CAP 16 CAP 5 - Final Product

[ElectivireRocks]

It's kind of funny how Malaconda ended up becoming a great addition to rain teams despite all the effort to prevent exactly that.
In fact, I think Malaconda is more useful to rain teams than sun teams since they have trouble against Heatran and Malaconda only compounds that weakness.
Ironically non-specs Heatran is walled by Malaconda in the rain, which is extremely useful if you carry pokemon such as Scizor in your rain team.

Malaconda is definitely going to increase the usage of anything that learns U-Turn, its main weakness. But lower the usage of rain teams? Not by a long shot.

 

[Brambane]

Okay, no offense to C&P, but Malaconda's movepool is really ugly from a flavor perspective. Competively its fine, but from an aesthetic standpoint it has a bunch of little things that make it look simply unrealistic for a Pokemon.

First and foremost, it's level up movepool consists entirely of attack moves. There is not a single Pokemon outside of Unown that gets only attacking moves via level up. Even Rampardos, who's very concept is all-out-attacking, gets non-attacking moves. So having Malaconda not have a single non-attacking move is both unrealistic and rather unattractive. Think of a new player looking at the CAPs and seeing that. We should make our Pokemon look realistic to the general public by correctly emulating standards set by real Pokemon. Having a level up movepool of all attacking moves is not a standard.

But the weirdest thing is it learns Crunch but doesn't learn Bite! Having a Dark-type that learns one but not the other... that just makes no sense! While I believe there are some moves it should have learned, the only one I feel that should be added "post-mortem" is Bite just because it looks so unrealistic without Bite. We can say we didn't give a snake Coil for competitive reasons, but how do we justify not giving it Bite when it has Crunch? That's a really tough sell.

As such, I moved around the movepool as a suggestion of how to make it look more realistic. With the exception of replacing Vine Whip with Bite, the moves it learns are exactly the same. The only difference is how it learns them. This isn't meant to be an attack on the creator, it just is to make Malaconda look more realistic on the outside.

movepool suggestion

Level Up:

1 - Rapid Spin
1 - Bite
1 - Wrap
6 - Wrap
10 - Pursuit
15 - Grass Knot
19 - Taunt
25 - Slam
30 - Scary Face
36 - Crunch
41 - Sweet Scent
46 - Wring Out
52 - Sucker Punch
57 - Power Whip
66 - Punishment

TMs/HMs:

TM05 Roar
TM06 Toxic
TM10 Hidden Power
TM11 Sunny Day
TM12 Taunt
TM15 Hyper Beam
TM17 Protect
TM21 Frustration
TM22 SolarBeam
TM27 Return
TM32 Double Team
TM42 Facade
TM44 Rest
TM45 Attract
TM46 Thief
TM48 Round
TM53 Energy Ball
TM66 Payback
TM67 Retaliate
TM68 Giga Impact
TM82 Dragon Tail
TM86 Grass Knot
TM87 Swagger
TM89 U-turn
TM90 Substitute
TM93 Wild Charge
TM95 Snarl
HM01 Cut
HM04 Strength

Tutor:

Bind
Dark Pulse
Foul Play
Giga Drain
Heal Bell
Iron Tail
Knock Off
Seed Bomb
Sleep Talk
Snore
Spite
Synthesis
Worry Seed

Egg Groups: Grass/Dragon

Aromatherapy
Beat Up
Glare
Haze
Leaf Blade
Night Slash
Poison Powder
Screech
Stun Spore

edit: well that would explain it Nyktos lol

 

[Nyktos]

Sucker Punch isn't a move tutor this generation...

 

[Deck Knight]

Hey man I tried submitting a movepool that had some kind of aesthetic and function to it, but it lost - and we really have no way of enforcing that unless we want to hammer Movepool Submissions as much as we did Name Submissions with endless rules "your movepool must have x non-damaging moves" etc.

 

[CiteAndPrune]

No offense taken, and admittedly Bite slipped my mind when I was designing that movepoll. If I could change back one thing about that setup, I'd have removed one of the early level Dark STABs, rearranged the rest, and given it Bite somewhere.

On the other hand, giving Malaconda only damaging moves was a conscious design decision on my end. Maybe it was unrealistic flavor-wise - but the competitive reason I had in mind of keeping its support and disruptive options in other lists, like TMs, Tutors and Egg Moves, was worth the exchange in my eyes. Still, one learns something new every day.

I'm really interested in all the comments people are sharing. So far Malaconda sounds like it plays out the way I had hoped it would, including its built-in weaknesses in stats and moves (or the moves it lacks). If I had to choose one area where I think we could've done better though, I'd have revisited the Ability stage and opposed Harvest some more. Even with no boosting moves and no Baton Pass or Ingrain, Malaconda still finds a home as a Baton Pass recipient thanks to Harvest. Gimmicky, yes, but it actually wins fights! Still, I think we did well with what we had to work with, and this metagame overpreparing for Malaconda leads to some really novel and fun sets also on regular OU Pokemon. Can't wait for the playtest results and their answers now.

 

[Nglittleguy]

i dont think typing and speed make it viable in an environment with scizor, heatran, and fighting types

 

[ryan]

Just throwing it out there that a 4x weakness doesn't keep a Pokemon from being competitively viable (Landorus, Scizor, Gyarados, Celebi, Heatran, Volcarona all come to mind off the top of my head).

Anyways, cool CAP, and I'll be looking forward to trying it out~

 

[Objection]

On the other hand, giving Malaconda only damaging moves was a conscious design decision on my end. Maybe it was unrealistic flavor-wise - but the competitive reason I had in mind of keeping its support and disruptive options in other lists, like TMs, Tutors and Egg Moves, was worth the exchange in my eyes. Still, one learns something new every day.

Is there something special about level-up moves in general that makes them competitively better than tutors and TM moves? I'm asking because I don't understand what competitive reason there would be for putting moves in the TM list or tutor list but not the level-up list. Flavour reasons, sure, and I know how egg groups can make certain egg move combos illegal so there's that, but I don't get what competitive difference it makes whether Malaconda gets Taunt via TM or level-up. Am I missing something horribly obvious here?

 

[Honus]

Just throwing it out there that a 4x weakness doesn't keep a Pokemon from being competitively viable (Landorus, Scizor, Gyarados, Celebi, Heatran, Volcarona all come to mind off the top of my head).

Anyways, cool CAP, and I'll be looking forward to trying it out~

It's not the 4x weakness, obviously you can switch when Scizor comes in but nglittleguy definitely makes a good point, this thing loses to the mons he mentioned all of which are common OU types; as a special wall it's decently bulky but I think it's outclassed by Celebi given PSong, Natural Cure and a resistance to Landorus Focus Blast, among other things [though it does have its advantages which I listed later in the post], the CAP Pokemon Necturna is probably a lot better choice too since it gives a spinblocker which is a staple on defense/balance and still has nice specially defensive bulk.

---
Honestly, if this thing is supposed, if it's supposed to discourage Steel/Fighting/Fire usage well it's not doing a very good job lol, this Poke definitely isn't dominant enough that I start using grass or ice types to counter it when I can just put a consistently good poke like SpD Heatran on my team and then it's dealt with. I guess I can see merit in having it on Stall over Celebi since it does give rapid Spin and Aromatherapy but Synthesis and Harvest are kind of bad outside of sun/in general so it'd be more worth it to just fill 2 slots with Starmie/Celebi. It's supposed to be good on sun teams but it has like 0 offensive presence so I guess it would only be good on something like sun stall. In all honesty I don't think this poke would be OU if it actually existed.

I actually read a few posts from the typing poll archive to educate myself on the process and subject and I think Meru made a good post http://www.smogon.com/forums/showpost.php?p=4586914&postcount=118,

Malaconda should actually make an impact on the metagame to encourage different types; it certainly didn't make much of an impact in the inaugural playtest battle. It should cause problems for Dragon/Steel/Fighting etc so I actually have to bust out a Poison Type or Poison Type attack to get rid of it. I don't see it making much of an impact with 100 atk/55 spe offensively [especially on a sun team, where it's extremely hard to fit in since most high level sun teams carry Ninetales/Spinner//Chlorophyll, you could probably argue Trapper on that roster as well] and on defense while it has nice bulk and a decent typing on the specially defensive side, the fact that I have to rely on Syntehesis/Harvest to recover with it is pretty much the nail in the coffin, especially when there's Celebi with Recover and Amoongus with Regenerator to offer. Mollux and Necturna were fantastic caps and really fun to use but I'm not a fan of this guy.

 

[Ada]

If only the fruit on its tail were a peach instead...

but I guess this is also fine^^

 

[Bull of Heaven]

Honestly, if this thing is supposed, if it's supposed to discourage Steel/Fighting/Fire usage well it's not doing a very good job lol

It's supposed to discourage Steel and/or Dragon and/or Water. If only Water drops, it's still accomplished that half of its goal. In fact, it was designed to lose to Fire as part of the other half.

That said, a team with two Waters, two Dragons and a Steel is working fairly well for me so far, and not struggling at all against Malaconda.

 

[Quanyails]

Let's head back to here for what Malaconda's supposed to threaten and be threatened by. :)

For the typings shown and from what I have spectated, I think it accomplishes it. One of Malaconda's goals is to provide Sun teams an answer to Substitute + Calm Mind Latias, a pokemon they otherwise struggle against. I have not seen one in my spectating, though, though I have seen it walling and defeating Latios. Of course, all sorts of pokemon start carrying physical and Bug-type moves and teams try to specifically counter Malaconda, hence its supposed lesser viability during this playtest.

 

[dwarfstar]

It's worth pointing out that those goals are secondary to the primary goal of type equalization outlined in the concept.

Based on my experience, Malaconda's effectiveness at fulfilling the concept is not that great. I'm seeing a lot more Fire-types than before, which is good, but so far I haven't seen an appreciable decrease in the numbers of Water-types (Malaconda actually partners well with Tentacruel and Jellicent) or Steel-types (despite the increased numbers of Fire-types around) in the meta. Dragons seem to be about as common as before (maybe slightly less common, since fewer people are running Lati@s but I'm seeing more Salamence), and we've actually INCREASED the number of Fighting-types (Conkeldurr seems to be everywhere, and it was pretty uncommon before).
That said, we're on track with the secondary goal (helping sun's viability against rain and sand), and that's always good.

 

[Geodude6]

If Harvest and pinch berries interact the way I think they do, I have come up with something very evil...

 

[Shadowhand]

While I enjoyed the process, I do believe I have seen it used on more rain teams than sun, and the rain teams are often superior. The problem with rain is that when there is a good rain counter, rain teams will use it against their greatest weakness, other rain teams with the possibility of being better designed.

 

[vyomov]

The issue with Mala is random stuff has started running HP Bug which is quite irritating :(

 

[Nyktos]

While I enjoyed the process, I do believe I have seen it used on more rain teams than sun, and the rain teams are often superior. The problem with rain is that when there is a good rain counter, rain teams will use it against their greatest weakness, other rain teams with the possibility of being better designed.

Well, as someone who's been playing sun in the playtest, I am very happy that people are using Malaconda in rain, because Malaconda is practically worthless against me. Rain teams weakening their sun matchup in exchange for a better mirror match is good for sun. For that matter, I'm not even sure how Malaconda is good in rain mirrors. I haven't played it on a rain team so maybe I'm missing something, but the main thing that Malaconda does well on sun is switch into Politoed and then U-turn to Ninetales. On rain, you switch in on opposing Waters and...what, Glare something? I mean, that's fine, I guess, but Ferrothorn does learn Thunder Wave. If this weren't a CAP playtest where everyone wants to try out the new mon, I doubt rain would be running Malaconda very often.

By the way Malaconda is completely amazing in the sun vs. rain matchup and I basically never lose the weather war to rain. I never thought that playing sun I would be happy to see Politoed show up in Team Preview, but we've made it happen. It's a shame how weak it is vs. sand, though.

The issue with Mala is random stuff has started running HP Bug which is quite irritating :(

Related: please, please, people. Before you run HP Bug on something, do check that it doesn't learn Signal Beam.

 

[ElectivireRocks]

Well, as someone who's been playing sun in the playtest, I am very happy that people are using Malaconda in rain, because Malaconda is practically worthless against me.

Not really. Malaconda screws sun teams in two ways:
-it forces Venusaur to run Sludge Bomb (HP Fire will barely scratch it) to get past it, which kills its coverage. Oh, and don't even think to setup on Malaconda, because Foul Play will OHKO Venusaur after a Growth boost. Even if Malaconda doesn't run Foul Play it will paralyze it. The best Venusaur can do is Sleep Powder, assuming Malaconda doesn't have a Lum Berry.
-Malaconda can survive anything from Ninetales, even in the sun, making it Glare bait. Having your weather starter paralyzed for most of the match will put you to huge disadvantage against any other weather team.

In other words Malaconda cripples sun teams' weather starter AND their best sweeper. Therefore it can function as an anti-sun pokemon, which goes against its intended purpose.

As for Volcarona, Bug Buzz won't OHKO Malaconda at full health without LO or a Quiver Dance Boost. That's just how bulky Malaconda is.

 

[Yilx]

I've been running physical celebi and it's been great vs all these god damn snakes

i love ohkoing them with uturn as they switch in

 

[Nyktos]

Okay, fine, saying Malaconda is completely worthless against sun is an overstatement. That being said, I don't see how you can call something which can't do anything but spread paralysis (and can't do that effectively since it can't switch in on anything) an "anti-sun Pokémon".

 

[Deck Knight]

So apparently it took about 8 more CAPs but I finally got my "Para-busing Tank" concept through if the recent posts are any indication.

 

[ruga650]

Okay... I made this profile just to ask this... Why on earth does Malaconda, a clear snake Pokemon, not have Coil, a move made exclusively for ALL Snake Pokemon?

 

[Unoriginal Name]

Okay... I made this profile just to ask this... Why on earth does Malaconda, a clear snake Pokemon, not have Coil, a move made exclusively for ALL Snake Pokemon?

Because Coil was ruled too competitively strong, and would make Malaconda OP. Competitive balance >>>> flavour any day. We didn't want Mal to have stat boosting options outside of Harvest. For more info, check here.
Next time, ask in the Simple Questions Simple Answers.

Anyway, on-topic, Xatu (or maybe even Espeon) are surprisingly decent at handling Malaconda, unless it knows Substitute (which none except the SubGlare and Starf/pinch berry set carry that often) and has one set up. Knock that Glare back, switch out (U-Turn for Xatu!) on a predicted Crunch to Lucario or Cobalion or something, reak havok. That simple. 90% of Malaconda are destroyed by Xatu, and the rest are checked by Heatran, Breloom or (dare I say it) Cloyster. It may not seem so good at first, but try him; in conjunction with another Mal check, he's pretty good.

 

[alexwolf]

Not really. Malaconda screws sun teams in two ways:
-it forces Venusaur to run Sludge Bomb (HP Fire will barely scratch it) to get past it, which kills its coverage. Oh, and don't even think to setup on Malaconda, because Foul Play will OHKO Venusaur after a Growth boost. Even if Malaconda doesn't run Foul Play it will paralyze it. The best Venusaur can do is Sleep Powder, assuming Malaconda doesn't have a Lum Berry.
-Malaconda can survive anything from Ninetales, even in the sun, making it Glare bait. Having your weather starter paralyzed for most of the match will put you to huge disadvantage against any other weather team.

In other words Malaconda cripples sun teams' weather starter AND their best sweeper. Therefore it can function as an anti-sun pokemon, which goes against its intended purpose.

As for Volcarona, Bug Buzz won't OHKO Malaconda at full health without LO or a Quiver Dance Boost. That's just how bulky Malaconda is.

First, Venusaur run Sludge Bomb most of the time even before Malaconda. Second, no Venusaur should set-up on Malaconda. Third, Heatran, Landorus-T, Darmanitan, Dragonite, Sub Hydreigon, and many other common Pokemon on sun teams murder Malaconda, and Dugtrio can even kill it with Reversal at 1 HP (either if Dugtrio was at 1 HP before encountering Malaconda or if Malaconda lacks U-turn). This means that half the members of sun team straight up beat Malaconda (the Fire-type other than Ninetales, the physical Dragon, the SR setter(Dugtrio or Lando-T), Forretress, etc, etc) and Venusaur easily beats it at +2, which means that Malaconda only has a chance to be useful against a few sun members, such as Ninetales, Xatu, and any potential Lati@s. So Malaconda definitely struggles vs sun teams, and rain teams definitely become weaker vs sun teams when using Malaconda.

 

[Adtherens]

New chansey that ain't set up fodder...