Justice
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- Thread starter LuckOverSkill
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I don't get why you delete my post. Anyway i will write It again.
Unban everything but trapping.
You know what beats Spikes + Psyspam? Landorus-Incarnate.
What beats Landorus-Incarnate? Fast offense like Rain Team with Kingdra and/or Ludicolo. What can allow them to not dominate the meta? Other Speed abusers.
The solution is to unban things from 0 and then check what will be broken.
The job was done poorly before: there is no agency for spikes team.
Now you either ban all the pseudo broken things or you don't ban anything and you need Tyranitar/Jirachi/Blissey in every team
Unban everything but trapping.
You know what beats Spikes + Psyspam? Landorus-Incarnate.
What beats Landorus-Incarnate? Fast offense like Rain Team with Kingdra and/or Ludicolo. What can allow them to not dominate the meta? Other Speed abusers.
The solution is to unban things from 0 and then check what will be broken.
The job was done poorly before: there is no agency for spikes team.
Now you either ban all the pseudo broken things or you don't ban anything and you need Tyranitar/Jirachi/Blissey in every team
I didn’t delete your post, but this won’t happen. Landorus-I with Sheer Force is staying Uber and DrizzleSwim isn’t going to make the tier better ever.
As a half-player (ladder rat), half-spectator (doesn't win tours lmao), I do like the "lol unban stuff at this point" attitude because I do think the community was overly ban-happy when it came to Volc and Cloy. The players that voted had a clear stance, though, so I'm not complaining. It just means that maybe when people suggested allowing ChloroSaur with no Dug, it's not actually that much of a meme in the eyes of some.
My serious take is that nothing needs to be banned or unbanned. You can hate Rain. You can hate Keldeo. You can hate Latios. You can hate Cloyster. The "adapt bro" argument gets clowned on because no one really agrees with it ever when it has to come up. Right now, though, it actually does. BW is always on delicate balance because everything's broken. The tour scene has been fun and interesting ever since Gems were banned: we don't need to bitch and moan about nitpicks from people that don't play the tier.
SPL 2023 had a surge of HO after the community was convinced HO was dead, as well as a Mamoswine uptick, and now in 2024 there's some real variety to the top players' brings. Some trend offensive, and some trend fat. That's healthy in my opinion. It's what 2022 had but with the weird power trip that Gems added to the tier so Volc/Cloy/Loom dominated everything.
My serious take is that nothing needs to be banned or unbanned. You can hate Rain. You can hate Keldeo. You can hate Latios. You can hate Cloyster. The "adapt bro" argument gets clowned on because no one really agrees with it ever when it has to come up. Right now, though, it actually does. BW is always on delicate balance because everything's broken. The tour scene has been fun and interesting ever since Gems were banned: we don't need to bitch and moan about nitpicks from people that don't play the tier.
SPL 2023 had a surge of HO after the community was convinced HO was dead, as well as a Mamoswine uptick, and now in 2024 there's some real variety to the top players' brings. Some trend offensive, and some trend fat. That's healthy in my opinion. It's what 2022 had but with the weird power trip that Gems added to the tier so Volc/Cloy/Loom dominated everything.
I get that there are those right now who like the place the tier is in currently and that's great for them, but that doesn't change that the majority of people have at least one major thing that they dislike. Asking people to adapt is like telling them to tweak their Reuniclus set to where it's even more nonsense to get rid of along with all of the spikes. Adaption has happened but that doesn't change the fact that the public perception is still relatively comparable to three years ago when Dice made their post
I appreciate the reply, but the reason public perception is low is because they choose to avoid the tier as it is, which is fine. DPP and ORAS are similar-ish tiers individually and have a more favorable "perception history" than BW. I find BW more fun than those, though, so I play BW mainly.
I also like the use of the metaphor, but I don't think the example you gave is actually that crazy. Excadrill is widely considered a decent Reun soft-check with Sand support. If a Reun lacks a fighting move, Drill is a tough nut to crack, and if it goes Psy-Focus, then there are subtle half-measures like Dragon Tail Slowking.
More generally, I think some Pokemon are "battle scares" whiles others are "builder scares". The trio of Latios/Keldeo/Thundurus is like the "ok this is stupid" category while the Reuniclus/Alakazam/Volcarona trio is the "oh wow my teams are so bad against this" category.
BKC always advocates for eliminating the former while the player-base tends to talk about the latter more. My tentative take on the latter is that if you over-prep for them, you lose overall win%, so it's important to pick your poison (lol) when building and just try to find outplay potential in your builds for the inevitably rough match-ups you may load into. The former just are constantly avoided topics (somehow), but I wouldn't really advocate for bans on them either: I've just meekly accepted them as annoying entities that exist and should be made use of.
Hello. I wanna give my take based on numerous discord conversations, what I have personally seen and just for interest in the tier.
Having watched BKC:s video with Peng, I do think it outlines the tier pretty well right now and what is even on the table. It very clearly shows that we have 3/4 real bans to keep the status quo, after that we are breaking the fundamentals. I am of the stance that the current tier we have is very good as a base, and we should focus on keeping the tier largely as is instead of going for a true game changers.
I think there are only 3 mons that are even on the table, even if the tier discussion post says otherwise. These mons are Cloyster, Reuniclus and Thundurus-Therian, in that order. Anything else feels way too out of reach for the current moment, stuff like Latios and Excadrill are a waste of time even discussing when without at least a big tour without one, there is not a large enough push to ban either of these mons. I also do think banning 2 of the mentioned list earlier will already lessen the brutality of Latios and Excadrill, which I am going to explain below.
Let's start with the mon that is probably going soon already and isn't changing the tier largely: Cloyster. Cloyster represents cheese in the BW OU tier. It is the ''mu shell'', sometimes it does a lot and sometimes it's useless. When the original suspect was done, Cloyster was mainly a physically oriented mon, but with the discovery of Mixed cloyster, it lost one of it's biggest true counter play measures, as you can't reliably counter the thing with something like a Jellicent anymore. Even the mighty Keldeo is prone to dying to Cloyster after it's chipped
+2 252+ SpA Expert Belt Cloyster Hidden Power Grass vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Keldeo: 326-386 (100.9 - 119.5%) -- guaranteed OHKO
So yeah, cheese is bad in a game of competitive pokemon and Cloyster should go outright for these reasons.
(Just wanna post this here for shits and giggles
+2 252+ SpA Cloyster Surf vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Reuniclus in Rain: 415-490 (97.8 - 115.5%) -- 87.5% chance to OHKO)
Then, let's start with the actually broken one: Reuniclus. Reuniclus is historically infamous for being dependant on it's environment. It becomes way less used at times, only to come back again next year in SPL when the meta favors it, becoming an absolute demon once more. Reuniclus issue is it abusing every single factor about BW OU perfectly. It is a spikes immune, paralysis abusing fighting resistant bulky Calm Mind setter with a movepool from gods and set variety making it hard to actually prepare for. Reuniclus has recently shifted into a more Calm Mind focused role due to the meta around it, but Trick Room or Life Orb 3 attacks are still potent in their own right and have their own use cases. All of this is good and all, but Reuniclus has 1 thing pushing it over the edge and which is why I do believe in it's ban: it's bulk. Let's go over some calcs, shall we?
+2 252+ Atk Dragonite Outrage vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Reuniclus: 381-448 (89.8 - 105.6%) -- 37.5% chance to OHKO
252+ Atk Choice Band Teravolt Kyurem-Black Outrage vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Reuniclus: 340-402 (80.1 - 94.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 SpA Choice Specs Latios Draco Meteor vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Reuniclus: 393-463 (92.6 - 109.1%) -- 56.3% chance to OHKO
(To note, Specs Latios isn't even that used as of now over something like Colbur Berry)
Yeah. Reuniclus eats offensive threats like it's nothing. Part of the fun also comes from doing some move guessing. Yes, usually Recover and Calm Mind are a given, but the coverage this cell blob has is a pain in the ass to guess. It effectively has something that no mons of this caliber should have: options. Reuniclus is also a massive benefitter of the recent shift in how Latios is used. Latios instead of being the main man with Reun/Latios, has come to find a supporting role along side it which I find baffling. This speaks to the volume of Reuniclus itself, where the mighty Latios is used as a supportive offensive threat / para spreader to aid Reuniclus do it's job of killing everything alive.
Thundurus-Therian is very weird one to me right now. It is objectively fucking monsterous. With modest and 48 evs in Special attack, it already has the highest base special attack in the entire tiers. Combine that with 120 bp Thunders and a really good movepool, we have an extremely strong special breaker in Rain, which with Agility can win a stupid amount of endgames on it's own. All of this has been stated so many times before, where I don't wanna repeat other greats 2 million times. But yes, Thundurus-Therian is bonkers.
Here come the famous however. Under any other circumstances, Thundurus-T would have been banned ages ago, with right now, it is the only reason why Rain is still prevalent in the current meta. Without it, the entire playstyle kind of dies of. There has been experimentation with Tornadus-I recently, and while with it's benefits, like outspeeding Latios, it lacks the same way of umpf like Thundurus does. For these reasons, I would not focus on Thundurus right now, as there are more immediate matters to discuss.
On Latios and Excadrill, the arguments for an Excadrill ban are absurd to me. While absolutely busted, SD Excadrill requires ParaSpam to really make it's mark against faster teams. I also do believe it's fine to have a breaker of this caliber in the meta especially with Reuniclus still existing. Should Excadrill ever have been unbanned? I don't think so. Should it stay as of now? Yes, we need a spinner like it.
I am hesitant like most of touching Latios right now. Latios has adapted in recent years, going away from the absolute power of Specs Dracos and instead going for longevity with Colbur Berry, be it a para supporter or a Calm Mind user. I am interested to see a metagame without Latios though, ie would Latias do the defensive role Latios does right now and would there be a better metagame after it's leaving. However, we need proof for this. Finchinator discussed a potential tournament with some cash on the line with Latios banned, which I would push for right now. Until this happens, discussing a Latios ban seems like a waste of time to me, because the push for it is not simply there among top players.
In conclusion, action of order in my opinion should be banning Cloyster, banning Reuniclus and then seeing how the meta evolves after it. Look into Thundurus-T more so we have more action taken before to see if rain comes back up more after Reuniclus is banned. On the bigger changes, I would push for a tournament with Latios banned to see would the meta turn out better after. The Excadrill shouts are a waste of time to me, don't focus on that when we need it's spin in the current meta. Thank you.
Having watched BKC:s video with Peng, I do think it outlines the tier pretty well right now and what is even on the table. It very clearly shows that we have 3/4 real bans to keep the status quo, after that we are breaking the fundamentals. I am of the stance that the current tier we have is very good as a base, and we should focus on keeping the tier largely as is instead of going for a true game changers.
I think there are only 3 mons that are even on the table, even if the tier discussion post says otherwise. These mons are Cloyster, Reuniclus and Thundurus-Therian, in that order. Anything else feels way too out of reach for the current moment, stuff like Latios and Excadrill are a waste of time even discussing when without at least a big tour without one, there is not a large enough push to ban either of these mons. I also do think banning 2 of the mentioned list earlier will already lessen the brutality of Latios and Excadrill, which I am going to explain below.
Let's start with the mon that is probably going soon already and isn't changing the tier largely: Cloyster. Cloyster represents cheese in the BW OU tier. It is the ''mu shell'', sometimes it does a lot and sometimes it's useless. When the original suspect was done, Cloyster was mainly a physically oriented mon, but with the discovery of Mixed cloyster, it lost one of it's biggest true counter play measures, as you can't reliably counter the thing with something like a Jellicent anymore. Even the mighty Keldeo is prone to dying to Cloyster after it's chipped
+2 252+ SpA Expert Belt Cloyster Hidden Power Grass vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Keldeo: 326-386 (100.9 - 119.5%) -- guaranteed OHKO
So yeah, cheese is bad in a game of competitive pokemon and Cloyster should go outright for these reasons.
(Just wanna post this here for shits and giggles
+2 252+ SpA Cloyster Surf vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Reuniclus in Rain: 415-490 (97.8 - 115.5%) -- 87.5% chance to OHKO)
Then, let's start with the actually broken one: Reuniclus. Reuniclus is historically infamous for being dependant on it's environment. It becomes way less used at times, only to come back again next year in SPL when the meta favors it, becoming an absolute demon once more. Reuniclus issue is it abusing every single factor about BW OU perfectly. It is a spikes immune, paralysis abusing fighting resistant bulky Calm Mind setter with a movepool from gods and set variety making it hard to actually prepare for. Reuniclus has recently shifted into a more Calm Mind focused role due to the meta around it, but Trick Room or Life Orb 3 attacks are still potent in their own right and have their own use cases. All of this is good and all, but Reuniclus has 1 thing pushing it over the edge and which is why I do believe in it's ban: it's bulk. Let's go over some calcs, shall we?
+2 252+ Atk Dragonite Outrage vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Reuniclus: 381-448 (89.8 - 105.6%) -- 37.5% chance to OHKO
252+ Atk Choice Band Teravolt Kyurem-Black Outrage vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Reuniclus: 340-402 (80.1 - 94.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 SpA Choice Specs Latios Draco Meteor vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Reuniclus: 393-463 (92.6 - 109.1%) -- 56.3% chance to OHKO
(To note, Specs Latios isn't even that used as of now over something like Colbur Berry)
Yeah. Reuniclus eats offensive threats like it's nothing. Part of the fun also comes from doing some move guessing. Yes, usually Recover and Calm Mind are a given, but the coverage this cell blob has is a pain in the ass to guess. It effectively has something that no mons of this caliber should have: options. Reuniclus is also a massive benefitter of the recent shift in how Latios is used. Latios instead of being the main man with Reun/Latios, has come to find a supporting role along side it which I find baffling. This speaks to the volume of Reuniclus itself, where the mighty Latios is used as a supportive offensive threat / para spreader to aid Reuniclus do it's job of killing everything alive.
Thundurus-Therian is very weird one to me right now. It is objectively fucking monsterous. With modest and 48 evs in Special attack, it already has the highest base special attack in the entire tiers. Combine that with 120 bp Thunders and a really good movepool, we have an extremely strong special breaker in Rain, which with Agility can win a stupid amount of endgames on it's own. All of this has been stated so many times before, where I don't wanna repeat other greats 2 million times. But yes, Thundurus-Therian is bonkers.
Here come the famous however. Under any other circumstances, Thundurus-T would have been banned ages ago, with right now, it is the only reason why Rain is still prevalent in the current meta. Without it, the entire playstyle kind of dies of. There has been experimentation with Tornadus-I recently, and while with it's benefits, like outspeeding Latios, it lacks the same way of umpf like Thundurus does. For these reasons, I would not focus on Thundurus right now, as there are more immediate matters to discuss.
On Latios and Excadrill, the arguments for an Excadrill ban are absurd to me. While absolutely busted, SD Excadrill requires ParaSpam to really make it's mark against faster teams. I also do believe it's fine to have a breaker of this caliber in the meta especially with Reuniclus still existing. Should Excadrill ever have been unbanned? I don't think so. Should it stay as of now? Yes, we need a spinner like it.
I am hesitant like most of touching Latios right now. Latios has adapted in recent years, going away from the absolute power of Specs Dracos and instead going for longevity with Colbur Berry, be it a para supporter or a Calm Mind user. I am interested to see a metagame without Latios though, ie would Latias do the defensive role Latios does right now and would there be a better metagame after it's leaving. However, we need proof for this. Finchinator discussed a potential tournament with some cash on the line with Latios banned, which I would push for right now. Until this happens, discussing a Latios ban seems like a waste of time to me, because the push for it is not simply there among top players.
In conclusion, action of order in my opinion should be banning Cloyster, banning Reuniclus and then seeing how the meta evolves after it. Look into Thundurus-T more so we have more action taken before to see if rain comes back up more after Reuniclus is banned. On the bigger changes, I would push for a tournament with Latios banned to see would the meta turn out better after. The Excadrill shouts are a waste of time to me, don't focus on that when we need it's spin in the current meta. Thank you.
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The fact that Thundurus-Therian exists make this metagame faster because nothing can switch on that horrendous pokemon
Just going to preface this and say that I am not the most experienced player, however I did get the requirements for voting on the last suspect and I would like to share my short opinion on what is currently happening with regards to next steps for BW.
Tiering in BW is not easy, you can see from the sheer amount of differing opinions from elite players as to what is bannable/suspectable/busted and what isn't.
However the main thing that absolutely has to get mentioned, and what is frustrating a lot of the players who truly care about this tier and play it often is that we agreed to revisit Cloyster post SPL. The voting format which we had was far from optimal, and even multiple people who wanted to keep Cloyster have changed their minds due to emergence of mixed sets which can OHKO former checks.
It can easily be debated that there are more pressing concerns with the tier, with regards to things like Latios, Excadrill, Thundurus etc. but the fact of the matter is that we should stand by what we said to do.
Tiering in BW is not easy, you can see from the sheer amount of differing opinions from elite players as to what is bannable/suspectable/busted and what isn't.
However the main thing that absolutely has to get mentioned, and what is frustrating a lot of the players who truly care about this tier and play it often is that we agreed to revisit Cloyster post SPL. The voting format which we had was far from optimal, and even multiple people who wanted to keep Cloyster have changed their minds due to emergence of mixed sets which can OHKO former checks.
It can easily be debated that there are more pressing concerns with the tier, with regards to things like Latios, Excadrill, Thundurus etc. but the fact of the matter is that we should stand by what we said to do.
First of all, mewtwo is faster and stronger and bulkier than zam, so it revenge kills just as easily. Second of all, it doesn’t need to rely on focus miss because it has aura sphere and Psy strike to melt physical walls. Not only that, but it can pick and chose between ice beam and flamethrower, meaning it can blow past d nite and sciz. Not only that, but it also gets calm mind and taunt plus recover, which means it can go defensive and stack up boosts to overwhelm a team. Stop trolling. But as for the weather part, Thundy is pretty good on rain, but skarm jelli and special cloy has been taking hyper offense to another level. I do think hail is okay though. (On a side note, have a good day friends!
)
Nah mewtwo completely balanced it only has a bst of 680 rookie numbers can easily be sucker punched.
Yeah about the rain part, its fallen hard mainly because of the rise of the skarmjelli style and reuniclus and a few other blobs being used regularly. Hail is a bit sad really because im assuming its the fact that its hard to build that it doesn't get used too much but it has many viable strategies. Dragmag also I just realised is at a 1.8% usage like bruh i prob contribute to a tenth of that myself.
Another thing to raise awareness about is dragmag, it hasn't got any major innovation since ages, rain has started to get some innovation at a very slow pace rarely when u see the amount of dragon types being used and rewers team in it nowadays but ive been seeing the same group of mons for them both for more then a yr now. Find something new, Ik yeah sand 'better' but at the usage rates its been through the modern history of BW sand is getting much more creativity which is dangerous to other archetypes if they don't even receive anywhere close to that amount of exploration.
As there is a much higher usage rate in things like HO and Sand this means more sets and more innovation will happen at a faster pace to allow it to counter the previous things that kept in check for example skarm jelli and mixed cloy HO. Rain and Dragmag will likely have many strategies that we haven't explored yet because of there less usage rate for example if kyu-b rains were used in a higher amount in the 2020s we would have seen rain as maybe one of the more dominant archetypes. Hail legit just needs more players it requires innovation to build with it in the first place perhaps y it was avoided so much.
Suns at a 3 percent usage which isn't great but i kinda expect considering the removal of everything that made it good. It prob could have some innovation as well i again have only seen the same few set of mons on it apart from some random guy running gyarados on it at low ladder.
So to conclude pls give all archetypes some love as then our metagames sides will all change at the same time allowing one to cope with the other rather then what is happening now. Mewtwo based give it some love too.
Yeah about the rain part, its fallen hard mainly because of the rise of the skarmjelli style and reuniclus and a few other blobs being used regularly. Hail is a bit sad really because im assuming its the fact that its hard to build that it doesn't get used too much but it has many viable strategies. Dragmag also I just realised is at a 1.8% usage like bruh i prob contribute to a tenth of that myself.
Another thing to raise awareness about is dragmag, it hasn't got any major innovation since ages, rain has started to get some innovation at a very slow pace rarely when u see the amount of dragon types being used and rewers team in it nowadays but ive been seeing the same group of mons for them both for more then a yr now. Find something new, Ik yeah sand 'better' but at the usage rates its been through the modern history of BW sand is getting much more creativity which is dangerous to other archetypes if they don't even receive anywhere close to that amount of exploration.
As there is a much higher usage rate in things like HO and Sand this means more sets and more innovation will happen at a faster pace to allow it to counter the previous things that kept in check for example skarm jelli and mixed cloy HO. Rain and Dragmag will likely have many strategies that we haven't explored yet because of there less usage rate for example if kyu-b rains were used in a higher amount in the 2020s we would have seen rain as maybe one of the more dominant archetypes. Hail legit just needs more players it requires innovation to build with it in the first place perhaps y it was avoided so much.
Suns at a 3 percent usage which isn't great but i kinda expect considering the removal of everything that made it good. It prob could have some innovation as well i again have only seen the same few set of mons on it apart from some random guy running gyarados on it at low ladder.
So to conclude pls give all archetypes some love as then our metagames sides will all change at the same time allowing one to cope with the other rather then what is happening now. Mewtwo based give it some love too.
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Scizor @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Technician
EVs: 252 Atk / 12 SpD / 244 Spe
Jolly Nature
- U-turn
- Pursuit
- Superpower (but dealer's choice)
- Bullet Punch
Keldeo @ Leftovers
Ability: Justified
EVs: 4 HP / 248 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 30 Atk / 30 SpD
- Surf
- Hidden Power [Ghost]
- Substitute
- Calm Mind
Terrakion @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Justified
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Close Combat
- Stone Edge
- X-Scissor
- Earthquake (but dealer's choice)
Overview:
Wanted to make a quick post about an offensive core I've really liked. Scizor is great at killing the offensive things that threaten keldeo (mie, lati, zam) and celebi while also doing a great job of getting momentum and being a pain for dragmag (not super common anymore). This keldeo set dumpsters 3 of the most common defensive keldeo checks: gastro (w/o eq), cruel, and jelli while still being generally terrifying with +1 surf. Scarf terrak is a nightmare for HO by outrunning volc, cloy, and jirachi. It also represents a good cleaning option against sufficiently chipped teams by being faster than scarf chomp and just launching stab 120 bp, perfect accuracy moves off of 129atk stat. It also really threatens mons that can give sciz/keld trouble like Chansey, blissey, and Ferro. What I like about these 3 is that they cover a bunch of matchups offensively on their own so you have space for a sturdy defensive backbone. The core presented is not frail by any means either so you could alternatively try running a very offensive back 3 to capitalize on the good matchups this core has.
Matchups:
Vs sand: keldeo runs train on the slower bulkier versions by abusing jelli as a setup Mon and then smoking everything else. Terrak is also super threatening if they let Lando/jelli die. Scizor annihilates the more offensive sands running multiple psychics.
Vs rain: scizor eliminates lati/mie (usually with u turn but pursuit after chip damage also comes in clutch). Once Ferro and the stuff that's faster than keldeo are gone, keldeo goes absolutely crazy. It abuses it's most common check on rain teams: tentacruel to set up and then explodes basically everything else. Terrak is supremely threatening vs most rain if it can eq tenta once and then CC everything else for big chip/KO's.
Vs HO: terrak revenge kills all the setup stuff so that's awesome. Keldeo (especially at +1) really messes up a bunch of mons HO loves. Scizor is real annoying for dragmag and can eliminate starmie.
Partners:
Celebi is a great partner for this core for it's ability to pivot, switch into thundo/keldeo, switch into EQs, and provide support with rocks or perish song (sub bp can also work). Politoed is an interesting pick to help keld and scizor. It can even free up some move slots on scizor or terrak by running encore or psychic to help vs reuniclus and toxicroak. Rotom W helps switch into EQs and can provide support by burning stuff (especially Ferro), tricking important threats, and pivoting with volt turn.
Big Threats:
It really jumps out at you that nothing of that core clearly kills amoonguss. Keldeo needs to get to +3 in order to make a sub that survives giga drain and though that's not entirely outside the realm of possibility, it's a tough ask. Pack support for this thing (I like trick lure).
Very fast setup
Agility (once) and DD (thrice) are very dangerous moves vs this core because everything that runs agility also runs enough speed to get past scarf lati and in this case scarf terrak. Meanwhile, bulky dnite can get fast enough with a combination of roost and multi scale. Gotta pack some stuff with a lot of bulk and ice coverage for those threats.
Not Ninetails specifically, but sun in general is quite annoying for the squad. None of those 3 are killing cress and hp fire in the sun does ohko scizor. Keldeo having surf neutered is trouble and terrak literally does nothing as long as cresc lives. Trick lure helps a great deal here as well.
Fuck the oyster mfer, will not be missed.
It's funny how much tiering discourse this one Ice Type has made over so many generations, either creating King's Rock discourse or just outright being problematic regardless. Honestly, after all of it, Cloyster deserved at least one Ubers tier. As a treat
Seeing the recent Cloyster ban, my question would be what other changes the community would like and when could we expect the next suspect test to be?
Wouldn’t expect anything immediately, but discussion is open for anyone to leave their thoughts.
Hello all, late clean up. This thread will be more heavily reviewed and moderated moving forward. As a reminder, simple one liners and brief questions should be posted in the simple questions thread. Lets keep discussion on with in the scope as defined in the OP (quoted above) + any future concerns / complaints about tiering action.
Heyo, haven't posted on this before but i had a cool set that i think players better than me may be able to experiment with and find results with.
Abomasnow is a "bad" pokemon with a very great ability that allows steel types to take passive damage. I think finding a way to leverage this without having to be as smart in terms of how you get it in and how you get a threat in the back in safely could be a cool idea. Something I thought of was running something such as a alongside it to trap and remove latios after the eject button activates. This of course would require some special defence investment on Abomasnow that may not be worth it. An obvious idea would be too stack set up sweepers or heavy hitters in the back such as 
and either 
or 
. Even a 
could potentially work in this slot to do big damage to Psyspam structures. Having something that can also exploit and set up on 
maybe a smart idea too like a 
, Substitute or even a 
This is just a cool idea I had, would be interesting to see what other players think about trying to get the most out of this set.
Abomasnow is a "bad" pokemon with a very great ability that allows steel types to take passive damage. I think finding a way to leverage this without having to be as smart in terms of how you get it in and how you get a threat in the back in safely could be a cool idea. Something I thought of was running something such as a
alongside it to trap and remove latios after the eject button activates. This of course would require some special defence investment on Abomasnow that may not be worth it. An obvious idea would be too stack set up sweepers or heavy hitters in the back such as and either or . Even a could potentially work in this slot to do big damage to Psyspam structures. Having something that can also exploit and set up on maybe a smart idea too like a , Substitute or even a This is just a cool idea I had, would be interesting to see what other players think about trying to get the most out of this set.
Terrak + Scizor lowkey destroys alot of these Fat Clef/Reun/Lati/Hippo builds that have sprung out, plus Scizor is one of the only Pursuit trappers with reliable recovery and isn’t immediately threatened by Focus Miss or HP Ice. Pretty much the only consistent Reuniclus answer.
Scizor @ Air Balloon
Level: 100
Adamant Nature
Ability: Technician
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
- Bullet Punch
- Pursuit
- Superpower
- Swords Dance
When I tried testing HO teams back when Cloy was still a legal mon (I don't really have the replay with me unfortunately), I was in a position where I was about to lose to a HippoClef Psyspam team only for lastmon Sciz to completely turn the game around. Air Balloon means that Hippo can't shut you down. Like with all sets Skarm is an annoyance, perhaps even moreso since it's running Phys Def as it's paired with Zong, but with Skarm out of the picture this is definately a set that deserves more use.
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thanks
thanks goat, i have used the roserade team before with some edits and i actually think its pretty solid. nice to see you active and sharing your teams boss. i will make sure to give some of them a try!These are some (not that) old teams a lot of players have already seen that I've been hanging on to. They don't really have use cases over stronger stuff beyond matchup fishing. I'm giving them away to incentivize myself to build more. Will update if/when Reuniclus gets banned.
sand balance subpass terrak
Very simple premise, pass Substitutes to Terrakion and destroy stuff.
sand hyper offense
LeadSkarm+BalloonJelli+ScarfTar hazards core, with Chomp and Zor to break and Zam for the late game.
sand balance hydra zam
A really strong breaker with a really strong lategame mon, with Spikes and a skeleton defensive crew just to pivot them into stuff.
sand balance tauntspam
Taunt abuse with Spikes, status spam, and a spinblocker. You will have to make some predictions to stay ahead with this team vs faster stuff.
rain offense chomp zap
SpecsToed with HP Bug lures Celebi for Zapdos, SubRoost Zapdos turns opposing Ferrothorn into setupbait. YacheChomp rounds out the team and provides an out towards various bulkier structures.
rain offense mixnite
You switch in Dragonite into Ferrothorn and click Hurricane, really. Vulnerable to faster stuff like Torn and Zam.
rain offense volc
You trade hazards with the other Ferro with your own, Spin with Excadrill, and then you hard in Volc the next time Ferro comes in. Azumarill switches in on and soft-checks a bunch of stuff with Aqua Jet.
rain balance subpass kyub
You essentially just pass Substitutes to Kyurem-Black.
loom mamo dnite offense
Your choice of lead between Lando-T and Loom depends on who you predict will come out from your opponent. Other than that the team is clear-cut: Zor switches in on Ferro and traps Latios, SubSalac Mamo punishes Ground-types.
hail balance
Essentially a setup for Modest Scarf Kyurem to spam Blizzards.
semistall
You usually anti-lead with Mew, and win by hazard stack+ Mew&CroCune pressure. You will need to play preemptively vs some threats to not get run over.
triple axel blaze
I had fun playing BW Cup, which is probably the first time I have had fun playing BW in about two years.
It's not that I disliked the metagame so much as I felt more motivated in CG OU (which I still do) and was busier in life. I like current BW and think it is an underrated generation that receives a lot of hate due to misunderstanding and weird generalizations. I also think we have a ton of motivated players, including some fresh faces, who deserve recognition and will do well in the immediate future (taking over for old players like me perhaps).
It was a bit weird being more distant from BW as it is the metagame I literally grew up playing (been 13 years since I began in '11), so when I made it to the semifinals of BW Cup for a third time, I was definitely hoping for a bit of a "full circle" moment where I finally broke through and won the tournament, clinched classic playoffs, etc. Didn't happen -- oh well, the world goes on. Yea, I am definitely sad because I had pretty great odds if not for the freeze G3, but that's how it goes sometimes. I really appreciated this experience regardless.
Thanks to a couple of my friends like Monai, Meessm, Fakes, and I am sure others for the discussions we had; it was refreshing to build my own teams each week again, but I did take a Fakes team and rip a SoulWind team with edits in prior rounds. They are both awesome BW players of course, so no shame in that I guess.
Of the numerous team I did build, here are some cool sets/concepts I used that could help continue to push the metagame forward:
Reuniclus (M) @ Flame Orb
Ability: Magic Guard
EVs: 244 HP / 244 Def / 20 Spe
Bold Nature
IVs: 2 Atk / 30 Def
- Calm Mind
- Psyshock / Thunder
- Hidden Power [Ice] / Focus Blast
- Recover
Flame Orb Reuniclus is not new, but it has been used with Trick on Psychic Spam teams prior to this. People frequently use paralysis to slow down Reuniclus on balance teams -- Clefable, Jirachi, Latios, Latias, Ferrothorn, Chansey, Blissey, and a few others have been able to limit Reuniclus in this way. Jaajgko in particular leaned into this with a vast majority of his teams being bulkier and even one team with Togekiss. Flame Orb allows you to stop this method of counterplay and bluff Trick, meaning you can often buy yourself a free set-up turn or avoid them going directly to Tyranitar, Scizor, or Jirachi against your Reuniclus.
Leftovers and Rocky Helmet are traditionally good items on CM Reuniclus while Life Orb can help with certain damage ranges, too, but Flame Orb at very least deserves a piece of the pie-chart here. It flips certain bulky mirror match-ups and players are not always sure how to react to this set. The spread can be changed to whatever you normally use and the coverage varies depending on team, too.
Latios (M) @ Colbur Berry
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Draco Meteor
- Surf
- Ice Beam
- Roost
Latios can run a lot of different moves, but Ice Beam has not seen much of any play in my experience. I do not think it will ever become mainstream, but I feel it is at least viable, specifically on the surging Colbur Berry variant. You typically need a faster Ice move or two on Sand bulky-offense and a way to beat SD Gliscor + Pursuit Tyranitar, which is a clasically strong core. Draco Meteor and Surf do not do close to enough damage to SDef Gliscor, sometimes even failing to 2HKO depending on investment and Protect turns. You can bluff using this as a way to trade health and get an OHKO with Ice Beam -- it happened to work out ideally here, where I rolled into an awesome match-up. Nothing much SoulWind could do here and I was fortunate to have the ideal set.
It is also good into Celebi, which is actually what I initially thought of it for -- I assumed for some reason Latios learned Signal Beam like other Psychic types, but it does not and I lost badly to NP Celebi with the right moves. Because of this, I knew Ice Beam did 40% (or a little more depending on investment) to standard SDef Celebi and this provided me with many turns to land a crit or freeze while it had to cycle through many Recover PPs. It is not a perfect science, but the odds are pretty good overall here.
There is trade-off: missing out on HP Fire means your team needs secure Ferrothorn counterplay (I had Clefable + Trick Rotom-W + Spin Excadrill + Flamethrower Tyranitar, for example), not having Thunder Wave or Roar makes it a worse partner for other Psychic types like Reuniclus or Alakazam, and not having Psyshock is tougher into Blissey, Tentacruel, and Clefable of course.
Other applications of this include picking off Dragonite (post-Sand chip), Landorus-T, Garchomp (not Yache), Salamence (not Scarf), and other Ice weak Pokemon without risking a Draco Meteor miss or going -2 for the following Pokemon, but Dragon Pulse performs similarly here of course.
Mamoswine @ Leftovers
Ability: Thick Fat
EVs: 8 HP / 244 Atk / 116 SpD / 140 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Ice Shard
- Earthquake
- Toxic
- Icicle Crash
Pivoting back to the Jaajgko set, he used a ton of different Mamoswine checks: Rotom-W, utility Mew, Slowbro, Balloon Jellicent, Sun Cresselia, etc. -- I did not think I would use Mamoswine in the set, but I wanted to hedge my bet a bit by having an Ice Shard user on a certain structure that wanted to RK Dragon and Ground types easier. Given this, I came up with this set as a midground with Toxic to catch all of the bulky checks and avoid being a liability while having Ice Shard for the offenses.
Lefties Mamoswine as is feels underrated as you are able to sequence a bit more comfortably and NMI damage only has so many situations it factors into (none of which I needed here). Bulk can be made into standard spread, but I did not feel an urge to max out, so this helped chew a Draco Meteor and some other attacks, so I went for it. This is not some groundbreaking innovation, but it does let Mamoswine cover some weak spots and function well with Excadrill or Gliscor, who love these Pokemon being chipped away at by Toxic, too.
Gliscor @ Toxic Orb
Ability: Poison Heal
EVs: 88 HP / 44 Atk / 140 Def / 8 SpD / 228 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Swords Dance
- Earthquake
- Ice Fang
- Protect
Gliscor that can outrun Landorus-T and surprise it with +1 Ice Fang. It also is quicker than Excadrill, meaning it is not flinchable unless Choice Scarf (which cannot SD and needs multiple or a critical hit). The bulk is for a few different HP Ice damages while maximizing the Excadrill match-up and still being good into standard Terrakion and Dragonite.
This set has been used many times before obviously, but this specific spread on it has not been used much on SD Ice Fang as far as I know (Feaniix used a similar spread before) and I think it is very practical right now.
Celebi @ Leftovers
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 160 HP / 160 SpD / 188 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 2 Atk / 30 Def
- Nasty Plot
- Giga Drain
- Hidden Power [Ice]
- Recover
Like the Gliscor concept: surprise Ice move with speed for utility Landorus-T, which usually tries to U-turn loop Celebi.
Flipping this interaction can make it so that an Excadrill or Gliscor can destroy the opponent who misses their primary check/counter to them. It does sting to lose special bulk and while investing less into HP and more into SDef helps a little bit, you can only do so much with so many EVs -- this spread covers a lot, but you still wish you were 5-6% bulkier than you normally are when slower I admit. In hilarious fashion, it also took multipl % more damage from Seismic Toss here, which spoiled my set to some observant spectators.
Scizor @ Sitrus Berry
Ability: Technician
EVs: 248 HP / 216 Atk / 8 Def / 36 SpD
Adamant Nature
- Bullet Punch
- Bug Bite
- Pursuit
- U-turn
Touched on this Scizor set here and it still works well + I think more people should try it as glue on Rain. It can flip rough match-ups.
It's not that I disliked the metagame so much as I felt more motivated in CG OU (which I still do) and was busier in life. I like current BW and think it is an underrated generation that receives a lot of hate due to misunderstanding and weird generalizations. I also think we have a ton of motivated players, including some fresh faces, who deserve recognition and will do well in the immediate future (taking over for old players like me perhaps).
It was a bit weird being more distant from BW as it is the metagame I literally grew up playing (been 13 years since I began in '11), so when I made it to the semifinals of BW Cup for a third time, I was definitely hoping for a bit of a "full circle" moment where I finally broke through and won the tournament, clinched classic playoffs, etc. Didn't happen -- oh well, the world goes on. Yea, I am definitely sad because I had pretty great odds if not for the freeze G3, but that's how it goes sometimes. I really appreciated this experience regardless.
Thanks to a couple of my friends like Monai, Meessm, Fakes, and I am sure others for the discussions we had; it was refreshing to build my own teams each week again, but I did take a Fakes team and rip a SoulWind team with edits in prior rounds. They are both awesome BW players of course, so no shame in that I guess.
Of the numerous team I did build, here are some cool sets/concepts I used that could help continue to push the metagame forward:
Reuniclus (M) @ Flame Orb
Ability: Magic Guard
EVs: 244 HP / 244 Def / 20 Spe
Bold Nature
IVs: 2 Atk / 30 Def
- Calm Mind
- Psyshock / Thunder
- Hidden Power [Ice] / Focus Blast
- Recover
Flame Orb Reuniclus is not new, but it has been used with Trick on Psychic Spam teams prior to this. People frequently use paralysis to slow down Reuniclus on balance teams -- Clefable, Jirachi, Latios, Latias, Ferrothorn, Chansey, Blissey, and a few others have been able to limit Reuniclus in this way. Jaajgko in particular leaned into this with a vast majority of his teams being bulkier and even one team with Togekiss. Flame Orb allows you to stop this method of counterplay and bluff Trick, meaning you can often buy yourself a free set-up turn or avoid them going directly to Tyranitar, Scizor, or Jirachi against your Reuniclus.
Leftovers and Rocky Helmet are traditionally good items on CM Reuniclus while Life Orb can help with certain damage ranges, too, but Flame Orb at very least deserves a piece of the pie-chart here. It flips certain bulky mirror match-ups and players are not always sure how to react to this set. The spread can be changed to whatever you normally use and the coverage varies depending on team, too.
Latios (M) @ Colbur Berry
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Draco Meteor
- Surf
- Ice Beam
- Roost
Latios can run a lot of different moves, but Ice Beam has not seen much of any play in my experience. I do not think it will ever become mainstream, but I feel it is at least viable, specifically on the surging Colbur Berry variant. You typically need a faster Ice move or two on Sand bulky-offense and a way to beat SD Gliscor + Pursuit Tyranitar, which is a clasically strong core. Draco Meteor and Surf do not do close to enough damage to SDef Gliscor, sometimes even failing to 2HKO depending on investment and Protect turns. You can bluff using this as a way to trade health and get an OHKO with Ice Beam -- it happened to work out ideally here, where I rolled into an awesome match-up. Nothing much SoulWind could do here and I was fortunate to have the ideal set.
It is also good into Celebi, which is actually what I initially thought of it for -- I assumed for some reason Latios learned Signal Beam like other Psychic types, but it does not and I lost badly to NP Celebi with the right moves. Because of this, I knew Ice Beam did 40% (or a little more depending on investment) to standard SDef Celebi and this provided me with many turns to land a crit or freeze while it had to cycle through many Recover PPs. It is not a perfect science, but the odds are pretty good overall here.
There is trade-off: missing out on HP Fire means your team needs secure Ferrothorn counterplay (I had Clefable + Trick Rotom-W + Spin Excadrill + Flamethrower Tyranitar, for example), not having Thunder Wave or Roar makes it a worse partner for other Psychic types like Reuniclus or Alakazam, and not having Psyshock is tougher into Blissey, Tentacruel, and Clefable of course.
Other applications of this include picking off Dragonite (post-Sand chip), Landorus-T, Garchomp (not Yache), Salamence (not Scarf), and other Ice weak Pokemon without risking a Draco Meteor miss or going -2 for the following Pokemon, but Dragon Pulse performs similarly here of course.
Mamoswine @ Leftovers
Ability: Thick Fat
EVs: 8 HP / 244 Atk / 116 SpD / 140 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Ice Shard
- Earthquake
- Toxic
- Icicle Crash
Pivoting back to the Jaajgko set, he used a ton of different Mamoswine checks: Rotom-W, utility Mew, Slowbro, Balloon Jellicent, Sun Cresselia, etc. -- I did not think I would use Mamoswine in the set, but I wanted to hedge my bet a bit by having an Ice Shard user on a certain structure that wanted to RK Dragon and Ground types easier. Given this, I came up with this set as a midground with Toxic to catch all of the bulky checks and avoid being a liability while having Ice Shard for the offenses.
Lefties Mamoswine as is feels underrated as you are able to sequence a bit more comfortably and NMI damage only has so many situations it factors into (none of which I needed here). Bulk can be made into standard spread, but I did not feel an urge to max out, so this helped chew a Draco Meteor and some other attacks, so I went for it. This is not some groundbreaking innovation, but it does let Mamoswine cover some weak spots and function well with Excadrill or Gliscor, who love these Pokemon being chipped away at by Toxic, too.
Gliscor @ Toxic Orb
Ability: Poison Heal
EVs: 88 HP / 44 Atk / 140 Def / 8 SpD / 228 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Swords Dance
- Earthquake
- Ice Fang
- Protect
Gliscor that can outrun Landorus-T and surprise it with +1 Ice Fang. It also is quicker than Excadrill, meaning it is not flinchable unless Choice Scarf (which cannot SD and needs multiple or a critical hit). The bulk is for a few different HP Ice damages while maximizing the Excadrill match-up and still being good into standard Terrakion and Dragonite.
This set has been used many times before obviously, but this specific spread on it has not been used much on SD Ice Fang as far as I know (Feaniix used a similar spread before) and I think it is very practical right now.
Celebi @ Leftovers
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 160 HP / 160 SpD / 188 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 2 Atk / 30 Def
- Nasty Plot
- Giga Drain
- Hidden Power [Ice]
- Recover
Like the Gliscor concept: surprise Ice move with speed for utility Landorus-T, which usually tries to U-turn loop Celebi.
Flipping this interaction can make it so that an Excadrill or Gliscor can destroy the opponent who misses their primary check/counter to them. It does sting to lose special bulk and while investing less into HP and more into SDef helps a little bit, you can only do so much with so many EVs -- this spread covers a lot, but you still wish you were 5-6% bulkier than you normally are when slower I admit. In hilarious fashion, it also took multipl % more damage from Seismic Toss here, which spoiled my set to some observant spectators.
Scizor @ Sitrus Berry
Ability: Technician
EVs: 248 HP / 216 Atk / 8 Def / 36 SpD
Adamant Nature
- Bullet Punch
- Bug Bite
- Pursuit
- U-turn
Touched on this Scizor set here and it still works well + I think more people should try it as glue on Rain. It can flip rough match-ups.
More people should use 310(+) speed NP Ice Celebi. It is the best set on Celebi and Celebi is peaking again right now due to what it offers on Drill Sand teams.
You still have the ability to soft-check Keldeo and non-NP Thundurus-T while countering the normal targets of Politoed, Rotom-W, and Jellicent, but now you’re able to defeat teams that rely on fast U-Turn Lando-T or even fast IH Drill to try and check you.
Most other fast counterplay like Trick Latios tends to be temporary or Pursuit weak, you can skimp out on some HP EVs to pump SDef depending on what specific calcs you’re looking for, and after minimal chip (1-2 SR rounds or a weak/Intimidated hit) you’re able to dispose of Landorus-T. People will see faster Leftovers, but by the time they do, it’s already too committed to the sequence where they either have to gamble on no Ice or change course entirely, which can be a crucial backstep in a hazard/tempo game.
Celebi in general rn is strong simply due to the fact that it allows for some non-Latios structures on Sand to work. It’s a lot about shuffling the looks you give and compositions that can work. These type of simple shifts within the archetype are how the tier is evolving right now anyway.
You still have the ability to soft-check Keldeo and non-NP Thundurus-T while countering the normal targets of Politoed, Rotom-W, and Jellicent, but now you’re able to defeat teams that rely on fast U-Turn Lando-T or even fast IH Drill to try and check you.
Most other fast counterplay like Trick Latios tends to be temporary or Pursuit weak, you can skimp out on some HP EVs to pump SDef depending on what specific calcs you’re looking for, and after minimal chip (1-2 SR rounds or a weak/Intimidated hit) you’re able to dispose of Landorus-T. People will see faster Leftovers, but by the time they do, it’s already too committed to the sequence where they either have to gamble on no Ice or change course entirely, which can be a crucial backstep in a hazard/tempo game.
Celebi in general rn is strong simply due to the fact that it allows for some non-Latios structures on Sand to work. It’s a lot about shuffling the looks you give and compositions that can work. These type of simple shifts within the archetype are how the tier is evolving right now anyway.