Cross Evolution (now with Viability Rankings!)

[Trex]

That looks like a solid set-up sweeper, but how about this:

Bibarel (Omanyte) @ White Herb
Ability: Simple
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Spa / 4 Speed
Modest Nature
- Shell Smash
- Surf
- Ice Beam
- Earth Power / Ancient Power / Thunderbolt

Going from 35 / 40 / 100 / 90 / 55 / 35 -> 55 / 80 / 120 / 110 / 75 / 75 isn't quite as eye-popping as some stuff already mentioned, but getting to +4/+4/+4 in one turn is insane. You also gain access to great coverage moves from Bibarel, such as Thunderbolt, Grass Knot, Superpower, and other things like Taunt and more priority in Quick Attack. You could also go physical with Rock Slide / Waterfall / Shell Smash / Coverage, but it is powerful wincon either way.

 

[Mygavolt]

There has been a lot of analytical work done already, but I just wanted to drop a resource that I hope will be helpful:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1S5-qLb-2PkiwhZGSQhaIPUdTLoyY_40UmRbe6M--G-g/edit?usp=sharing

It's a set of spreadsheets containing information (i.e., pretty much everything of value but movepool) on all cross evolutions and all cross evolvers. The stat changes for cross evolutions and base stats for cross evolvers are color coded based on the quartile beyond which they lie (red: minimum; orange: Q1; green: median; blue: Q3).

If there are any errors in any of the spreadsheets or any way to improve them, please let me know.

 

[Highways]

Tbh, I think that this Metagame would be an Official Other Metagame, wow, the complexity turns it onto a very good metagame, and you never know what will happen
Anyway, I think that Multiscale Sweepers will be more common, such as this one:

Dragonite (Tyrantrum) @ Lum Berry
Ability: Multiscale
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Dragon Dance
- Stone Edge
- Aerial Ace
- Earthquake

Idk if Multiscale is banned, but it is so broken oo

 

[Hourai]

Tbh, I think that this Metagame would be an Official Other Metagame, wow, the complexity turns it onto a very good metagame, and you never know what will happen
Anyway, I think that Multiscale Sweepers will be more common, such as this one:

Dragonite (Tyrantrum) @ Lum Berry
Ability: Multiscale
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Dragon Dance
- Stone Edge
- Aerial Ace
- Earthquake

Idk if Multiscale is banned, but it is so broken oo

Tyrantrum can't evolve in this because it can't evolve normally

 

[Adonzo]

So there are a ridiculous amount of options in this meta and lot of them broken, so if I may I'd like to suggest a small change to the meta to try and rein in the more broken options. Namely, I suggest that the resultant evolutions cannot have a BST greater than 600.

600 is a slightly arbitrary number, but with a few exceptions is pretty much the cutoff line between standard and Ubers. It's also the highest BST a Pokemon can evolve into normally outside of Slaking, which has a detrimental ability to offset this.

A few examples of what this would do is prevent the use of Milotic (and Gyarados if unbanned with this provision) on any mon with higher than a 260 BST ie. nothing stronger than a Skitty. It may even allow the unbanning on some Foundations - Scyther, for example, can't use an evolution with more than a 100 point boost.

 

[Lemon Ginger]

THE HORROR

Rhydon (Gallade) Ground / fighting
135 / 220 / 150 / 45 / 105 / 70 -> 725 BST
- Earthquake
- Close Combat
- Knock Off
- Stone edge/ swords dance ?

Porygon 2 (Gardevoir) Normal
115 / 110 / 120 / 165 / 155 / 90 -> 755 BST
+ moonblast
+ taunt

Just so everyone remembers, the primals are 770 BST, but they can't hold items. Only mega-Ray and mega mewtwos have higher BST

 

[Adonzo]

THE HORROR

Rhydon (Gallade) Ground / fighting
135 / 220 / 150 / 45 / 105 / 70 -> 725 BST
- Earthquake
- Close Combat
- Knock Off
- Stone edge/ swords dance ?

Porygon 2 (Gardevoir) Normal
115 / 110 / 120 / 165 / 155 / 90 -> 755 BST
+ moonblast
+ taunt

Case in point

 

[pahgawk3]

A pokemon I haven't seen anyone mention yet is Vigoroth, a set like so would be very effective and the attack stat is through the roof.
Vigoroth (Gallade) Normal / Fighting
110 / 170 / 110 / 55 / 115 / 120 -> 680
-Return
-Close Combat
-Knockoff/icepunch/sword dance/pursuit (only one of knockoff/sworddance)

Im not sure if having a bst clause would be great off the bat, while there are many crazy strong combinations, there are many defensive behemoths that can be made to counteract these as well.

 

[Adonzo]

Honestly, without a BST clause we may as well make this an Ubers OM, as many of the mons are comparable to or better than Ubers.

 

[pahgawk3]

I can see certain mons getting out of hand, specifically a handful of things inheriting from gallade/milotic, as well as already high bst mons like rhydon, P2, etc. But I think it would be best if we had a chance to play around with these mons first. Has this om been coded yet or is it playable anywhere?

 

[tehy]

Well, Adonzo, some pokemon are probably going to be broken to cross-evolve from, and some pokemon are going to be broken with many cross-evolutions - we already have cross-evolution bans for both of those reasons in this metagame's rules already. (Can't evolve into Gyarados, Sneasel cannot evolve, etc).

One interesting case is one pokemon broken with one cross-evolution but with no others, and I'm not sure how that will be handled. So hopefully it will never come up, I guess. And if it does, I guess the pokemon will be banned from cross-evolving, like Smogon tends to do, but I guess we'll see when it gets here.

 

[Angry2]

For now, Suspects won't be done until the game is finally playable and tested, Things on paper can seem good but not always

As you see, Pure suspects based on paper and theorymons won't work due to how there is millions of combinations here and millions there, I guess adding rules/bans will be much clearer when the meta is finally playable, Also thanks for paying attention to the meta and for showing a load of nice combinations, Keep the good work!

 

[canno]

Honestly I really like the idea of a 600 BST cap. While it would remove some of the mons that I posted (such as Hydreigon + Magneton), I feel that it will grant an overall balance to the meta, especially since at the moment there really isn't really a point to run non-cross evo'd mons, as they are mostly outclassed due to the higher BSTs outside of those who have Megas. It would also allow Gyarados to be a doner and let Scyther, Sneasel, and Archen from receiving evolutions, and it would resolve people's issues with Gallade, Milotic, and even stuff like Vivillon which grant ridiculous boosts. It would also balance the roster of viable pokemon to receive evolutions - most of the Pokemon that got late gen evos have much higher BSTs than their competition (look at the BST on Gligar, Tangela, Misdreavus, Porygon2, and Rhydon and compare them to the non later gen evo mons), making them, in general, much better receivers of stats. It would also allow a variety on donors - now that things like Scyther can only take a +100 BST boost, mons that give lower BST boosts can now shine.

Dunno, I can see the meta being fun regardless of if we implement a 600 BST cap or not, but I feel like the 600 BST cap helps with diversity and balance.

 

[Highways]

Honestly, without a BST clause we may as well make this an Ubers OM, as many of the mons are comparable to or better than Ubers.

Forgot about that, sorry xD

 

[Stocke]

On paper a 600 BST cap does seem like a good idea. While I can't say how this idea will work out in practice given that this isn't playable anywhere yet, a BST cap does seem like a good way to prevent certain threats (offensive, supportive, or defensive; there are plenty of options for each) from becoming overcentralizing, and in turn it promotes diversity (not least in making Scyther, Sneasel, and Archen legal; I can see the latter two becoming top-tier threats with certain evolutions even if they're somewhat limited in their choices) which, from my understanding, was at least part of the intention of making this meta in the first place.

Honestly, without a BST clause we may as well make this an Ubers OM, as many of the mons are comparable to or better than Ubers.

Dunno if this was a serious suggestion or not, but making this an Ubers meta also seems like an attractive option if the BST cap idea gets rejected.

 

[Stocke]

sorry for doublepost, but:

There has been a lot of analytical work done already, but I just wanted to drop a resource that I hope will be helpful:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1S5-qLb-2PkiwhZGSQhaIPUdTLoyY_40UmRbe6M--G-g/edit?usp=sharing

It's a set of spreadsheets containing information (i.e., pretty much everything of value but movepool) on all cross evolutions and all cross evolvers. The stat changes for cross evolutions and base stats for cross evolvers are color coded based on the quartile beyond which they lie (red: minimum; orange: Q1; green: median; blue: Q3).

If there are any errors in any of the spreadsheets or any way to improve them, please let me know.

I have been able to find one error in this spreadsheet so far: You have Volcarona down as a stage 3, while it's actually only a stage 2 (it evolves from Larvesta which is a stage 1, and Volcarona itself doesn't evolve). Understandable mistake though as I figure you probably mixed it up with the other butterfies/moths which with the exception of Venomoth do have three stages.

Other than that, great work!

 

[Martin]

Happiny-->Chansey: +150 HP, +0 Atk, +0 Def, +20 SpA, +40 SpD, +20 Spe

This is only a little terrifying defensively, especially when you consider that Chansey's movepool is identical to Blisseys and as such it passes Blissey's spectacular movepool to its recipient. Seriously, getting +150 HP is a godsend for anything with 105 or less base HP.

 

[Laxpras]

Alright, you'll definitely have to consider trapping in this meta. I didn't spend much time looking, but stuff like this could definitely be broken:

Gothitelle (Porygon2) @ Choice Specs
Ability: Shadow Tag
New stats: 95/90/115/125/120/70
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Def / 8 SpD
Bold Nature
- Tri Attack
- Ice Beam
- Recover
- Trick

This thing can trap and beat any defensive threat.

 

[InfernapeTropius11]

Alright, you'll definitely have to consider trapping in this meta. I didn't spend much time looking, but stuff like this could definitely be broken:

Gothitelle (Porygon2) @ Choice Specs
Ability: Shadow Tag
New stats: 95/90/115/125/120/70
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Def / 8 SpD
Bold Nature
- Tri Attack
- Ice Beam
- Recover
- Trick

This thing can trap and beat any defensive threat.

It uses OU banlist/clauses so Shadow Tag should be banned. Idk how broken Stage 1 mons in a 2 stage evolution taking Arena Trap from Duggy is gonna be tho.

 

[EV]

I'd advise the people interested in Evo Cross to set aside the OU/Uber constructs for now. We're using the OU banlist, yes, but imagine this metagame in a tier all its own.

Klang-Gallade and Omanyte-Milotic would surely break OU, but among all these other super-hybrids, who knows?

A 600 BST cap might make sense if we wanted to preserve OU. Is that what we want? Or would we rather develop an entirely new environment which just happens to borrow OU rules?

 

[Lemon Ginger]

I'd advise the people interested in Evo Cross to set aside the OU/Uber constructs for now. We're using the OU banlist, yes, but imagine this metagame in a tier all its own.

Klang-Gallade and Omanyte-Milotic would surely break OU, but among all these other super-hybrids, who knows?

A 600 BST cap might make sense if we wanted to preserve OU. Is that what we want? Or would we rather develop an entirely new environment which just happens to borrow OU rules?

I would be supportive of this more tempered approach. Too many OMs end up as "buffed OU" and as such I think it would be good to develop a largely novel meta. Yes, things like milotic evos or P2 evolving might be strong, but those can be suspected appropriately as this OM progresses. Similarly, we can fiddle with introducing certain members of the OU ban list, but I would wait on making this Ubers (and thus centralized on Pdon :p)

 

[dsm77773]

For now we're not making any changes to the metagame aside from certain Pokémon that are WAY above the rest of the meta (think something like Shedinja and its Wonder Guard shenanigans), not until this is playable.

As for the 600BST limit, I'm thinking of it as a resort if the metagame ends up being too centralized (think something like BH right now). Again, this won't happen at least until this is playable.

 

[bp scrub]

175 / 125 / 80 / 80 / 125 / 25

Quagsire (Munchlax) @ Leftovers
Ability: Unaware
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
Impish Nature
- Recover
- Curse
- Return
- Earthquake/Fire Punch/Crunch

The bulk on this thing is pretty insane. Basically all special attackers are physical, so if you can get a couple of Curses in, physical attackers w/o Mold Breaker won't be able to do much, and since it naturally has so much special bulk, special attackers can't do a whole lot too.

252+ SpA Wailmer (Milotic) Water Spout (150 BP) vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Munchlax: 259-306 (45.1 - 53.3%) -- 31.3% chance to 2HKO

252+ Atk Rhydon (Gallade) Superpower vs. +2 252 HP / 252+ Def Munchlax: 270-320 (47 - 55.7%) -- 18.4% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

Of course, if your opponent switched in Rhydon right away, Munchlax would be dead, but if they wait just 1 extra turn, Rhydon gets walled

 

[Lemon Ginger]

175 / 125 / 80 / 80 / 125 / 25

Quagsire (Munchlax) @ Leftoverrecovery: Unaware
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
Impish Nature
- Recover
- Curse
- Return
- Earthquake/Fire Punch/Crunch

The bulk on this thing is pretty insane. Basically all special attackers are physical, so if you can get a couple of Curses in, physical attackers w/o Mold Breaker won't be able to do much, and since it naturally has so much special bulk, special attackers can't do a whole lot too.

252+ SpA Wailmer (Milotic) Water Spout (150 BP) vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Munchlax: 259-306 (45.1 - 53.3%) -- 31.3% chance to 2HKO

252+ Atk Rhydon (Gallade) Superpower vs. +2 252 HP / 252+ Def Munchlax: 270-320 (47 - 55.7%) -- 18.4% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

Of course, if your opponent switched in Rhydon right away, Munchlax would be dead, but if they wait just 1 extra turn, Rhydon gets walled

Idk meng, there's this:
+6 0 Atk Munchlax Return vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Rhydon: 186-219 (45.2 - 53.2%) -- 1.2% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

That's 125 atk against uninvested 135/150 bulk.

Rhydon gets SD and Drain punch aaaand Dragon tail, so I don't think it's getting walled/setup on. Also it's stab of choice will be CC. Maybe Focus punch I you're a god

 

[bp scrub]

Idk meng, there's this:
+6 0 Atk Munchlax Return vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Rhydon: 186-219 (45.2 - 53.2%) -- 1.2% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

That's 125 atk against uninvested 135/150 bulk.

Rhydon gets SD and Drain punch aaaand Dragon tail, so I don't think it's getting walled/setup on. Also it's stab of choice will be CC. Maybe Focus punch I you're a god

Dragon Tail is the only move that's doing anything though, it walls CC just as well as Superpower and Drain Punch is even weaker.