CAP 35 - Part 5 - Defining Moves

[Imw0rstadP0keM0n]

I want to highlight Volt Switch and Teleport as two distinct options that should *both* be available on CAP 35.

Volt Switch offers heavy chip in conjunction with Electromorphosis, but gets bricked by Ground type switch-ins like Libra, GTusk, and Gliscor. Alternately, Teleport can't be bricked by most pokemon (Taunt being the exception obviously), but offers CAP 35s team no chip. U-Turn or Flip Turn should stay out of the picture, the former because its' unblockable and therefore less interesting designwise, and the latter because it punishes Ground types far too well (unless our attacking stats are abysmal, which they shouldn't be if we actually want to utilize our ability.) I don't think Parting Shot fits this concept super well though obviously its quite strong.

I'd really like to hear more about Thunder Cage, Soak, Leech Seed, Ice Coverage, Normal STABs like Blood Moon, and Hazard Removal

Thunder Cage

Thunder Cage is really cool, but I'm neither here nor there on it and wouldn't mind if it does or doesn't end up on CAP 35. I've seen good arguments both for an against this move, though I do think we should lean away from the argument of "We shouldn't include any legendary moves" both because we have a huge amount of power budget to use and the fact that that argument falls a little too close to "arguing for flavors' purpose" IMO.

As of my own thoughts, trapping is cool and underutilized, though there might be more fruit elsewhere. Thunder Cage helps us very little against two of our primary targets, Kitsunoh and Gholdengo. Furthermore, Thunder Cage does have a miss chance and doesn't have a paralyze chance unlike other special electric moves, which are both elements to consider. Still, Thunder Cage is uniquely powerful, helps us trap favorable matchups, and hits hard with Electromorphosis.

Soak

I actively dislike Soak. Soak is incredibly gimmicky, relies on on your opponent not knowing you have Soak, fails in its' function if your opponent has more than one ground/lightning immunity, and is often a waste of momentum. Stats show Soak is actively detrimental in most tiers even for Bellibolt, our example pokemon who uses it. Not even going to touch on how easy it is to use Tera to reverse surprise the Soak user. We'll need to rely on coverage or utility to make progress on Grounds, and this isn't it.

Leech Seed

I'd like Leech Seed a little more if most of our Grounds we'd like to seed weren't also rapid spinners. That being said, there is value in instantly recovering 12% and chipping most targets for 12%. There isn't really a great option to both block spin and EQ except for Air Balloon Gholdengo That being said, if we're forced to rely on Leech Seed for Recovery over a 50% move (moonlight etc) it'll significantly hurt our matchup into Necturna, Hatterene, and Oger-W.

In a way, utilizing Leech Seed as a mix-up against grounds is very interesting. On the one hand, it forces both you and your opponent into a mind-game (who needs to switch, can I afford to EQ, etc.). Leech Seed instantly adds a lot of very interesting synergies (ex. Moltres who can soak an EQ and attempt a burn on CAP 35s incoming ground). On the other hand Leech Seed makes CAP 35 much more polarizing.

I also want to add an addendum that we should avoid both trapping and leech seed. We really don't want a better version of randbats Tropius SubSeed.

Ice Coverage

BoltBeam is very dangerous to give a pokemon that's going to inherently be very bulky and capable of dishing out at least non-trivial amounts of damage with unboosted attacks. While it does instantly give us a better matchup into pokemon like Gliscor and Lando-T, I don't think this will end up healthy. If we end up going for "SE against ground type coverage" I think I honestly would prefer Water coverage, which lets us hit most ground types for 2x (including Libra) rather than some for 4x. Still. I think overall best option is utilizing other methods of making progress (Knock, Teleport, Paralysis,) over expanding coverage in general too much.

Blood Moon (and something like Boomburst by extension)- Normal STAB

We should be very careful not to make this "Electric type Ursaluna," and gifting out massive BP STABs is one of the things that will do that. Moves like Tera Blast, Hyper Voice, and Body Slam are perfectly fine.

Hazard Removal.

while I could see the value of a spinner/defogger that matches well into Gholdengo, I absolutely don't think its' a great idea to have a spinner/defogger that immensely struggles with the tiers' setters (ground types in general).

speaking of normal types...

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Pleasepleaseplease add Glare over Nuzzle. Glare gives us an immediate and powerful progress maker against Ground types--furthermore, one that doesn't eat our Electromorphosis boost. Nuzzle eating our boost makes this absolutely a non-option in my eyes.

 

[StarFalcon555]

Giving my thoughts on all of the moves SHSP laid out as well as a couple that have been suggested more recently:

Thunder Cage: I'm pretty mixed on this one ngl. While the trapping aspect is intriguing, as Ama stated earlier, I'm really not a fan of throwing signature moves on CAPs where the concept doesn't call for them. Additionally, I also worry that the combination of Thunder Cage and Electromorphosis would push us firmly in wallbreaker territory. Leaning towards not having this move currently.

Soak: Bellibolt already does the Electromorphosis + Soak combo well enough, so this avenue doesn't really feel that intriguing to explore. Pass.

Leech Seed: This is a much more intriguing way of beating Ground-types than Soak, but my main concern is how it compares to 50% recovery moves, which I feel are just a bit more reliable all around. I do like this move a lot though!

Ice Coverage: Okay, massive hot take here: I really don't like Ice coverage on CAP 35. There's been a trend lately of CAPs being overtuned to beat all of their checks and counters, resulting in an unbalanced final product. One of the main reasons Electric/Normal was chosen as our contradictory typing was that it causes us to struggle hardcore against Ground-types, and while I agree that we shouldn't be complete sitting ducks against all Ground-types, we should be able to be reliably countered by some of them, which Ice coverage doesn't allow for. If we really wanted a coverage type for Grounds, I would much rather prefer Grass coverage (Energy Ball, Grass Knot, Horn Leech), Psychic coverage (Psychic, Psychic Noise) or even Fighting coverage now that the Kyurem ban has been reversed (Focus Blast, Drain Punch). These types allow us to hit certain Ground-types (mainly Great Tusk, but also Ting-Lu and Equilibra depending on the move) while still ensuring we have two very good counters in Gliscor and Landorus-T. Even then, I would vastly prefer Leech Seed or even a powerful Normal STAB move as our way of handling Grounds. Speaking of which...

Normal STAB: I'm not keen on Blood Moon for the same reason as Thunder Cage (don't like giving out signature moves to CAPs willy nilly), but I wouldn't be opposed to something like Hyper Voice or even Boomburst as a way to hit Grounds. My favorite Normal STAB, though, is easily Body Slam. The combination of Discharge and Body Slam would make us an excellent paralysis spreader, which would be an extremely interesting route to work with. The one issue I see with this is that it could make the stats stage a little messy, but otherwise I'm a big fan of this move and think it should be discussed more.

Hazard Removal: While the idea of STAB Rapid Spin is kinda funny, I'm not really the biggest fan of this avenue. Just feels kind of unnecessary IMO, and another example of throwing tools on a CAP that it doesn't need. Pass.

Glare: I absolutely LOVE this move. I've already touched on how I think paralysis is one of the best avenues we can take for this CAP, and this is pretty much the best way to do. 100% accurate AND can hit Ground-types due to not being an Electric-type move?! Sign me up!

Teleport: This is a pretty interesting suggestion, but sadly, I don't think CAP 35 has the tools needed to use this move successfully. A huge part of why Clefable and the Slowtwins were such good Teleport spammers in Gen 8 OU was because of their Abilities: Magic Guard meant Clefable didn't have to get chipped when it came back out, and Regenerator rewarded the Slowtwins with free healing for using Teleport. Electromorphosis, though, actually has negative synergy with Teleport - since Teleport is a -6 priority move, we'll almost certainly be taking damage before using it, which means that we get a Charge only to switch out and lose it immediately after. If CAP 35 had any other Ability I would be all for this, but alas, Electromorphosis is just not the right tool to pair with it.

 

[Robraf]

I‘m actually making a separate post for this. I think Matcha Gotcha is a very intriguing avenue we could explore more. While moves such as Scald hit all ground types effectively Matcha Gotcha would be slightly worse as it can 1) miss and 2) inflict neutral damage to the likes of libra, threads, Lando-T and Gliscor. We would also do resisted damage against dragons like Pult, the ghosts with Dengo and Kitsunoh and the grass types Necturna/Rillaboom. With that being said I believe that Matcha Gotcha is a more reasonable Scald as it has it‘s benefits hitting a good portion of the ground types while simultaneously fishing for burns and recovering HP while still having the downsides with it’s accuracy and grass cocer overall being less effective. Additionally all of these effects also play into our ability Electromorphosis burning our targets allows us to take more hits and recovery plays into our longevity.

 

[CharSiuEmboar]

Does Double Shock have any interest for us, trading us into Pure Normal Type until switched?

I appreciate that the aim of 35 is to use a less typical typing and removing our typing does play against this somewhat, however, it is something that is only useable by something with Electric, and can be used to specifically bait in ground types, and therefore build momentum from expected counterplays.

I think Teleport still has it's uses and shouldn't be discounted Electromorphosis is not ideal usage. With Volt Switch, we are heavily penalised by a Ground switch in, we lose a turn, don't switch in, and likely get STAB Earth Power or EQ'd back. This therefore encourages us to be either somewhat faster, or hardlocked. With Teleport, we get the benefit of being able to either switch in our best counterplay with foreknowledge of the opponents state, and if need be end up taking a hit that otherwise might be intended for our own switch. Whether it's defining, I don't think so, but I believe Teleport has a use with 35 specifically to allow it to Slow Pivot at the same time as having normal priority. If we make a slow 35, however, Teleport loses further viability even though Volt Switch may exist.

 

[Pipotchi]

At the moment I'm anti-Thunder Cage. I don't think this move is a good choice because it leads to complications when it comes to stats and movepool. I strongly believe that this mon should at the least hit like a nuke on the level of Bellibolt when electromorphosis is active which was the reason for it to get this ability: that requires some level of Atk or Spa. I feel uncomfortable giving high spa to a trapper that can then eliminate non-ground midgrounds (Grass and Dragon types) so easily with terastalization + tera blast, especially when shrugging off a mid typing. If you were afraid of Water Bubble before because of being a supposed gateway to offensive terastalization, I think you should probably be anti-cage also.
Im thinking of mons like Kyurem, Raging Bolt, Miasmaw, Caribolt, as mons who might chance a switchin on for instance Electromorphosis Discharge but would be trapped and killed by Tera + Thunder Cage off of any usable SpA.

I already find the ground/non-ground matchup to be potentially very awkward and binary (either very scary or no threat at all) and I think Thunder Cage amplifies this to a point where the mon becomes awkward to land correctly. If you're thinking that Heatran is a decent example of a mon that has trapping + tera and isnt an issue- thats true, but my issue is more about landing nicely. I want to feel comfortable giving this tools to make small progress on ground types on switchin, high overall stats and compensate having a mid defensive typing, and the more pressuring its Electric options are the less we have the ability to give these tools. Having a really strong Thunder Cage but no ground matchup makes this a highly unreliable mon that also has kinda derailed from the concept of wall much further than Electromorphosis alone could take it.

I would be really happy if the electric choices were Thunderbolt and Volt Switch (and to a lesser extent ,Discharge or Parabolic Charge) to keep things on track, not to mention minimizing unnecessary signatures getting thrown around (seriously, I think having a signature ability is already quite a change in the metagame and would be enough), but I also haven't given Thunder Cage a huge amount of thought and considered every possible route- this is just my initial reaction. I guess the only move here that really needs to be used in calcs is Thunderbolt, and Parabolic Charge due to its healing percentages wrt HP value and trading against mons 1v1.

 

[FourEyesIsAFish]

For the folks who are scared of specific moves being "too strong," bear in mind that we've selected...

1. a mediocre typing
2. a wholly offensive ability that doesn't exactly help with our ability to wall (despite the fact that it rewards us for being a wall)
3. and we're selecting our move set now.

we really shouldn't be too conservative with our moveset, as we'll need to throw the rest of the power budget into our stats which could lead to CAP 35 being incredibly polarizing (or worse, outright unviable.)

Butting in a little late here, but my primary concern with the moveset is much less strength but rather making it function as just a bulky sweeper instead of a wall. That's especially a heavy concern given Electromorphosis + Electric Stab, and we very much don't want to just make Bellibolt 2.

Another thing I want to note in the beginning: our Electromorphosis Charge does not actually get wasted if CAP 35 uses a non-Electric move, which is a new change in Gen IX which I don't think most people know about.

With all of that said...

I'd like to start off by disagreeing with a lot of people here and say that actually Parabolic Charge is a very obvious "yes definitely" for the moveset. While I agree it's not that strong without boosting, I do want to remind people that Electromorphosis is an inbuilt boost basically every time you'd use Parabolic Charge that also boosts the HP you get back. In addition, Parabolic Charge's low base power might actually be an asset to keep CAP 35 a Wall without drifting into bulky sweeper syndrome.

While I understand the concern around it and have mixed feelings myself, I think Thunder Cage is an interesting move to consider. A trapping move would be a very good way of differentiating CAP 35 from Bellibolt while cementing its wall status. However, the main problem is Thunder Cage's base power, which is a bit too high for me to be fully comfortable approving it.

Thunder Cage does reflect my main philosophy for CAP 35's moveset: we should be leaning primarily into utility as opposed to raw power. Electroweb is an obvious choice of move there, as are Volt Switch and even potentially Nuzzle, which is here despite being a very weak physical attack due to being guarenteed paralysis. On the normal side, we have moves such as Fake Out, Covet, Bide (which is probably not good but would be REALLY funny), Bind, and Rapid Spin. I would especially like to highlight Rapid Spin, as it's extremely funny to have it be STAB. I'm not exactly sure what coverage moves we should have yet, but I think most of them also serving utility roles should be considered.

In terms of big stabs, I'm not sure if we should have some, but if we must I gotta suggest Discharge over Thunderbolt. I feel like the 30% paralysis chance trade off for 10 power would help sell the wall more, as well as Electromorphosis-charged Discharge being slightly less terrifying than charged Thunderbolt in a way I prefer. Double Shock is very interesting, but i'm worried it might end up too aggressive, especially if it's alongside Volt Switch. For Normal Stabs, I agree in considering Hyper Voice (especially since Electromorphosis can't affect it) but would also like to potentially suggest Hyper Fang for the flinch.

And now for the biggest, and I'd argue most important, section of the moveset for CAP 35: utility moves. This is gonna be long, so I'm gonna do bullet points for individual moves/move categories here.

• Thunder Wave: Gotta have either this or Nuzzle at least, possibly both depending on how the people are feeling. Thunder Wave is THE Electric status move, after all. Although, it does have competition...
• Soak: Agree with other people here in saying that it's too Bellibolt for my tastes.
• Leech Seed: Really like leech seed as a way of getting around grounds, even if it leaves us open to getting spinned.
• Defog: I'd rather have spin as our hazard removal option if we give one.
• Glare: YESSSSSSSS! Guarenteed paralysis? Check! Hits ground types? Check! Love it all around.
• Teleport: Interesting suggestion but not really sure what it would bring to CAP 35?
• Recover: Going into our recovery options, Recover is an old reliable for good reason. Very good candidate for our main recovery move, along with...
• Strength Sap: Strength Sap is less reliable than Recover, but that attack drop is VERY nice to have on a wall. A very good option to at least consider.
• Slack Off: For all intents and purposes, this is identical to Recover. Which one we choose doesn't really matter unless we choose both.
• Rest: Our overall "worst" recovery option, Rest is still pretty good, especially with Snore and Sleep Talk. I generally prefer our other recovery options though.
• Encore: Part of the typical mon shutdown package, might be a good idea to have here.
• Magnet Rise: Hey, wanna say "no ground for u" for a few turns? This is another interesting pick on how to deal with grounds defensively while stalling out with other means.
• King's Shield: This is a very weird thing to pitch, and it might not even be a legal thing to pitch due to Aegislash's absence from Scarlet and Violet, but King's Shield is a very funny thing here. Protect that lowers Attack on contact would let us be a brutal physical wall. As a note on legality, while King's Shield can't be selected its description is intact, which was the case for other signature moves who were unusable due to their users not being in game at the time (Water Shuriken comes to mind).

 

[SHSP]

Thanks everyone for the amazing discussion this stage; I think this is one of the most interesting Defining Moves stages that I've been a part of. After discussing with the TLT for a while, I've come to a solid conclusion for our Defining Moves list:

Required: Electric STAB (Thunderbolt/Discharge), Normal STAB (Hyper Voice/Body Slam), 50% Recovery, Knock Off, Paralysis (Glare/Thunder Wave/Nuzzle)
Optional: Ice Coverage, Volt Switch, Super Fang

As for a little explanation: both STABs were more or less given as something we do need to consider during Stats proper. Discharge will almost surely be the Electric option of choice, but Normal moves had a lot of discussion around Body Slam as a potential option, so I wanted to consider that as a STAB option as well. Recovery was well supported, as was Knock, both of them fitting our presumptive role extremely well. Paralysis is already going to be a large element of CAP 35 considering Discharge, so the big question was surrounding Glare, which had a great deal of support behind it in thread.

With the optional list, Super Fang was one of the immediate standouts of this stage, but fits better as something to add to and not something to absolutely require. Volt Switch is important to consider, especially with Electromorphosis, and fits potential roles really well for us, but it could compete with other Electric options and shouldn't be made mandatory. Ice Coverage in various levels- Ice Beam, Aurora Beam, or even Ice Spinner- all had some solid support behind them, and in general this is the strongest coverage we want to consider with our stats compared to a Surf or a Grass Knot.

Thunder Cage had support, but it also had a great deal of opposition that few other options in contention had. I felt as though to include a strong, role-warping signature move on the list, it would need to have more widespread approval and focus behind it. Removal has been considered more of something for CAP 35 to do, and not something that we need to be specifically built around, making it not particularly defining as we move ahead. Soak and Leech were similarly not super defining or impactful.

With that being said, I'm excited to hand it over to mad scientist Brambane for the start of stats!