument, and it doesn't hold any real weight because there is no way to speculate how the meta will look in 3 months. However, we do know what the meta looks now and its not great. As for the meta lacking creativity with Protean gone, the Primals were pokemon and we banned them without much cost to creativity and freedom. And Pokemon have the most potential of any element in BH. There is also going to be a no-protean ladder so we can see what the metagame is like. I doubt the ladder without protean won't feel like BH anymore. I feel as if we have done a great job staying minimalstic with bans and only removing the most blatantly broken abilities and i'm not worried about BH becoming "just another normal restricted meta."

Edit: can we also stop talking about imp and shed unless you have some earth shattering revelation about them they aren't even being suspected and no one has brought up a good reason too.

Quantum Tesseract · May 4, 2016

Kingslayer2779 said:
So you can up with all these fine reasons of why Protean is a problem for a meta but you don't want to ban because you are afraid it might reduce creativity? If anything Protean restricts creativity by being just better than most offensive sets. There isn't much reason to run things like Mega Man, Sheer Force, No Guard, etc because Protean is just better. But anyway thats not the real issue with your argument. Theres no guarantee that something like Protean will take over and centralize the meta to the point where its a problem. Its a slippery slope argument, and it doesn't hold any real weight because there is no way to speculate how the meta will look in 3 months. However, we do know what the meta looks now and its not great. As for the meta lacking creativity with Protean gone, the Primals were pokemon and we banned them without much cost to creativity and freedom. And Pokemon have the most potential of any element in BH. There is also going to be a no-protean ladder so we can see what the metagame is like. I doubt the ladder without protean won't feel like BH anymore. I feel as if we have done a great job staying minimalstic with bans and only removing the most blatantly broken abilities and i'm not worried about BH becoming "just another normal restricted meta."

For myself, i'd disagree, but only because I don't think protean is broken (the rest of it I'd agree 100%, like the suspect ladder argument). To me, Protean isn't broen because it just isn't powerful enough. It doesn't have the unwallable pressure of Contrary, the sheer power of -ates. It doesn't invalidate other sets just by existing- in fact, only 3 mons really use protean, and 2 of them have better options. It doesn't really drop creativity, either, as it takes a lot of work to make an actually good protean set that isn't the standard one (yes you can slap one together, but gl with that), which has many flaws of its own.
Anyway, lets see how this suspect goes.

Kingslayer2779 · May 4, 2016

Quantum Tesseract said:
For myself, i'd disagree, but only because I don't think protean is broken (the rest of it I'd agree 100%, like the suspect ladder argument). To me, Protean isn't broen because it just isn't powerful enough. It doesn't have the unwallable pressure of Contrary, the sheer power of -ates. It doesn't invalidate other sets just by existing- in fact, only 3 mons really use protean, and 2 of them have better options. It doesn't really drop creativity, either, as it takes a lot of work to make an actually good protean set that isn't the standard one (yes you can slap one together, but gl with that), which has many flaws of its own.
Anyway, lets see how this suspect goes.

Protean definitely has that the same sort of pressure and power of -ates and contrary. Whenever i send my Chans or Audino into Mm2y i'm always extremely nervous because if that protean set happens to beat my walls i just lose everytime. Is it just bad teambuilding? No, because the only reliable offensive revenge kill method for Protean is a faster Protean. So i have to have brought the one of 2ish mons that counter any given Protean set or use Protean myself to not just lose. Thats pressure. As for raw power, -ate boomburst is one of most powerful hits in BH, outside of just V-create in Sun iirc. Protean V-create and Boomburst are just below -ate Boomburst. Also the standard ones are good enough to act as wincons against most teams. Even if your opponent has a counter or check its likely they only have just one.

Quantum Tesseract · May 4, 2016

Kingslayer2779 said:
Protean definitely has that the same sort of pressure and power of -ates and contrary. Whenever i send my Chans or Audino into Mm2y i'm always extremely nervous because if that protean set happens to beat my walls i just lose everytime. Is it just bad teambuilding? No, because the only reliable offensive revenge kill method for Protean is a faster Protean. So i have to have brought the one of 2ish mons that counter any given Protean set or use Protean myself to not just lose. Thats pressure. As for raw power, -ate boomburst is one of most powerful hits in BH, outside of just V-create in Sun iirc. Protean V-create and Boomburst are just below -ate Boomburst. Also the standard ones are good enough to act as wincons against most teams. Even if your opponent has a counter or check its likely they only have just one.

I can see the wall argument, but I'd really like to challenge the "faster protean as the only rk option". Some examples of other common offensive mons that beat protean- PDon, contrary Mega Sceptile, prankster MRay (don't laugh, it's really good), Weather teams, Mega Latias... The list is actually pretty long.
On stall, things like max def/hp fur coat chains wall MMy regardless of the coverage-
252 SpA Protean Mega Mewtwo Y Secret Sword vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Eviolite Fur Coat Chansey: 252-296 (35.7 - 42%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after magma storm damage
Similarly, Maudino walls every set that lacks Sludge Wave, Shedinja is stupidly obnoxious for it, and from what I've seen every individual set has at least 1 other counter on every good bh team. Protean is versatile, yes, but while the boost is 50% that boost is only apply able to coverage. It fundamentally isn't like and never will be like ate in wall breaking, as ate deals solidly more damage in a better attacking type (compared to say, protean boomburst) while also giving gr-ate priority. Yes it does make things like MMY extremely splashable despite their bad typing, but is that really a bad thing?
Also, and this isn't directed at you because I've seen your teams and while they underprepared for protean they over prepare for everything else, but protean is a viable enough start that you should run two counters on every team (or at least a counter and a solid soft check), simply because your opponent can run 2 proteans viably.

morogrim · May 4, 2016

Quantum Tesseract said:
I can see the wall argument, but I'd really like to challenge the "faster protean as the only rk option". Some examples of other common offensive mons that beat protean- PDon, contrary Mega Sceptile, prankster MRay (don't laugh, it's really good), Weather teams, Mega Latias... The list is actually pretty long.
On stall, things like max def/hp fur coat chains wall MMy regardless of the coverage-
252 SpA Protean Mega Mewtwo Y Secret Sword vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Eviolite Fur Coat Chansey: 252-296 (35.7 - 42%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after magma storm damage
Similarly, Maudino walls every set that lacks Sludge Wave, Shedinja is stupidly obnoxious for it, and from what I've seen every individual set has at least 1 other counter on every good bh team. Protean is versatile, yes, but while the boost is 50% that boost is only apply able to coverage. It fundamentally isn't like and never will be like ate in wall breaking, as ate deals solidly more damage in a better attacking type (compared to say, protean boomburst) while also giving gr-ate priority. Yes it does make things like MMY extremely splashable despite their bad typing, but is that really a bad thing?
Also, and this isn't directed at you because I've seen your teams and while they underprepared for protean they over prepare for everything else, but protean is a viable enough start that you should run two counters on every team (or at least a counter and a solid soft check), simply because your opponent can run 2 proteans viably.

Any protean user with ground coverage can pretty much ohko or at worst 2hko pdon, even spooky plate judgment from mmy does around 80%ish iirc. Contrary mega sceptile wins only if it has the proper type to hit the protean user super effectively. Mega latios gets ohkod by spooky plate judgment from mmy (not sure about latias though). Prankster MRay does however beat protean users (and yes, it's pgood I use it sometimes myself), and the uncommon weather teams can also beat protean users unless if they use a contact move and get ks'd.

Mega audino does not wall protean boomburst (it could even get 2hko'd by earth plate judgment with a bit of prior chip damage), and shedinja does not wall a protean magma storm set (which is pretty common btw). Furcoat chansey does however wall a good majority of the protean users minus secret sword mega latios which 2hkos even the mighty furcoat chansey. My point here is that protean users can easily have methods to deal with these "counters" since they all have at least 1 extra move slot. The point is that protean and -ate do indeed create similar pressures for their opposition which definitely shows that they are the two most powerful offensive threats in the meta currently. I honestly am looking forward to the no protean week to see how the bh tier would change as a result; I can't really say much about it until then.

E4 Flint · May 4, 2016

Hello
Show proof of your eligibility to vote by posting here
http://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/balanced-hackmons-voter-identification-protean.3571600/
Hope the process of getting reqs is going smoothly!

Kingslayer2779 · May 5, 2016

Quantum Tesseract said:
I can see the wall argument, but I'd really like to challenge the "faster protean as the only rk option". Some examples of other common offensive mons that beat protean- PDon, contrary Mega Sceptile, prankster MRay (don't laugh, it's really good), Weather teams, Mega Latias... The list is actually pretty long.
On stall, things like max def/hp fur coat chains wall MMy regardless of the coverage-
252 SpA Protean Mega Mewtwo Y Secret Sword vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Eviolite Fur Coat Chansey: 252-296 (35.7 - 42%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after magma storm damage
Similarly, Maudino walls every set that lacks Sludge Wave, Shedinja is stupidly obnoxious for it, and from what I've seen every individual set has at least 1 other counter on every good bh team. Protean is versatile, yes, but while the boost is 50% that boost is only apply able to coverage. It fundamentally isn't like and never will be like ate in wall breaking, as ate deals solidly more damage in a better attacking type (compared to say, protean boomburst) while also giving gr-ate priority. Yes it does make things like MMY extremely splashable despite their bad typing, but is that really a bad thing?
Also, and this isn't directed at you because I've seen your teams and while they underprepared for protean they over prepare for everything else, but protean is a viable enough start that you should run two counters on every team (or at least a counter and a solid soft check), simply because your opponent can run 2 proteans viably.

morogrim said:
Any protean user with ground coverage can pretty much ohko or at worst 2hko pdon, even spooky plate judgment from mmy does around 80%ish iirc. Contrary mega sceptile wins only if it has the proper type to hit the protean user super effectively. Mega latios gets ohkod by spooky plate judgment from mmy (not sure about latias though). Prankster MRay does however beat protean users (and yes, it's pgood I use it sometimes myself), and the uncommon weather teams can also beat protean users unless if they use a contact move and get ks'd.

Mega audino does not wall protean boomburst (it could even get 2hko'd by earth plate judgment with a bit of prior chip damage), and shedinja does not wall a protean magma storm set (which is pretty common btw). Furcoat chansey does however wall a good majority of the protean users minus secret sword mega latios which 2hkos even the mighty furcoat chansey. My point here is that protean users can easily have methods to deal with these "counters" since they all have at least 1 extra move slot. The point is that protean and -ate do indeed create similar pressures for their opposition which definitely shows that they are the two most powerful offensive threats in the meta currently. I honestly am looking forward to the no protean week to see how the bh tier would change as a result; I can't really say much about it until then.

Yeah Morogrim basically nailed it, almost everything you listed is dependant on 2 things: 1. The typing the Protean mon currently is. 2. The coverage it possesses. Weather is build around or bust. Its not something you add on a team to patch up a weakness. Mega Latias doesn't have a build that does doesn't depend on SE damage to OHKO and tank a Moonblast. PDon gets bopped by every MM2y set ever. I'm not even sure what Prank Mega Ray would run but i'll bet its sleep dependent, so Dark Void or bust. As for Fur Coat Chans walling all Mega Mewtwo Y sets, 42% is pretty shaky with even just rocks. The main problem is that most Secret Sword sets also have Judgement and Quiver Dance. It can boost the turn you switch in, then 2hko with Secret Sword. You could try to answer with Metal Burst or Whirlwind, but you could take signifcant damage trying to phase them out or let them set up and kill you. Topsy Turvy is a passable answer if we ignore the fact that Chansey wants to counter sub mons like GW Mega Ray at the same time as Protean Mega Mewtwo. The problem with topsy-turvy is you still have to take a +1 Secret Sword and you can die to the follow up -1 secret sword if you switched into Stealth Rock. I've found Chansey to be pretty unsustainable as a long term Mega Mewtwo Y counter by itself. It just can't repeatedly stop +1 Secret Swords.

Anna says hi · May 5, 2016

Kinda nitpicking about this, but you will make reqs eventually with a GXE of more than 69.25% - even if it will take upwards of 1000 battles and be generally impossible to battle that much in the span of a week.
Fun fact completely unrelated to this: 75.23669861628659 is the magic number for this suspect (How many games it takes you to make reqs perfectly with games and GXE being the same).

So this isn't completely irrelevant, I'm going to throw my two cents in here and say that so far, I don't think Protean is banworthy in BH at the moment. This may change later on, though.

motherlove · May 5, 2016

Quantum Tesseract said:
it takes a lot of work to make an actually good protean set that isn't the standard one

This is something that I completely disagree with. Protean is one of the easiest things to use in bh, it's just running four powerful moves on a pokemon. Especially since you can run plate + judgement.

One thing that I think protean excels at is lure sets. Not saying it's the only way to run lure sets but it's by far the most effective since it essentially turns a pokemon into a completely different one. Some of my most effective teams have been built in 10 seconds with just a good protean lure. Just take a pokemon, think of a/multiple counters and then run a protean lure that beats them all.

Protean + -ate is probabely the most common one because of how stupidly effective it is.
Take a common -ate set:

Diancie-Mega @ Safety Goggles
Ability: Pixilate
EVs: 4 Atk / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Rash Nature
- Extreme Speed
- Boomburst
- Spore
- Magma Storm

What counters that? Ho-Oh, FF steels, FF Venusaur, maybe even soundproof slowbro. You can hit all of them with Precipice Blades + Bolt Strike.
Now you need something to lure it in, let's see... Just run the same darn pokemon again why don't you.

Diancie-Mega @ Life Orb
Ability: Protean
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Bolt Strike
- Precipice Blades
- King's Shield / Spiky Shield
- Extreme Speed

And here you have a core that can beat every relevant diancie counter in the entire metagame. It's even easier with Rayquaza considering ALL of it's relevant counters are straight up OHKOed by Precipice Blades and can easily be mistaken for -ate + gw at team preview.

Rayquaza-Mega @ Sky Plate
Ability: Aerilate
EVs: 4 Atk / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Rash Nature
- Boomburst
- Extreme Speed
- Tail Glow
- Techno Blast

Rayquaza-Mega @ Poke Ball
Ability: Protean
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Precipice Blades
- Infestation
- Extreme Speed
- King's Shield / Spiky Shield

Now that's just with -ate + protean but you can have a good protean lure for just about anything you want to build your team around.
For example if you want to build around:

Mewtwo-Mega-Y @ Leftovers
Ability: Contrary
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Psycho Boost
- Leaf Storm
- Earth Power
- Substitute

And you want to lure out yveltal, you can run:

Gengar-Mega @ Choice Specs
Ability: Protean
EVs: 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Moonblast
- Boomburst

If you want to build around:

Mewtwo-Mega-X @ Safety Goggles
Ability: Prankster
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Close Combat
- Knock Off
- Spore
- Substitute

And you want to lure out Giratina, Ho-Oh or Slowbro, you can run:

Mewtwo-Mega-X @ Life Orb
Ability: Protean
EVs: 4 Atk / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Naive Nature
- Boomburst
- Blizzard
- Bolt Strike
- King's Shield / Spiky Shield

I think you're getting the idea.

But the thing is, despite theses being lure sets they are still extremely good on their own as kingSlayer said since they can run coverage while still being able to break fat neutrals, and despite theses being stallbreaking sets, they are still extremely good against offence.

Quantum Tesseract · May 5, 2016

morogrim said:
Any protean user with ground coverage can pretty much ohko or at worst 2hko pdon, even spooky plate judgment from mmy does around 80%ish iirc. Contrary mega sceptile wins only if it has the proper type to hit the protean user super effectively. Mega latios gets ohkod by spooky plate judgment from mmy (not sure about latias though). Prankster MRay does however beat protean users (and yes, it's pgood I use it sometimes myself), and the uncommon weather teams can also beat protean users unless if they use a contact move and get ks'd.

Mega audino does not wall protean boomburst (it could even get 2hko'd by earth plate judgment with a bit of prior chip damage), and shedinja does not wall a protean magma storm set (which is pretty common btw). Furcoat chansey does however wall a good majority of the protean users minus secret sword mega latios which 2hkos even the mighty furcoat chansey. My point here is that protean users can easily have methods to deal with these "counters" since they all have at least 1 extra move slot. The point is that protean and -ate do indeed create similar pressures for their opposition which definitely shows that they are the two most powerful offensive threats in the meta currently. I honestly am looking forward to the no protean week to see how the bh tier would change as a result; I can't really say much about it until then.

2hkoing pdon doesn't matter when it Ohko's you/sets up a shift gear and then ohkos you.
You are right on Mega Sceptile- I should have said it revenges all the common protean types, which is a different story entirely.
On Shedinja, however, it just volt switches out and gets free damage. Like it or not, it comes in on any protean move bar magma storm and gets free chip and a switchin of your choice, like your RKer. If you don't carry that (and most MMY's don't), it walls you entirely.
Just as a note, Mega Latias does live a protean judgement (That's why I picked it) and can easily QD/OHKO.

Kingslayer2779 said:
Yeah Morogrim basically nailed it, almost everything you listed is dependant on 2 things: 1. The typing the Protean mon currently is. 2. The coverage it possesses. Weather is build around or bust. Its not something you add on a team to patch up a weakness. Mega Latias doesn't have a build that does doesn't depend on SE damage to OHKO and tank a Moonblast. PDon gets bopped by every MM2y set ever. I'm not even sure what Prank Mega Ray would run but i'll bet its sleep dependent, so Dark Void or bust. As for Fur Coat Chans walling all Mega Mewtwo Y sets, 42% is pretty shaky with even just rocks. The main problem is that most Secret Sword sets also have Judgement and Quiver Dance. It can boost the turn you switch in, then 2hko with Secret Sword. You could try to answer with Metal Burst or Whirlwind, but you could take signifcant damage trying to phase them out or let them set up and kill you. Topsy Turvy is a passable answer if we ignore the fact that Chansey wants to counter sub mons like GW Mega Ray at the same time as Protean Mega Mewtwo. The problem with topsy-turvy is you still have to take a +1 Secret Sword and you can die to the follow up -1 secret sword if you switched into Stealth Rock. I've found Chansey to be pretty unsustainable as a long term Mega Mewtwo Y counter by itself. It just can't repeatedly stop +1 Secret Swords.

I get that Mega Sceptile is reliant on that, but how so for the other mons?
PDon easily lives all standard attacks (Boomburst/EP can break it, but those are uncommon/niche. I guess earth plate also can, but then you lose a lot of what makes MMY good). It can be KO'd by spooky plate judgment, but its less than the chance of a crit.
Prankster MRay runs spore or DV, and MMY needs 5 1 turn sleeps in a row to win.
for chansey, however, I'm going to do even more explaining.

Turn 1. You switch in, and since you are a) chansey and b) a normal type, the best move it has is secret sword. Of course, those aren't its only options- it can Magma Storm, QUiver Dance, or Secret Sword.

Scenario 1- Magma StormAFter they hit you, they can't spam secret sword. 252 SpA Protean Mega Mewtwo Y Secret Sword vs. 248 HP / 252+ Def Eviolite Fur Coat Chansey: 252-296 (35.8 - 42.1%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after magma storm damage. This means they need to boost (meaning they forewent king's shield or judgment), or they need to switch out.

Scenario 2- Chansey comes in, they Quiver Dance. At +1, they can't ohko. At 2, even, they still cant. This means they can boost again or attack, while you can Recover, Metal Burst, or Whirlwind. If they Secret Sword, any move lets you potentially win. Whirlwind forces them to take another round of SR and hope their next mon out can stop you from recovering, metal burst flat out KO's, and recover lets you repeat this cycle- you have 13% less hp than you started, tops- while convincing them you don't have the other two. This repeats until they make a mistake or finally wear you down.
They can also Quiver Dance. If you whirlwind, you just easily won, if you recovered you prevent them from KOing you even with chip- the only choice that can screw you over is metal burst if you've already switched into SR 2 or 3 times. They need to outpredict you at least twice, while you only need to be smart once.

Scenario 3- Chansey comes in, they secret sword. You can either recover wall them or KO them with metal burst, and if they boost you transition into scenario 2.

motherlove said:
This is something that I completely disagree with. Protean is one of the easiest things to use in bh, it's just running four powerful moves on a pokemon. Especially since you can run plate + judgement.

One thing that I think protean excels at is lure sets. Not saying it's the only way to run lure sets but it's by far the most effective since it essentially turns a pokemon into a completely different one. Some of my most effective teams have been built in 10 seconds with just a good protean lure. Just take a pokemon, think of a/multiple counters and then run a protean lure that beats them all.

Protean + -ate is probabely the most common one because of how stupidly effective it is.
Take a common -ate set:

Diancie-Mega @ Safety Goggles
Ability: Pixilate
EVs: 4 Atk / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Rash Nature
- Extreme Speed
- Boomburst
- Spore
- Magma Storm

What counters that? Ho-Oh, FF steels, FF Venusaur, maybe even soundproof slowbro. You can hit all of them with Precipice Blades + Bolt Strike.
Now you need something to lure it in, let's see... Just run the same darn pokemon again why don't you.

Diancie-Mega @ Life Orb
Ability: Protean
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Bolt Strike
- Precipice Blades
- King's Shield / Spiky Shield
- Extreme Speed

And here you have a core that can beat every relevant diancie counter in the entire metagame. It's even easier with Rayquaza considering ALL of it's relevant counters are straight up OHKOed by Precipice Blades and can easily be mistaken for -ate + gw at team preview.

Rayquaza-Mega @ Sky Plate
Ability: Aerilate
EVs: 4 Atk / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Rash Nature
- Boomburst
- Extreme Speed
- Tail Glow
- Techno Blast

Rayquaza-Mega @ Poke Ball
Ability: Protean
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Precipice Blades
- Infestation
- Extreme Speed
- King's Shield / Spiky Shield

Now that's just with -ate + protean but you can have a good protean lure for just about anything you want to build your team around.
For example if you want to build around:

Mewtwo-Mega-Y @ Leftovers
Ability: Contrary
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Psycho Boost
- Leaf Storm
- Earth Power
- Substitute

And you want to lure out yveltal, you can run:

Gengar-Mega @ Choice Specs
Ability: Protean
EVs: 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Moonblast
- Boomburst

If you want to build around:

Mewtwo-Mega-X @ Safety Goggles
Ability: Prankster
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Close Combat
- Knock Off
- Spore
- Substitute

And you want to lure out Giratina, Ho-Oh or Slowbro, you can run:

Mewtwo-Mega-X @ Life Orb
Ability: Protean
EVs: 4 Atk / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Naive Nature
- Boomburst
- Blizzard
- Bolt Strike
- King's Shield / Spiky Shield

I think you're getting the idea.

But the thing is, despite theses being lure sets they are still extremely good on their own as kingSlayer said since they can run coverage while still being able to break fat neutrals, and despite theses being stallbreaking sets, they are still extremely good against offence.

This is going to come off as rude, but what? Running 4 random protean moves is a recipe for a terrible set- I've gone through well over 40, and I can assure you that there is a world of difference between a well constructed set and a random set. You might get lucky with your picks, but that's a bad thing to rely on.
Secondly, Being a good lure a) nowhere near confined to protean and b) usually done better elsewhere. Diancie, for instance, has a far better lure set in magic guard, which reks things like Registeel, Aegislash, and Slowbro while still being objectively good. MRay has similar sets, like GW, PRankster, and Contrary. MMY could just run moonblast itself, or Overheat (unless its specifically to beat FF steels? Idk what the aim of that set is, so I guess I cant help that much). MMX doesn't need lures for any of those bar MB Giratina, which protean MMX doeesn't do so well against anyway...

DOn't get me wrong, protean is amazing, but the only mons its really ever the best choice on are MMY/X, Deoxys-A, and the Lati twins.

MAMP · May 5, 2016

Quantum Tesseract said:
2hkoing pdon doesn't matter when it Ohko's you/sets up a shift gear and then ohkos you.
You are right on Mega Sceptile- I should have said it revenges all the common protean types, which is a different story entirely.
On Shedinja, however, it just volt switches out and gets free damage. Like it or not, it comes in on any protean move bar magma storm and gets free chip and a switchin of your choice, like your RKer. If you don't carry that (and most MMY's don't), it walls you entirely.
Just as a note, Mega Latias does live a protean judgement (That's why I picked it) and can easily QD/OHKO.

I get that Mega Sceptile is reliant on that, but how so for the other mons?
PDon easily lives all standard attacks (Boomburst/EP can break it, but those are uncommon/niche. I guess earth plate also can, but then you lose a lot of what makes MMY good). It can be KO'd by spooky plate judgment, but its less than the chance of a crit.
Prankster MRay runs spore or DV, and MMY needs 5 1 turn sleeps in a row to win.
for chansey, however, I'm going to do even more explaining.

Turn 1. You switch in, and since you are a) chansey and b) a normal type, the best move it has is secret sword. Of course, those aren't its only options- it can Magma Storm, QUiver Dance, or Secret Sword.

Scenario 1- Magma StormAFter they hit you, they can't spam secret sword. 252 SpA Protean Mega Mewtwo Y Secret Sword vs. 248 HP / 252+ Def Eviolite Fur Coat Chansey: 252-296 (35.8 - 42.1%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after magma storm damage. This means they need to boost (meaning they forewent king's shield or judgment), or they need to switch out.

Scenario 2- Chansey comes in, they Quiver Dance. At +1, they can't ohko. At 2, even, they still cant. This means they can boost again or attack, while you can Recover, Metal Burst, or Whirlwind. If they Secret Sword, any move lets you potentially win. Whirlwind forces them to take another round of SR and hope their next mon out can stop you from recovering, metal burst flat out KO's, and recover lets you repeat this cycle- you have 13% less hp than you started, tops- while convincing them you don't have the other two. This repeats until they make a mistake or finally wear you down.
They can also Quiver Dance. If you whirlwind, you just easily won, if you recovered you prevent them from KOing you even with chip- the only choice that can screw you over is metal burst if you've already switched into SR 2 or 3 times. They need to outpredict you at least twice, while you only need to be smart once.

Scenario 3- Chansey comes in, they secret sword. You can either recover wall them or KO them with metal burst, and if they boost you transition into scenario 2.

This is going to come off as rude, but what? Running 4 random protean moves is a recipe for a terrible set- I've gone through well over 40, and I can assure you that there is a world of difference between a well constructed set and a random set. You might get lucky with your picks, but that's a bad thing to rely on.
Secondly, Being a good lure a) nowhere near confined to protean and b) usually done better elsewhere. Diancie, for instance, has a far better lure set in magic guard, which reks things like Registeel, Aegislash, and Slowbro while still being objectively good. MRay has similar sets, like GW, PRankster, and Contrary. MMY could just run moonblast itself, or Overheat (unless its specifically to beat FF steels? Idk what the aim of that set is, so I guess I cant help that much). MMX doesn't need lures for any of those bar MB Giratina, which protean MMX doeesn't do so well against anyway...

DOn't get me wrong, protean is amazing, but the only mons its really ever the best choice on are MMY/X, Deoxys-A, and the Lati twins.

Alright, a few things: Neither PDon nor Mega Latias is an answer to Protean. PDon can't switch in, it can't check the vast majority of Protean sets with even just a bit of prior damage, and even then a lot of Protean sets can just cleanly OHKO it. Boomburst and Earth Power are neither uncommon nor niche:

| Boomburst 29.487% |
| Earth Power 8.292% |

And nor is Earth Plate Judgment for that matter, which imo is just as effective as Spooky Plate at the moment.

| Earth Plate 7.588% |

As for Mega Latias - sure, it does live Spooky Plate Judgment from full, but it only takes a little bit of prior damage for it to get KO'd:

252 SpA Spooky Plate Protean Mega Mewtwo Y Judgment vs. +1 0 HP / 0 SpD Mega Latias: 252-296 (83.7 - 98.3%) -- 75% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock

It literally only takes a single Registeel U-turn or SR hit for Mega Latias to drop to that. Thats not a reliable check by any stretch of the imagination. These Pokemon are so shaky as Protean checks that they really can't be used as arguments for why Protean is not broken - if I were building a team and I identified a Protean weakness, and I put one of these Pokemon on the team, I wouldn't consider that team any less weak to Protean.

As you explained in your post, Chansey is completely reliant on a) being at very high HP and b) winning some 50/50s in order to beat Protean. Considering Chansey's susceptibility to being worn down through status and hazards, this makes it a very shaky counter.

Also, there are heaps of Pokemon that can viably run Protean besides the ones you mentioned. Mega Ray is the most notable example, but basically anything with decent offensive stats can run protean effectively to lure in its usual counters, as motherlove mentioned in his post.

Quantum Tesseract · May 5, 2016

MAMP said:
Alright, a few things: Neither PDon nor Mega Latias is an answer to Protean. PDon can't switch in, it can't check the vast majority of Protean sets with even just a bit of prior damage, and even then a lot of Protean sets can just cleanly OHKO it. Boomburst and Earth Power are neither uncommon nor niche:

| Boomburst 29.487% |
| Earth Power 8.292% |

And nor is Earth Plate Judgment for that matter, which imo is just as effective as Spooky Plate at the moment.

| Earth Plate 7.588% |

As for Mega Latias - sure, it does live Spooky Plate Judgment from full, but it only takes a little bit of prior damage for it to get KO'd:

252 SpA Spooky Plate Protean Mega Mewtwo Y Judgment vs. +1 0 HP / 0 SpD Mega Latias: 252-296 (83.7 - 98.3%) -- 75% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock

It literally only takes a single Registeel U-turn or SR hit for Mega Latias to drop to that. Thats not a reliable check by any stretch of the imagination. These Pokemon are so shaky as Protean checks that they really can't be used as arguments for why Protean is not broken - if I were building a team and I identified a Protean weakness, and I put one of these Pokemon on the team, I wouldn't consider that team any less weak to Protean.

As you explained in your post, Chansey is completely reliant on a) being at very high HP and b) winning some 50/50s in order to beat Protean. Considering Chansey's susceptibility to being worn down through status and hazards, this makes it a very shaky counter.

Also, there are heaps of Pokemon that can viably run Protean besides the ones you mentioned. Mega Ray is the most notable example, but basically anything with decent offensive stats can run protean effectively to lure in its usual counters, as motherlove mentioned in his post.

Bleh, yes Pdon isn't an answer to protean. I even specifically said rker :/
Earth power is definitally niche. I'm genuinely not sure why its used- on a ghost judgement set its outclassed by not having a move to hit you, on almost any other set its outclassed by ground judgement, and on those few remainders Magma Storm is pretty much universally better.
I'm also kind of surprised at a 0/0 invested MLatias, but that's neither here nor there.
Yes, it isn't the most reliable, but its a supremely viable mon that wins 1v1 100% of the time, can switch in at full unless the opponent is much more skilled or supremely lucky, and stops any "sweeping" in its tracks.
The point is valid, though. I suppose I'm rather too invested in an offensive playstyle if these aren't considered viable answers.

Also can we please agree that ladder usage isn't anywhere near the end all metric? On ladder (1760) moonblast and boomburst are both used more than magma storm and secret sword, which is just dumb.

Laxpras · May 5, 2016

Quantum Tesseract said:
Bleh, yes Pdon isn't an answer to protean. I even specifically said rker :/
Earth power is definitally niche. I'm genuinely not sure why its used- on a ghost judgement set its outclassed by not having a move to hit you, on almost any other set its outclassed by ground judgement, and on those few remainders Magma Storm is pretty much universally better.
I'm also kind of surprised at a 0/0 invested MLatias, but that's neither here nor there.
Yes, it isn't the most reliable, but its a supremely viable mon that wins 1v1 100% of the time, can switch in at full unless the opponent is much more skilled or supremely lucky, and stops any "sweeping" in its tracks.
The point is valid, though. I suppose I'm rather too invested in an offensive playstyle if these aren't considered viable answers.

Also can we please agree that ladder usage isn't anywhere near the end all metric? On ladder (1760) moonblast and boomburst are both used more than magma storm and secret sword, which is just dumb.

I wouldn't say that's dumb at all. Moonblast and Boomburst usually go hand in hand, so that is just saying that set is more common than other sets, which shouldn't be a surprise.

Anyway to make this post longer and keep discussion going: I entirely agree with motherlove in that protean lets you run whatever lure you want. Combining that with KS's argument, I can make any mon a lure, regardless of stats and typing (Look at Motherlove's diancie). It really just makes it hard to play against, your counter gets countered in effect, and then you just lose. When I think about it like this, I have no doubt that Protean should be banned. But then, I think how Protean is probably the best offensive check to -Ate. If we ban protean, -Ate could just run even more wild, causing teams to play even more defensively than they would just due to the lack of a protean threat. So, how do people think a protean ban would affect the meta, specifically -Ate?

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