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Breaking Down the Walls Project [Read post #129]

@Knight of Cydonia
Well the fact that you yourself said it wasn't Tier 1 doesn't do it any favors, but if you really want I can fairly easily include it in the vote for the Tier 1 Stallbreakers next round. Make a proper nomination then, but for now people have already started voting so it's a little late.

Also everyone, feel free to discuss your votes below your list should you wish to, because the more information and reasoning we have the more informed voting everyone can make!

Salamence: Yes (HELL YES)
Infernape: No (You guys convinced me)
Dragonite: Yes (From experience)
Terrakion: Yes (He was my goddamn example)
Alakazam: No (Sp.Def Jirachi just pwns it.)
Tyranitar: Yes (Its movepool and the calcs people posted sinched it)
Haxorus: Abstain (I'm too back and forth on this one)
Latios: No (Just not reliable enough to break through its special walls)
Hydreigon: Yes (It works if people would try it)
Scizor: No (Yeah, being hard walled by like 6 Pokemon off the top of my head means no)
Lucario: Yes (Both NP and SD sets are near impossible to wall, revenge killing is the only option).
Heracross: Yes (Forget 2HKOs... OHKOing all of OU after rocks? Shit!)

Or you can use stupid brackets like I did as long as you bold your actual vote. I am a bad example XD.
 
Ok no problem I will do that, also I just worked out that thunder punch over leaf blade means only reuniclus can avoid the OHKO in OU ( and volcarona but it's not a wall).
EDIT -I won't put it in as a stall breaker, tier 2 wallbreaker is more like it.
 
Knight of Cydonia said:
Ok no problem I will do that, also I just worked out that thunder punch over leaf blade means only reuniclus can avoid the OHKO in OU ( and volcarona but it's not a wall).
EDIT -I won't put it in as a stall breaker, tier 2 wallbreaker is more like it.
Click to expand...

Only reuniclus? That puts it almost in the same league as Heracross... I didn't mean that I would have it voted in as a stallbreaker, I meant I'd have it voted in as tier 1 wallbreaker alongside the stallbreakers. The way this voting is being done there's no reason I can't do stragglers from this round in the next one too. Of course the fact it has to set up with it's rather subpar defense stat does hinder it from being tier 1. At least Heracross has decent bulk and some useful resistances.
 
ive havent used this because po isnt working but ive theorymoned



Tyranitar (M) @ leftovers
Trait: Sandstream
EVs: 252 HP / 52 Atk / 204 SAtk
Quiet Nature (+SAtk, -Spe)
- substitute
- focus punch
- ice beam
- Fire blast

beats blobs, heatrans, and specially defensive ferrothorns with subpunch, it beats gliscor with ice beam, and beats skarmory and physically defensive ferrothorns
with fire blast these are only a few examples i can think of and it gets hardwalled by jellicent/slowbro but other than those it does fairly good
 
Salamence: YES
Infernape: no
Dragonite: yes
Terrakion: yes
Alakazam: no (While I think it does well as a wallbreaker, a Spdef jirachi is a hard stop even if it can muscle through Bliss/Chans if running CM + 3 attacks)
Tyranitar: yes
Haxorus: yes
Latios: no
Hydreigon: Yes
Scizor: no
Lucario: Yes
Heracross: Yes
 
@Jimera0 I understand now, but I still won't put it in next round as it seems to be outclassed by Heracross. I originally posted quickly because I didn't have enough time to read the info as nominations had just closed and I thought that the vote would determine who would then be voted on for tier 2. Also when I did those damage calcs with thunder punch I had Honko's damage calc on strict ou so stuff like slowbro and mew was skipped which it can't OHKO. It does have good Spd, but the resistances are on the wrong side of the spectrum - rock and fighting resist with 115 def would have been excellent against Terrakion.
Anyway may aswell vote
Salamence: Yes
Infernape: No
Dragonite: Yes
Terrakion: Yes
Alakazam: No
Tyranitar: Yes
Haxorus: No
Latios: No
Hydreigon: Yes
Scizor: No
Lucario: Yes
Heracross: Yes
What, no Lucario? I ran the calcs and even with Crunch, Ice Punch and Close Combat, and with stealth rock the chance of Slowbro, Hippowdon and Tangrowth surviving the +2 attacks is too high from full health (damage taken is a maximum of 89.3%). Tentacruel always avoids the OHKO with stealth rock, Gyarados also (with intimidate).
Haxorus is beastly, but Skarmory, Forretress and Ferrothorn are some of the most common walls and can take an outrage, generally I think there are too many steels in OU for Haxorus to flourish.
EDIT- found out that Lucario does work.
 
Knight of Cydonia said:
@Jimera0 I understand now, but I still won't put it in next round as it seems to be outclassed by Heracross. I originally posted quickly because I didn't have enough time to read the info as nominations had just closed and I thought that the vote would determine who would then be voted on for tier 2. Also when I did those damage calcs with thunder punch I had Honko's damage calc on strict ou so stuff like slowbro and mew was skipped which it can't OHKO. It does have good Spd, but the resistances are on the wrong side of the spectrum - rock and fighting resist with 115 def would have been excellent against Terrakion.
Anyway may aswell vote
Salamence: Yes
Infernape: No
Dragonite: Yes
Terrakion: Yes
Alakazam: No
Tyranitar: Yes
Haxorus: No
Latios: No
Hydreigon: Yes
Scizor: No
Lucario: No
Heracross: Yes
What, no Lucario? I ran the calcs and even with Crunch, Ice Punch and Close Combat, and with stealth rock the chance of Slowbro, Hippowdon and Tangrowth surviving the +2 attacks is too high from full health (damage taken is a maximum of 89.3%). Tentacruel always avoids the OHKO with stealth rock, Gyarados also (with intimidate).
Haxorus is beastly, but Skarmory, Forretress and Ferrothorn are some of the most common walls and can take an outrage, generally I think there are too many steels in OU for Haxorus to flourish.
Click to expand...

Errrr and then it promptly outspeeds and finishes each of them off. He's not so frail they're guaranteed to KO them or anything, with the exception of Hippowdon, who is just as screwed if it's switched in or has even a little prior damage. It doesn't need to be a OHKO to count you know.
 
Salamence: yes
Infernape: no
Dragonite: no
Terrakion: abstain
Alakazam: no
Tyranitar: yes
Haxorus: no
Latios: no
Hydreigon: yes
Scizor: no
Lucario: yes
Heracross: no
 
Sorry, I meant as in switching in as it SDs or after a KO, obviously they can't take two hits. After a CC it will be pretty weak but I overestimated the damage they would do back to Lucario ( ran some more calcs XD). Point taken.
 
Salamence - Yes
Infernape - No
Dragonite - Yes
Terrakion - Yes
Alakazam - Abstain
Tyranitar - No
Haxorus - Yes
Latios - Yes
Hydreigon - No
Scizor - No
Lucario - Yes
Heracross - Yes
 
This is a cool topic. Wish I would have seen it earlier!

Salamence: Yeah. Not much to say on that. Yes
Infernape: Nope. I can think of like seven or eight Pokemon in the top fifteen or so that wall the shit out of it, and there are often multiple ape counters on one team. I really don't see what other people see in it tbh. :( No
Dragonite: Depends on the set, but I'm leaning towards no in general. I have the most experience with a CB set, and while it's incredibly powerful, there are several Pokemon that can handle it well. DD might be a little different and a special set may catch physical counters off-guard, but unless you're using some crazy mixed set I'm not sure how DNite is breaking down walls. Did I miss something, though? No
Terrakion: "hi i 2HKO every physical wall in the game with two moves" except fuck you slowbro Yes
Alakazam: Never used. Doubting it, though. No
Tyranitar: Nah. No
Haxorus: Not sure why there's controversy on this. Also not sure why anyone would ever use Taunt. Skarm's gonna Whirlwind you away? Fuck that, Outrage on that bitch. It takes like 44%? Okay. They'll either Whirlwind you out, or they'll use Brave Bird which does roughly 42% to you - but they take recoil as well, so you KO after your next Outrage. Basically, if you aren't a dumbass, every situation where SD Haxorus is out against Skarm should always come out in the advantage of the Haxorus user. They could sit there and Roost until your Outrage runs out, but then you just get a free switch out and you've wasted a ton of their recovery PP (which is really advantageous if you're facing a really well-built stall team, or a very good player) and you essentially get a free switch into your next sweeper as they use Roost again. Double Dance w/ Lum is by far the best set imo, and if you manage to set up a Swords Dance, something on their team should be hurting afterwards. Yes
Latios: No. Trick, maybe, otherwise no. No
Hydreigon: Mixed LO perhaps, otherwise no. No
Scizor: Fuck no. No
Lucario: Sure. My issue with Lucario is that you really only get two coverage moves to break walls apart, unless you want him to be generally useless against offensive teams. Yes
Heracross: Never seen, but I guess I can understand it. Yes

edit: I didn't bold the votes so people would actually read my post and I thought I made my opinion relevant on all of them, so yeah. Whatever, though~
 
Because heracross is still very slow, it doesnt matter if hydregion is 1ko'd by megahorn, when it outspeeds and kills heracross with fire blast
 
The QWAZ said:
Because heracross is still very slow, it doesnt matter if hydregion is 1ko'd by megahorn, when it outspeeds and kills heracross with fire blast
Click to expand...

From the OP: "Wallbreakers are Pokemon that focus on beating defensive Pokemon by muscling right through them."

Generally, since most defensive Pokemon (walls) are fairly slow, Speed does not matter. Think more along the lines of Gliscor, Skarmory, etc., rather than Hydreigon.
 
I agree with zebraiken the heracross set doesn't have much general utility as the scarf set to be honest that thing is gonna die in no time but it breaks walls allowing your main sweeper to well sweep
 
Ah, well heracross is still slower than gliscor who can proceed to destroy it with acrobatics or a combination of protect, posion heal and sub and leave heracross nearly dead from the poision or burn damage
 
The QWAZ said:
Ah, well heracross is still slower than gliscor who can proceed to destroy it with acrobatics or a combination of protect, posion heal and sub and leave heracross nearly dead from the poision or burn damage
Click to expand...

Defensive Gliscor don't run enough Speed to outrun Heracross afaik (unless it doesn't want to be able to beat Terrakion lol). It could sort of Protect stall, yes, but it was proven to be OHKOed by a +2 Facade so it couldn't do that for very long.
 
Zebraiken said:
This is a cool topic. Wish I would have seen it earlier!

Salamence: Yeah. Not much to say on that.
Infernape: Nope. I can think of like seven or eight Pokemon in the top fifteen or so that wall the shit out of it, and there are often multiple ape counters on one team. I really don't see what other people see in it tbh. :(
Dragonite: Depends on the set, but I'm leaning towards no in general. I have the most experience with a CB set, and while it's incredibly powerful, there are several Pokemon that can handle it well. DD might be a little different and a special set may catch physical counters off-guard, but unless you're using some crazy mixed set I'm not sure how DNite is breaking down walls. Did I miss something, though?
Terrakion: "hi i 2HKO every physical wall in the game with two moves" except fuck you slowbro
Alakazam: Never used. Doubting it, though.
Tyranitar: Nah.
Haxorus: Not sure why there's controversy on this. Also not sure why anyone would ever use Taunt. Skarm's gonna Whirlwind you away? Fuck that, Outrage on that bitch. It takes like 44%? Okay. They'll either Whirlwind you out, or they'll use Brave Bird which does roughly 42% to you - but they take recoil as well, so you KO after your next Outrage. Basically, if you aren't a dumbass, every situation where SD Haxorus is out against Skarm should always come out in the advantage of the Haxorus user. They could sit there and Roost until your Outrage runs out, but then you just get a free switch out and you've wasted a ton of their recovery PP (which is really advantageous if you're facing a really well-built stall team, or a very good player) and you essentially get a free switch into your next sweeper as they use Roost again. Double Dance w/ Lum is by far the best set imo, and if you manage to set up a Swords Dance, something on their team should be hurting afterwards.
Latios: No. Trick, maybe, otherwise no.
Hydreigon: Mixed LO perhaps, otherwise no.
Scizor: Fuck no.
Lucario: Sure. My issue with Lucario is that you really only get two coverage moves to break walls apart, unless you want him to be generally useless against offensive teams.
Heracross: Never seen, but I guess I can understand it.
Click to expand...

Alright I like the reasoning but I need solid "Yes, No, and Abstain" answers for you otherwise I'll never be able to decipher what you're voting.

Speaking of which, I think I'll wrap that up in 24 hours, so if you haven't voted yet get it done!

OH and for Dnite, you're missing it's mixed sets. In particular, the one I have going through QA testing in the C&C Forum is basically Salamence with the element of suprise and a little bit more bulk. It has no trouble 2HKOing anything in the game, and that's with enough speed to outrun defensive Gliscor. Hydreigon can do the same with its own mixed set (though I haven't actually TESTED that one, but all the calcs look good). Just so you have all the information when you write up what you're actually voting :P
 
Salamence: Yes
Infernape: No
Dragonite: Yes
Terrakion: Yes
Alakazam: Abstain
Tyranitar: Yes
Haxorus: Yes
Latios: Yes
Hydreigon: No
Scizor: No
Lucario: Yes
Heracross: Yes
 
Salamence Yes
Infernape No
Dragonite no
Terrakion Yes
Alakazam No
Tyranitar Yes
Haxorus Yes
Latios No
Hydreigon Yes
Scizor No
Lucario Yes
Heracross Yes

Most of them should be obvious, Infernape is to easily walled. Dragonite has 4MSS and can't break them with one moveset. Latios has to many good switch ins. and Scizor is lulz
 
Salamence - Yes
Infernape - No
Dragonite - Yes
Terrakion - Yes
Alakazam - No
Tyranitar - Yes
Haxorus - No Been back and forth though
Latios - No
Hydreigon - Yes
Scizor - No
Lucario - Yes
Heracross - Yes (wow those calcs are nuts)
 
Salamence - Yes
Infernape - No
Dragonite - No
Terrakion - Yes
Alakazam - No
Tyranitar - No
Haxorus - No
Latios - Yes
Hydreigon - No
Scizor - No
Lucario - No
Heracross - Yes

WHY IS THERE NO OU SWORDS DANCE ANALYSIS FOR HERACROSS
 
Alright, voting closed, tallying results now. I'll edit this post when I'm done.

EDIT:
Results are in! Those that are in red have been voted into Tier 1! Here we go everyone! In order to be classified as a Tier 1 Wallbreaker, a Pokemon have 2/3s of voters in favor of it joining (not counting those who chose to abstain). Seeing as there were 14 voters, the cut off line for those without anyone abstaining is 10 yeses.

Salamence: 14/14
Infernape: 0/14
Dragonite: 10/14
Terrakion: 13/13 (1 Abstention)
Alakazam: 1/12 (2 Abstained)
Tyranitar: 11/14
Haxorus: 9/13 (1 Abstention... me)
Latios: 6/14
Hydreigon: 9/14
Scizor: 1/14
Lucario: 13/14
Heracross: 13/14

Alright, there you have it! I'll be updating the main post and opening up nomination for Tier 1 Stallbreakers within the next 48 hours (I'm really tired right now and not feeling up for a lot of editing atm). Until then, feel free to discuss the results! Note, I'll probably be allowing those within one vote (meaning Hydreigon, Haxorus and Dragonite) to be voted on again, as our voter pool is small enough that a margin of error that small deserves a second look. We'll vote on those alongside the Tier 1 Stallbreakers when the time comes. I hope that in the meantime that people who voted both ways will give their opinions so that we can get a better result.

Now, as for my own opinions:
I'm not really surprised at all Salamence was the only unanimous inductee, seeing as he's been the posterboy for wallbreaking since generation IV at least (I dunno anything about gen III).

Dragonite surprised me with the narrow margin though, seeing as it's been used in a wallbreaking role for just as long. Just because you don't see the wallbreaking sets as often these days doesn't mean he's incapable of breaking through all the walls (ALL OF THEM)! Seriously, check out the Dragonite I have on the OU C&C forums and tell me that it's not tier one. I've used it and know from EXPERIENCE that nothing can wall it.

Terrakion was almost as unanimous as Salamence, with one abstention. This is hardly a surprise either, at least to anyone who actually plays OU.

Tyranitar was more of a surprise for me, but once I was shown what it could do it made sense. It has spectacular coverage and the power to back it up; the only reason it's not used in this role more often is that people like to use it to fill other roles they need more I guess. It certainly has the oomph, baneded or running a mixed set. I'm just surprised more people knew that than knew of Dragonite's power...

Haxorus was probably the most indecisive vote of them all, with my abstention being the only thing allowing it to make the cut. It has the power, there's no doubting that. The question is, can it manage it against multiple Pokemon? After mulling over it I think the answer is yes, as it usually WILL roll through multiple walls unless it's revenge killed, and we're not considering revenge killing here.

Lucario and Heracross also somewhat surprised me, simply by their appearence in the first place. Honestly I hadn't even thought of either at the start, but the arguments made in their favor really impressed me (and almost everyone else it seeems). Seriously, who knew Heracross could OHKO all of OU with rocks?

Now for the losers. Infernape has its head hung low with exactly 0 yes votes. But really, after looking at the facts it was kind of hard to deny he didn't have what it takes this generation. Last generation, sure. Not so much now, with Jellicent, Latias and others running around. But hey, he's still up for Tier 2 which I think he'll find much more welcoming.

Alakazam was almost as unloved, as I think pretty much everyone realized the poor thing didn't have what it took to get through Blissey, Chansey and Jirachi reliably (ESPECIALLY Jirachi).

Latios was almost 50/50, but I think overall we decided it needed too much support to be tier 1. It was a tough call though, as Latios definitely does put walls in trouble.

Hydreigon got oh so close to Tier 1 glory, but fell just short. I personally think this due to the lack of discussion about him; most people either weren't aware of his mixed set or just assumed it could break through Blissey and Chansey. I think some calculations are in order to show whether or not Hydreigon actually has what it takes.

And finally Scizor was almost seen as a joke. I'm still not sure how he got one vote, seeing as he can't reliably break through Skarmory, defensive Dragonite, Tangrowth, Slowbro, Vaporeon... I could go on. Scizor is a great Pokemon, don't get me wrong. We all know that. He just isn't a wallbreaker.
 
WELP I'm double posting here because it's time to get this show on the road!

Alright everyone, here's what we're doing next. Last round a little issue came up with the definition of a Tier 1 Wallbreaker... mid way through voting. To prevent this from happening again, I'm suggesting that we go over the current definition first and decide if we need to change it. This is the current definition:

Tier 1 Stallbreaker: A Pokemon that can reliably win the war of attrition against stall teams and Pokemon. They must be able to do so throughout the match, and be able to win against most, if not all walls with their various movesets. They must have at least one moveset that beats the majority of walls.

So, do you think this definition fits your idea of what a top tier stallbreaker is? If not, write what you think it should mean and any changes you think we should make. We're going to decide this before we move on. And we won't be moving on until I've heard at least a few people's opinion on it. If you agree with the current definition, say that you do! Or I won't know whether anyone's actually looked at it or not >.>

Also, I'd like to see some discussion on Haxorus, Dragonite and Hydreigon's Tier 1 status. These three all came within one vote of either making it (Hydreigon) or not making it (Haxorus and Dragonite), and seeing as we only had 14 voters I think there's enough reason to call for a re-vote on these three. I want to hear arguments from both sides on why or why not they belong. We'll be voting on their status at the same time as we vote on Tier 1 Stallbreakers, so this discussion is important!

Oh, as for the OP I'll be editing it with all the updated information literally minutes after this post goes up, it's almost all written up except for the bits where I need to link to this post. Just wait a few seconds and it'll show up. If you have any issues with the current descriptions for the Tier 1 Wallbreakers, speak up and we'll see if we can change them.

So, let the discussion begin!
 
By "beat the majority of walls", do you mean anything more than 50% of walls? Or are we looking at a general ~75% definition of majority? I guess in common speech we all think we know what it means, but some Pokemon might make the cut if they only need to beat one over half of the walls.

Second, I might be confused. Are we talking Wallbreakers or Stallbreakers? You used the term "stallbreaker" a few times last post and it's easy to understand how they'd be mixed up.
 
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