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And we're back for part two of our ability discussions! This is where we get to decide which, if any, ability we want to go along side our primary ability and shiny new set of stats. Once again, Pwnemon is the ability leader for CAP 6, and he will be posting shortly to get this discussion started.
We recently updated our rules about abilities; you can read about them here. In summary:
Custom abilities are banned
There are ability banlists for the different stages of ability discussion
Flavor abilities do not have any place in this thread. Do not bring up flavor reasoning.
The following abilities are banned from this discussion:
Air Lock
Bad Dreams
Color Change
Defeatist
Forecast
Illusion
Imposter
Moody
Multitype
Sand Veil
Shadow Tag
Slow Start
Snow Cloak
Teravolt
Truant
Turboblaze
Victory Star
Wonder Guard
Zen Mode
Arena Trap
Drizzle
Drought
Huge Power
Magic Bounce
Magic Guard
Prankster
Pure Power
Sand Stream
Serene Grace
Snow Warning
Speed Boost
Big Pecks
Friend Guard
Healer
Honey Gather
Illuminate
Pickup
Run Away
Telepathy
Be careful not to discuss any of these abilities. If you want to learn why they're banned from discussion, you can check out the Policy Review thread that created this list.
General Description: A good user of moves with effects not frequently used in the OU metagame.
Justification: There are many moves in Pokémon with great effects, but they often end up unused. Moves such as Gravity, Snatch, and Safeguard have potential in OU, but they are neglected for several reasons: the moves are apparently overshadowed, have poor distribution, or are inefficient compared to another strategy. This CAP uses a combination of typing, ability, and stats to make these underused moves not only feasible, but also capable.
Questions To Be Answered:
What mechanics of Pokémon determine how viable moves are?--not only the Pokémon's typing, stats, and ability, but also its interaction with playstyles and momentum.
What new strategies might emerge by giving a new OU Pokémon underused moves?
What challenges do Pokémon that use lesser-used moves face compared to ones that use a more standard moveset?
If the Pokémon has options of staple OU moves (high-powered STABs, offensive stat-boosting moves, reliable recovery, Substitute), will those moves be useful to it, even if it's specialized toward a separate and distinct strategy?
Can underused moves increase other underused moves' viabilities?
Can one user of a strategy unrecognized in a metagame massively influence a pre-existing playstyle?
Time to pick the other ability for our CAP! School's in session now, so I won't be writing out multiple-hour-long triple-proofread megaposts daily; I will try to post at least once a day but you might see a bit more "rawness" in it. Anyways...
We know a whole heck of a lot more specifics about our Pokemon than we did for the primary ability discussion, which allows for a much more... specific approach to this thread. HOWEVER, before I want to see arguments for any specific abilities, I think there are some questions about the role of the secondary ability in regards to our concept and our creation that need to be answered in a more general sense.
Very most importantly, how should the secondary ability interact with the counters list? The default for a secondary ability is that it does not beat any counters of the primary ability set. I'd like to stress that if no good arguments are put forth to the contrary, this is how we will proceed. However, I've seen arguments and speculation on IRC for many abilities which would force the opponent to potentially run two different CAP6 answers depending on its ability. The possibilities should we choose to go down this route are good and many, but more importantly we must first address why CAP6 needs such a strong attribute as having two different counters lists depending on ability. I am not saying I am strongly against such an ability; I am simply saying the community must decide.
Only once this question is answered can we really move on, so I'd like for everyone to discuss!
I am going to go ahead and say that with the winning stat spread, we absolutely cannot justify needing a strong secondary ability that radically alters the counters/checks lists for and against CAP 6. We can outspeed Scarf Magnezone by using a Jolly Nature, so, assuming any of Fire/Fighting/Ground coverage, Magnezone is a goner after the set-up (Even something as weak as Base 50 OHKOs 81% of the time, guaranteed after Rocks.)
This is besides the point that Scarf Magneton could easily just replace Scarf Magnezone... but anyway... no one wanted to listen to me about outspeeding Scarf Zone being futile and silly.
I'm really leaning towards offering a quite niche ability verging on NCA, at least when compared to what Intimidate does for CAP 6. It was the right ability. Let's keep it that way.
Just dropping in to remind people that you should be reading the ability leader Pwnemon's posts and discussing the points he asked about. Pwnemon specified that he wanted people to be talking about what we want out of an ability so that we can decide from what angle to go about this BEFORE people start suggesting specific abilities. From the looks of it the majority of people have completely ignored this. It is the ability leader's job to direct discussion, so please address his posts. Any posts that completely ignore the points the ability leader has asked us to talk about are not helping and may be moderated.
Edit: I went through and cleaned out most of this thread. There was really almost nothing addressing what Pwnemon asked about, so it makes more sense to just try and start fresh.
Birk-a-dit: We won't accept further posts that do not actively address Pwnemon's post. Expect to be moderated if you do not follow the rules. We do this for the sake of meaningful discussion; if you cannot follow the rules, you have nothing meaningful to contribute at this time.
Skarmory is the best counter to the CAP, which you forgot to mention. Phazes the CAP out, which is then unable to set up again with only 50% of its life at best (assuming no SR was up)
And regarding Pwnemon's question, i think that the secondary ability should keep the main answers to the CAP mostly untouched (Heatran, Metagross, Jirachi, Rotom-W, Skarmory), while it could take a few checks out of the equation as we already have a fuckton of them.
And it should definitely help the CAP get a more versatility on his Belly Drum set.
I think Pwnemon's main question in the kickoff post is really important, and I agree that our secondary ability should do its best to avoid interfering with the CAP's fairly small list of checks. Before we even get to the movepool, we're looking at Alakazam, Jolteon, Magnezone, and Choice Scarf users as the only reliable offensive responses to this CAP, which is already limiting to teambuilders (Zam/Jolt/Zone are not exactly high-OU or difficult to deal with via teammates). On the defensive side, none of the CAP's checks outside of Rotom-W, Rain Jirachi, and Heatran have much of anything to do when it comes to actually KOing this Poke. Those three are far from uncommon in OU, but I would like to point out that there are still only three of them. Taken all together, it looks as though strategy is going to trump teambuilding when it comes to eliminating CAP 6 over the course of a given battle. All in all, I am comfortable with the current list of checks at this point, which is bound to shrink even from where it is now when we potentially start adding priority moves and non-STAB attacks to the movepool. With such a specific list of counters, we should definitely not be requiring two of them per team just to adequately prepare for this one Pokemon.
I don't believe this CAP needs anything beyond what it already has to make Belly Drum work (besides moves, of course), so we would sort of be missing an opportunity here if we chose to come up with more ways to set up BD or sweep better with BD or whatever. We still have a concept, remember! In this stage, I would be very interested in discussing abilities that, while not as generically powerful as Intimidate, could boost CAP's potential in more specific ways to make use of other underused moves or strategies, which iirc was something we decided we wanted to do at the end of the concept assessments. Even if the secondary ability ends up being a niche option, it will be leaps and bounds more informative than something like Wonder Skin or Iron Fist.
I would like to start off by saying that I think the secondary ability should in fact cover a different list of Pokemon that potentially threaten CAP 6. What this does for us is that it makes CAP 6 a more versatile threat in the sense that, depending on its ability, it is dealt with very differently. If CAP 6 is harder to deal with, it's safe to conclude that CAP 6 has a higher chance at pulling off a sweep. If CAP 6 is going to be so one-dimensional to the extent that every team is going to carry that one Pokemon to shut it down, then that makes CAP 6 a lot more difficult to effectively use and, thus, walks the line of failure. CAP 6 needs this characteristic of versatility because not only will it provide additional setup opportunities, it prevents teams from slapping on this one solid counter to deal with CAP 6. Instead, teams now have to consider the different approaches one can take with CAP 6 and must compensate for that either by carrying Pokemon that handle the two different variations or building a team that can strategically handle CAP 6 as a whole.
I don't see how it's possible to suggest an ability that will improve other underused moves or strategies. We've devoted our focus to making Belly Drum work (our typing and statspread reflect this so far), so turning our attention to other uncommonly used things will distract us from what we want to initially accomplish and will likely suck anyway because we didn't prepare any reliable typing or statspread to significantly help them. We'd essentially be catering for two different concepts in one if we take that path as well. With that said, I still think there are abilities out there that can help CAP 6 succeed as a Belly Drummer that Intimidate fails to offer, and it's in our best interest to compensate for as much of Belly Drum's weaknesses as we possibly can if we wish to make this CAP successful.
If CAP 6 is going to be so one-dimensional to the extent that every team is going to carry that one Pokemon to shut it down, then that makes CAP 6 a lot more difficult to effectively use and, thus, walks the line of failure.
One dimensional set-up sweepers are never useful because they all have an obvious counter or two. Just like how SD Speed Boost Blaziken was useless because of Slowbro or Gyarados or Jellicent or Latias. I don't mean to be rude, but that's such a reductionist argument. Every Pokemon is different. This thing has 118 Base Speed and many chances to set up on physical attackers due to great bulk and immunity to a lot of residual damage. It's going to get some form of coverage for sure and possibly priority too. One set really CAN be good enough to be OU. One set can be good enough to be Uber, even.
The only reasoning I get from "we need to be more diverse" is that more diversity will make CAP 6 better. Well, yes. I agree. Obviously. But our goal is not to make CAP 6 the best Pokemon ever. Otherwise it'd have had higher speed, better all around bulk, etc. The goal is to fulfill the concept.
To answer Pwnemon's question, I would say that no, the ability should not change the list of Pokémon that counter CAP 6. This is for two reasons. The first is that the list of insurmountable counters as it is is fairly small. It's not necessarily a problem for it to be smaller, but CAP 6 is certainly reasonably capable of pulling off a sweep as-is. The second reason, though, is this: even if we do want to shrink the list of counters, there is no need to break the principle for secondary abilities when we can accomplish that just as well at the movepool stage. Such is the power granted by Belly Drum that almost any Pokémon can be OHKO'd given the appropriate coverage move, and addressing counters that way allows us to be much more "surgical" with picking and choosing what we want to cover than an ability is likely to be.
On the other hand, an ability that doesn't remove checks or counters is not very useful. Intimidate is about as good as you can get as far as an ability for aiding setup goes, so any usable secondary would have to be something that makes it easier to sweep once you've already set up, and that means removing checks. If we aren't going to go for an ability that removes checks (and we shouldn't) then there is no sense in giving it a competitive secondary at all. There's really no secondary that would be worth using over Intimidate that is weak enough to be allowed under the normal constraints for secondary abilities. As such, I prefer No Competitive Ability (or Ineffective or whatever it is now).
I'm actually gonna go ahead and agree with Fuzznip in that the secondary ability for this CAP should 'flirt' with the checks and/or counters a bit. Fuzz covered it pretty well, but I will say that I'd like a secondary ability with a niche over Intimidate. An ability that messes with checks to CAP 6 when it carries Intimidate would fill that criteria nicely. I don't really want a NCA because like other offensive Pokemon like Breloom and Gyarados, it could have an ability that is often preferred over its other ability, but the other ability still has a lot of potential and adds unpredictability to a rather predictable Pokemon (a Belly Drummer).
One dimensional set-up sweepers are never useful because they all have an obvious counter or two. Just like how SD Speed Boost Blaziken was useless because of Slowbro or Gyarados or Jellicent or Latias. I don't mean to be rude, but that's such a reductionist argument. Every Pokemon is different. This thing has 118 Base Speed and many chances to set up on physical attackers due to great bulk and immunity to a lot of residual damage. It's going to get some form of coverage for sure and possibly priority too. One set really CAN be good enough to be OU. One set can be good enough to be Uber, even.
The only reasoning I get from "we need to be more diverse" is that more diversity will make CAP 6 better. Well, yes. I agree. Obviously. But our goal is not to make CAP 6 the best Pokemon ever. Otherwise it'd have had higher speed, better all around bulk, etc. The goal is to fulfill the concept.
Does Blaziken shave off 50% of its health to sweep? Does it even need to Swords Dance? Does it have crap offensive typing? Does it have underwhelming STAB attacks?
Like you said, every Pokemon is different. We are dealing with something that solely relies on Belly Drum to do anything remotely significant, a boosting move that might not even work in practice. We need to take necessary measures to make CAP 6 a worthwhile sweeper that can actually do what it's intended to do. At the moment, this isn't completely the case.
Intimidate is obviously a great ability on this CAP because it aids setup, which is what we need. But what does it aid set up against? Physical attackers. So what about the whole slew of other Pokemon that don't fall under that category? You're limiting CAP 6 by making it set up against specific types of Pokemon. This is where the versatility I feel CAP 6 needs comes into play.
If we look back at our threats discussion, we concluded that CAP 6 threatens a handful of defensive Pokemon to which it will set up against. Can it? Nope. Hippowdon will Roar it, Ferrothorn will Leech Seed + Protect stall it, Celebi will Thunder Wave it, etcetc. It simply lacks the ability to do so. Intimidate helps offensively, but what helps defensively? This piece is missing and should be considered in my opinion. This is the versatility I'm pretty much talking about. I want CAP 6 to have different answers depending on what ability it selects and in turn have different setup opportunities depending on what ability it selects. It simply improves CAP 6's chances at pulling off Belly Drum and sweeping when you look at the bigger picture.
I'm sure there are suitable abilities that can help in this regard.
If we look back at our threats discussion, we concluded that CAP 6 threatens a handful of defensive Pokemon to which it will set up against. Can it? Nope. Hippowdon will Roar it, Ferrothorn will Leech Seed + Protect stall it, Celebi will Thunder Wave it, etcetc. It simply lacks the ability to do so. Intimidate helps offensively, but what helps defensively? This piece is missing and should be considered in my opinion. This is the versatility I'm pretty much talking about. I want CAP 6 to have different answers depending on what ability it selects and in turn have different setup opportunities depending on what ability it selects. It simply improves CAP 6's chances at pulling off Belly Drum and sweeping when you look at the bigger picture.
I was looking at the "Pokemon we want to Threaten" list and pretty much we've only been able to safely say we threaten Scizor and Blissey. If we even attempt to set up on anything else, they all have a way to deal with us. Defensive water types all almost do 50% damage with no investment in Scald, and there's always the burn chance. Ferrothorn and Celebi both have Leech Seed and T-Wave. Landy-T's carrying Superpower have close to no trouble dealing with it, with some luck involved on who wins. Donphan and Hippodown click Roar, Garchomp carries Fire Blast or Fire Fang and can do enough damage with it.
We seriously need an ability that can deal with these mon's we're supposed to threaten and do no such thing to. We're too weak to do anything at +0 (or -1 for that matter) and too frail at +6 to actually have the chance to attack. Intimidate only really threatens Scizor right now and slightly helps against Landorus-T. Our biggest concern is to find an ability to deal with the defensive side of the spectrum that won't break CAP6.
I can only agree with this.
Intimidate is a wonderful ability to set-up on offensive threats, but it does nothing against defensive ones. However, it's hard to find an option over Intimidate to help against stall without being borderline (I'm thinking about things like Magic Bounce, even if it won't be an option).
Belly Drum, by it's very nature, is very destructive against stall (because they don't hit hard, especially against this typing) but it needs to set-up first. So we want an ability which gives CAP options to set-up against defensive threats, without being too obnoxious (like, again, Magic Bounce or Water Absorb which surclasses Intimidate in most cases), which looks like Seed said : a great alternative, but still an alternative.
The biggest issue I see are statues. All of them are deadly and put a big stop to our sweep. I'd prefer something to deal with at least some of them.
However, I really don't think we need something to help to sweep harder. The only exception to this is Technician because it may bring some less seen moves to the light but I won't argue about it.
Anything that would help the CAP sweep better or help set up on defensive Pokemon would be a fair-game imo. OU has terrifying sweepers such as SD Lucario, offensive DD Gyarados in rain, and offensive Volcarona in sun, which all have similar power to a +6 CAP without needing to throw away 50% of their health. Furthermore, all of those Pokemon either have strong priority (Extremspeed), can outspeed many Choice Scarf users after a boost (Volcarona), or have the bulk after setting up to take some hits from a few Choice Scarf users (Gyarados). Not to mention that all of them have way more offensive presence before setting up, making it much easier for them to threaten the opponent offensively.
Out of those Pokemon that i mentioned, Volcarona and Gyarados have a certain degree of versatility thanks to their ability to run different boosting sets and two different abilities in Gyarados's case. Intimidate helps Gyarados setup easier against offensive teams and provides some team support as well, while Moxie is better against defensive teams. Lucario can beat some of its checks as well, with a few move changes on its standard set (Ice Punch / Crunch / Bullet Punch), but Lucario doesn't really need versatility as once the battlefield has been prepared for it (not hard to do), and it finds a set up chance, it is going to sweep even if the opponent knows exactly your set. However, this won't be true with the CAP, because at 38% life (SR and Belly Drum) you can never be unstoppable even if the proper preparations have been done. The Pokemon against which you set up can always choose to stay in and do 15-20% damage with its attack, leaving you as easy prey against priority and Choice Scarf users, as well as Pokemon that can take a hit at +6. Hell you can even get KOed by attacking a Rocky Helmet Garchomp or Ferrothorn at this point.
So, if those OU sweepers have some degree of versatility while not even needing to sacrifice 50% of their life to reach the level of power that the CAP has, i don't see why the CAP shouldn't. Especially when its offensive pressure at +0 is laughable and for this reason can't really threaten out any defensive Pokemon, not even those weak to its STABs, meaning that even the defensive Pokemon which can't do any damage to us can just status / Perish Song / Leech Seed / Whirlwind us.
The CAP has way too many checks after setting up right now, and has almost zero defensive Pokemon that it can setup on. We need to address either one of this problems right now with the pick of the secondary ability.
Both abilities grant a specific positive and a specific negative that are distinct from one another, and importantly, that both have their own individual merit on similar sets.
What am I looking for here? I'd like an ability that has triality with Weak Armour and Illusion, and ability which, when all three are combined, equally usable, thus reinforcing our CAP's teambuilding risk element, and forcing the user to choose wisely.
No Guard I really don't feel like repeating the arguments for (but to do it anyway, it's a lovely ability with a controllable side-effect which is unique in its applications so will almost always command a niche in the Pokemon's usage rather than the whole), and NCA because we don't necessarily *need* a third ability... but it would be nice for us to push the boundaries, as 'twere.
Direct quotes from what happened in CAP 4 last time after I had proposed NCA in the Second Ability Poll to ensure Weak Armor, the ideal choice, was actually used. Despite reasonable support, what ensued was quick, glib rejection from the TL because he wanted paired abilities that could pressure opponents different ways. This duality, to ensure more versatility and more teambuilding risk, by both having individual merits distinct from each other, eventually morphed into a triality. This process ended so horrifically that we entirely recodified how Abilities are done in Policy Review.
I do not mean to suggest that picking an additional ability, such as other popular options from the first poll, will break CAP 6 like No Guard and Illusion totally undermined Weak Armor (which isn't even mentioned on Aurumoth's on-site analysis...) EDIT: Nor do I mean to suggest that if NCA doesn't win, Pwnemon or capefeather would in anyway resemble that TL. People vote for abilities. These two only make the slates. What I do mean to say is that one ability is good enough. A lot of the time. Not just sometimes. OU has 50 Pokemon. 16 have only one ability (including Garchomp who can't use Sand Veil, and Volcarona, Heatran, and the Therians, whose DW abilities have not been released). 25 only use one ability, despite having multiple "options."
That amounts to 82% of OU using only 1 ability. The 9 that don't? Breloom, Conkeldurr, Gyarados, Infernape, Jellicent, Lucario, Salamence, Starmie, Vaporeon. In the cases of Infernape, Jellicent, and Lucario, the changed ability doesn't even affect all that much in terms of what they can switch into, what they beat, what they lose to, what they can set up on, etc. Only 6 things in OU have 2 diverse sets that change at least somewhat radically depending on which ability they use.
So, no. As the CAP 4 TL put it, "We don't necessarily *need* a [second] ability." And when in doubt, minimalism is better. I am advocating for NCA because that "additional teambuild risk" caused by a duality of abilities is a near occasion of unnecessary OPness. Why should a team need to carry two options against CAP 6 to cover against two radically different versions? It's not like you have to do this for almost anything else in OU depending on Ability.
Moves and EV Spreads are a different issue, so don't even think about bringing that up as a counterargument.[/quote]
The problem with CAP 6 that I'm seeing is that even with intimidate, CAP 6 will lose some HP even with the high def, and because it revolves around losing half of it's hp to begin with, every point counts. Also, during the turn CAP 6 sets up, the opponent will bring out the appropriate counter, which I am looking at Jolteon, heatran, and Alakazam. Jolteon and Heatran can take a +6 bullet punch, and finish off CAP 6 with a thunderbolt or flamethrower, and Alakazam with focus sash can finish off it with a focus blast or hidden power fire. I don't want to see a straight up counter to all of them, as it would make CAP 6 way, way to op, however I feel that at this point in time, intimidate isn't helping CAP 6 do it's job
I honestly feel as if we've already done our job with our CAP's role in terms of abilities. Intimidate is a good ability which will let us set up a sweep more easier than usual; Intimidate should certainly be the superior choice when choosing our CAP's ability during the playtest. That's not to say that our CAP can't have another competitive ability, but I'd prefer it if we choose an ability which has little impact on how our CAP functions and would only be used over Intimidate in very situational circumstances, akin to Infiltrator for Malaconda which was mainly used for Choice Band sets. The reasoning of "our CAP has an ability which helps it set up, how about giving it an ability which would let it sweep better" is a little bit contrived if you ask me. The stats were designed with Intimidate in mind and with the high speed of our CAP, it doesn't need any prompt to "sweep better". Abilities suggested in order to sweep better are either going too far to the point where they overshadow Intimidate, (Unburden, Iron Fist), or are nonsensical and damage the longevity of our CAP (Guts). I'm not discouraging an ability which would help you in sweeping; rather, I'm simply stating that there should not be a bias towards that option. Either way, the secondary ability should not outclass the first and should only be used for extremely specific reasons (once again, I refer back to Infiltrator Choice Band Malaconda).
I don't necessarily disagree with what has been said thus far about intimidate being good enough that this CAP doesn't need an amazing secondary ability, but there is a difference between non competitive and generally inferior.
E.g. unburden is clearly too strong on our CAP, but Rattled and Weak Armour provide much more mild speed boosts that are either dependent on the foes, or come with a price, making them generally inferior to intimidate in almost all situations, but providing a more risky option if you want gamble.
I think abilities like that are fine. Nothing project altering, but a little more punch, a little more speed or a little bit more resistance to being pushed out (soundproof) seem fine when you risk a harder time setting up. I want to see abilities like that.
Iron Fist treads the line a bit more by being both reliable and noticable, but is also probably not overly powerful.
I Guess that the summary of my point would be that there is a difference between noncompetitive abilities and mild-moderately competitive abilities, so I think we ALMOST need to decide right away what direction we are going before we narrow the slate. i.e. If we were to decide that we didn't want a truly competitive secondary ability, but abilities with mild competitive applications were okay, then we could still talk about a lot of abilities that aren't absolutely useless, as long as intimidate is almost always better
I'd agree with the sentiment that the secondary ability shouldn't interfere with the counters list, although I wouldn't mind seeing some of the less reliable checks or the list of Pokémon we can set up on affected. Ultimately, in comparison to the primary ability, the secondary ability really needs to be a niche option - possibly preferable for a particular team archetype, or for a team that struggles with a certain threat - and we're going to have a much harder time achieving that if we don't retain the same core set of counters.
I think the key question we need to be asking is, for most teams, will using the secondary ability cost more in giving up Intimidate than it gains? For example, any of the speed boosting abilities should probably be ruled out here, because the ability to outspeed Choice Scarf Pokémon at the expense of losing some safe switch-ins is more of a 50-50 trade-off than an outright loss. I'd be inclined to think that HP restoring abilities would largely fall into the same category as well, because there is a significant gain achieved by being able to restore HP without team support. A way to sum this up could be that any of the effects achieved by the abilities slated for the Primary Ability are probably of significant enough benefit that they don't belong in the Secondary Ability discussion.
The comparison to Infiltrator on Malaconda is a fairly solid one - I dislike NCA, because I think we can give a niche ability here that is competitively viable. However, whichever ability we pick should come at a greater cost (from the loss of Intimidate and/or side effects) than it does benefit for the vast majority of teams. An option I'd be intrigued to see discussed along these lines is Unaware. Since we've already ruled out an overly deep support movepool to avoid turning into a pivot, there is little risk that this will see CAP6 used as a wall and all of our counters (and most of our checks) remain that way, but there are a handful of fringe checks and Pokémon that otherwise wouldn't be threatened by CAP6 that turn into possible setup opportunities. However, in the process we lose some of our more secure setup opportunities, a greater loss than the possible opportunities granted by the ability. Other abilities that have been mentioned that would fit this sort of categorisation are Guts and Soundproof, neither of which grant tremendous advantages but allow a small number of checks to be better dealt with.
CAP 6's first ability is Intimidate. This means that, assuming it gets another ability, it will give away what ability it's carrying as soon as it switches in (unless the opponent is Metagross or something). This is a significant potential hindrance to the surprise value of having an effective secondary ability. At the very least, the opponent won't waste a turn guessing the ability wrong while CAP 6 drums up.
On the other hand, I'm not sure at this point of the soundness of the argument about defensive Pokemon. Sure, it has to compete with a few other OU sweepers, but none of the prominent ones have traits unique to them to help set up against defensive Pokemon. Does CAP 6 need this leg up on them? Of course, Substitute in particular is going to be worse for CAP 6 to use than for other Pokemon to use, but other than that, it seems like the threat of defensive Pokemon can be mitigated by fairly common moves on a set designed for it, even if we don't focus on the defensive threats with the abilities.
OK, I'm going to open up discussion to actual abilities now. Still, when you're bringing them up, I want you to do so in the context of what they do for the checks/counters list and why the CAP needs it.
Before you all rush off to post, though, I think that CAP6 having a secondary ability that affects is checks/counters list is an option that needs to really be explored. People haven't exactly been looking at it the right way. Aside from being fairly easily to actually play around strategically—it's not too hard to actually maneuver while playing to a point where cap6 can never set up on you—you can also just slap one of its handful of hard counters on your team and not worry about it at all. The point of giving cap6 an ability that affects its counters list is not that we are trying to remove them as counters (it'll still have counters depending on which ability it uses), it's to make it so you can't just slap a Jolteon or Ferrothorn on your team and say "done!" The reason we can't do this in movepool stage as well is because you have four moves, but only one ability (so you can't assemble an uncounterable pokemon with just ability stage, because again the point isn't to actually wholly remove them as counters).
So yeah, discuss actual abilities (and nca), and I'll be providing commentary on the ones that gain steam. Go!
CAP 6's first ability is Intimidate. This means that, assuming it gets another ability, it will give away what ability it's carrying as soon as it switches in (unless the opponent is Metagross or something). This is a significant potential hindrance to the surprise value of having an effective secondary ability. At the very least, the opponent won't waste a turn guessing the ability wrong while CAP 6 drums up.
On the other hand, I'm not sure at this point of the soundness of the argument about defensive Pokemon. Sure, it has to compete with a few other OU sweepers, but none of the prominent ones have traits unique to them to help set up against defensive Pokemon. Does CAP 6 need this leg up on them? Of course, Substitute in particular is going to be worse for CAP 6 to use than for other Pokemon to use, but other than that, it seems like the threat of defensive Pokemon can be mitigated by fairly common moves on a set designed for it, even if we don't focus on the defensive threats with the abilities.
Most dangerous OU sweepers force switches against defensive Pokemon with their offensive pressure. And good luck applying offensive pressure to defensive Pokemon with 93 base Attack.
Here are two proposals and the reasoning behind them:
Iron Fist
While the CAP will defitely have a lot of power after a boost, it is still going to have huge trouble with faster Pokemon and Choice Scarf users. Jolteon, Choice Scarf Keldeo, Choice Scarf Jirachi, Choice Scarf Thundurus-T, Choice Scarf Garchomp, Choice Scarf Landorus-T, Choice Scarf Politoed, Choice Scarf Heatran, Choice Scarf Scizor, Choice Scarf Starmie, Choice Scarf Infernape, Venusaur in sun, and Stoutland in sand will all be able to revenge kill the CAP. This is a really huge number of revenge killers, considering that almost any team is going to pack one of them, some of them even define entire playstyles (Venusaur on sun offense), and the CAP still has many more problems to deal with, such as priority users and Pokemon that wall it at +6. Bullet Punch seems as a very possible option for the CAP, and in my eyes is a must if we want the CAP to not suck against offensive teams, which often use multiple priority users that would otherwise make it impossible for the CAP to beat, in addition to Choice Scarf users that check it. Not to mention that assuming Bullet Punch with Iron Fist is not poll-jumping in practice, because if the majority of the community wants Iron Fist it also means that it would want Bullet Punch too, the basic reason to choose this ability in the first place. Here are the calcs that show how Iron Fist Bullet Punch helps against the aforementioned faster than the CAP Pokemon (+6 Atk, 252 Atk EVs, neutral nature):
vs
0 HP / 4 Def Jolteon: 68.63 - 80.81%
4 HP / 0 Def Keldeo: 41.66 - 49.07%
0 HP / 0 Def Jirachi: 36.07 - 42.81%
0 HP / 0 Def Thundurus-T: 55.18 - 65.21%
4 HP / 0 Def Garchomp: 72.06 - 84.91%
4 HP / 0 Def Landorus-T: 74.06 - 87.18%
4 HP / 0 Def Politoed: 48.44 - 57.45%
112 HP / 0 Def Heatran: 16.8 - 19.65%
0 HP / 0 Def Scizor: 43.77 - 51.95%
0 HP / 0 Def Starmie: 54.02 - 63.98%
0 HP / 0 Def Infernape: 55.97 - 65.87%
72 HP / 4 Def Venusaur: 90.28 - 106.26% -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock
0 HP / 0 Def Stoutland: 87.13 - 102.57% -- 93.75% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
vs
0 HP / 4 Def Jolteon: 83.02 - 97.41% -- 62.5% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
4 HP / 0 Def Keldeo: 50.3 - 59.25%
0 HP / 0 Def Jirachi: 43.69 - 51.61%
0 HP / 0 Def Thundurus-T: 66.88 - 78.92% -- 31.25% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
4 HP / 0 Def Garchomp: 87.43 - 103.07% -- 56.25% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
4 HP / 0 Def Landorus-T: 89.37 - 105.31% -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock
Of 'course Iron Fist boosts other moves the the CAP could potentially get (Drain Punch, Mach Punch, Meteor Mash), but those are not are such givens as Bullet Punch and the opinion differs about them, while most of the community seems to agree on Bullet Punch. For this reason i am not going to talk specifically about any of them, just keep in mind that they can potentially be boosted too. So basically, Iron Fist helps the CAP remedy its vulnerability against Choice Scarf users somewhat, while keeping the CAP's main source of power (Flying STABs) untouched, acting as a controllable power boost to only some of our weakest moves.
Motor Drive
Motor Drive helps the CAP set up on defensive threats, in contrary to Intimidate that helps more against offensive ones. Pokemon such as T-Wave Celebi, Volt Switch Forretress, and T-Wave Ferrothorn become set-up targets with Motor Drive, giving it more room for setting up against defensive teams. Contrary to popular belief, Motor Drive doesn't mess with our threatlist at all. Magnezone can still KO the CAP if it doesn't get a Fighting move:
252 SpA Magnezone Hidden Power Ice vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD (custom): 97-115 (40.24 - 47.71%) -- guaranteed OHKO after SR and Belly Drum
252 SpA Magnezone Hidden Power Fire vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD (custom): 194-230 (80.49 - 95.43%)
252+ SpA Choice Specs Magnezone Hidden Power Ice vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD (custom): 159-188 (65.97 - 78%)
252+ SpA Choice Specs Magnezone Flash Cannon vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD (custom): 136-161 (56.43 - 66.8%)
Same goes for Jolteon:
252 SpA Choice Specs Jolteon Hidden Power Ice vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD (custom): 130-153 (53.94 - 63.48%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Belly Drum
252 SpA Life Orb Jolteon Hidden Power Ice vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD (custom): 112-133 (46.47 - 55.18%) -- more than 50% chance to OHKO after Belly Drum and guaranteed OHKO after BD and SR
And other Electric-types such as Rotom-W and Thundurus-T make sort work of the CAP with Hydro Pump, Hidden Power Ice, or Focus Blast, meaning that the CAP can't setup on them.
So basically, Motor Drive helps cover the inability of the CAP to setup on defensive threats, giving it a unique niche over Intimidate, which would still be the superior choice, because of its much wider usefulness.
Wonder Skin is a good ability as well, but Fuzznip is going to support it greatly (i am sure of it), so there will be nothing left for me to say.
I'm going to heavily advocate for Wonder Skin because I think it's one of the abilities that can actually compete with Intimidate and not be completely overlooked to the extent it's never used.
From what I understand, the community generally believes that aiding set up is far more important than aiding a sweep. I mean, if Belly Drum can't even be set up in the first place, we have failed our concept at step 1. Intimidate did this for us, but not in the approach Wonder Skin does. Intimidate helps CAP 6 set up against more offensive-based teams as it provides switch-in opportunities against several physical attackers for CAP 6 to set up against. However, with Wonder Skin, CAP 6 has a better chance at Belly Drumming against teams that rely on defensive checks to prevent CAP 6 from setting up. So what this essentially means is that the user can select the ability of choice that fits better with their team as a whole. For instance, a team that has good wallbreakers would probably use Intimidate, but a team that excels in countering and weakening offensive threats are probably more inclined to using Wonder Skin.
With Wonder Skin, any non-damaging attack with an accuracy, which are most that CAP 6 will be susceptible to, are instantly shot down to a shaky 50% accurate answer to preventing CAP 6 from sweeping them. Even though it doesn't directly ignore them, putting the opponent in a position where he has to bank on a coinflip to stop CAP 6 is pretty good and definitely better than nothing. A sweeper that's chopping half its health off to sweep but can be severely crippled by these moves is pretty crappy, and Wonder Skin helps with this. What kind of moves am I talking about? Here's a quick list:
Leech Seed - Ferrothorn would have a harder time to Leech Seed + Protect stall CAP 6.
Taunt - Something like Sableye or other fast Taunt users can fail to stop CAP 6 from Belly Drumming.
Encore - The many Prankster Encore users could fail.
Trick - Relying on Tricking that Choice Specs to make CAP 6 less threatening? How about it misses instead as you get crushed by a +6 STAB attack?
Will-O-Wisp - From a 75% burn chance down to a 50% burn chance, odds of you coming out unscathed are no longer in your opponent's favour.
Thunder Wave - Dodging a Thunder Wave can be critical.
Spore/Sleep Powder - Makes Breloom and Venusaur think twice to sleep.
Whirlwind, Roar - Skarmory and Hippowdon are only half as good as they were as solid answers to phaze CAP 6 away.
I might have missed some more, but you get the point. Wonder Skin can provide some really cool utility and can potentially be a game-breaking ability. CAP 6 right now is so susceptible to the aforementioned moves, so having an ability to accommodate for that quite substantially is a major boon. It's far more different than Intimidate as it covers a whole other list of threats, making the two of them neither superior or inferior to one another. They're equally useful in their own ways.
Like I said in my previous post, we're supposed to be able to threaten out and set up against many defensive Pokemon, such as Celebi, Blissey, Ferrothorn, and Hippowdon, but we clearly cannot do so with the tools CAP 6 currently has. You can argue that CAP 6 can run Substitute or Taunt, but think about it. If you're going to tack on either of those moves, you're sacrificing valuable coverage for the off-chance at blocking some of these effects. In terms of Substitute, it doesn't block Encore, Taunt, Whirlwind, or Roar, and you're putting CAP 6 at a dangerously low HP stat at ~14% or so when all things are considered. Taunt is too risky to rely on as well in case of a misprediction. Wonder Skin just buffers you by 50% and you don't have to sacrifice coverage. I should note that Wonder Skin makes Skarmory 50% worse at being a solid check to CAP 6 as well, so we're not really significantly altering our list of counters because Skarmory can still technically counter you, albeit being half as good.
In general, Wonder Skin is probably one of the better abilities out there that can decently respond to the defensive spectrum of the metagame and the wide array of harmful effects being thrown about.
For those who want to set up on defensive threats that may use Thunder Wave or Leech Seed or Will-o-Wisp, may I present to you: Substitute.
Here's a hypothetical: Ferrothorn has just killed a teammate. You switch in CAP 6, take SR damage and intimidate Ferrothorn. It thinks this is a perfect opportunity to cripple you and is confused why you switched into it. It goes for the T-Wave/Leech Seed as you use Sub. You're still at 62.5% of your health, leaving you with enough to Belly Drum the next turn, behind a Sub. This then activates your Sitrus Berry, bringing you back up to 37.5% of health. Ferrothorn's Gyro Ball, if it even has it, has only a 0% chance to break your Sub, btw. You then can Acrobatics for the kill (leaving you with 25% health post Iron Barbs), still behind a Sub.
Do you give up coverage to run Sub? Sure. Do you give up potential item-based power to run Sitrus Berry? Sure. Do you utterly destroy the things you are so worried about even without needing to add an unnecessary ability? Yes. And I don't think anyone would call these unfair tradeoffs.
These concerns can be resolved at movepool if we so desire, in a much more controlled fashion. Since when are we desiring to maybe beat certain counters like Skarm based on hax? Everything that Wonder Skin "beats" potentially is better dealt with by just using Substitute on your moveset. It better deals with the things like Leech Seeds and T-Waves you might want to avoid while still not changing a thing about how Skarm beats us. Skarm should be a hard counter, always able to switch in on the Belly Drum and Whirlwind CAP 6 out without dying, even with Stealth Rock damage.
That's the easy argument against Wonder Skin. I might get around to Iron Fist and Motor Drive tomorrow, but I'd rather if someone else jumped in.
I think you miss the extremely obvious when it comes to Substitute. Unless it's Baton Passed, a setup now requires 75% of total health, and CAP6 is still likely to be crippled when the Substitute inevitably breaks. Leftovers isn't going to compensate for that, especially when hazards are up.
Then there's the coverage needed to be effective as a sweeper, severely crippled with now 2 moveslots going to setup.
I don't think it's asking for too much to allow CAP 6 to be able to set up on defensive threats with it's second ability, especially since the tradeoff is being weaker to offensive ones. It not only allows options for CAP itself, but the types of teams it can play on.
I'd vote for wither Wonder Skin, or even Shield Dust here. Or anything really that tackles the times when CAP6 isn't going to be taken out by brute force. Both Burn and Paralysis are hard cripples, and yes, that is solved by running Substitute, but I hate to see it as something CAP 6 is forced to rely on with the drawbacks that go into using it.
