DP Tier Discussion Thread - BL and UU

[Dragontamer]

1. Wobbuffet was tested in one of the first Smogon tournaments for D/P. It was then banned from OU. Remember, Ubers is not a balanced metagame, OU is. Wobbuffet cannot be countered in OU by definition, and can guarentee at least 1 free turn of setup for the player with Wobbuffet, and generally will score a few KOs before that.
2. This is not the place for Uber <--> Standard discussion

 

[Slickee]

I'm not terribly fond of the idea either at all.

Exeggutor is an incredible and versatile powerhouse that anyone even the village idiot can use to incredible effect in any environment.

If it weren't for the fact Heat Rock was introduced I would be tempted to consider it but as a user of Eggy myself the only problems I ever had was two. Blissey and 4 turns of Sunnyday only which can be stalled out and I'd have to recharge alot more often.

Pinsir is probably one of the largest threats it can face but besides having to be Scarf'd most of the time.(Pinsir loses alot of versatility from beign Scarf'd) Facing a possible HP Fire boosted and Psychic which could OHKO.

Isn't there any other BL's that could be considered instead?

To be fair, there are a couple solutions to handle Sunnybeaming Eggy:

-Altaria could switch into Solarbeam with impunity with a 4X resistance and can take its HP fires, and then strike back with any number of SE attacks. it also has Natural Cure (I think, I could be wrong :p) to take its status attacks.

-Rapidash and Ninetales (if it makes it in that is) can get boosts from HP Fires and bitchslap it back to hell.

-Primeape can switch in on Sleep Powder and knock it out with U-Turn

-Skuntank is immune to Psychic and resists Solarbeam and can strike it with a dark attack. (does it learn Flamethrower?)

To be fair, I dont know how much Hypno and Grumpig can take, but Hypno can switch in on Sleep Powder. Maybe Focus Sash Sharpedo can take him on too, but I dunno.. :p

 

[Hyra]

-Skuntank is immune to Psychic and resists Solarbeam and can strike it with a dark attack. (does it learn Flamethrower?)

Yes, it does. However, I'm not sure that it is worth it, considering both Dark and Fire will receive a 3x modifier on Executor in the sun, while Fire will only receive a 2x both without.

 

[Lemmiwinks MkII]

Not to mention grass/psychic is pretty terrible typing. He'll be hit hard from 1 of 7 different super-effective attacks :D!!!

That may be true, but don't forget its six awesome resistances: Grass, Water, Ground, Fighting, Psychic and Electric. The first five are likely to be extremely common in UU so it'll be able to utilize them frequently. Compare that to Glaceon with only an Ice resist and four weaknesses that include Fire, Rock and Fighting. With double STAB as well, Grass/Psychic is a far better typing than pure Ice IMO.

 

[ODDish]

I'm on Shoddybattle now if anyone is interested in doing some testing of different stuff ...

 

[Forsety]

To be fair, there are a couple solutions to handle Sunnybeaming Eggy:

Theres definitely alot but they are somewhat situational.

One main problem with the switch ins. You still have to outspeed it and take low enough damage from any possible attack and if they're conservative they can keep Sleep powder for emergency. Sucker Punch generally is hit or miss when 95/85 defenses and Sleep stare you down.

Eggy can still run STAB Psychic even more as a 3rd move now if you have a Heat Rock user setup for it in advance, theres Ancientpower too but I don't think anyone would use that. This wouldn't have been as realistic in Advance since you had like 3 turns to capitalize afterwards. I'd normally just alternate between Psychic and HP Fire.

Grumpig cannot take repeated Solarbeam assaults. Hypno would be the best bet definitely, though you'll be running near maxed defenses to make sure of that.

Although the prospect of Skuntank I rather like. (Mainly because I've been mulling over ideas for one lately anyway.) But looking at the calculations HP Fire boosted would tear into Skuntank if you try switching in. However not entirely sure of this since this is definitely a new D/P prospect but really its stats are kinda urgh...

 

[Fishin]

Remember that Eggy is playing with just barely less than Glaceon's base sp atk, and unlike Glaceon it has a decent secondary STAB to back it up with. It's also got 418 speed during sunshine with a neutral nature. Any Fire/Dragon types trying to take Solarbeam will take a decent amount of damage from Psychic, though I don't know if they'll be 2HKO'd. I'll have to do the calcs later when I have more time. HP Rock would actually hit both Altaria and any Fire types SE, but I doubt it'd be a great option otherwise.

 

[Dragontamer]

What about Shiftry? Immune to psychic, gains speed in the sun, and resists Solar beam. 2x effective with Nasty Plot + Dark Pulse.

 

[ODDish]

So does anyone else have any suggestions as to what BL might be worth testing in UU? Or are we destined to see BL become the larger tier?

 

[Dragontamer]

Hmm...

Arcanine has little going for him aside from being one of the bulkiest fire types possible (lol), so maybe some UU testing for him. Claydol is a nice spinner, but I don't see him sweeping nor walling entire UU teams. He'll be bulky of course. Drapion seems interesting as a UU wall also, certainly stoppable with the earthquake disadvantage, but nice resists and stats may be too much...

Houndoom is a glass cannon, weaker than Weavile in both defenses, and only 110 Sp. Atk to cover himself. But he seems too strong for UU, but I'd be willing to test him if anyone else is.

Ninjask can be phazed, and I don't see him sweeping teams. Roar Walrein pwns him already, and probably Noctowl / any whirlwinder as well. Stealth rocks hurt him a lot this generation, so I'd be willing to test.

I'm also willing to test Shedinja, simply because stealth rocks / spikes kills it completely.

Heh, some of the guys I'm looking at seem a bit powerful >_>

 

[Deck Knight]

Hmm...

Arcanine has little going for him aside from being one of the bulkiest fire types possible (lol), so maybe some UU testing for him. Claydol is a nice spinner, but I don't see him sweeping nor walling entire UU teams. He'll be bulky of course. Drapion seems interesting as a UU wall also, certainly stoppable with the earthquake disadvantage, but nice resists and stats may be too much...

Houndoom is a glass cannon, weaker than Weavile in both defenses, and only 110 Sp. Atk to cover himself. But he seems too strong for UU, but I'd be willing to test him if anyone else is.

Ninjask can be phazed, and I don't see him sweeping teams. Roar Walrein pwns him already, and probably Noctowl / any whirlwinder as well. Stealth rocks hurt him a lot this generation, so I'd be willing to test.

I'm also willing to test Shedinja, simply because stealth rocks / spikes kills it completely.

Heh, some of the guys I'm looking at seem a bit powerful >_>

Base power easily makes up for Houndoom's lower primary attacking stat. Weavile's Ice Punch is only 112.5 power after STAB, whereas Houndoom's Flamethrower is 142.5, Fire Blast 180, and Overheat 210, combined tby the fact Houndoom can get a further boost if it switches into a Will-O-Wisp or other fire move. Furthermore, Houndoom easily destroys most of its would-be counters with a Super-effective HP after it gets off a Nasty Plot, whereas even Swords Danced Weavile's Ice Punch still couldn't take out Hippowdon or Rhyperior. Houndoom also has the option of going mixed with 90 Attack (compared to LOL 35 SA Weavile), and as crappy as Fire is defensively, Ice is worse, and Houndoom has 2 immunities to work with and more resistances. Houndoom also has ways to wipe out its would-be counters, whereas if Swampert or Skarmory switches into Weavile it pretty much has to run or be slaughtered/set up on. Weavile's defenses are also only marginally better than Houndoom's. 70/65/85 vs. 75/50/80. Since the idea behind both of them is you'll never be taking a physical hit, they work about the same way.

If allowed in UU, Houndoom would also have the devastating option of Nasty Plot + Powerful Herb Solarbeam, which would quickly silence any water type switchin and leave Houndoom open to sweep, especially if it came in with Flash Fire activated. HP Water, and Dark Pulse would round out its compliment and ensure no fire types came in to ruin its day either.

I wouldn't discount Arcanine. It has great mixed attacking potential, an 80 power no drawback priority move off 110 Base attack, its Flare Blitz is obscenely powerful, and it gained physical Crunch and now has Reversal to play with. Since Stealth Rock deals 25%, Arcy can still Subversal just fine if it's out. It even has Will-O-Wisp and Thunder Fang if you're so inclined. Remember, this has the highest non-ledendary non-600 club stat total in the game, and both of its abilities work very well.

Remember what people say about Entei: It's a bad Arcanine.

 

[Bourbon]

OK, I think if we're gonna let Houndoom in, then Ninetales has to be in to stop it's rampage. Sharpedo and Azumarril will tear up Houndoom though. I'll run some quick calcs on Aqua Jet.

Ok, yep. It's a guaranteed OHKO from Sharpedo. So yeah, I think it's fair to let Houndoom in. Claydol's attack stats suck, and his has 6 weaknesses, so I think it's OK too. It's help wall some physical sweepers and keep the Hitmons in check. Drapion is fairly good, has same stats as Houndoom, except he has just base 90 attack. We'll have to test him.

Anyways, with all the Psychics running around, we need to add some darks. How do you guys feel about Sneasel though? It's been an underachiever, I think it's time to let it get some action this gen.

 

[Forsety]

Only one who even comes close to being mentionable for a move down would be Drapion.

Speaking from experience his EQ weakness does hurt him quite alot and his attack is generally alot lower than most people think it is and generally lacks high power attacks....If you try a defensive option, generally mehish HP and no recovery move generally doesn't give him any real staying power.

On the other hand it can be pretty deadly and sturdy sweeper even without Snipe's effect kicking in. Acupressure can be gamebreaking if you're lucky. Also even if weak having all 3 elemental fangs and Brick Break does wonders for coverage.

-Houndoom is a general big fat no, Houndoom is essentially Ninetales EX in terms of offense especially with its double STAB. It'd easily turn most of UU upside down and make Mach Punch/Aqua Jet almost staple on every team.
-Claydol has already been mentioned multiple times.
-Psychic's are not even remotely dominating when you have other perfectly good Dark types like Absol and co. still running around.
-Ninjask will possibly never be anything lower than BL, its too dangerous and easy as a support option even with Phazer's in play. Just majority of players are too stupid to save it for later.
-Compared to most suggestions so far you'd have more grounds on bringing down Steelix or Typhlosion than randomly picking on things.

 

[Bourbon]

Well, SORRY. Just trying to think of a few good ideas that would spice up UU. The BL tier is huge, and hopefully, eventually, it will cease to exist.

 

[Mood4food77]

i'm still surprised on why regigigas is on BL

is it cause of it's defenses makes it too much for UU to handle?

cause it does have the worst ability in the game

 

[Rubberbandman]

Only one who even comes close to being mentionable for a move down would be Drapion.

Speaking from experience his EQ weakness does hurt him quite alot and his attack is generally alot lower than most people think it is and generally lacks high power attacks....If you try a defensive option, generally mehish HP and no recovery move generally doesn't give him any real staying power.

On the other hand it can be pretty deadly and sturdy sweeper even without Snipe's effect kicking in. Acupressure can be gamebreaking if you're lucky. Also even if weak having all 3 elemental fangs and Brick Break does wonders for coverage.

Drapion is too good for UU, just because it has no recovery move doesnt mean it cant recover. Wish support from other walls like Hypno and Xatu especially for covering his ground weak can give him enough support. And His defenses are nice when you think about it. One weakness and average HP gives him a way to take many shots. Sure, he has no way to recover hp, but its not like people wont know how to get around that.

 

[Slickee]

i'm still surprised on why regigigas is on BL

is it cause of it's defenses makes it too much for UU to handle?

cause it does have the worst ability in the game

110/110/110 defenses says CHA... XD

 

[Deck Knight]

160/110/110 defenses says CHA... XD

Its 110/110/110, 160 is its base Attack, and that gets slashed in half to a dismal 200somthing.

 

[Sovereign]

Do these tiers apply to both singles and doubles? If so, I can see how regigigas can make the bl mark (that is, if it applies to both types of battle).

 

[Deck Knight]

Do these tiers apply to both singles and doubles? If so, I can see how regigigas can make the bl mark (that is, if it applies to both types of battle).

As far as I'm aware, all tiers are considered for singles and doubles for ease of use, but use assumptions based primarily on singles battles.

That's why you don't see Camerupt in OU, even though Specs Eruption can take out entire opposing teams with the help of Trick Room + Switch and Sunny Day/Follow Me Togekiss.

Turn 1: SD and TR
Turn 2: FM and switch
Turn 3: FM and ERUPTION.

 

[Mood4food77]

camerupt should be a tank rather than a completely offensive guy

if it had stats like weezing and donphan, it'd probably be BL

 

[Brazeku]

A quick look at the BL list says that really, only shedinja and regigigas strike me as weak enough for UU, but I have never used them, so I can't really comment.

Re: Drapion - this guy I have used, and the crit hax version is fucking terrifying. It can easily set up an SD, and after that just about anything it crits that doesn't resist (ie anything not a steel) is dead. It's almost like having an OHKO move that just happens to deal damage if it misses. One weak is almost more useful than no weaks, because it makes your opponent telegraph, and pushing a telegraph into a ground move is useful due to widespread immunity. Keep in mind the psychological effect of threatening instant kills usually makes people try to exploit its weakness, especially if they know meta but suck at prediction.

I don't see any particular problem with having a large BL list, to be honest.

 

[Fishin]

Houndoom is BL, IMO. Outspeeds most of UU and can do a very large amount of damage after just 1 plot. I haven't done calcs to see what it can beat, but just from it's stats/movepool it looks like it could definitely tear up UU.

Btw, the fact that it can be finished off by a priority move doesn't mean that it's definitely UU. It means it's definitely not completely unstoppable, but...meh. Being completely unstoppable isn't the bar for being BL - it's overcentralizing/unbalancing the metagame. I'm too lazy to do the calcs on this, but Rayquaza is probably OHKO'd by a CB Ice Shard from Mamoswine. Don't expect him to come down to OU anytime soon.

camerupt should be a tank rather than a completely offensive guy

70/70/75 defenses and quad (triple) weakness to water. Tank of the year!

>_>

There hasn't been any argument for this, but I don't think Camerupt is too powerful for UU. Only huge threat it poses is Trick Room Specs Eruption, but that does require some setup and is beaten by prediction.

 

[X-Act]

But the second one is about something more near to the thread: Wobbuffet. GameFreak fixed the problem with Shadow Tag. Then, what is the problem with it? It's easy to counter: a Ghost with Physical attacks won't have problems, and a Dark with Special ones neighter (McGar, Houndoom, Dusknoir, Spiritomb...). Also, with Taunt, it can't encore. Furthermore, they add Shed Skin too.

Okay, tell me how you're going to switch to your Spiritomb to counter Wobbuffet, when Wobbuffet has just switched into your <insert random Pokemon here>? That is the reason why Wobbuffet is uber.

 

[ODDish]

Compared to most suggestions so far you'd have more grounds on bringing down Steelix or Typhlosion than randomly picking on things.

It would seem that we have reached a point where no matter what is suggested someone is going to staunchly oppose the idea.

If you recall I did actually suggest Steelix for testing a while back, but the idea was opposed (or at least was given no support), so it looks like BL will remain the largest tier ...