CAP 21 CAP 21 - Part 1 - Concept Assessment

[YellowAdminSilver]

Well, I'll be completely honest. I haven't finished reading all of the posts above, but I wanna put this down before I forget.

I'm kinda surprised at the lack of what has been the go-to shit typing for over a decade now (or until Aurorus was released): Bug/Flying. I don't think I need to give any examples of shit Pokémon who share this typing. However, I think this is a good typing to exemplify both jas' and imanalt's questions. First of all, What are examples of Pokemon with "bad" typings that really fail to take advantage of the typings benefits? Unless you've been living under a rock for the past nineteen years, you know who these are. However, there's a real argument to be made for the strong points of this typing. The ones that immediately come to mind are its amazing 4x resistance to Fighting-type moves and its immunity to Ground type moves (and to a lesser extent, a 4x resistance to Grass-type moves), as well as immunities to Sticky Web, Spikes and Toxic Spikes. Offensively, the Flying type is a known commodity at this point, with Birdspam teams being ever-present back in early XY thanks to the Flying type only being resisted by three other types. On the other hand, the Bug type has decent coverage along with Flying, with only Steel-types resisting both, and the combination being resisted by only seven Pokémon in the top 49 of OU usage (by 1825 stats): Heatran, Skarmory, Excadrill, Thundurus, Magnezone, Diancie and Zapdos. Both types have really good STAB options: Hurricane has high BP and confusion chance, Acrobatics has high BP without an item and no recoil and Brave Bird has even higher BP. On the Bug side, Megahorn has high BP with no recoil and Bug Buzz hits through Substitute, while U-Turn is one of the best utility moves in the game for its ability to keep momentum. Also, the two types typically have access to some great moves, with Roost, Defog, Powder moves, Sticky Web, Tailwind and Quiver Dance immediately coming to mind.
So, why do these mons typically blow? First of all, the average BST for FE non-Mega Bug/Flying types is a whopping 437. Second, there's the issue of a 4x weakness to Rock, which also negates both the defensive attributes of the type (it's pretty hard to come in on resisted hits when simply coming in shaves off half of your health and most of the things you're trying to come in on have Rock coverage) and the utility of U-Turn (again, losing half your health by switching).

Now, for imanalt's question. I know there's no OU Pokémon with this typing, but I think we have a decently close comparison in Volcarona. The crippling 4x weakness to rock is there, exchanging the immunity to Ground for neutralities to Fire, Electric and Ice and a weakness to Water. Still, Volcarona has a lot of the positive traits mentioned above: access to reliable dual STABs with good coverage (even sometimes running Hurricane back in BW for Flying coverage), reliable recovery and an amazing boosting move in Quiver Dance. What separates Volcarona from stuff like Masquerain or Mothim that share the 4x Rock weakness and access to Quiver Dance along with a good offensive typing, as far as I can tell, is the BST.

Also, there's a good case to be made for Rotom-F, but I'm kinda short on time right now so that'll have to wait.

 

[Alfalfa]

Bug is the worst of all typings (unless you have a secondary Steel typing). Between its multitude of common weaknesses, and the number of typings that resist it, it is quite difficult for most Bug types, aside from those with a secondary Steel typing, to function effectively in OU. While Volcarona is an exception, it possesses a lot of firepower and a secondary Fire typing to back it up. However, I am most unsure that if we give this CAP a supposedly horrid typing, that it will be able to utilize its advantages in OU. However, if we are looking for supposed bad typings, looking a bug typing would be interest to look into. Something like Bug / Grass, Bug / Flying, or Bug / Dark would be interesting to look into (and for reference: Bug / Water and Bug / Ground are not that offensively, regardless of how much I want to explore them).

 

[NumberCruncher]

Well, I'll be completely honest. I haven't finished reading all of the posts above, but I wanna put this down before I forget.

I'm kinda surprised at the lack of what has been the go-to shit typing for over a decade now (or until Aurorus was released): Bug/Flying. I don't think I need to give any examples of shit Pokémon who share this typing. However, I think this is a good typing to exemplify both jas' and imanalt's questions. First of all, What are examples of Pokemon with "bad" typings that really fail to take advantage of the typings benefits? Unless you've been living under a rock for the past nineteen years, you know who these are. However, there's a real argument to be made for the strong points of this typing. The ones that immediately come to mind are its amazing 4x resistance to Fighting-type moves and its immunity to Ground type moves (and to a lesser extent, a 4x resistance to Grass-type moves), as well as immunities to Sticky Web, Spikes and Toxic Spikes. Offensively, the Flying type is a known commodity at this point, with Birdspam teams being ever-present back in early XY thanks to the Flying type only being resisted by three other types. On the other hand, the Bug type has decent coverage along with Flying, with only Steel-types resisting both, and the combination being resisted by only seven Pokémon in the top 49 of OU usage (by 1825 stats): Heatran, Skarmory, Excadrill, Thundurus, Magnezone, Diancie and Zapdos. Both types have really good STAB options: Hurricane has high BP and confusion chance, Acrobatics has high BP without an item and no recoil and Brave Bird has even higher BP. On the Bug side, Megahorn has high BP with no recoil and Bug Buzz hits through Substitute, while U-Turn is one of the best utility moves in the game for its ability to keep momentum. Also, the two types typically have access to some great moves, with Roost, Defog, Powder moves, Sticky Web, Tailwind and Quiver Dance immediately coming to mind.
So, why do these mons typically blow? First of all, the average BST for FE non-Mega Bug/Flying types is a whopping 437. Second, there's the issue of a 4x weakness to Rock, which also negates both the defensive attributes of the type (it's pretty hard to come in on resisted hits when simply coming in shaves off half of your health and most of the things you're trying to come in on have Rock coverage) and the utility of U-Turn (again, losing half your health by switching).

Now, for imanalt's question. I know there's no OU Pokémon with this typing, but I think we have a decently close comparison in Volcarona. The crippling 4x weakness to rock is there, exchanging the immunity to Ground for neutralities to Fire, Electric and Ice and a weakness to Water. Still, Volcarona has a lot of the positive traits mentioned above: access to reliable dual STABs with good coverage (even sometimes running Hurricane back in BW for Flying coverage), reliable recovery and an amazing boosting move in Quiver Dance. What separates Volcarona from stuff like Masquerain or Mothim that share the 4x Rock weakness and access to Quiver Dance along with a good offensive typing, as far as I can tell, is the BST.

Also, there's a good case to be made for Rotom-F, but I'm kinda short on time right now so that'll have to wait.

You forget that right up until ORAS came out, Mega Pinsir was a staple mega of OU. It's literally the perfect Bug/Flying. It has immense attack stats, had Close Combat and Earthquake to deal with all of its weaknesses, had pretty nice speed, and could sweep like nobody's business. The only reason Mega Pinsir isn't still everywhere is that it's a mega in a metagame with a very competitive mega slot (something this project can't fix), and Stealth Rock setters becoming far more prevalent (again, something this project can't fix).

Our Pokemon won't realistically be better than Mega Pinsir, and Bug/Flying is only a weakness for Pinsir because the format has shifted to where Bug/Flying simply can't compete with the hyper-efficient Rock setters in the tier.

 

[SotheBlacKnight]

Choo Choo, Here comes Bug Train!

Well, I'll be completely honest. I haven't finished reading all of the posts above, but I wanna put this down before I forget.

I'm kinda surprised at the lack of what has been the go-to shit typing for over a decade now (or until Aurorus was released): Bug/Flying. I don't think I need to give any examples of shit Pokémon who share this typing. However, I think this is a good typing to exemplify both jas' and imanalt's questions. First of all, What are examples of Pokemon with "bad" typings that really fail to take advantage of the typings benefits? Unless you've been living under a rock for the past nineteen years, you know who these are. However, there's a real argument to be made for the strong points of this typing. The ones that immediately come to mind are its amazing 4x resistance to Fighting-type moves and its immunity to Ground type moves (and to a lesser extent, a 4x resistance to Grass-type moves), as well as immunities to Spikes and Toxic Spikes. Offensively, the Flying type is a known commodity at this point, with Birdspam teams being ever-present back in early XY thanks to the Flying type only being resisted by three other types. On the other hand, the Bug type has decent coverage along with Flying, with only Steel-types resisting both, and the combination being resisted by only seven Pokémon in the top 49 of OU usage (by 1825 stats): Heatran, Skarmory, Excadrill, Thundurus, Magnezone, Diancie and Zapdos. Both types have really good STAB options: Hurricane has high BP and confusion chance, Acrobatics has high BP without an item and no recoil and Brave Bird has even higher BP. On the Bug side, Megahorn has high BP with no recoil and Bug Buzz hits through Substitute, while U-Turn is one of the best utility moves in the game for its ability to keep momentum. Also, the two types typically have access to some great moves, with Roost, Defog, Powder moves, Sticky Web, Tailwind and Quiver Dance immediately coming to mind.
So, why do these mons typically blow? First of all, the average BST for FE non-Mega Bug/Flying types is a whopping 437. Second, there's the issue of a 4x weakness to Rock, which also negates both the defensive attributes of the type (it's pretty hard to come in on resisted hits when simply coming in shaves off half of your health and most of the things you're trying to come in on have Rock coverage) and the utility of U-Turn (again, losing half your health by switching).

Now, for imanalt's question. I know there's no OU Pokémon with this typing, but I think we have a decently close comparison in Volcarona. The crippling 4x weakness to rock is there, exchanging the immunity to Ground for neutralities to Fire, Electric and Ice and a weakness to Water. Still, Volcarona has a lot of the positive traits mentioned above: access to reliable dual STABs with good coverage (even sometimes running Hurricane back in BW for Flying coverage), reliable recovery and an amazing boosting move in Quiver Dance. What separates Volcarona from stuff like Masquerain or Mothim that share the 4x Rock weakness and access to Quiver Dance along with a good offensive typing, as far as I can tell, is the BST.

Also, there's a good case to be made for Rotom-F, but I'm kinda short on time right now so that'll have to wait.

You seemed to be avoiding any mention of Mega-Pinsir, I wonder why? Though it never did care for it's bug typing but with that in mind.

Bug Types currently sit at the least numbered type in OU with only Scizor as it's representative. Defensively Bug is essentially a worse Flying type with similar but lesser resistances and a common weakness to fire, flying and rock (Fire and Flying are about as common as Ice and Electric though). Offensively Bug is uniquely able to hit both Psychic and Dark as well as Grass, all of which are fairly popular (all three totaling 21 out of 51 OU pokemon), however as of gen 6 bug is tied with grass for the most amount of resisted types at 7 (which includes 23 OU pokemon). Bugs do have some decent moves with powerful attacks such as Megahorn and Bug Buzz, and some unique utility moves such as U-Turn and Sticky Web and the untapped potential of Powder and Heal and Defend Order. Bugs also have a trend of having some the most unique and useful abilities in the game, such as Compound-Eyes, Tinted-Lens, Shield Dust and Overcoat.

What keeps most bugs from achieving high tier usage is that they are generally coupled with poor typings, stats, and movepools. A great example of this is Mega-Beedrill and Mega-Heracross. Mega-Beedrill has wonderful offensive stats and ability but is left unused thanks to a poor movepool and typing that can't seem to break through any counters and checks. Mega-Heracross has a great movepool and a very strong Attack stat but is left behind by it's poor speed tier and is very hurt by popular Bird Spamming. Other bugs like Mega-Pinsir and Scolipede don't use their Bug Stab to there fullest extent by either not needing it (Pinsir) or are used for other reasons (Scoilpede). Volcorona is a successful poke for the most part but it's role is mostly handled by Mega-Charizard Y and done better. As for the bugs that have the unique and potentially useful moves and abilities, such as Venomoth and Vivillion, they are held back by their atrocious stats and aren't able to be useful in OU.

Bugs do have the potential to become either threatening sweepers or even useful offensive/pure utility pokes with a array of rare and unique moves.

 

[YellowAdminSilver]

You forget that right up until ORAS came out, Mega Pinsir was a staple mega of OU.

You seemed to be avoiding any mention of Mega-Pinsir, I wonder why?

Guilty as charged. In all honesty, I forgot about Mega Pinsir to an extent, mainly because I've always thought of it as a Flying-type first and a Bug-type a distant second. Mega Pinsir doesn't really suffer from the 4x SR weakness as much as other Bug/Flyings do, mainly because it stays a pure Bug-type right until it can set up and sweep and doesn't come back out, afaik. Also, when is the last time you saw X-Scissor Mega Pinsir? MPinsir basically comes in, SDs if it can, spams Flying-type attacks and dies. I don't think the Bug typing comes into play too much.

But yeah, I can see where the issue lies. I think the best way to differentiate from Pinsir (if that is indeed the goal) would be to go special, which just gives us Volcarona B or Syclant. Still, I don't think that the analysis is wrong by any means, and it seems as good a point as any to generate some discussion.

Also, a support-oriented Bug could be viable I believe, and it could serve to explore an unexploited niche in OU as long as we don't make it part Steel and based around hazard control.

 

[NumberCruncher]

Also, when is the last time you saw X-Scissor Mega Pinsir? MPinsir basically comes in, SDs if it can, spams Flying-type attacks and dies. I don't think the Bug typing comes into play too much.

Very true statement. However, how do you propose to make a Bug/Flying actually use its Bug type moves? I'd argue even if you gave Mega CAP Attack Order and U-Turn, it probably wouldn't use either. U-Turn is terrible on a monster with 4x weakness to Stealth Rocks. Heck, the only Bug types that actually do use U-turn in pretty much any tier you care to check are the ones without Rock weaknesses or ones with Rapid Spin. Attack Order just suffers from being always worse as a spam move than Flying type moves except against Electric types and Rock types. That means in order to make a Bug/Flying use Attack Order, you need it to not have Earth or Fighting moves while also having some sort of out to Steel types, which means Fire moves. The problem is that Fire moves are also more spammable than Bug moves, which makes having that STAB even more questionable when you already have strong STAB from the Flying part of your typing, and presumably the strength to back it up.

So even the most spammable two Bug-type moves would probably not see play on a Bug/Flying type provided it didn't just have an awful movepool, which would make it unviable given how bad the typing also is.

 

[Alfalfa]

Very true statement. However, how do you propose to make a Bug/Flying actually use its Bug type moves? I'd argue even if you gave Mega CAP Attack Order and U-Turn, it probably wouldn't use either. U-Turn is terrible on a monster with 4x weakness to Stealth Rocks. Heck, the only Bug types that actually do use U-turn in pretty much any tier you care to check are the ones without Rock weaknesses or ones with Rapid Spin. Attack Order just suffers from being always worse as a spam move than Flying type moves except against Electric types and Rock types. That means in order to make a Bug/Flying use Attack Order, you need it to not have Earth or Fighting moves while also having some sort of out to Steel types, which means Fire moves. The problem is that Fire moves are also more spammable than Bug moves, which makes having that STAB even more questionable when you already have strong STAB from the Flying part of your typing, and presumably the strength to back it up.

So even the most spammable two Bug-type moves would probably not see play on a Bug/Flying type provided it didn't just have an awful movepool, which would make it unviable given how bad the typing also is.

And the purpose of this CAP is to explore a perceived bad typing. We should not shut ourselves off completely to Bug / Flying, even if it is not the most appealing typing to work with.

 

[snake]

Yanmega is probably the best example of a Bug/Flying Types that actually uses Bug-Type moves with other special moves like Air Slash, Shadow Ball, Giga Drain, and the like. Mega-Pinsir kinda just spams Aerialate Return and Quick attack. Yanmega has four problems though. First, it has no STAB with a Base Power over 90 (Bug Buzz). Air Slash is sitting at 75. All of its coverage moves do not exceed 80 (excluding Hyper Beam, Solar Beam, and Dream Eater), and do not provide it with amazing coverage. Second, its base 116 Special Attack and base 95 Speed stats are good, but not great. And the third, which ties into the second issue, is that it can circumvent only one of these issues at a time through its amazing two abilities: Tinted Lens, which patches up his Special Attack to a certain extent, and Speed Boost, which obviously boosts its speed. However, it can't run both at the same time. It has no boosting moves besides Tailwind with which to set up, while most other Bug/Flying mons have the coveted Quiver Dance. Ultimately, specially offensive Bug/Flying Types have most of these problems...except for one: Vivillon.

Vivillon has Compoundeyes Hurricane and Sleep Powder and Quiver Dance, and then has an extra coverage slot to boot. However, it has pretty mediocre stats, and has no recovery if it decides to run a coverage move, or no extra coverage if it decides to run Roost. Theoretically, it wants to Sleep Powder and then Quiver Dance, but it needs the speed to put something to sleep without dying. It's a vicious cycle for Pokemon 666.

Every other Specially Offensive Bug/Flying has mediocre base stats, lower powered moves, and awesome abilities that can't have effect at the same time. They mostly have access to Quiver Dance, but they have bad bulk to actually set up with it and cannot sacrifice the coverage slot for Roost. They also have to run Life Orb to get a decent damage output.

I know my posts are kind of badly organized, but I hope you get my point. Bug/Flying might have a great physical attacker in Mega-Pinsir, but lacks a good special Bug/Flying type. Not trying to poll jump, but I'm pointing out the facts.

 

[LightningLord2]

If we are to focus on the strengths of a mediocre/bad typing, we should be focusing on either making use of a poorly distributed STAB that's really strong or let it wall certain threats with a unique set of resistances and the right STAB to hit it with. A support move that belongs to the type can also be run by a Pokémon with a different typing (such as Quiver Dance Lilligant) to its full effect. We need to focus on traits that are directly tied to the type.

I agree on a Bug Type being focused on offense - Bug as a defensive typing is almost entirely outclassed by Flying, having the same Stealth Rock weakness, two equally common remaining weakness and resists exactly the same types Flying does, except Flying is immune to Ground rather than resisting it and Flying also resists Bug. Not to mention Roost allowing you to remove your Electric and Ice weaknesses for one turn. The only real advantage it has is that you can't strip Bug-Types of their Ground resistance.

 

[snake]

Just be aware, that if you want to run a Bug/Flying type, then you need to bear in mind that its pretty much guaranteed to run Flying STAB, and its certainly not guaranteed to run Bug attacks. Sure you can tailor make this CAP's movepool, but flying STAB is just so ridiculously good, so good in fact that its entirely viable as a mono attacking option, while Bug STAB is often something that you can "take or leave". Just mentioning this because if people want to hype up the "Bug" typing over anything else, you would be better served combining it with a typing that would be encouraged to run Bug STAB along side it, than picking a typing like water or flying, which are very strong on their own.

I still think that something combined with an Ice typing would work the best though, since you have a powerful offensive coverage option, with the (probable) defensive weaknesses that comes with it.

Something I forgot to mention in my post: Most of those specially oriented Bug/Flying Types run Bug STAB (Bug Buzz) because Air Slash (their normal secondary STAB, excluding Vivillon) has such poor base power for a usable STAB. Flinch chance is nice and all, but still.

Also, we have Scylant (Bug/Ice), which achieves to be both a fast special attacker and a mixed attacker.

 

[Minnakht]

Speaking of Bug types, I'd like to draw attention to two combinations using that type.

right now, there's all of one Bug/Electric Pokemon... line. One fully evolved one, anyway, namely Galvantula. It has only two weaknesses, Rock and Fire. It also has four resistances... and pretty terrible 70/60/60 bulk. I think a bulky Bug/Electric could be interesting, Bug covering Electric's sole Ground weakness at the cost of bringing its own.

The second, and arguably more interesting combination would be the currently nonexistent Bug/Psychic type combination. I've gone on for a while about Psychic earlier, and Bug is actually a rather convenient type for it - Psychic hits everything not Steel, Dark or Psychic at least neutrally, and fortunately enough, Bug hits Dark and Psychic SE. As a result, this combination could do well offensively against non-Steel types. It'd also have a double resistance to Fighting as Bug/Flying does, for all that's worth, and a Ground resistance.

It'd have six weaknesses in many popular offensive types like Dark, Fire and Flying (and Rock), though, so its statblock could work around its poor defenses. Magic Guard, fitting on a Psychic type, to avoid 25% from rocks and/or let it hold a Life Orb so that it hits hard on its plentiful neutral hits?

 

[KhosroTheGreat]

If we are talking about poor Bug typings, then surely the worst of them all is Bug/Grass?

With 4x weakness to the common Fire- and Flying-type moves in OU alongside U-turn and SR weaknesses, as well as weakness to Ice and Poison, Bug's already poor defensive credentials are made even worse by a secondary Grass typing, leading to this horrendously poor defensive typing. To its credit, the typing does have useful resistances to Ground, Water and Electric among others.

Leavanny, Parasect and Wormadam are the only mons to carry this typing, and all 3 are banished to obscurity in NU, despite Leavanny and Parasect carrying Sticky Web and Spore, respectively.

For a potential CAPmon with a Bug/Grass typing, I believe that, as with most poor defensive typings, it is necessary to either give it excellent offensive stats and good speed (see: Mega Pinsir) or to give it an excellent defensive ability to make up for it's poor typing and something for it to work with e.g. good moves, good offensive stats, good speed (see: Dry Skin Mollux, Mountaineer Syclant and Levitate Rotom-H). A Grass typing could potentially allow the CAP access to status moves such as Sleep Powder, Stun Spore and Spore, as well as a form of recovery through Horn Leech/Giga Drain, whilst a Bug typing could potentially mean that the CAP gets STAB U-turn (always useful).

The Bug/Grass typing is just an example, however, used to show my points.

 

[SotheBlacKnight]

I think that if are to concentrate on Bug then I'd say that possible type combinations we should consider are Bug/Poison, Bug/Rock, or Bug/Dark.

Bug/Poison is a common enough typing in the games but it's rarely used in higher tiers due to the general pokemons of that type being horrible. They generally have terrible stats and/or coverage moves. If given something like Earthquake and a good Attack stat you could have a pokemon rip through the tones of Psychic types in OU as well as the generally powerful (and annoying) Fairy types without fears of being stopped by all the Steel types.

Bug/Rock would be two very uncommon typings that have the potential to do major damage with the right moves and stats. There are Bug/Rocks already in existence but they're usually slow and bulky on a typing that is pretty poor defensively.

Bug/Dark is a bit different. Dark is actually doing pretty well in OU right now (Knock Off Spamming) but there is one aspect of this concept that I think can be addressed and that is: can a typing's potential also be making the best out of moves in that typing (logically)? Both types still have some interesting moves that can be put to good use if they were on a better poke: Parting Shot, Topsy-Turvy, Powder, etc. Because a type is more than it's type chart it's also the moves that can best put it to use.

As for Bug/Flying I don't think it's the way to go. Flying is already a huge success in OU and honestly Mega-Pinsir is the success story for that typing in my eyes anyways. Its advantage of x4 resistance to Fighting is also not worth noting anymore as Fightings are no longer as hot as they were in gen 5, with only four currently in OU and only two of them highly viable.

Bug/Psychic is a nice idea I admit, but there already exists Aurumoth. While I know that CAP projects really don't take previous CAPs into consideration I fear it would be a little too redundant if that's the path we went down.

 

[NumberCruncher]

Bug Types currently sit at the least numbered type in OU with only Scizor as it's representative.

That's a slightly misleading figure. While there is only one Bug classified as OU, there are plenty of Bug types classified as A- Rank or higher. If we're looking at either viability or percent usage, Ice trails Bug by a slight margin in unweighted usage, and Poison trails both when we take into account 1825 and over usage. I don't think I really need to go into why Ice doesn't see much play because much of what makes it mediocre is pretty apparent, and anything that isn't apparent at first glance has already been discussed, but Poison deserves a closer look.

Part of the biggest problem with Poison-types is that it only hits Grass and Fairy super-effectively, but many Grass-types in OU aren't actually weak to Poison, so that really limits it to just hitting Fairies. Most of the benefits Poison gets are shared with Steel outside of a neat resistance to Fighting, while Steel has a substantial edge when it comes to things it can do that Poison can't. Further, the most prominent Poison-type in the tier, Gengar, doesn't actually get this advantage become it's already a Ghost type.

The second problem with Poison-types is that because Poison really only serves one function as an offensive typing, namely knocking out the Fairy, you never really need to have multiple Pokemon using Poison-type attacks. It's not like Earth moves, which are good against Steel and Fire and Electric and even more than that as well. This is a problem, because plenty of good Pokemon actually get Poison-type moves. If your Hoopa-U already has Gunk Shot and you have even one Steel type attacker, you probably aren't that tempted to add a Poison-type offensive mon unless all three of the last Pokemon have a Fairy weakness.

These combined make it so that Poison really wants to be on a Defensive wall. Specifically a Special Wall, since Psyshock, Zen Headbutt and Earthquake are the three most common moves that are super effective against Poison, and you don't really want to get hit by those even with reliable bulk. Super effective special moves really only show up on Diancie, Kyurem-B, Alakazam and occasionally Gardevoir. Venusaur can wall from the special end, but it's susceptible to being walled, because Grass/Poison coverage is full of holes.

 

[HeaLnDeaL]

Just as a fair warning, this thread is not the typing discussion. We are not here to pick out the exact type of our CAP. Overly talking about very specific type combinations should be discouraged. Please, limit yourself to answering one of jas's most recent questions or making a point that correlates with one of them. Just as a refresher, they are as follows:

-What are examples of Pokemon with "bad" typings that really fail to take advantage of the typings benefits?

-What kinds of roles are these Pokemon fitting in, versus what kinds of roles mesh best with the advantages of their types?

-Is there a frequent trend in these kind of Pokemon (such as simply having bad stats, or having good offensive type on a defensive mon), or does it seem that the individual cases are frequently different?

Also, as a brief reminder, thread hogging is discouraged. We want people to reply, but addressing every few posts without adding to the progression of the conversation is not the goal here.

 

[Fire Blast]

Is there a frequent trend in these kind of Pokemon (such as simply having bad stats, or having good offensive type on a defensive mon), or does it seem that the individual cases are frequently different?

It seems like the main trend for these kind of typing is a mismatch between the desires of the typing and the stat distribution of the pokemon (which is probably the most obvious). Many of the things people are bringing up are how certain types are work well together offensively or defensively, but the Pokemon is not able to take advantage of this. For instance, Macargo doesn't have the speed or power to be a good attacker while Drapion doesn't have a good movepool or stats to be defensive. I think that we should try to look for more of these because they are likely to be our source of inspiration.

 

[jas61292]

As far as examples, we people have brought up a good number by this point. I think right now we can really focus less on the specifics, and more on the what the most common links between them are. I know there were a few People answering my last question, but I would just like to reiterate it here again: is there a frequent trend in these kind of Pokemon, preventing them from taking advantage of their typing, and if so, what is it?

In addition, I would like to just add in a few more question to discuss. While not explicitly what I had asked for (though he did clear it with me before posting), Imanalt's post did a good job giving an example of a Pokemon, Celebi, that has a typing that might, at first glace, be thought to be bad due to its traits. In actuality though, the Celebi is able to take advantage the advantages of its type, and be a good Pokemon because of it. Now, while he didn't explicitly mention this in his post, I think this specific example is even more fitting, because there is exactly one other Pokemon family with the Grass/Psychic typing, and its final form is not good in OU at all. If Celebi did not exist, it is very likely that Exeggutor might make people think of Grass/Psychic in the same way that something like Magcargo makes people think of Fire/Rock.

So, what I want to ask here is this:

In cases where a single example (or a few examples) of a good Pokemon exists with a typing that otherwise only has bad Pokemon, what separates the good Pokemon from its typing brethren? Remember, the differences are more important than the specific Pokemon examples.

More generally, do these differences seem to follow any sort of pattern, and what do they suggest about the kind of approach we should take to making such a typing good, regardless of which type we pick?

I don't know how much people will have to say on this, and I don't want this thread to drag on too long, so I'm going to go ahead and put a 24 hour warning on this thread. While we can establish a base of knowledge in this thread that will help us going forward, I believe for this project, much of our direction will depend on the typing we pick, and I don't want to go in circles here talking about hypothetical rather than getting to where we can make real decisions.

 

[Elite Lord Sigma]

Another example that works here is Steel/Ground, which also has exactly two fully evolved representatives. If Excadrill weren't such a terror in Gen V and a powerful offensive presence in Gen VI, it seems doubtful that Steel/Ground would be thought of as a very good typing by modern players. Steelix, despite outstanding physical bulk, lacks reliable recovery and has easily exploitable weaknesses thanks to its abysmal Speed and middling Attack. In contrast, Excadrill can serve as a Rapid Spinner and can make most spinblockers think twice about switching in with its powerful STAB moves and Mold Breaker. It also has good enough base Speed for it to be able to run Choice Scarf or utilize Sand Rush, allowing it to outrun the majority of the OU metagame.

Looking at Grass/Psychic and Steel/Ground together, the common link lies in how the "good" members have some combination of movepool, stats, and/or ability to compensate for the typing's limitations, while the "bad" members do not have a combination of attributes sufficient to make up for their typing's issues. Excadrill has excellent base Attack, two useful abilities, and a movepool that is just wide enough for it to be a successful Attacker despite Ground/Steel STAB having a few noticeable gaps in coverage (Talonflame, Zapdos, etc.), while Steelix's massive physical defense, solid ability options, and arguably superior movepool is let down by the mediocrity of its other stats, particularly atrocious base Speed, and a lack of reliable recovery to maximize its longevity. Celebi's good ability, well-balanced stat distribution, and access to a wide variety of attacking and supportive moves (Leaf Storm, Earth Power, Nasty Plot, Recover, Stealth Rock, etc.) more than make up for Grass/Psychic's high number of weaknesses, while Exeggutor exacerbates the typing's problems with a shallow movepool, low base Speed, and sun-dependent ability choices.

 

[Empress]

In cases where a single example (or a few examples) of a good Pokemon exists with a typing that otherwise only has bad Pokemon, what separates the good Pokemon from its typing brethren? Remember, the differences are more important than the specific Pokemon examples.
Perhaps unsurprisingly (and unfortunately, considering how simple it is), what separates good Pokemon from bad Pokemon of the same types may just be the combination of stats, ability, and movepool. These attributes also subsequently indicate what role a Pokemon performs best as. Going back to the Celebi vs. Exeggutor example, Celebi's stats and movepool better shape it for a role in the OU metagame. Down in NU, Exeggutor is relatively pigeonholed into an offensive role because of its raw Special Attack, poor bulk compared to Celebi, and lack of a good supportive movepool outside of Sleep Powder, so I wouldn't call it a stretch to say that Exeggutor would be doing the same thing in OU if it was viable here. Moreover, as Imanalt mentioned, Grass/Psychic is pretty poor offensively, as the combination hits few things super effectively and has a lot of mons resistant to it. That is also why a Grass/Psychic type would seem more suited for a defensive role, and Celebi has the stats and movepool to take far better advantage of its resistances than Exeggutor can. While it's not an excellent defensive typing, it's still deceptively decent.

Another comparison that came to mind is Tyranitar vs. Rhyperior, both of which share a Rock typing. (Note that in this paragraph, I'm talking specifically about Tyranitar's support set.) While the Rock typing can be considered poor defensively due to its five crippling weaknesses, several of which are prominent offensive typings in OU, it also possesses key resistances to Flying and Fire, both of which are also dominant offensive types. (Perhaps not as amazing as they once were, but still notable.) Both of these Pokemon can take advantage of that in OU by serving as hard-hitting tanks that can check the likes of Talonflame and Mega Charizard X. So why is Tyranitar A rank while Rhyperior ic C+ rank? Well, for a bunch of reasons. Obviously Sand Stream is one of them, helping Tyranitar support its teammates, inflict residual damage, and massively boost its special bulk. Even without Sand Stream, though, Tyranitar also possesses better stats and a better secondary typing to go with its stats. Its much better Special Defense than Rhyperior turns it into a fearsome mixed wall capable of taking on Life Orb Latios outside of sand, among other things. Its Dark typing, though it gives Tyranitar seven weaknesses, doesn't give it a 3x weakness to Grass- and Water-type moves; Rhyperior's Ground typing does, which severely hinders its walling alongside its poor Special Defense. Essentially, while the seemingly hindering Rock typings of Tyranitar and Rhyperior actually help them do their jobs, the combination of ability and stats gives Tyranitar a clear edge. In regards to what Jas said below, these help Tyranitar by letting it function as a mixed wall, while Rhyperior can't do any sort of special walling.

More generally, do these differences seem to follow any sort of pattern, and what do they suggest about the kind of approach we should take to making such a typing good, regardless of which type we pick?
When looking at the above two examples, we first have to make sure that we tailor CAP 21 to fit the role that works best alongside the typing we choose. After that, though, it's pretty simple; we subsequently need to give CAP 21 the ability, stats, and movepool that it needs to succeed in the role that we gave it. Doing it this way is basically a compromise of what the community wanted during Mollux. We're gonna make this CAP's typing its selling point and "fix" some of its shortcomings down the road.

 

[jas61292]

Ok.... so, I don't want to post too much here, but I really feel like we need to get away from the specific examples. We have had plenty of them now, but what we really need to do is, using those examples to help us, figure out any patterns or similarities that can help us decide on some sort of direction for the project. And when I say pattern, I don't simply mean saying that the "bad" Pokemon have worse stats, movepools, etc. than the good Pokemon. This is obviously the case, but that is not that helpful for our purposes. Of course we don't want to make a mon without the tools it needs.

What I'm talking more about is something like what Imanalt was saying with Celebi. I already talked about how that was an interesting example, but what is really nice about what he did was he talked about how, despite its weaknesses, Celebi can actually serve as a utility counter for a number of important Pokemon, such as Keldeo. Obviously Celebi has better stats and movepool and whatnot compared to Exeggutor, but stats and movepool only matter if they let you do something worthwhile. The differences here actually lets Celebi act as a sort of utility counter, which Exeggutor cannot do.

So, again, what I would like people to talk about for the remainder of this thread is not just the Pokemon that are bad vs good, but what the key differences are in what they actually do. if we can find patterns in that, then we can state those as our direction for the project.

 

[DetroitLolcat]

The most common roles of Pokemon with underrepresented typings are utility counter and revenge killer.

For example, mono-Electric and mono-Psychic are typings that don't have many important resistances and weaknesses to common moves such as Earthquake, U-Turn, and Crunch/Pursuit. Furthermore, mono-Electric is shut down by Ground, a type that's seen at least once on just about every competitive team. Psychic, on the other hand, has problems getting by Dark and Steel. However, Pokemon such as Mega Manectric and Mega Alakazam have the stats and movepool in order to serve as revenge killers. In fact, one could argue that typing is the least important aspect of a quality revenge killer, as their jobs are foremost to outpace and do moderate to severe damage to an opposing sweeper. Usually a revenge killer's role is to threaten to take out the last 60-70% of an opponent's HP, and that requires significant coverage moves much more so than STAB. The revenge killer's typing usually only matters insofar as its STAB and if a resistance lets it take one hit if it's forced into the role of late-game cleaner.

Many bulky tank Pokemon also can live with suboptimal typings. Mega Venusaur and Mew are common examples of this, as they both specifically counter one large subset of the metagame while being vulnerable to another large portion of it. Mew and Celebi specifically work here, as they provide tough stops to a lot of Fighting-type attack spammers and can even deal with Dark/Bug type counters by burning them before taking damage or Baton Passing away. Mew can stop numerous Choiced attackers and can burn its counters before they knock it out.Celebi hard coutners one of the best sweepers in the game and can avoid being punished for its weakness to Pursuit and U-Turn. The common thread here is that OU's current "Typing Underdogs" have the tools to abuse the resistances granted by their type while avoiding punishment for their weaknesses. Bulky tank-like Pokemon either need to have a way to stop enough of the metagame to justify the weaknesses of the typing or a method of countering common strategies employed by the types they're weak to.

I believe the best roles for a "Typing Underdog" are either revenge killer or support tank. Revenge killer is the easier role to fill, but if the goal is to play more towards the strengths and weaknesses of the typing then it makes sense to create a tank that can use its movepool to deal with its typing's shortcomings.

 

[Yiam]

I'm really really new to this, but I like to take Shaymin-S and compare it to every other Grass/Flying Pokémon. Hoppip, Skiploom, Jumpluff and, my favorite of the bunch, Tropius. Of course, we can go ahead and get rid of Hoppip and Skiploom.
The main pattern I see is, obviously, the major difference in stats. Tropius has a stat total of 460, Jumpluff has the same. Shaymin-S has a stat total of 600. This, of course doesn't mean that stats are all that matter, since Shaymin normal has the same stat total and is down in NU, together with Tropius and Jumpluff.
Shaymin-S works well as a revenge killer, with great speed and a high flinch chance with Air Slash due to its ability. With this, Shaymin-S has special utility which both Tropius and Jumpluff lack. Tropius has decent health and special defense, but that will never be enough to survive a quick Ice Beam, and it doesn't really have anything else to counter it. All it can do is hide behind a substitute and throw seeds around. Leech seeds. Jumpluff has speed, and works slighty similar to Shaymin-S but its abilities are lackluster and it doesn't have a way to quickly kill off enemies. Jumpluff uses its speed to use sleep powder ASAP mostly, so it doesn't work as a revenge killer. After that Jumpluff tries to boost its stats with sword dance or something of the sorts (swords), then throwing STABs around. Obviously not quite as effective.
So it seems Grass/Flying, despite its 4x weakness against Ice, does work but only in the case of a (fast) revenge killer, at least with existing examples. There are surely other ways to make this typing work...

This does line up with post 47 somewhat. Pattern? Illuminati confirmed.

 

[jas61292]

Ok, its been over 24 hours since I posted the warning, so it is time for me to wrap this up. I think the last few posts really hit on the kind of things that we wanted to get at, especially DetroitLolcat's post. What I believe we have established here is that utility counters and revenge killers are the two main roles in which we see Pokemon with undervalued types being successful. These roles work well because they either don't need you to have a type that can handle every pokemon of a specific role, or function more on not really getting hit in the first place, which makes up for a typings defensive downsides.

With this said, I would agree with what DLC said in his last paragraph: "Revenge killer is the easier role to fill, but if the goal is to play more towards the strengths and weaknesses of the typing then it makes sense to create a tank that can use its movepool to deal with its typing's shortcomings." Creating a revenge killer would be a fairly simple way to make a Pokemon with an undervalued typing be useful. However, I believe that with this concept, where the goal is more to play with, not around, the strengths and weaknesses of the typing, the utility counter route would be the best path for us to take.

So, moving forward, we should aim to work towards the goal of making some sort of utility counter. We won't be able to say exactly which Pokemon we are going to try and take on until we choose a typing, but we will need to focus on the ability to deal with a number of threats, despite being weak to a large number of others. Our aim should be to handle a specific set of Pokemon, and simply having enough tools to not be dead weight when not in a good matchup. We don't need to, and should not be aiming to negate the downsides of our type, but rather, we need to simply have ways to stay out of situations where those downsides can really cost the Pokemon.