CAP 21 CAP 21 - Part 2 - Typing Discussion

[mcFlareon]

Just throwing an idea when I hear "undervalued", I think of two of the poorest attacking types in the combination of Normal/Poison.

Sure attacking coverage is pretty horrible (Poison could be good for Fairies like Azumarill but Steel/Ghosts put an absolute stop). It would be interesting to explore other strengths of the type though, particularly resistances or whether it provides more supporting roles through movepool/ability to add to a few neat resists.

A few interesting things would be that it is immune to Ghost (a fairly spammable attacking type against Steels), resists Fairy attacks, Bug (U-turn), Grass, absorbs Toxic Spikes, throws accurate Toxic and can't be poisoned (which is always nice for a possible tank). The Fighting neutrality is a bit disappointing and it is weak to the common Ground and occasional Psychic type attacks.

A STAB boost for some interesting and useful Normal moves like Fake Out, Extremespeed, Boomburst and Explosion could also be interesting, even if they are not super effective the utility can be explored.

 

[HeaLnDeaL]

Seeing as imanalt has asked for typings that "are neither truly unsalvageable nor overly good" I think I'm going to try to scrape a bit above the bottom of the barrel and suggest Electric/Ghost. I don't think this is a perfect type, but I really don't think one has been suggested either.

1) Why is Electric/Ghost an undervalued typing?
-Currently only Rotom has this typing, and he is NU. Sure, he also has some bad stats holding him back, but currently one could say that his sole existence makes his typing under utilized.
-Electric/Ghost is weak to Ground-type moves, which are common. Knock Off and Dark-types are also a concern. Rotom has a Ground immunity and is still NU; if CAP21 is Electric/Ghost it will have more weaknesses than the NU Rotom.

2) Why is Electric/Ghost suitable for a Utility Tank?
-Electric/Ghost can deal with Flying types pretty well, with the exception of EQ Mega Pinsir.
-It has far more resistances that weaknesses, and only has to truly worry about Ground, Dark, and Ghost moves. Ground and Dark are somewhat common coverage moves but certainly there are a number of things that do not run them.
-Electric/Ghost resists Scizor lacking a Dark move, and can square off and take hits from fellow Electric types such as Raikou and Thundurus, both which lack a secondary stab (except for HP Flying in Thundurus's case, if that even counts).
-The offensive power of Electric gives the typing the potential to threaten out opposing waters.
-Being immune to fighting (and normal) also gives this typing some switch in possibilities.
-Electric/Ghost also stops spinners while strongly discouraging most Defoggers from coming in. Even the non-Flying type defoggers such as Latias fears the Ghost STAB. It seems to me that Electric/Ghost has a fair amount of switch in potential without being obviously good at the same time.

3) How does Electric/Ghost differentiate itself from Mega Sableye?
-Unlike Mega Sableye, Electric/Ghost has more potential to deal with Flying Spam and Talonflame.
-It is also neutral to Fairy, whereas Mega Sableye is weak to it. Mega Lopunny scores a super effective hit against Mega Sableye and resists both of Mega Sableye's STABs; this is not the case for Electric/Ghost.
-In general, Electric/Ghost has more offensive potential than Sableye. Overall, the typing traits are different enough to the point where each mon has different checks/counters.

 

[sparktrain]

I'll suggest Bug/Dragon as a potential typing. While it doesn't initially jump out as an obviously terrible typing, it's by no means a great typing, and still has enough drawbacks defensively to be considered an "undervalued" typing.

What are the drawbacks of Bug/Dragon?

The disadvantages of this typing are numerous and significant when analyzing its defensive potential. To start, it's weak to five types (Dragon, Fairy, Flying, Ice, and Rock). This notably makes it weak to Stealth Rock, which is unappealing for a Pokemon serving as a utility counter, and susceptible to several common attacking types. This typing can also be easily taken advantage of, as it's checked or countered by several common Mega Pokemon, including Diancie, Gardevoir, Altaria, and Zard X, not to mention other potent threats, such as Talonflame, Azumarill, Clefable, Tornadus-T, and many more.

Why is Bug/Dragon undervalued?

Despite the drawbacks mentioned above, the combination of Bug and Dragon still gives it a unique set of resistances to work with (Electric, Fighting, Grass, Ground, and Water). This typing gives it resistances to important STAB combinations, notably Water/Fighting (Keldeo), Electric/Water (Rotom-W), and Grass/Fighting (Breloom), so these are the Pokemon it would aim to take on. There's no way to draw a direct comparison, as this typing currently isn't seen in an existing Pokemon. However, it's necessary to consider the similarities of Bug/Dragon to the typings of Latios, Latias, Celebi, and Mega Venusaur, as they are quite comparable in terms of the Pokemon that Bug/Dragon aims to take on, therefore giving it stiff competition in this role.

How can Bug/Dragon differentiate itself from existing typings that serve a similar role?

There are a few key advantages that Bug/Dragon has over these typings that would justify its usage over these Pokemon. For one, this typing isn't weak to Bug or Dark, which leaves it much less susceptible to U-turn users, Pursuit trappers, and Knock Off users when compared to Latios, Latias, and Celebi. The neutrality to Psychic is also a decent bonus over Mega Venusaur's typing, leaving it less vulnerable to Mega Alakazam and Gothitelle. Another important trait Bug/Dragon has over all of the the previously mentioned Pokemon is that this typing isn't hit super effectively by any of Hoopa-U's STAB moves, or its common coverage barring HP Ice for that matter, meaning that a healthy Bug/Dragon mon can serve as a great check to it.

Overall, Bug/Dragon has a fair share of drawbacks when compared to existing typings that serve a similar role (mainly Dragon/Psychic, Psychic/Grass, and Grass/Poison), as its Stealth Rock weakness and susceptibility to very common and spammable attacking types in OU make it appear to be an initially unappealing defensive typing. However, the advantages provided by its Bug and its Dragon typing (two rather underutilized defensive typings) come together to form a typing that can differentiate itself from these existing typings, providing it with a unique niche for us to work with.

 

[Project_Mars]

Out of the types mentioned thus far, I really like Electric/Ghost and Rock/Poison with an honorable mention going to Ice/Grass and Poison/Fighting.

Electric/Ghost - The fact that it can scare out most Defoggers/Spinners is pretty neat, but there's the fact that it can also put a stop to flyspam and some of the more threatening water-types (especially Keldeo.)

Rock/Poison - Fits the Utility Role with the ability to absorb Toxic Spikes and is a pretty specialized counter for a few types of pokemon, but would definitely need to pick its battles carefully.

Ice/Grass - Has a couple of decent resistances and a cartload of weaknesses. May be workable though offensively.

Poison/Fighting - Absorbs Toxic Spikes, resists Stealth Rock and Knock Off are some pretty high points for this typing since it means it will have a slightly easier time coming in. It is pretty suited to scaring out most Fairies and Steel-types, while threatening some Grass-Types... But will probably struggle with some of the more common ones. On top of that there is Toxicroak, who does kind of fit the bill already.

Now I would like to Suggest Electric/Fighting as a choice. Plusses for the typing are:
- Resists Rock(Stealth Rock), Bug (U-Turn), Dark (Knock Off), and Steel.
- Deals Super Effective damage to Water, Flying, Ice, Steel, Rock, and Dark.
- Is immune to Paralysis

On the Negatives you have weaknesses to Ground, Psychic, and Fairy since the Electric typing cancels out Fighting's weakness to Flying. There are also two more slightly meta drawbacks: It probably doesnt really qualify for "undervalued typing" and the fact that Electric has few good physical moves and Fighting has few good Special moves.

Besides that there is a similar Rock/Fighting type combo that can deal with most common Fire-types fairly well at the cost of being weak to most of the common OU attack types. (weak to Water, Grass, Ground, Fighting, Steel, and Psychic.)

 

[Mikasa]

Gonna throw my suggestion:

- Grass/Ghost : IMO this is a great type for this concept because it both has very interesting resistances but at the same time it has some really harsh weaknesses, Water, Ground and Electric are all very useful resistances so is a Fighting Immunity but at the same time Fire, Ice, Dark, Flying and Ghost are some of the most common atacking moves on the tier, so we can easily agree it is not one of the good types, but by no means it's too bad that is unsalvageable, we also had two mons who had this type and tried to compete on OU but failed mostly due to bad status, I really feel we could make this type work and be a good check to some dangerous mons like Keldeo and Thundurus (their ice atacks are not too strong that a 2x SE hit will be dangerous enough).

Also offensively while Ghost has amazing coverage it lacks power on the moves and is not the kind of type who hits much for SE damage and with the best STAB being an 80 damage move (if our mon is phisycal it is even worse) it should not do that much damage unless we have very high offenses, while Grass has some powerful moves but the type is resisted by a lot of mons, meaning on the offensive side we have usable STABs but by no means too good ones. I dunno to me this seems like the perfect "meh" type for our concept.

 

[Alfalfa]

Rock / Fighting is an exceptional offensive typing, and there is not much that is undervalued about it. This also does not fit much of a utility counter, but more like an offensive Pokemon or revenge killer, which Terrakion already fulfills. Grass / Ghost really is not an undervalued typing because it is very solid defensively, and I fail to see how a utility counter version of a Grass / Ghost is going to be very different from a Gourgeist-L.

 

[WhiteDMist]

I'm going to list a couple more types before this thread closes.

Rock/Flying

Weak to: Rock, Steel, Electric, Ice, Water
Resists: Fire, Flying, Normal, Poison, Bug
Immune to: Ground

It was discussed in the CAP Room, though no one posted it. It's not a bottom of the barrel type, nor overly good either. It counters a very select group of Pokemon, namely Talonflame, Mega Charizard-Y, and Tornadus-T (plus Mega Beedrill), especially in Sandstorm. It also checks Garchomp, Mega Pinsir, unboosted Mega Charizard-X, and Mega Pidgeot (basically Fire, Flying, and Bug-types). This type fulfills a interesting role in stopping Flying-spam without being weak to Ground-type coverage. This typing is found on Mega- Aerodactly, who is used as an offensive check to these Pokemon; it'll be interesting to see the type in a more defensive utility role. Weaknesses are plenty, as many of the top Pokemon are Steel-types, and take little from its STABs; Mega Metagross, Mega Scizor, Bisharp, and Excadrill being super notable (the latter also makes use of Sand, likely outspeeding a CAP with this typing). Most of the top Pokemon may not enjoy taking a hit, but this typing also has trouble dealing with common Rock and Water moves. The typing doesn't quite check Fighting-types, which is a bit of a shame as they are quite common as coverage or STAB moves.

Fire/Psychic

Weak to: Ground, Rock, Dark, Ghost, Water
Resists: Fire, Psychic, Fighting, Steel, Fairy, Grass, Ice

Same as above, neither bottom of the barrel or overly good. Looking at the weaknesses, they are all extremely common as STAB or coverage, which is a big problem. At the same time, the wide array of useful resistances helps mitigate the defensive problems. This typing walls Clefable, Mew, Ferrothorn, Skarmory, Mega Venusaur, Celebi, Mega Medicham, Serperior, and Mega Gardevoir; basically stops all OU Grass-types, and handles Fairy-types except Azumarill, Mega Altaria, and Mega Diancie. Being immune to Burns is a useful side effect, making physical moves possible as well. It still has some problems due to common Ground and Dark coverage, and is fearful of Pursuit; at least it doesn't take full damage from Knock Off, though it still hurts. Being weak to Stealth Rock is also pretty irritating to handle, but it does mitigate the advantages of the typing as well. Heatran walls the STABs of this type as well, and Earth Power breaks what would otherwise be a stalemate. All the other Fighting-types has a second STAB or coverage move that threatens Fire/Psychic as well, so at best its a check to them. Victini also carries this typing, but is solely used for offense, so it'll be an new perspective on this typing as well.

 

[Mr Holiday]

Hrm.....Well, I guess I misinterpreted what y'all were looking for in "undervalued"...

So, let's try this: Grass/Ground. We only have one example of a Grass/Ground type, Torterra, and while it's certainly an ok Pokemon, I don't think anyone will disagree that it's not exactly a top OU threat. Grass/Ground has more weaknesses than resistances, being weak to Fire, Ice(X4), Flying and Bug, all of which are fairly common attacking types, particularly Fire and Ice. However, It's two resistances, to Ground and Rock, are interesting, as it mitigates the damage from Stealth rock, which is conducive to our utility counter concept, and gives it a respectable number of opportunities to switch in on things. Most teams carry at least a handful of ground and/or rock type attacks, and usually use them to nail specific threats on the enemies team; having a mon that resists both can nicely turn the tables on anyone trying to take advantage of the wide coverage Ground and Rock offer. And, we can't forget it's immunity to Electric types, which saves us from Thunder Wave and gives us another good opportunity to switch in. Offensively, Grass/Ground is a bit of an odd choice, as it's actually resisted by a pretty good number of Pokemon. However, most of these aren't competitively viable, or are rarely (or never) seen in OU. While it's true that most of the Pokemon that resist Grass/Ground could threaten our CAP in turn, I actually think this helps go toward the "bad, but not unsalvageable" premise. This thing has flaws. Pretty big flaws. But at the same time, it has ample opportunity to shine if it's used right. To me, it seems to hit everything we want: A poor but usable typing, while still maintaining potential as a utility counter.

As for other types that have been suggested: I love the idea of Bug/Dragon, but just going off what Imanalt, HealnDeal and others have said, I'm a bit uncertain about anything/Dragon. I mean, for a "bad but not unsalvageable" type, it's got an awful lot of useful resistances, and while it does, as Sparktrain mentioned, have a hefty number of weaknesses, it is not resisted by anything it's weak to, except Fairy types. Only 61 Pokemon resist Dragon/Bug, it has massive neutral coverage, and it can maim just about any Grass, Psychic, Dark, or Dragon type in meets. In my opinion, Bug/Dragon is a pretty decent, if not just plain good, type. Honestly, I would love to see a Bug/Dragon type, and I think it definitely deserves to be explored with a CAP...just not this CAP.

I'm actually a bit perplexed by Electric/Ghost. Sure, it's weak to Ground and almost certainly won't get Levitate. Sure, it's vulnerable to Dark type moves like Knock-Off, as well as Ghost Type moves. But, it also has 5 really useful resistances AND 2 immunities. Even if one of those immunities is to Normal type, it still has a grand total of 7 resistances and immunities, something just about any Pokemon would kill for. Additionally, Electric/Ghost has just ludicrous coverage: only 13 Pokemon resist it, only six if we just count fully evolved mons, and only two of those (Hydreigon and Krookodile) can really be considered threatening/ Give it Ice Beam, or hell, HP Ice, and it's good to go. I think what you said about Rotom is very telling: It' NU, but it has poor stats. I'd be willing to say that if you gave Rotom a better stat spread, you would find that Ghost/Electric is actually a very good type combo. Of course, I suppose the same could be said of any type combo, but that's neither here nor there.

I know i was against it earlier, but I'm actually starting to lean toward liking Poison/Rock. While it does have six resistances, two of those being to Normal and Poison, which are rarely seen offensively, kinda reduces it's defenses from "great" to just "good". Being 4X weak to Ground really hurts it, and weaknesses to Water, Psychic and, to a lesser extent, Steel makes it hard to switch in whenever you like. You have tough enough defenses that you can feel confidant switching in, but you can't just switch into anything, either. Offensively, Poison/Rock is good, but not great. There are an awful lot of things that resist it, many of which are rather common, so I don't think we have to worry about being to threatening. We can switch in on a lot of things and threaten them, but there are still plenty of things out there that our CAP wouldn't be able to handle without some coverage, which I think lends it well to the "Bad, but not unsalvageable" idea. I kinda like Fire/Rock for mostly the same reasons.

That's my two cents.

 

[Mikasa]

Rock / Fighting is an exceptional offensive typing, and there is not much that is undervalued about it. This also does not fit much of a utility counter, but more like an offensive Pokemon or revenge killer, which Terrakion already fulfills. Grass / Ghost really is not an undervalued typing because it is very solid defensively, and I fail to see how a utility counter version of a Grass / Ghost is going to be very different from a Gourgeist-L.

The deal with Grass/Ghost is that Grass itself is already almost perfect for our project of being a type that really has to pick its fights, Ghost just makes it even more apparently as it doesn't remove any of the major weaknesses of the Grass type (namely Ice, Fire and Flying) and also doesn't mess with the best resistances the type has (Water and Ground) it also adds a great immunity but two much worse weaknesses than the ones it had before (it trades bug, which is basically just U-turn, and poison weaknesses for Dark and Ghost).

While Ghost/Grass may not be what you guys are looking for I really fell like Grass/something is our best bet due to very nature of the Grass type itself, I dunno maybe Grass/Electric? Or is it too good? I dunno I just fell Grass/something is that good of an option.

 

[Korski]

I'm somewhat wary about choosing a typing that is weak to Ground or Rock. Ground is the most common coverage type in the game, with huge distribution and great super effective coverage. Something like Rock / Poison isn't going to be able to confidently switch into Mega Altaria, Dragonite, Charizard, Kyurem-Black, Diancie, or Gyarados because they often run Ground coverage, in addition to Azumarill, whose STAB Water attacks also hit for SE damage, or Clefable / Talonflame, who can still hit the CAP with status even though they can't damage it much directly (notice all the Fairy and Flying-types in that list). Unless we polljump into presuming Levitate, I don't see much positive in pursuing a MegaCAP that can only apprehensively check the majority of opponents that its STABs intend to threaten. Poison / Fighting is a somewhat better option, as the two STABs do a decent job of deterring each others' natural switch-ins, like Fairy and Steel-types. Ice / Steel is just awful and shouldn't be considered.

I think a Rock weakness is just terrible for utility Pokemon and for Mega Pokemon, and this CAP is going to be both. With the exception of Tornadus-T, which is an offensive pivot, every Rock-weak Pokemon in OU is either a sweeper or wallbreaker, and those that like to switch in and out all must run recovery moves (or Regenerator, in Tornados-T's case). A utility Pokemon should be able to switch in multiple times, and ideally shouldn't have to wait for Defog support to do so. We could certainly patch up a Rock weakness halfway with Regenerator or recovery or Magic Bounce or a hazard clearing move, but outside of extraordinary measures a Rock-weak MegaCAP is going to require above average team support and hazard control to function, which is asking too much for a utility Pokemon with suboptimal typing that is already competing for a teamslot with other Megas.

I agree with ginganinja's most recent post about choosing at least one generally effective offensive STAB so as to lower the pressure to run both STABs + coverage in order to not become a liability for its team. Doing this should open up more room for utility moves on a given moveset (so it can be reasonably considered a "utility Pokemon"), or at least not greatly cripple its offensive capabilities should it run two or more utility moves in lieu of coverage or secondary STAB. This is why I like Grass / Fairy, because Grass is a narrow attacking type and Fairy is a broad attacking type that can feasibly pick up some slack if the Grass STAB is left out in favor of an additional utility or coverage move.

I also believe Grass / Fairy does a better job at checking actual, individual Water and Ground-type targets than other typing suggestions fare against their own targets. Fairy's Bug and Dark resistances, combined with Grass's Ground resistance, allow the CAP to switch into any of Earthquake, Knock Off, or U-turn (neutral hit but low-BP) from Landorus-T. Depending on bulk, we can add Stone Edge to that list to make a highly reliable check. Grass's Water and Grass resistances combined with Fairy's Fighting resistance means the CAP can reliably switch into Keldeo, whose best options are Icy Wind and Hidden Power with good prediction, and Breloom, whose best option is Rock Tomb. Grass's Ground resistance combined with Fairy's Dragon immunity means the CAP can reliably switch into Garchomp (half of Garchomp do not run Fire Blast and Garchomp hates having to use Fire Blast anyway). A moveset that foregoes Grass STAB would still be able to take on these Pokemon all the same, while a moveset that keeps its Grass STAB but foregoes coverage would still be able to take on every Water and Ground-type in the tier, as well as a decent helping of Fighting and Dragon-types. Finally, a moveset with both STABs, coverage, and one utility move would potentially have very good offensive presence in the tier, possibly enough to justify using it as your team's Mega. The typing is not perfect, in fact it's quite mediocre overall when taking into account its common weaknesses to Fire, Flying, Ice, and Steel, terrible typing matchup vs. Fire, Steel, and Poison-types, weakness to common priority, and susceptibility to all forms of passive damage bar Leech Seed. However, the goal of the concept is to play to the typing's strengths and weaknesses, and with this typing it is crystal clear what those strengths (pivoting into Water, Ground, some Dragon, and some Fighting Pokes) and weaknesses (any Steel, Fire, or Poison type, especially Talonflame, Heatran, and Megagross) are.

 

[Imanalt]

Ok so after some discussion on irc, I've come to a conclusion on a very small slate. I had some trouble finding types that I thought were salvageable, while still being undervalued enough. Grass/Fairy for example would have been very good for making a utility counter... but fairy isn't undervalued in the slightest, and I have trouble with any dualtyping with it as an option for this. On the other end, a lot of typings felt like they didn't do well when I asked the basic question of "What good pokemon does this type beat on typing alone?" So I managed to come up with four typings that i think can pass both tests of sufficiently undervalued and still beating a good number of good pokemon. Those are: Rock / Flying, Grass / Ice, Dark / Fire, Rock / Poison. Pending Jas's potential +/- 1, this will be the slate.

 

[jas61292]

Before I say what I would like to do here, I just want to take a second to explain the kind of thought process I will be using any time I need to decide on a potential change to a slate. Slates for CAP polls are made up of options that recieved a certain level of both quality and quantity of support. The way I see it though, the section leader has already looked at that with regard to the options on the slate. My job as TL then is about making sure the concept is being held paramount with the selected options, and making sure that no such option is left behind. Therefore, I will only remove an option from the slate if I believe either that it is anti-concept, or that the arguments in favor of the option fail to address important issues with regard to the concept. On the other hand, I would only use a +1 to add an option to the slate if I believe the option is both well argued to the same extent as other slated options AND that the option had a good amount of support.

So, with that said, I will not be taking any action here. I do not believe that any of the options selected by Imanalt are too good to be considered undervalued, nor to weak to have such value. I do sort of wish that we had at least one more option on this slate, but I feel that looking at the thread, the only other typings to receive decent quality arguments lacked enough supporters to make it something I consider worth slating.