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Format Discussion Metronome Battle
- Thread starter Ivy
- Start date
Thanks guys!
Some kind of recent change has made it so that Metronome (and possibly other caller moves like Copycat) calling two/multi turn moves (Shadowforce, ice ball) now fails all the time, instead of just with a choice item. According to big guy asgdf, in the replay logs it showed an error of "no target" but it's still unclear if this is an ingame or PS issue so I want to hopefully get a final answer on this. Just posting it here since the current implementation basically makes choice items have no tradeoff and nerfs all the two turn moves, very big changes for the actual playouts of metronome battles.
Now I personally suspect this commit Make a move fail if the target is the user and it's not self-target did this, mostly because it was very recent and this wasn't happening until recently, Metronome targets the user, moves are failing, and the first thing in there mentions charge moves. Could be wrong though, but from the recent commits, this one really stood out to me in terms of being related to this new behaviour.
EDIT: Disregard that speculation, 100% wrong interaction
This is a youtube video of some guy doing a (hackmon) metronome battle in the real USUM game. It was the first result but fortunately he used the exact thing I was looking for on turn 1.
In 2:31 the guy charges up Solarbeam. At 3:13 the guy uses Solar Beam successfully so PS is wrong on this one. The mons may be hacked but it's more likely this is a ps bug, than it being ingame and someone making a mod to fix this without telling anyone about it.
Shoutouts to greenheroes for getting me interested enough to look further into this.
Now I personally suspect this commit Make a move fail if the target is the user and it's not self-target did this, mostly because it was very recent and this wasn't happening until recently, Metronome targets the user, moves are failing, and the first thing in there mentions charge moves. Could be wrong though, but from the recent commits, this one really stood out to me in terms of being related to this new behaviour.
EDIT: Disregard that speculation, 100% wrong interaction
This is a youtube video of some guy doing a (hackmon) metronome battle in the real USUM game. It was the first result but fortunately he used the exact thing I was looking for on turn 1.
In 2:31 the guy charges up Solarbeam. At 3:13 the guy uses Solar Beam successfully so PS is wrong on this one. The mons may be hacked but it's more likely this is a ps bug, than it being ingame and someone making a mod to fix this without telling anyone about it.
Shoutouts to greenheroes for getting me interested enough to look further into this.
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peaked no.4 no.7 and no.26
peaked with a pair of banded flash fire scizors
Scizor-Mega @ Choice Band
Ability: Flash Fire
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD
Sassy Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Metronome
Scizor-Mega @ Choice Band
Ability: Flash Fire
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD
Sassy Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Metronome
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Once peaked no 2 with a pair of shaymins long ago. After a long fall down the ladder and being driven so far, those days of selective winstreaks and being the best are over now. I've found a new purpose in the existence of antimeta, counterteaming random people when the ladder's quiet and easy to snipe. It's a fine art, but hard to accomplish with Mold Breaker being the only way to get through most of the common meta abilities. Flower Veil is fun for reliability, but there's that greater sense of satisfaction when you find an Imposter team and bring Illusion/Unnerve or see Prankster and bring Dazzling. Truly, this is an oft underlooked factor of the strategy in Metronome Battles.
Huh, Dazzling blocks Prankster Metronome Self-Destruct?
According to bulbapedia a priority move just has to target one of your guys, and Dazzling then stops the whole move from being executed. It basically ruins pranksters, I guess counters like this (and other stuff like bad dreams vs comatose) could support the idea of banning scouting in a tour even if they'll barely come up. It's a lot easier to just go in with a meta team/team you like and click away anyway.
Also while looking for some other less matchup-based niches, I noticed "No Ability" is actually a choice here. The funny thing is that it inconveniences Trace by stopping it from copying anything, so having "nothing" ends up being slightly more useful than something like Illuminate.
Yesterday, I reached rank 1 with double melmetal. The team was:
Melmetal @ Weakness Policy
Ability: Defiant
Happiness: 128
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD
Brave Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Metronome
Melmetal @ Weakness Policy
Ability: Defiant
Happiness: 128
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD
Brave Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Metronome
Melmetal is just too good in ladder. His pure steel typing and his ridiculous physical bulk (135HP/143Def) along with an attack stat of 143 and a not-so-bad special stat make him a dominant force in the metagame. High elo battles were basically jpeg wars where both sides were using Melmetal. I have converted several Scizor/Celesteela users into becoming double Melmetal users. I think the current viability ranking is Melmetal>Other steel types>Actually fun and creative teams.
I definitely believe that Melmetal is ban-worthy, but banning Melmetal wouldn't really change much. If Melmetal is banned, players will go back to playing Scizor-M and Celesteela, and they will become the next dominant force. I have an intersting proposal that a lot of players would disagree with: banning all steel-typed pokemon. The meta is centered too much around steel types. There is literally no one I met that has 1500+ elo and uses a team that doesn't use any steel types. Steels ruin the fun for non-steel users, because no matter what strategy they use, steels will outclass them with brute force most of the time. I really hope my opinions are taken into consideration, and thank you for reading this far.
Raidx
Banned deucer.
The metronome meta really just either using Steels or running anti meta stuff tbh which is why this format has gotten stale imo. Mons like M-Sciz and Celesteela are so meta defining that you either run those or counterteam them to be really successful from my experience. The lack of "viable" (i say viable in quotes bcus there are some mons that aren't exactly bad but the presence of mons like M-Sciz, Celesteela and Melmetal mean there's little reason to use them over the aforementioned mons) and a bunch of mons banned for no reason other than "oh bst over 600 too broken" kills the format. Ridaz what happened w the unbanning of some megas? It's been months since that post and still nothing. If you can't do it is it possible for another higher-up to do it since this format has a lot of potential but not in its current state
That is exactly what I wanted to say. No matter what you do with non-steel mons, they are just simply outclassed by steels unless you run a dedicated counter team. The meta is laughably stale once you reach a moderately high elo. Removing steels would benefit the meta a lot imo. I don't know about increasing the BST limit, but it sounds like a fun change.
The BST update is active now, seems to be up to 625.
This legalizes Mega Steelix, Mega Ampharos, Mega Aerodactyl, Mega Gardevoir, Mega Gallade, Mega Lucario, Mega Venusaur, and School Form Wishiwashi (unban Schooling?).
There's a lot of power here, we'll have to see how they can fare against the melmetal menace. Not much to say at the moment, still trying things out. Venusaur seems very nice for Flower Veil teams, Lucario is strong and Wishiwashi is fun.
This legalizes Mega Steelix, Mega Ampharos, Mega Aerodactyl, Mega Gardevoir, Mega Gallade, Mega Lucario, Mega Venusaur, and School Form Wishiwashi (unban Schooling?).
There's a lot of power here, we'll have to see how they can fare against the melmetal menace. Not much to say at the moment, still trying things out. Venusaur seems very nice for Flower Veil teams, Lucario is strong and Wishiwashi is fun.
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It looks like Melmetal has some competitors. Double Venusaur-M with flower veil is fairly strong (Flametix was the second guy to use flower veil btw). It has very good mixed bulk with a good offensive spread, along with tons of status move immunities. Steelix-M has a ridiculous amount of physical bulk. It can reliably tank physical hits from a statboosted Melmetal. The downside is that it can be wiped out by strong special moves like heat wave or surf. Amphardos-M is a pretty decent special attacker. It is capable of dealing heavy damage while being bulky. Wishiwashi School form has strong offense but its HP stat is lackluster. Lucario-Mega can really sweep teams if it keeps rolling offensive moves. It is a very good Downlod user. However, Lucario is a little unreliable because it dies easily to super effective hits. I feel like Gardevoir-M and Gallade-M are a little outclassed by Lucario. Idk about Aerodactyl-Mega, never seen anyone use it. I doubt it is any good because it has poor stat distribution.
Did the Metronome item get fixed? I notice it's no longer banned.
Definitely think the entire steel type should be considered for a ban -- it's just so obviously the best type (ground moves are scarce, fire moves are easy to become immune to, and fighting weakness can be negated with a secondary type) that there is really no good reason to ever consider any other type. I've tried using a variety of other options (like Flower Veil and ghosts) and steel's absurd suite of resistances just wins every time. If not that, then at least Melmetal, which has single-handedly turned this into a fully solved metagame.
I also think Normalium Z could be considered for an unban. One ~double damage move with a very high whiff chance (it does nothing if it rolls a status move) really doesn't seem that broken (compared to Choice items or Weakness Policy), and only one mon can use it anyway.
Definitely think the entire steel type should be considered for a ban -- it's just so obviously the best type (ground moves are scarce, fire moves are easy to become immune to, and fighting weakness can be negated with a secondary type) that there is really no good reason to ever consider any other type. I've tried using a variety of other options (like Flower Veil and ghosts) and steel's absurd suite of resistances just wins every time. If not that, then at least Melmetal, which has single-handedly turned this into a fully solved metagame.
I also think Normalium Z could be considered for an unban. One ~double damage move with a very high whiff chance (it does nothing if it rolls a status move) really doesn't seem that broken (compared to Choice items or Weakness Policy), and only one mon can use it anyway.
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I personally, given the fully random nature of metronome, use this team
The basic idea is to have normalize make every attack that comes out of metronome normal, giving the attack a STAB boost with a silk scarf to boost that even more. Evs are evenly split between atk and spatk to take advantage of whatever offensive move comes along. Full speed evs. I know this isn't the most creative set, and probably not the best either, but its one i thought would work somewhat decently.
I also have a second team where i switched one of the silvally with this:
Lurantis @ Expert Belt
Ability: Neuroforce
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 252 HP / 128 Atk / 128 SpA
Brave Nature
- Metronome
Silvally @ Silk Scarf
Ability: Normalize
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 128 Atk / 128 SpA / 252 Spe
Hasty Nature
- Metronome
Silvally @ Silk Scarf
Ability: Normalize
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 128 Atk / 128 SpA / 252 Spe
Hasty Nature
- Metronome
Ability: Normalize
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 128 Atk / 128 SpA / 252 Spe
Hasty Nature
- Metronome
Silvally @ Silk Scarf
Ability: Normalize
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 128 Atk / 128 SpA / 252 Spe
Hasty Nature
- Metronome
I also have a second team where i switched one of the silvally with this:
Lurantis @ Expert Belt
Ability: Neuroforce
Shiny: Yes
EVs: 252 HP / 128 Atk / 128 SpA
Brave Nature
- Metronome
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A few things:
1) You should use 252 EVs in all stats (as it says in the OP). (optionally you can run min speed on one or two mons to try to survive trick room)
2) Ghost types aren't nonexistent, and Steel types are extremely common; both resist Normal in some fashion. It's not wise to lock yourself out of using an attack they'd be weak to.
3) Normal is a pretty mediocre type defensively. People tend to use Steel for the Poison immunity (both in terms of moves and status) as well as its insane amount of resists.
The concept is neat though! If you like the Silvally family, dual Type:Null with Eviolite and some ability of your choice like Magic Bounce may be a good variant.
1) You should use 252 EVs in all stats (as it says in the OP). (optionally you can run min speed on one or two mons to try to survive trick room)
2) Ghost types aren't nonexistent, and Steel types are extremely common; both resist Normal in some fashion. It's not wise to lock yourself out of using an attack they'd be weak to.
3) Normal is a pretty mediocre type defensively. People tend to use Steel for the Poison immunity (both in terms of moves and status) as well as its insane amount of resists.
The concept is neat though! If you like the Silvally family, dual Type:Null with Eviolite and some ability of your choice like Magic Bounce may be a good variant.
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Back at rank 1. After converting more people into meta slaves with the usual defiant+weakness policy Melmetal, I noticed that Tinted lens is also a very viable option. Since there are so many steels running around, Tinted lens actually racks up a lot of damage overall. Even a Steelix-mega, who has a base 55 spa, can hit Melmetals fairly hard with moves like psycho boost, which would otherwise be a trashy spa drop. I've been having some success with this team (Props to Chaostrodon who started using it first):
Steelix-Mega @ Weakness Policy
Ability: Tinted Lens
Happiness: 128
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD
Sassy Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Metronome
Steelix-Mega @ Weakness Policy
Ability: Tinted Lens
Happiness: 128
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD
Sassy Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Metronome
Also, Unaware is a niche ability that can get you a good chance to win against defiant/competitive+weakness policy. You take this ability when you are 99% sure that your next opponent will be someone who uses a heavy statboosting set.
Lastly, let's discuss items. Weakness policy is by far one of the best items in the meta right now, and it works so well with bulky pokemon that I might choose it over something like Sitrus berry (Not berries like Iapapa or Aguav though). Was it really necessary to ban all healing items regardless of how much healing they provide? I think damage items would be plenty viable even if some weak healing items were unbanned. Okay, Sitrus berry should probably remain banned, but not items that provide just a minor amount of healing. Also, I see no reason in the Normalium-Z ban because you are essentially risking a valuable item slot for a high risk high reward item. It unnecessarily takes away the fun in the game in my opinion.
P.S. But at the top priority, let's ban steels please please...
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I was thinking about talking about abilities, but wasn't sure where to start. I ended up trying out some of the banned abilities (with some banned items) today with regular teams against banned tests, so here are my quick thoughts. I didn't really test weather combos, and passive healing may be better on average than my experience.
tl;dr: Most of these relate to passive healing/damage and have a major effect on play; I like the pace the way it is now and don't mind these being banned.
Pressure is useless as far as I can tell. Protean/Parental Bond aren't that great in my opinion.
EDIT: Pressure is bugged and it does affect PP ingame.
Battle Bond: Forme change, banned because of the BST rule, only usable on Greninja. It was legal for a short time back then and I used it a bit. Normal Greninja without an ability isn't great, and killing something as Greninja means it's a 2v1/1v1. The extra stats are too late to be worth it imo, unlike other abilities that can be in effect the whole game. The Water Shuriken change barely affects the game. If Ash Greninja was selectable from the start, this ability would be useless unless you get Water Shuriken regularly.
Cheek Pouch: Heals 1/3 HP when eating a berry. All the 50% HP proc berries are banned under the healing rule too, so you have to go with pinch berries/Kee/Maranga/Leppa. If all heals were allowed, you could combo with a 50% pinch berry and heal 83% at 25% HP or less, or Sitrus for 58% at 50% or less. Not bad, though there's the risk of being in kill range and just outside of heal range with the pinch berries. Steel types will probably lose their HP slower on average. Unnerve/Magician can counter I guess.
Cursed Body: 30% chance to force Disable/3 turns of Struggle on any hit is crazy and pretty reliable.
Desolate Land: Infinite sun that blocks water moves. Not many good sun abilities to combo with. Flower Gift is Cherrim locked, Chlorophyll's Speed doesn't help too much, Comatose is usually better than Leaf Guard, and Solar Power's passive damage isn't worth it. (EDIT: Harvest is a good one I forgot about.) Water isn't a major weakness to avoid for the meta except Camerupt. Has some competition with a slower Primordial Sea or Delta Stream/Air Lock.
Dry Skin: Passive 1/8 healing in rain, heals 1/4 from water moves, but takes 1.25x damage from Fire and passive 1/8 damage in sun. Really great with Primordial Sea, but rain is limited to 5/8 turns via Drizzle or RNG otherwise. With Leftovers, you can really last a while off of healing and turns where nothing happens. Aside from the rain healing, I'd say Storm Drain is a better water immunity because it attracts moves. Water Absorb doesn't have the fire weaknesses.
Fluffy: Half damage against contact moves, but 2x Fire damage. Fur Coat is better in most cases aside from the rare contact special move.
Fur Coat: 2x defense, no drawbacks. It's not Magic Bounce level, but it's a big boost that's active all the time. Mega Steelix gets 1000+ Defense. Can combo with Kee Berry for even more defense. Steel types/the meta mons have solid physical stats in general, so this will defend against the higher attack stat most of the time.
Grassy Surge: Passive 1/16 healing terrain, boosts Grass moves. 4 healing turns from the start isn't that much, could be annoying if you get one strong hit on Turn 1 and whiff all your next moves. Also halves some Ground move powers, more occasional help for steels. Grassy Seed and Grass Pelt can boost Defense but aren't optimal. Grassy Terrain is callable on its own, so people have probably played in its effects at least once.
Huge Power: 2x Attack, no drawbacks. Like Fur Coat, it's active all the time and provides a major boost. You can combine this with a Choice Band for really high Attack. Super effective and STAB moves get really dangerous, and even chip damage like Nuzzle or Struggle can do more than expected.
Ice Body: Passive 1/16 healing + hail immunity. Not very reliable to use, since Snow Warning only happens at the start of the match (exception: Mega Abomasnow) and getting Hail is otherwise RNG. Overcoat/Magic Guard can cover the hail immunity and more. Still, with Icy Rock the Hail lasts 8 turns and with Leftovers
Iron Barbs: 1/8 damage against contact moves. With Rocky Helmet, this combines to make a brutal 29% on each hit. Alone it's not as bad, but the passive damage is noticeable, especially against tanky steels. Magic Guard is a hard counter.
Moody: +2 and -1 to a random stat per turn. Adds more RNG to the RNG metagame. After enough turns, there are so many boosts that regular mons just can't keep up. Unaware could neutralize it.
Parental Bond: Adds an extra 25% damage hit to moves. Unlike the normal metagame, you can't take full advantage and choose to use a set damage move or whatever. Best used on glass cannons/high attack mons. I don't think it's game breaking. It was legal for a short time through a Kangaskhan loophole, and I don't recall it being that effective.
Poison Heal: Heals 1/8 HP per turn when poisoned. With Toxic Orb, this is better than most passive healing (Leftovers) and protects you from other status.This ability was the one that showed me how strong consistent passive healing can really be, survivability increases a lot. Fortunately, steels can't take advantage of this strat because of their immunity.
Power Construct: Turns Zygarde into 100% which is banned under BST rule. If Zygarde 100% was legal then I imagine you could just select it in the first place with an actual ability. If there was a scenario like Greninja where you had to Power Construct to activate it, I think having an ability would still be worth more than a mid battle HP boost.
Pressure: For all the pressure on it, this ability doesn't even affect Metronome because it targets the user. If it worked like most people expected, it would be all over the meta. You can kind of get the same effect with Truant to halve your own turns.
Primordial Sea: Infinite rain, immunity to fire. This helps steels, Scizor especially. It's like Flash Fire, but for the whole field so you can run another ability or just appreciate the extra immunity in general. Rain Dish and Dry Skin are good passive healing abilities to combo with. Swift Swim and Hydration are not that great. Can be stopped by Delta Stream/Air Lock or a slower Desolate Land.
Protean: On the surface, it's free STAB on every move. The power isn't bad (should be used on an attacker/mixed attacker), but the type change is very noticeable in terms of defense and feels like Color Change. Losing Steel resistances can make mons a lot less consistent and really lowers survivability. Worse than I expected.
Pure Power: 2x attack. See Huge Power.
Rain Dish: Passive 1/16 healing in rain. Can combo with Primordial Sea or Drizzle, as well as Leftovers. Dry Skin's 1/8 healing is better though.
Rough Skin: See Iron Barbs.
Sand Stream: Passive damage, though the meta is full of steels that it doesn't affect. Sand Rush isn't viable, Sand Force is reliant on Metronome getting specific moves to boost, and I guess Sand Veil can be annoying. Mega Tyranitar can get 2 Sand Streams, though banned under the BST rule. Rock types are rare and probably won't be able to take advantage of the SpD boost.
Schooling: Banned because of the former BST rule that blocked Wishiwashi School, only usable on Wishiwashi. Since you can use School forme alone, this ability doesn't provide anything and just makes Wishiwashi weaker now. If Schooling was the only way to use Wishiwashi School, it'd at least be usable from the start but wouldn't have an endgame.
Snow Warning: 5 turns of hail/4 turns of passive 1/16 damage. Ice types are rare so this will affect most mons. Can combine with the Icy Rock for 8 turns of Hail. Snow Cloak can be annoying, Ice Body can heal, and Slush Rush is meh. Mega Abomasnow can get 2 Snow Warnings.
Stamina: +1 Defense when hit. Similarly to Moody or Fur Coat, this ability lets you tank any physical move after a few turns. Easy for steels to get going thanks to their resistances and initial bulk.
Volt Absorb: Heals 25% when hit by an Electric move. I prefer Lightningrod as an Electric immunity since it draws moves in. The healing isn't consistent either and relies on Metronome, unlike some of the passive healing that you can get for a few turns/every turn.
Water Absorb: Heals 25% when hit by a Water move. Same opinion as Volt Absorb, there's Storm Drain for Water immunity that draws moves in. The healing can come in clutch, but it's not reliable.
Wonder Guard: Very broken, relies on RNG to hit. Still vulnerable to status moves, but there's a good chance you won't inflict any direct damage against a Wonder Guard user. Loses to Mold Breaker.
Sturdy + Shedinja: For the most part you're invincible, but still vulnerable to some status moves. Also loses when forced to use/gets hit by Struggle, so you have to hope Metronome lets you hit some good physical moves to get past those steels. You can actually get this combo via Power of Alchemy sacrifice though I wouldn't recommend it.
Harvest + Rowap/Jaboca: 1/8 HP passive damage berries. Harvest procs often enough even without sun. I've tried some Pickup variants, but it all comes down to RNG. The damage is helpful but not totally reliable.
Cheek Pouch: Heals 1/3 HP when eating a berry. All the 50% HP proc berries are banned under the healing rule too, so you have to go with pinch berries/Kee/Maranga/Leppa. If all heals were allowed, you could combo with a 50% pinch berry and heal 83% at 25% HP or less, or Sitrus for 58% at 50% or less. Not bad, though there's the risk of being in kill range and just outside of heal range with the pinch berries. Steel types will probably lose their HP slower on average. Unnerve/Magician can counter I guess.
Cursed Body: 30% chance to force Disable/3 turns of Struggle on any hit is crazy and pretty reliable.
Desolate Land: Infinite sun that blocks water moves. Not many good sun abilities to combo with. Flower Gift is Cherrim locked, Chlorophyll's Speed doesn't help too much, Comatose is usually better than Leaf Guard, and Solar Power's passive damage isn't worth it. (EDIT: Harvest is a good one I forgot about.) Water isn't a major weakness to avoid for the meta except Camerupt. Has some competition with a slower Primordial Sea or Delta Stream/Air Lock.
Dry Skin: Passive 1/8 healing in rain, heals 1/4 from water moves, but takes 1.25x damage from Fire and passive 1/8 damage in sun. Really great with Primordial Sea, but rain is limited to 5/8 turns via Drizzle or RNG otherwise. With Leftovers, you can really last a while off of healing and turns where nothing happens. Aside from the rain healing, I'd say Storm Drain is a better water immunity because it attracts moves. Water Absorb doesn't have the fire weaknesses.
Fluffy: Half damage against contact moves, but 2x Fire damage. Fur Coat is better in most cases aside from the rare contact special move.
Fur Coat: 2x defense, no drawbacks. It's not Magic Bounce level, but it's a big boost that's active all the time. Mega Steelix gets 1000+ Defense. Can combo with Kee Berry for even more defense. Steel types/the meta mons have solid physical stats in general, so this will defend against the higher attack stat most of the time.
Grassy Surge: Passive 1/16 healing terrain, boosts Grass moves. 4 healing turns from the start isn't that much, could be annoying if you get one strong hit on Turn 1 and whiff all your next moves. Also halves some Ground move powers, more occasional help for steels. Grassy Seed and Grass Pelt can boost Defense but aren't optimal. Grassy Terrain is callable on its own, so people have probably played in its effects at least once.
Huge Power: 2x Attack, no drawbacks. Like Fur Coat, it's active all the time and provides a major boost. You can combine this with a Choice Band for really high Attack. Super effective and STAB moves get really dangerous, and even chip damage like Nuzzle or Struggle can do more than expected.
Ice Body: Passive 1/16 healing + hail immunity. Not very reliable to use, since Snow Warning only happens at the start of the match (exception: Mega Abomasnow) and getting Hail is otherwise RNG. Overcoat/Magic Guard can cover the hail immunity and more. Still, with Icy Rock the Hail lasts 8 turns and with Leftovers
Iron Barbs: 1/8 damage against contact moves. With Rocky Helmet, this combines to make a brutal 29% on each hit. Alone it's not as bad, but the passive damage is noticeable, especially against tanky steels. Magic Guard is a hard counter.
Moody: +2 and -1 to a random stat per turn. Adds more RNG to the RNG metagame. After enough turns, there are so many boosts that regular mons just can't keep up. Unaware could neutralize it.
Parental Bond: Adds an extra 25% damage hit to moves. Unlike the normal metagame, you can't take full advantage and choose to use a set damage move or whatever. Best used on glass cannons/high attack mons. I don't think it's game breaking. It was legal for a short time through a Kangaskhan loophole, and I don't recall it being that effective.
Poison Heal: Heals 1/8 HP per turn when poisoned. With Toxic Orb, this is better than most passive healing (Leftovers) and protects you from other status.This ability was the one that showed me how strong consistent passive healing can really be, survivability increases a lot. Fortunately, steels can't take advantage of this strat because of their immunity.
Power Construct: Turns Zygarde into 100% which is banned under BST rule. If Zygarde 100% was legal then I imagine you could just select it in the first place with an actual ability. If there was a scenario like Greninja where you had to Power Construct to activate it, I think having an ability would still be worth more than a mid battle HP boost.
Pressure: For all the pressure on it, this ability doesn't even affect Metronome because it targets the user. If it worked like most people expected, it would be all over the meta. You can kind of get the same effect with Truant to halve your own turns.
Primordial Sea: Infinite rain, immunity to fire. This helps steels, Scizor especially. It's like Flash Fire, but for the whole field so you can run another ability or just appreciate the extra immunity in general. Rain Dish and Dry Skin are good passive healing abilities to combo with. Swift Swim and Hydration are not that great. Can be stopped by Delta Stream/Air Lock or a slower Desolate Land.
Protean: On the surface, it's free STAB on every move. The power isn't bad (should be used on an attacker/mixed attacker), but the type change is very noticeable in terms of defense and feels like Color Change. Losing Steel resistances can make mons a lot less consistent and really lowers survivability. Worse than I expected.
Pure Power: 2x attack. See Huge Power.
Rain Dish: Passive 1/16 healing in rain. Can combo with Primordial Sea or Drizzle, as well as Leftovers. Dry Skin's 1/8 healing is better though.
Rough Skin: See Iron Barbs.
Sand Stream: Passive damage, though the meta is full of steels that it doesn't affect. Sand Rush isn't viable, Sand Force is reliant on Metronome getting specific moves to boost, and I guess Sand Veil can be annoying. Mega Tyranitar can get 2 Sand Streams, though banned under the BST rule. Rock types are rare and probably won't be able to take advantage of the SpD boost.
Schooling: Banned because of the former BST rule that blocked Wishiwashi School, only usable on Wishiwashi. Since you can use School forme alone, this ability doesn't provide anything and just makes Wishiwashi weaker now. If Schooling was the only way to use Wishiwashi School, it'd at least be usable from the start but wouldn't have an endgame.
Snow Warning: 5 turns of hail/4 turns of passive 1/16 damage. Ice types are rare so this will affect most mons. Can combine with the Icy Rock for 8 turns of Hail. Snow Cloak can be annoying, Ice Body can heal, and Slush Rush is meh. Mega Abomasnow can get 2 Snow Warnings.
Stamina: +1 Defense when hit. Similarly to Moody or Fur Coat, this ability lets you tank any physical move after a few turns. Easy for steels to get going thanks to their resistances and initial bulk.
Volt Absorb: Heals 25% when hit by an Electric move. I prefer Lightningrod as an Electric immunity since it draws moves in. The healing isn't consistent either and relies on Metronome, unlike some of the passive healing that you can get for a few turns/every turn.
Water Absorb: Heals 25% when hit by a Water move. Same opinion as Volt Absorb, there's Storm Drain for Water immunity that draws moves in. The healing can come in clutch, but it's not reliable.
Wonder Guard: Very broken, relies on RNG to hit. Still vulnerable to status moves, but there's a good chance you won't inflict any direct damage against a Wonder Guard user. Loses to Mold Breaker.
Sturdy + Shedinja: For the most part you're invincible, but still vulnerable to some status moves. Also loses when forced to use/gets hit by Struggle, so you have to hope Metronome lets you hit some good physical moves to get past those steels. You can actually get this combo via Power of Alchemy sacrifice though I wouldn't recommend it.
Harvest + Rowap/Jaboca: 1/8 HP passive damage berries. Harvest procs often enough even without sun. I've tried some Pickup variants, but it all comes down to RNG. The damage is helpful but not totally reliable.
tl;dr: Most of these relate to passive healing/damage and have a major effect on play; I like the pace the way it is now and don't mind these being banned.
Pressure is useless as far as I can tell. Protean/Parental Bond aren't that great in my opinion.
EDIT: Pressure is bugged and it does affect PP ingame.
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Congrats on #6. While I do think friend guard is an interesting idea, I feel like there is no reason to use Dusclops when you can just use another Melmetal instead. First of all, Melmetal has superior physical bulk, even with Dusclops' eviolite. While Dusclops may have better special bulk, Melmetal is a (fair and balanced btw) steel type, which makes it immune to poison and lets it tank hits generally better. Well, the bulk may be arguable. However, the more important part is that Melmetal has a free item slot, so it can run weakness policy/friend guard to have an actual offensive presence. From my experience, "do nothing" characters like Shuckle or Mega Sableye generally fail to do well in this meta.
Statboost carry (Melmetal) @ Weakness Policy
Ability: Defiant
Shiny: Yes
Happiness: 128
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD
Brave Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Metronome
Fren guard sup. (Melmetal) @ Weakness Policy
Ability: Friend Guard
Shiny: Yes
Happiness: 128
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD / 252 Spe
Sassy Nature
- Metronome
This is what I am testing.
New CAP mons are on PS, and also available to use in Metronome Battles.
EDIT: Never mind, these are old apparently. My b.
Caribolt - Grass/Electric - 84/106/82/77/80/106 (BST 535)
Smokomodo - Fire/Ground - 88/116/67/88/78/97 (BST 534)
Snaelstrom - Water/Bug - 91/94/110/80/97/63 (BST 535)
First thoughts:
The type combos aren't too common. In general, the BSTs aren't 600+ level/optimal but they aren't unusable in low ladder.
Caribolt mainly offers another choice for Flower Veil teams. Rotom-Mow has better defenses/Special Attack but less HP and Attack. The Electric type neutralizes a Flying weakness and the Ground resist, not much change. Using Galvanize for Electric STAB could be interesting.
Smokomodo doesn't seem as great as Mega Camerupt. It's outclassed everywhere but HP and Speed.
Snaelstrom is mostly better than Araquanid aside from Special Defence. Compared to Golisopod, it has noticeably more HP/Special Attack/Speed, but less Attack and Defence. It's a solid choice for a Water/Bug, but steels will still be superior in general.
EDIT: Never mind, these are old apparently. My b.
Caribolt - Grass/Electric - 84/106/82/77/80/106 (BST 535)
Smokomodo - Fire/Ground - 88/116/67/88/78/97 (BST 534)
Snaelstrom - Water/Bug - 91/94/110/80/97/63 (BST 535)
First thoughts:
The type combos aren't too common. In general, the BSTs aren't 600+ level/optimal but they aren't unusable in low ladder.
Caribolt mainly offers another choice for Flower Veil teams. Rotom-Mow has better defenses/Special Attack but less HP and Attack. The Electric type neutralizes a Flying weakness and the Ground resist, not much change. Using Galvanize for Electric STAB could be interesting.
Smokomodo doesn't seem as great as Mega Camerupt. It's outclassed everywhere but HP and Speed.
Snaelstrom is mostly better than Araquanid aside from Special Defence. Compared to Golisopod, it has noticeably more HP/Special Attack/Speed, but less Attack and Defence. It's a solid choice for a Water/Bug, but steels will still be superior in general.
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