Ladder Monotype [Read post #393 for Tiering Updates]

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Freeroamer

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Awesome! Some things I noticed from a quick look at type stats
Flying finally has over 10% usage. Obviously needs to be nerfed, ban Char X Togekiss Skarmory and Landorus, both formes Nah, usage isn't everything, for those people who say >10% ban something, it doesn't need a nerf because it has no Pokemon that are powerful enough to be considered broken. They have many good Pokemon, but no borked asf ones. Just because it is overall a good all-around type with a solid core, doesn't mean it is unbeatable or something is broken. Many types have good cores that can be hard to break or hard to check (such as Steel, Water, Bug, and Dark), Flying is just popular and customizable as it has wide type diversity, allowing it to do whatever you want it to
Psychic and Steel switched places, they are now 2nd and 4th respectively, with water still holding down third.
Normal and Fairy both dropped in usage. Fairy is probably because of Mega Metagross. Normal is probably because of Mega Gallade/Medicham
Electric is surprisingly up to 4% usage, the Core challenge maybe? Or is Tesla playing thousands of battles just to raise its usage?
Dragon and Ground are now the closest to the average 5.56% usage that every type would have in an ideal metagame.
I will post some stuff I noticed about the actual Pokemon later, glad we finally have a few months worth of stuff now to go on and draw conclusions from!
I don't know why you use the term "finally" here, looking at 1760 stats which represent the top end of the ladder, Flying has had over 10% for the last 3 months, in fact it actually decreased in usage from November to December, confirming what I and a lot of other players thought, in that while still good, it's not as good as it used to be. Once again I'm going to refer to the Mega Mawile ban as indirectly affecting this, in that it increased usage of Mega Diancie who has a field day vs Flying while also freeing the way for Mega Metagross Steel, another positive matchup vs Flying. From my viewpoint the metagame is going in the right direction, and we have to accept its a fact of Monotype that we can't ever create a balanced metagame where every type will correspond to an ideal usage of 5%, because the amount of bans required to level the playing field between the likes of Grass and Flying means that we might as well start calling ourselves UU Monotype or similar, as that's what we'll essentially be getting close to. Our best bet looking at potential suspects is to identify those Pokemon which singlehandedly skew multiple of what should be ideal matchups into one types favour. Note the bit that says should be even, this doesn't mean we ban Terrakion on Fighting because it performs very well against Ice and Normal teams, otherwise we'd have an unholy amount of bans. I'm talking more about things like Mega Mawile, who was simply impossible for some types to counterplay and did skew those matchups in its type's favour.

Also on the topic of lower tier Monotype, we've hosted tours for them in the past but I never really found them all that enjoyable, due to the fact that you're often just throwing together 6 viable mons for certain types and hoping for the best, as you already lost all your stuff to the tiers above. UU could work to an extent I guess, in terms of that every type would still have options, but I just couldn't see the player base for it, and I certainly wouldn't go any tier lower than that.

EDIT: My bad, I had a weird moment and read the wrong thing, it actually increased between December and January, and decreased between November and December. That said, I still think from personally using the type and from watching others use it, it's still not as effective.
 
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I don't know why you use the term "finally" here, looking at 1760 stats which represent the top end of the ladder, Flying has had over 10% for the last 3 months, in fact it actually decreased in usage from December to January, confirming what I and a lot of other players thought, in that while still good, it's not as good as it used to be. Once again I'm going to refer to the Mega Mawile ban as indirectly affecting this, in that it increased usage of Mega Diancie who has a field day vs Flying while also freeing the way for Mega Metagross Steel, another positive matchup vs Flying. From my viewpoint the metagame is going in the right direction, and we have to accept its a fact of Monotype that we can't ever create a balanced metagame where every type will correspond to an ideal usage of 5%, because the amount of bans required to level the playing field between the likes of Grass and Flying means that we might as well start calling ourselves UU Monotype or similar, as that's what we'll essentially be getting close to. Our best bet looking at potential suspects is to identify those Pokemon which singlehandedly skew multiple of what should be ideal matchups into one types favour. Note the bit that says should be even, this doesn't mean we ban Terrakion on Fighting because it performs very well against Ice and Normal teams, otherwise we'd have an unholy amount of bans. I'm talking more about things like Mega Mawile, who was simply impossible for some types to counterplay and did skew those matchups in its type's favour.

Also on the topic of lower tier Monotype, we've hosted tours for them in the past but I never really found them all that enjoyable, due to the fact that you're often just throwing together 6 viable mons for certain types and hoping for the best, as you already lost all your stuff to the tiers above. UU could work to an extent I guess, in terms of that every type would still have options, but I just couldn't see the player base for it, and I certainly wouldn't go any tier lower than that.
The problem I take is the fact that Flying has ways around those things you mentioned. Multiple, in fact. Anything you can check it with that isn't Ice, it can easily check in return while remaining fully viable. If a person looks at the last three months' stats, they'll see that its getting more popular on the ladder. It has increased in usage each month, which wouldn't happen if things were getting worse for flying like you said. The increase is consistent as more things are banned. There may not be any one Pokemon considered too broken, but the overabundance of options can start to become broken on its own. Also, by statistics it has at least somewhat of an advantage in all but two matchups, totaling 8.68% of the metagame, which makes me think it really does get babied too much by the monotype council. It has a statistical advantage over 80.92% of the metagame, and 10.40% of the metagame is flying itself. From the looks of it, its popularity is just going to continue to increase and take up an even larger portion of the metagame. Why is it still being defended? Why is it being allowed to slowly choke out so much of the tier with its presence?

I wouldn't count on it...

Team building is already restricted in Monotype, and taking away most of the top Pokemon would leave UU teams without some of the ever-important resists and immunities that make teams viable. The other side of this is Monotype already contains one of the widest pools of viable Pokemon, especially when compared to the standard tiers:

OU: 49 Pokemon
UU: 61 Pokemon
RU: 53 Pokemon
NU: 58 Pokemon

We have at least 6 viable Pokemon for all 18 types (I know there are dual type Pokemon, but different types often use these Pokemon differently and it is easy to argue most types have well over 6). 6*18=108, which puts us in a metagame with more than 100 Pokemon you should expect to encounter on the ladder.
The problem is, while the Pokemon may be viable in theory, the viability of their type drags them down. How often do we plan to run into Rock? Not very often, which is why I don't see people planning for Rhyperiors or Aggrons.

Btw, I'm sorry if I sound aggressive. I'm just tired of watching stuff like this happen to my favorite tier.
 
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DoW

formally Death on Wings
Not really adding much here TBH, just decided to show a few little things I threw together:

Again don't expect these to have been done in an entirely scientific manner, but I though it'd help a little in demonstrating just how much each type is used, and how clear it seems to be that Flying is the most common type. With its usage 2.5% higher than the second most common type, I think it's become evident that flying needs a nerf.
Of course, usage doesn't always mean something's broken, but from what I've seen watching games I'd say that's what it's pointing to here. Also, rip rock.
 

Freeroamer

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i honestly don't agree, what you have to remember is that Flying has the most options, along with Psychic and Water, and thus these 3 types are at the top of usage simply because more people can adapt them to their preferences. If you look at the website chart that scpinion made, Ground actually has the greatest overall number of strong matchups with a ratio of 16 / 7 but is kinda held back by the fact you only really have like 9 mons with which to build a successful team from. If I remember correctly, when we first did stats Dragon actually had the overall best win rate but again, it can be fairly limited in how you build it. You can try other things, as I have, I tried sandless Ground with Gliscor and I've even tried a dual weather variant with Mega Swampert but the reality is none of these are anywhere near as effective as the standard build so to put it bluntly, I simply got bored of using Ground whereas I enjoy using Water, Flying and Psychic as they give me a lot of team building options with which to support the concept that I'm building around eg. If im building around Mega Gardevoir, I'd ensure I had checks to common faster offensive threats ie the plethora of walls / offensive scarfers Psychic can utilise, I could add in Healing Wish support which can come from Jirachi most likely, or I could look elsewhere. Next I'd want hazards, for which I have Mew, I could use a defensive Jirachi or Celebi etc etc. basically what I'm trying to say is that there's a lot of team building paths you can follow with these types and that's part of what attracts people to use them, as well as their overall effectiveness.

Tl;dr usage is comprised of both effectiveness and wealth of viable options, and as such is an unreliable metric for determining which types need nerfing.
 
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Alright, I've decided to do a similar type analysis for Rock, so here goes.

Nov (1.18%) -> Dec (1.49%) -> Jan (1.45%):
Very slight growth but otherwise still the most consistently least used type in the meta.

Terrible Matchup : Fairy, Fight, Psychic, Steel, Water ---> Fairy, Fight, Ground, Psychic, Steel, Water ---> Fight, Ground, Psychic, Steel
Bad Matchup: Bug, Grass, Ground, Normal, Psychic ---> Bug, Dark, Flying, Grass, Normal, Poison ---> Bug, Dark, Dragon, Electric, Fairy, Flying, Grass, Water
Neutral Matchup: Dragon, Ghost ---> Dragon, Electric, Ghost, Ice ---> Ghost, Normal, Poison
Good Matchup: Dark, Flying, Ice ---> Fire ---> Fire, Ice
Awesome Matchup: Electric, Fire ---> N/A ---> N/A

From the above it is easy to see that Rock fairs pretty horribly across most of the types. Something interesting I noticed is how it Rock vs Electric went from an awesome matchup in Nov to a Bad matchup in Jan. Dark and Flying types also went from a good matchup to a bad matchup over the three months.

Top 12:
1. Tyranitar (84.57%) --->Tyranitar (83.35%) ---> Tyranitar (80.03%)
2. Terrakion (79.83%) ---> Terrakion (80.34%) ---> Terrakion (76.63%)
3. Cradily (70.88%) ---> Cradily (68.83%) ---> Cradily (67.50%)
4. Diancie (59.97%) ---> Diancie (66.14%) ---> Omastar (60.15%)
5. Shuckle (56.32%) ---> Omastar (46.77%) ---> Diancie (55.29%)
6. Omastar (52.59%) ---> Aggron (45.58%) ---> Shuckle (52.17%)
7. Aggron (37.36%) ---> Shuckle (43.20%) ---> Aggron (45.48%)
8. Aerodactyl (30.02%) ---> Rhyperior (41.65%) ---> Aerodactyl (32.95%)
9. Rhyperior (23.17%) ---> Aerodactyl (26.34%) ---> Rhyperior (21.70%)
10. Archeops (12.92%) --->Tyrantrum (14.43%) ---> Tyrantrum (17.80%)
11. Tyrantrum (12.60%) ---> Armaldo (10.59%) ---> Archeops (15.45%)
12. Armaldo (12.40%) ---> Archeops (9.76%) ---> Regirock (11.78%)

So basically, the top 3 have remained unchanged. Places 4 to 7 have just been switching around and placed 8 to 12 likewise with a few changed. Armaldo dropped out of the top 12 in January and now sits at 16th with 5.64% usage. This made way from Regirock moving up to take 12th place, who was previously at 17th with 4.76% usage. I'm not sure how to account from this change, but maybe someone else might? If you only count pokemon that have had over 10% usage in the last 3 months, Rock only have about 13 viable pokemon, which is quite small (not as small as ground though). Counting all combinations of these 13, it allows for, theoretically, 1716 different teams.

As for mega usage, in December they were Diancie (41.00%), Aggron (39.05%), Aerodactyl (11.99%) and Tyranitar (9.38%). In January, they are Aggron (38.91%), Diancie (38.57%), Tyranitar (12.17%) and Aerodactyl (9.10%). So really, you only need to prepare to run into Mega-Diancie or Mega-Aggron.

That's all for now, I hope someone finds this useful.
 

scpinion

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Alright, I've decided to do a similar type analysis for Rock, so here goes.

Nov (1.18%) -> Dec (1.49%) -> Jan (1.45%):
Very slight growth but otherwise still the most consistently least used type in the meta.

Terrible Matchup : Fairy, Fight, Psychic, Steel, Water ---> Fairy, Fight, Ground, Psychic, Steel, Water ---> Fight, Ground, Psychic, Steel
Bad Matchup: Bug, Grass, Ground, Normal, Psychic ---> Bug, Dark, Flying, Grass, Normal, Poison ---> Bug, Dark, Dragon, Electric, Fairy, Flying, Grass, Water
Neutral Matchup: Dragon, Ghost ---> Dragon, Electric, Ghost, Ice ---> Ghost, Normal, Poison
Good Matchup: Dark, Flying, Ice ---> Fire ---> Fire, Ice
Awesome Matchup: Electric, Fire ---> N/A ---> N/A

From the above it is easy to see that Rock fairs pretty horribly across most of the types. Something interesting I noticed is how it Rock vs Electric went from an awesome matchup in Nov to a Bad matchup in Jan. Dark and Flying types also went from a good matchup to a bad matchup over the three months.

Top 12:
1. Tyranitar (84.57%) --->Tyranitar (83.35%) ---> Tyranitar (80.03%)
2. Terrakion (79.83%) ---> Terrakion (80.34%) ---> Terrakion (76.63%)
3. Cradily (70.88%) ---> Cradily (68.83%) ---> Cradily (67.50%)
4. Diancie (59.97%) ---> Diancie (66.14%) ---> Omastar (60.15%)
5. Shuckle (56.32%) ---> Omastar (46.77%) ---> Diancie (55.29%)
6. Omastar (52.59%) ---> Aggron (45.58%) ---> Shuckle (52.17%)
7. Aggron (37.36%) ---> Shuckle (43.20%) ---> Aggron (45.48%)
8. Aerodactyl (30.02%) ---> Rhyperior (41.65%) ---> Aerodactyl (32.95%)
9. Rhyperior (23.17%) ---> Aerodactyl (26.34%) ---> Rhyperior (21.70%)
10. Archeops (12.92%) --->Tyrantrum (14.43%) ---> Tyrantrum (17.80%)
11. Tyrantrum (12.60%) ---> Armaldo (10.59%) ---> Archeops (15.45%)
12. Armaldo (12.40%) ---> Archeops (9.76%) ---> Regirock (11.78%)

So basically, the top 3 have remained unchanged. Places 4 to 7 have just been switching around and placed 8 to 12 likewise with a few changed. Armaldo dropped out of the top 12 in January and now sits at 16th with 5.64% usage. This made way from Regirock moving up to take 12th place, who was previously at 17th with 4.76% usage. I'm not sure how to account from this change, but maybe someone else might? If you only count pokemon that have had over 10% usage in the last 3 months, Rock only have about 13 viable pokemon, which is quite small (not as small as ground though). Counting all combinations of these 13, it allows for, theoretically, 1716 different teams.

As for mega usage, in December they were Diancie (41.00%), Aggron (39.05%), Aerodactyl (11.99%) and Tyranitar (9.38%). In January, they are Aggron (38.91%), Diancie (38.57%), Tyranitar (12.17%) and Aerodactyl (9.10%). So really, you only need to prepare to run into Mega-Diancie or Mega-Aggron.

That's all for now, I hope someone finds this useful.
Just as a general comment: If many people would like to see this type of information automatically generated on the stats page it shouldn't be too hard for me to do. I just don't want to write it up unless there is interest. Please do not post you would like to see it in this thread. If you think you'll utilize it either like this post or shoot me a pm.

Edit: Thanks guys. I'll try to get this on the site ASAP.
 
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http://www.smogon.com/stats/2015-01/metagame/monotype-0.txt <----stats were obtained from here (these are the unweighted statistics for Jan 2015)

  1. monowater..................... 7.97668%
  2. mononormal.................... 7.60687%
  3. monodark...................... 7.49521%
  4. monobug....................... 7.38692%
  5. monofighting.................. 7.19761%
  6. monoflying.................... 6.62505%
  7. monosteel..................... 6.54698%
  8. monopsychic................... 6.42189%
  9. monoghost..................... 5.33136%
  10. monofire...................... 5.14498%
  11. monograss..................... 4.96617%
  12. monodragon.................... 4.94896%
  13. monopoison.................... 4.73026%
  14. monofairy..................... 4.17408%
  15. monoground.................... 4.03472%
  16. monoelectric.................. 3.87144%
  17. monoice....................... 3.51380%
  18. monorock...................... 2.10467%
From this I would just like to draw a few points. Flying isn't omnipresent on the ladder so I would like to say that it isn't "choking out" other types from being used so that ice and rock aren't used more. Rather, I am assuming rock and ice are either underdeveloped and or lackluster themselves.

That being said, the contrast from 6.6% usage to 16% usage by the 1760 stats page leads me to believe that flying is a very easy type to use and as such is why the higher ladder is exploding its usage and making these stats look unreasonable.

Should something be done? I don't really think so. The amount of times I lose to water, dark, fighting, fire, dragon, and a few others tells me it is pretty fair. Then again I have the ability to win against those types too so it isn't like running flying has a soul crushing matchup like steel v. ice.

Anyways just thought I would point that out since usage is becoming a hot topic here (something seemed odd about those stats for some reason, then I realized it was weighted XD).

http://pastebin.com/cV2mhgwQ <---- here is November 2014

http://pastebin.com/rLuvikTj <---- here is December 2014

EDIT: Also, I know the weighted stats are based on glicko, but I haven't bothered to read how it was a perfect system for finding anything , just a scalar for usage I presume (which may or may not be misleading, IDK). If someone could explain or link me I would read it.
 
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So how is the decision to ban Greninja, M-Sableye, M-Medicham and M-Gallade going? Because I really like M-Medicham and wouldn't like him to get banned just after I joined the meta D:
 
So how is the decision to ban Greninja, M-Sableye, M-Medicham and M-Gallade going? Because I really like M-Medicham and wouldn't like him to get banned just after I joined the meta D:
Well Greninja hasn't been talked about its more along the lines we are talking about Mega-Sab, Mega-Medi, Mega-Gallade that the discussion is about. Greninja will be talked about in the future we have these three to sort out first.
 
Well Greninja hasn't been talked about its more along the lines we are talking about Mega-Sab, Mega-Medi, Mega-Gallade that the discussion is about. Greninja will be talked about in the future we have these three to sort out first.
And what is the chance that they may be banned?
 
I find it odd so many people seem to be very eager to talk about banning M-sable when Ghost and Dark aren't that great overall. And eager to talk about M-Cham and M-Gallade whom, while they are in superior types they don't need a ban on fighting and Psy is better off without them anyway. But when it comes to banning things for types like water (aka. Greninja), steel and psychic's ACTUAL ban worthy poke (aka mega metagross) and flying (aka anything: Lando or char) the best types in the metagame right now, it's like "meh. We'll talk about that later"
 

DoW

formally Death on Wings
I find it odd so many people seem to be very eager to talk about banning M-sable when Ghost and Dark aren't that great overall. And eager to talk about M-Cham and M-Gallade whom, while they are in superior types they don't need a ban on fighting and Psy is better off without them anyway. But when it comes to banning things for types like water (aka. Greninja), steel and psychic's ACTUAL ban worthy poke (aka mega metagross) and flying (aka anything: Lando or char) the best types in the metagame right now, it's like "meh. We'll talk about that later"
Pokemon can be broken despite being on weak teams. For example, Kyurem-W is generally considered broken on Ice teams, and yet Ice is one of the least-used types simply because it's so bad. That doesn't stop Kyurem-W being broken, however. It just means that Ice either wins or loses based on Kyurem-W, rather than based on skill.

Moreover, just because ChariXard and Lando-i are used a lot on Flying teams doesn't mean that they're broken. In fact, the most powerful thing about flying teams isn't any one particular pokemon, but rather the variety of pokemon that you can use. Building a flying team can almost feel more like building an OU team than a Mono team. It's therefore important that we consider the situation carefully rather than simply banning the most prominant pokemon.
It's also important that we have some kind of idea what we're looking at at any given time. If everyone's arguing about everything at once, it'll take even longer to sort the meta out than it is currently taking. Hopefully we will soon get a descision on the current three suspects, at which time I hope to revisit Kyurem-W and Skymin. After this is done, I believe Nani Man has been considering a number of ways to nerf the flying type, and pokemon such as Mega Metagross and Greninja will be considered as well.

It would also take a very strong argument to convince me that Water and Steel need nerfing on the whole. They're certainly strong types, currently #3 and #4 in usage (see graphs in my post above), however since the Aegislash ban on Steel and the Damp Rock ban on Water, they've been strong but manageable rather than overwhelmingly strong. I think dealing with more obviously broken things is a far bigger priority than trying to sort out something that will mildly nerf these types without putting them at the bottom of the pile. A heatran ban on steel, for example, would be catastrophic.
 
I find it odd so many people seem to be very eager to talk about banning M-sable when Ghost and Dark aren't that great overall. And eager to talk about M-Cham and M-Gallade whom, while they are in superior types they don't need a ban on fighting and Psy is better off without them anyway. But when it comes to banning things for types like water (aka. Greninja), steel and psychic's ACTUAL ban worthy poke (aka mega metagross) and flying (aka anything: Lando or char) the best types in the metagame right now, it's like "meh. We'll talk about that later"
I agree with you on the second part, but Psychic is not better off without mega medi or mega gallade. Really, mega gallade just needs 1 swords dance and it already wrecks everything left and right, while with mega medicham you can just click High Jump Kick against dark teams once sableye/spiritomb is down(thats not the only thing it does but i dont want to sit here and explain what it does against every type and im pretty sure you get what i mean) but i dont think its ban worthy. Dark is also one of the top types too,id say its like top 7 or something like that(who knows,maybe even top 5) it has stuff like bisharp,hydreigon,mandibuzz,tyranitar,umbreon,honchkrow,etc and we are actually discussing a mega sableye ban on dark not ghost btw (the extreme majority at least) because ghost admittedly is a bad type, and sableye helps alot by adding a neutrality to both weaknesses. Lando really doesnt need a ban, whichever form you are talking about,both can be controlled and killed. I also think we should get a decision from Nani Man on the bans soon. Anyway i hope i didnt sound rude, or ban happy, i just want to express my thoughts and opinions, all i want to do is fix the metagame that at the moment is broken. Have a nice day! :toast:
 
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I understand the process. I know not everything I listed is in need of a ban off a brokenness. But I think the priorities of this topic are off. While there a very few, if no, broken things between the top types, if you truly wish to balance the types out they will have to take a nerf to become balanced. Flying will need to take a blow to it's power or defense. Psy, water and steel need to lose a powerful mon. Even bug will probably need to take a blow in the form of Pinsir or genesect.

Yeah, these are banning some pretty fair pokes for no reason, but it will finally give the other types a chance. I mean, I use bug, always have, and while it's in the top 5, there is clearly a big gap in power between bug and the top 4. Same probably goes for fighting, dark etc.

So to me, the question is not if flying and other types need a nerf. It's whether this nerf should happen now or later.
 

InfernapeTropius11

get on my level
Monotype stats notes: (most of this stuff will only be noticed by someone like me who spends time looking at the bottom stuff that no one else notices :])
Flying: Above 10% usage in 1630 weighted stats (Freeroamer this is what I meant by finally--it was 9.72% in December, I was basing it off of the 1630 weighted stats that is what pops up automatically when you click the link to the stats page) and has 2.49% more usage than the next type. Moltres is up from under 2% usage up to over 4%, pushing Sigilyph off of the list. I guess people feel the power of Choice Specs Fire Blast or Flamethrower or Overheat/Hurricane or the speed and ability to hit hard or pivot out offered by Scarf outweighs the 4x Stealth Rock weakness. BandNite increased in popularity, and Dragonite has passed Thundy-T for 7th most common Flying type Pokemon. Tornadus and Aerodactyl both increase in usage, most likely because of the Core challenge. Staraptor lost 5% usage :( The top 5 as a group all clustered closer to 50%. Dazzling Gleam has almost doubled in usage on Togekiss, probably to hit Mega Sableye harder. Thunderbolt got more popular on Zappy Burd. Altaria increased in usage, and Heal Bell got more popular on it (EQ fell, but D-Dance is now the most common move).

Psychic: Cresselia got more usage. Deo-D pushed Bobbafett off the list and has 7% usage. This is funny since that core challenge was only created on January 31st, I guess people are just liking them more. Band and Assault Vest are getting slightly more popular on Victini. Scarf Jirachi is getting more popular than paraflinchax Jirachi. Only 29% of Gallades run Close Combat which is surprising to me--72% run Drain Punch. I guess they prefer longevity over sheer power. Shadow Sneak also has ~47% usage, and Psycho Cut/Zen Headbutt/SD only have 28%/21%/40% usage respectively. Calm Mind attacker is more popular on Espeon than bulky unDefoggable/unTauntable Screens/Wish passing Espeon. Suicide Lead Azelf went down in usage. Both priority moves Medicham has increased in usage (Fake Out and Bullet Punch).

Water: Still holding down third. I'm happy to see based penguin Empoleon has 4% more usage. Its underrated imo, and is a Skymin counter.Greninja fell over 13% and Azumarill passed it for most used Pokemon on Water. 1.3% of people actually use Torrent on Greninja, fml. If you see Lanturn, it will be Scald/Volt Switch/Heal Bell/Toxic or Thunderwave like 90% of the time lol, #LuckyLanturn is pretty generic. Slowbro decreased in usage by 14%. Assault Vest on Tentcruel decreased in usage. LO Keldeo increased slightly in usage, pushing Scarf/Lefties/Specs sets down a bit. Politoed increased in usage by 10%. The return of Swift Swim Probably to help out Mega Swampert and Kabutops who pushed Alomomola off the list and has 4.76% usage. Ludicolo went up 5% usage. CroCune increased slightly in usage Sae has been laddering with SaeCune o3o Mega Shark has doubled in usage to around 13%.

Steel: Dropped 1.62% usage and is now 4th, so it has exactly 7.5% usage. Generic steel got more used, with Heatran now having over 95% usage on Steel. Mawile dropped in usage not that Mega Mawile is banned, and Mega Metagross has taken over, causing Metagross to increase to around 70% usage and third, passing Excadrill. Mega Steelix has over 1% usage, too OP, needs nerf o3o. Based penguin once again has more usage. Scizorite has exactly 50% usage on Scizor, and Bullet Punch has 99.9% usage lol. But, Technician only has 85.9% usage, should be 100%. Registeel increased in usage. Escavalier replaces Probopass on the list and has 0.69% XD.

Bug: Volcarona got even MORE usage, up to 91.43%. Genesect and Galvantula switched places with Genesect jumping to second and gaining 7%, and Galvantula dropping to 5th, losing 10%. Pinsir/Scizor also switched places, with Pinsir staying the most popular Mega and increasing to 3rd, and Scizor dropping down to 6th. Bug still has 7 Pokemon with over 50% usage. The top 24 Pokemon are the same, just with some position realignment. People use Shedinja more often now, why <.< Crustle dropped in usage.

Fighting: Terrakion and Breloom dropped in usage, and now Infernape is up to second most used <3 Probably because it is the second most viable special attacker after Keldeo, even if it is usually mixed or LeadApe. The next best one is Lucario, so I can see why it is used a lot. Gallade and Heracross both moved up 3 places, with Conk falling 1, Cobalion rising 2, and Hawlucha holding down 7th. Emboar and Hariyama replace Poliwrath and Primeape on the list, with 1.71% and 1.03% usage respectively. Sawk also kicked out Throh which I think is kinda funny, taking its 22nd place ranking and with 1.15% usage. Band Terrakion increased in usage and the Sash lead fell, which I personally think is good--Cobalion sets Rocks better with its extra bulk imo, and Terrakion should aim at nailing everything as hard as possible. BulkyRaptor Up seems to be these up move of choice for Fighting users, as Dragon Dance fell by about 12% and Bulk Up went up by about 11%. Conkeldurr is still pretty generic with Ice Punch/Mach Punch/Drain Punch/Knock Off and Guts and Assault Vest all having between 76.8% and 97.5% usage. Once again, Drain Punch has more usage than Close Combat on Gallade, so people must like longevity over sheer destructiveness.

Dark: Sableye gained a percent in usage, knocking Greninja out of top spot, who fell 10%. Hydro Pump has become more common and Gunk Shot less common on Greninja. Bisharp dropped about 2% but is still third. Mandibuzz/Tyranitar are still fourth and fifth respectively, but dropped around 3% usage each. Bisharp is also still generic as Knock Off/SD/Sucker Punch/Iron Head and Defiant all have minimum 79.5% usage, and up to 99%. Honchkrow is up 4% and some people actually don't run Moxie o.o Krookodile also is up, gaining 16%. Half the time it runs Scarf Moxie sweeper, half the time it runs Lefties or Sash Rocks setter/Taunter. Sharpedo dropped 8%. Crawdaunt is still generic, and deservedly up 13% in usage as one of the premier wallbreakers in the game with stuff like Mega Medicham and Landorus-I. Mega Tyranitar has seen more usage as Mega Shark and Mega Sableye fell slightly. Zoroark and Umbreon fell and Weavile rose a couple percent. Houndoom has exactly 10%, which is up from 7.01%. No changes to the top 24 here.

Normal: Chansey, Staraptor, Porygon2 and Lopunny all fell slightly in usage, but are still the top 4. Ditto dropped 6%, from 5th to 7th. Meloetta and Diggersby both gained 9% and occupy 5th and 6th respectively. Mega Pidgeot gained a couple of percent, and Defog became more popular on it. Coincidentally, Defog also happened to lose 6% usage on Staraptor. Swallow knocked Chatot off thelist and now occupies 22nd place with 3.09% usage. Soaking lost over 1%, Exploud gained over 1% and StallTank gained almost 8% <3 Porygon-Z dropped 9% usage. They have 7 Pokemon with over 50% usage.

Ground: If you run Ground, you will run Hippo/Excadrill/Mamoswine/Garchomp/Lando-I/Gastrodon. These all have over 70% usage, and Nidoking, in 7th, only has 18%. The top 7 remain the same, as do the top 24, with only Seismitoad jumping to 8th while gaining 5% usage. Core challenge again, I presume. There was some other movement, but Ground is so generic o.o Every Piloswine runs Eviolite, Thick Fat, and Earthquake lol, not surprising, but kinda funny.

This is the halfway point. Most of the above types are top-tier or competitive with the top tier types. From here down the types start to get worse. The ideal 5.56% usage for every type also lands in this middle area, is that good or bad? I personally think it's good that the average is where it should be--right smack dab in the middle.

Dragon: Mega Altaria is the new Mega of choice for Dragon, offering its Dragon immunity, and causing MegaChomp to fall slightly. Garchomp and Kyurem-Black will be on almost every Dragon team. Garchomp offers tremendous revenge killing potential with Scarf, or sweeping potential with Swords Dance. It is also commonly used as a Sashed Rocks lead. Kyurem-B offers tremendous synergy with Dragon, being neutral to Ice. It is a potent Band or Scarf user, with a great ability in Teravolt, meaning Sturdy Skarmory is ignored, Volt Absorb Lanturn is ignored, and Levitaters such as Rotom formes and Weezing are bopped by Earth Power among other uses. It also has a great SubShuffler set, as well as SubRoost sets. Dragonite, Latios, Latias, Hydreigon, and Goodra all dropped a couple of percent. Salamence gained 3%, usually as a mixed Scarfer. Druddigon gained some popularity as a defensive wall/Rocks lead. It is also one of only a few Pokemon with Glare, a move that can paralyze Ground types and Electric types but not Ghost types. Bagon, Tyrunt, Axew, and Deino were replaced by Gabite, Fraxure, Noibat, and Sliggoo rof, they have 0.00% usage and no usage statistics XD. Shelgon passed Dragonair for 19th place lol, gaining 0.05% usage to reach 0.19%. I literally laughed so hard, Dragon is one of the most limited types, and Flygon is actually deservedly in the top 18 (btw, I personally think it sucks, so that's kind of sad).

Fire: My personal favourite type, but I have never used it except for some horrible team I created when I first came to monotype (that experience was so bad, I haven't built another Fire team since rof). Charizard fell 1% in usage, but still occupies first place with over 96% usage. Infernape is second on this type too <3 gaining 9% usage to reach 79.89% (so close to 80% <.<). Victini gained 11% to reach 3rd and Torkoal fell 7% to sit in 4th. Heatran dropped 2% to fifth, and Entei leaped 14% to round out the top 6. Screens Rotom-Heat increased in usage, as did Life Orb Entei (Band decreased in usage). Band Darmanitan increased in usage. Oh lawd, Band Darmanitan Sheer Force Flare Blitz in Sun. /me dies. Volcarona dropped 5% usage. Ninetales gained around 3% usage, so I guess people use it as an alternate sun setter, or if they use MegaDoom/Zard X. Arcanine dropped 5% usage, which is sad, I've always liked it, 2majestic4me. Chandelure dropped 2% in usage, but gained a spot in the ranking order, as others dropped more than it did. Delphox increased in usage whle Emboar fell. I thought it would see more usage, now that Reckless is released, and it has access to Flare Blitz, Wild Charge, and Head Smash and Take Down. People actually run Blaze on Combusken, when its only niche is as a Baton Passer of Speed Boosts and SD/Bulk Up <.< Houndoom also gained 1% usage, but Solarbeam lost almost 40% usage on it. Rapidash knocked Magcargo off of the list.

Fairy: Azumarill is still used ~97% of the time and now Klefki is also above 90%. Mawile fell becasue Mawilite is banned. Togekiss, Clefable, Gardevoir, and Diancie rased 11%, 8%, 5%, and 28% respectively (Diancie rose drastically as the new best Mega for Fairy). Choice Specs got less popular on Sylveon. Slurpuff also gained 6% usage as the next most viable physical attacker after Azumarill. Swirlix knocked Togepi off the list. Btw, scpinion, there are 2 Pokemon that I can't see their sprites, the last one and the one before Carbink, and after Granbull (I think that one is Mr. Mime based on its detailed usage statistics, but I can't see the last one's usage stats, so I have no idea what that is). Nuzzle is used more and Petaya Berry less on Dedenne, and Choice Specs increased in usage on it.

Electric: Raikou, Thundurus-I, Ampharos, and Magnezone increased in usage, while Zapdos, Rotom-Wash, Manectric, Electivire, and Eelektross fell. Luxray, Jolteon, and Galvantula also dropped in usage. Stunfisk more than doubled in usage to over 26% as the only Stealth Rock setter on Electric. Choice Scarf rose on Rotom-W, while Lefties fell, as did the popularity of ChestoRest sets. HP Ice and Substitute rose in usage on Raikou and Calm Mind fell. Lawn Mower fell in usage and Microwave rose (Rotomz ftw). Zebstrika, Emolga, and Eelektrik replaced Minun, Magneton, and Luxio on the list. Thunderbolt increased in usage on Manectirc by about 12%. Choice Band got more popular on Electivire as Scarf fell slightly.

Ghost: Aegislash and Chandelure didn't gain too much usage, but they have passed Sableye (1st-->4th) and Gengar (2nd-->3rd) for the top 2 spots as both Gengar and Sableye fell. Trevenant dropped 3% usage, and now Gourgeist has passed it as the most common Ghost/Grass type, jumping 25% from 11th to 7th. Trevenant still occupies 8th. Rest/Lum Berry got slightly more usage on Trevenant, but Sitrus Berry is still the most common set. Froslass also dropped 17% usage. Jellicent also gained 12% usage. As you can see, ghost was shaken up quite a bit, with many Pokemon moving in double digits percentages. Life Orb and Choice Specs got more usage on Gengar, while Focus Sash and Black Sludge fell. Mismagius is Ghost's only Heal Beller, yet dropped in usage to under 5% and Heal Bell is even then only used 16.2% of the time. Haunter replaced Misdreavus on the list.

Poison: Gengar, Venusaur, and Drapion fell in usage, while Nidoking got more usage. ScarfKing got more popular. Scolipede got over 21% increase and LO and Choice Band variants got more popular. Tentacruel dropped 10% and Assault Vest got more usage. Golbat more than doubled in usage, and Qwilphish dropped like 0.5%. Muk dropped in usage as well, but Band got slightly more popular on it. Garbodor and Victreebel replaced Whirlipede and Swalot on the list.

Grass: Serperior leaped from off of the list to 42% usage and 5th place in the rankings because of Contrary. Ferrothorn and Cradily dropped in usage, with Breloom gaining a bit. Skymin also gained around 3% to 79.65%. Sceptile dropped in usage as Serperior does the whole fast Leaf Stormer thing better with Contrary (although Sceptile can still go physical). Whimsicott fell in usage, I guess people are starting to realize it isn't as amazing as it seems. Attacking sets are outclassed (aside from Moonblast, but Serperior will usually hit hard enough after one boost (+2>+1 imo)) and Prankster Paralysis would be more useful on a more offensive type. Shiftry, Virizion, Roserade, and Ludicolo all fell in usage, with Celebi rising a bit :) Leavanny and Serperior knocked Abomasnow and Leafeon off the list. Apparently I'm the only person who runs Dual Screens/Heal Bell Celebi :I Surprisingly HP Rock is more popular on Serperior than HP Ground and HP Fire. I guess to hit the Fire/Flying types that are SE on Grass, but it leaves it walled by every Steel type ever. Damp Rock and Scald got more popular on Ludicolo, allowing it to deprive Hippo/Zard Y of their weather and nail them with Scald or Giga Drain, while making the rain last longer. Spiky Shield/Drain Punch/Leech Seed got more popular on Chesnaught with Hammer Arm falling in usage. Tangela fell drastically (4%ish) to last place in the rankings.

Ice: Mamoswine fell slightly, Kyurem-White rose. Weavile and Avalugg both rose more than 10% with Froslass falling over 15%. Cryogonal rose a couple percent, once again I blame Sae o3o Abomasnow, Articuno, and Glalie all rose a bit. Sneasel pushed off Delibird :( I've always hated Sneasel since one swept my team when it refused to be captured in Diamond (my only loss ever in that game lol, and I still remember it). Zoom Lens surprisingly gained 16% usage on Articuno, probably to give Blizzard/Hurricane more accuracy. Rotom-Frost fell in usage, but HP Fire increased in usage. People are starting to realize it is a good Scizor check I guess, so when they do use it they run it to beat Scizor more. Aurorus more than doubled in usage, and Freeze-Dry, Ancientpower, and Hyper Beam got more popular (Refrigerate Hyper Beam ftw). Lax Incense fell and Brightpowder rose in usage on Glaceon lmao.

Rock: Tyranitar, Terrakion, Cradily, and Diancie fell slightly in usage and Omastar rose. Shuckle rose in usage while Rhyperior fell. Rhydon and Crustle replaced Barbaracle and Rampardos in the top 24. Choice Band moved up in usage on Terrakion (for a while I thought I was the only person who thought that was good :s). The top 4 moves on Cradily (Recover, Toxic, Giga Drain, and Stockpile) all fell slightly in usage. People must be getting less generic. But seriously, Cradily's main niche is being immune to Water type attacks with Storm Drain, so there is like, no reason for 6.4% of people to use Suction Cups.

So uh, this is me geeking out for 3 days analyzing some changes for each type, I hope somebody gets something useful out of this :s

EDIT: gdi, I missed Electric and Fairy <.< will edit them in sometime in the next coupla days
EDIT 2: Added Fairy
EDIT 3: Added Electric. NOW the whole thing is done. Enjoy c:
 
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DoW

formally Death on Wings
I understand the process. I know not everything I listed is in need of a ban off a brokenness. But I think the priorities of this topic are off. While there a very few, if no, broken things between the top types, if you truly wish to balance the types out they will have to take a nerf to become balanced. Flying will need to take a blow to it's power or defense. Psy, water and steel need to lose a powerful mon. Even bug will probably need to take a blow in the form of Pinsir or genesect.

Yeah, these are banning some pretty fair pokes for no reason, but it will finally give the other types a chance. I mean, I use bug, always have, and while it's in the top 5, there is clearly a big gap in power between bug and the top 4. Same probably goes for fighting, dark etc.

So to me, the question is not if flying and other types need a nerf. It's whether this nerf should happen now or later.
I understand you wish all types to be equal or at least, all types to be viable, and I agree that this would be great and we should do what we can to cause this. However, let's take another look at the (rather shoddily done) chart I made and posted earlier:

Looking at the top of the chart, evidently Flying is off the scale, and if we're taking it that usage is caused solely by viability (a decent, if not perfect assumption) then it seems evident that it needs a nerf. And indeed, I'm sure a nerf will take place at some point. It's hugely powerful, and I've yet to see anyone who doesn't use flying on a regular basis defend it. In fact, I use flying on a regular basis and I'm certainly not going to defend it.
Let's look a little further down now. Here we see what I've marked as "Strong Types" and "Decent Types". Dark, Fairy and Electric were a little ambiguous; I placed dark halfway between because honestly I don't know which one it should fall into, but fire and fairy I placed as "Decent Types" because honestly, if used well they're a definite threat to the vast majority of the teams above them. A good fire player will probably beat an average water player, especially if the water player hasn't taken precautions against banded/scarved victini bolt strike or MegaZard Y Solarbeam. Assuming no Mega Metagross (which I'm sure will be suspected at some point), Fairy doesn't have particularly big problems with any of the types listed above it.

So basically, what I'm saying is that the 11 types ranging from "Decent" to "Strong" are, outside of the occasional arguably broken pokemon, perfectly capable of beating one another so long as they are used well. I'm not saying that it's perfectly balanced; Dragon will have a hard time dealing with Fairy, and Ground may struggle against Water, however a good dragon player using a well-built team will still beat a subpar fairy player the majority of the time.

It seems then, that rather than needing to nerf the majority of the types I've listed as "Strong", it would actually take less to improve those I've listed as "Weak". For Grass, I would argue that this would be halfway done simply by nerfing flying, another thing that needs to be done. This leaves perhaps five or six types that struggle with the metagame. And even then, if we ban all the completely broken pokemon, a type like Poison may struggle compared to other types and find a matchup vs. ground pretty much unwinnable, but the majority of the time a good user will still beat a bad user of another type. I used poison a reasonable amount myself before Kyu-W was unbanned, and even before M-Beedrill it was a decent enough type, if a little underpowered. The five or six types still won't be unusable, and they may be hard to use but to some this merely provides challenge, or an element of surprise.

So tl;dr I honestly think that banning broken pokemon and nerfing flying will put the current metagame into a strong position. We should consider any action we take carefully for the effect it will have on the metagame, but I think with the right moves taken a strong metagame will emerge with less effort than some might think. We certainly don't need to consider a nerf specific to water or steel at the present time.
 

Freeroamer

The greatest story of them all.
is a Community Contributoris a Top Tiering Contributor
You're still comparing usage to what needs to be nerfed, but imo, the metagame actually isn't all that bad at the moment. Before you all jump on this, think, when I first became properly involved with Monotype(XY release) pretty much every OT was dominated by Flying or Water. Times have changed and we regularly see many different types featuring in our tournaments and winning them, to the point where a Water vs Flying final is actually reasonably rare. What I guess I'm trying to say here is similar to the argument I've made before, in that we will never make every type equally viable, but it's more than that, while we certainly need to address the balance in usage between top types and lesser ones, we need to be careful about how we do it. For example I've seen many an argument about how Flying needs to be nerfed, however ive not heard one argument for how to do it that actually seems fair. You could ban something like Skarmory, one of the essential cogs of Flying, but then how do you know you won't just make it a lesser type such as Ice? Plus in nerfing one type you will only make others stronger, that's a fact, and so if you continue trying to nerf top types, due to the amount of options they have, you will need a hella lot of bans to ever make Flying, Water and Psychic on an even keel to the aforementioned lower types. By which point we then have to think about the image of Monotype, how can we possibly hope to attract users from the likes of OU etc. if they can't use half the mons they were originally able to use? Like I understand why people want things nerfed, but you have to understand that by going down that path, it has far bigger implications than you understand, rather than just being a simple issue of saying this is banned, hello great and balanced metagame. I haven't even got on to how to actually decide what needs nerfing on these types, again let's use the example of Flying, let's say popular opinion prevails and it needs nerfing, how do you justify what you do when nothing is objectively broken? How can you justify banning something like Skarm or Zapdos? You could go the other route and ban things like Lando-I which has more justification behind it but then that's not quite a nerf to Flying as something from their defensive core would be, and so you'd probably need to ban something else too, which brings me back to my original point.

Tl;Dr

Nerfing top types will take a lot more than simply saying x pokemon is banned, and has a lot more implication too.
 

InfernapeTropius11

get on my level
I personally think that the metagame is actually alright right now (except for Ice/Rock, but what are we gonna do, eliminate every Steel and Fighting move?) but if we have to nerf Flying/Steel, what if we banned Skarmory?
First of all, I would like to say that I personally love Skarmory, and it is on all of my Flying/Steel teams. I would hate for it to be banned, but before you rage at me for suggesting that, here is my reasoning:

Flying:
What is its role?
On Flying, it takes every Stone Edge, Diamond Storm, Rock Blast, Rock Slide, Icicle Crash, Ice Punch, Avalanche, and Ice Shard ever. It absorbs every non-Fire/Electric physical hit like a boss, and especially the Rock/Ice hits its teammates hate. It is one of the best Defoggers, as it is neutral to Stealth Rock. It can run Whirlwind for phazing. It is one of the best hazard setters on Flying, setting Stealth Rock or Spikes. It has Roost for reliable recovery, which is amazing on a wall. It has access to Brave Bird, a 120 BP physical STAB move, or Iron Head to hit the Ice/Rock types it walls for SE damage. It can even use some other niche options effectively, such as Toxic or Counter. It is also part of the generic asf flying core.
If it were banned, how would it affect Flying?
First of all it would shake up the annoying generic Flying core, which is never be a bad thing--change and diversity are (almost) always good. It also forces Flying users to rely on something like Landorus-Therian, Gliscor, physically defensive Zapdos, or Mandibuzz for their main physical wall. These all have disadvantages--Lando-T/Gliscor are 4x weak to Ice, Zapdos still doesn't like powerful Icicle Crashes or Stone Edges from something like Mamoswine or Terrakion even with investment (which Skarmory laughs at), and Mandibuzz has all of Flying's weaknesses, as well as one to Fairy. This forces some more juggling for the Flying player, requiring more skill than slapping Skarmory on a team and saying "I have physical attacks covered." It also indirectly drops the usage of some other Pokemon. For example, I believe that Lando-T would probably increase greatly in usage, causing Landorus-Incarnate's amazing special wallbreaking power to be left off the team. You might also have to run 2 defensive walls, such as Lando-T/Gliscor, and then Mandibuzz/Zapdos, who take Ice hits a little better. Although, physically defensive or mixed wall Char X could become a thing to take physical Ice hits. Having to run 2 defensive walls instead of just Skarmory means that balanced teams lose another spot for another attacker (defensive teams probably already have 2 defensive walls lol). So, it would create a more diverse metagame by breaking Flying's generic core and forcing them to find other options. It would also make it slightly easier to beat Flying, without making it a low-tier type (it will still have other options).

Steel:
What is its role?
On Steel, it is part of the fabled immunity core, offering a Ground immunity. It is also neutral to Fighting, and probably the best physical wall. Once again, its main moves are Roost, Whirlwind, Brave Bird, Stealth Rock, Spikes, and Defog.
If it were banned, how would it affect Steel?
Steel would rely more on Ferrothorn (4x weak to Fire, 2x weak to Fighting), physically defensive Scizor (4x weak to Fire), Eviolite Doublade (immune to Fighting, but weak to Fire/Ground and hates Knock Off), Klefki, Registeel, or Mega Aggron (all weak to Fire/Ground, the last two are weak to Fighting, but Mega Aggron has Filter and Klefki has screens). These are all slightly lesser options, and once again requires a bit more skill and juggling. Making the metagame more skill-based could never hurt.

Water and Psychic have Greninja and MegaCham/MeGallade/MegaGross respectively who are or will be discussed for a ban so that should be enough for them. The MegaBro ban also slightly nerfed both of them.

To conclude, I personally think that the metagame is very good right now, and the right stuff is currently being discussed for a ban (MegaCham, MeGallade, MegaEye) or is on the list (Skymin, Kyu-W, Genesect, MegaGross, Greninja), but IF it turns out that Flying and Steel DO in fact need a nerf, I believe banning Skarmory may be the best way to do this, as it nerfs them while still allowing them to remain competitive as a top-tier type. BUT, this should not be discussed at least for the next few weeks (maybe more) so we can finish discussing the current suspects, and those on the "up next" list and make decisions on them, as well as hopefully getting another month's stats from which to work with and draw conclusions from.
 

DoW

formally Death on Wings
You're still comparing usage to what needs to be nerfed, but imo, the metagame actually isn't all that bad at the moment. Before you all jump on this, think, when I first became properly involved with Monotype(XY release) pretty much every OT was dominated by Flying or Water. Times have changed and we regularly see many different types featuring in our tournaments and winning them, to the point where a Water vs Flying final is actually reasonably rare. What I guess I'm trying to say here is similar to the argument I've made before, in that we will never make every type equally viable, but it's more than that, while we certainly need to address the balance in usage between top types and lesser ones, we need to be careful about how we do it. For example I've seen many an argument about how Flying needs to be nerfed, however ive not heard one argument for how to do it that actually seems fair. You could ban something like Skarmory, one of the essential cogs of Flying, but then how do you know you won't just make it a lesser type such as Ice? Plus in nerfing one type you will only make others stronger, that's a fact, and so if you continue trying to nerf top types, due to the amount of options they have, you will need a hella lot of bans to ever make Flying, Water and Psychic on an even keel to the aforementioned lower types. By which point we then have to think about the image of Monotype, how can we possibly hope to attract users from the likes of OU etc. if they can't use half the mons they were originally able to use? Like I understand why people want things nerfed, but you have to understand that by going down that path, it has far bigger implications than you understand, rather than just being a simple issue of saying this is banned, hello great and balanced metagame. I haven't even got on to how to actually decide what needs nerfing on these types, again let's use the example of Flying, let's say popular opinion prevails and it needs nerfing, how do you justify what you do when nothing is objectively broken? How can you justify banning something like Skarm or Zapdos? You could go the other route and ban things like Lando-I which has more justification behind it but then that's not quite a nerf to Flying as something from their defensive core would be, and so you'd probably need to ban something else too, which brings me back to my original point.

Tl;Dr

Nerfing top types will take a lot more than simply saying x pokemon is banned, and has a lot more implication too.
It's certainly true that we should be careful about banning pokemon that aren't broken simply to nerf the type they're on, and should also be careful not to do too much damage. However, it is possible to ban pokemon such that the metagame improves dramatically (and I think the problem with flying would be not enough damage being done honestly). Moreover, there's precident for banning a pokemon that on its own isn't broken: Look at the Aegislash ban in OU. The ban vote succeeded by a mere two votes, and it seems certain to me that it wouldn't have been banned were it not for the fact that it opened Mega Gardevoir, Mega Medicham, Mega Heracross and to some extent Hawlucha to the metagame, thus increasing the variety in the metagame despite the fact that without this, the pokemon almost certainly wouldn't have been banned.
I think it should also be pointed out that the top candidates for bans (at least, that I would suggest, as a flying player who has thought about this problem for a number of months) would be Charizardite X, Landorus-i, Togekiss and Zapdos, quite possibly a few of these and all of them as type-specific bans.

As for how we know Flying is broken... well, this is somewhat hard to quantify. As Antar pointed out when we tried using stats for it, we can often assume that players use the same type whenever laddering, at least for periods of time, so we can't use glicko variation particularly well to assess whether flying is better, at least not quantitatively. This is why I've been using the usage statistics: as we know from UU and below, usage statistics are a reasonable way of telling how good something is in the current meta, if not perfect (see BL, BL2 etc.). The fact that flying is so far in front of literally everything else, and the fact that a large number of neutral players will tell you this is the broken type, are the only real evidence I can provide. It has a vast amount of variety and options; if you want a pokemon that can do something then there's an option that can do that job very well. The only real weakness to flying is SR, which is covered by the vast options of defoggers available.

So no, I can't quantifiably show that flying as a whole is broken. But there is good reason and some precident for banning pokemon in order to help the metagame as a whole, and I've provided what evidence is possible for flying being broken, while seeing no evidence against this. As a scientist, therefore - even a drunk one - I feel I've done the best that can be done in determining whether action needs to be taken, and whether it indeed can be taken, and concluded that it can and should.
 
Steel: Bisharp, magnet pull magnezone, metagross with ice punch/ thunderpunch or both, heatran with rocks and toxic.

Water: Greninja with rockslide, manaphy with tail glow, cloyster, suicune, DD gyarados, sharpedo, DD/orb crawdaunt.

Normal: Chansey with rocks, porygon 2 stomachs pretty much all physical and most special attacks and can return with toxic, diggersby can 2hko everything with band/life orb/SD, specs meloetta breaks every special wall after rocks or some damage

Dark: Tyrantiar rocks (and potentially ice punch or ice beam), greninja..., mega sableye..., bisharp.

Bug: Mixed Genesect + SD mega pinsir/heracross is massive pressure. Skarm does lose if any prior damage or pinsir gets a SD with no damage done to him.

Fighting: stone edges / close combat from heracross or terrakion can defeat the physical walls and then the game. Banded terrakion has been used to great effect and tbh, idk why it isn't being used, or why the double dance set isn't being used either. Regardless, M-Gallade ALMOST OHKOs skarm after rocks after a SD, and if there was previous damage and it has ice punch it is over.

Flying: Mirror matchup.

Psychic: Lots of status and bulk, mega gross or mega gallade/cham, reliable rock setter in mew or deoxys, massive walls in cresselia and slowbro.

Ghost: rocks golurk, mega sableye with foul play/toxic. Ghost plays in a defensive manner from what I've seen, hard to name pokes that stop me when it is a song and dance switch fest.

Fire: Aggressive fire moves wear down flying, once charizard/gyarados dies the match is pretty much over. Entei rolls every team that doesnt have a landorus, and lando can't switch in regardless of sun because of eSpeed and the want to preserve him to epower the rest of the team.

Grass: Mega venu + rocks from ferro + cradily forms a core that is hard to break, skymin can break zap after a seed flare.

Dragon: Kyurem B..., rocks on garchomp who can fire blast/stone edge/outrage, mega alt does 2HKOs pretty much everything with return that isn't skarm, which can be dealt with by a fire blast, calm mind lati@s with stored power

Poison: Nidoking bolt beam, Nidoqueen bolt beam, mega venusaur is hard to take down or even set up on.

Fairy: mega diancie, belly drum azu (after skarm takes any damage), setup clefable

Ground: Gravity landorus then ground stab punishment, sand annoys leftovers recovery, nidoking fireblast + ice beam + S. Wave

Electric: calm mind thundurus, mega ampharos with toxic/hp ice/dpulse, pain split rotom- W with toxic/hydro pump/tbolt/all

Ice: Cloyster, kyurem-w, banded mamoswine almost 2HKOs skarm after rocks just needs 1 flinch and skarm cant fight back.

Rock: mega diancie, tyranitar (mixed or DD ice punch), massive stone pressure


This is qualitative research versus this quantitative usage statistic that is being thrown at me. I will admit that grass, ghost, bug, and electric typically have a rough time against the more standard flying cores. However, the rest of the types are more than equipped to deal with the flying in the current metagame. I see no reason to even mention a nerf just based on a usage statistic. And if you would like to mention the W/L chart scp has provided, ground wins the most at the moment and that isn't being discussed.

BTW: I accidentally clicked a few buttons and this posted on its own unfinished IDK if you guys can see that but ignore it haha.

Also I listed these pokemon in a sense for you to connect the dots and see that some pokemon, like bisharp with the assistance of rocks, can pummel teams when combined. If I have to show how these pokemon work in tandem to beat flying I am sure I can find quite a few replays to share with the forum from every type.
 
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InfernapeTropius11

get on my level
Alright guys! We've kinda derailed a bit recently talking about whether or not top-tier types need a nerf and discussing the January stats, but I think we should go back to discussing our current suspects, then the up-next ones, and then decide whether or not to nerf these types, as we will probably have another month's stats to use, and it will also give people more educated opinions if they are actively considering this problem for a bit, rather than just saying ">10% needs nerf."

As for the suspects:

Mega Sableye:
On Dark I believe it needs a ban. It has tremendous support, from every angle. Wish passing and Heal Bell support is readily provided by Umbreon. Umbreon, Tyranitar, and Mandibuzz provide nice walls to switch in on attacks it doesn't like. Tyranitar, Hydreigon, Absol, Crawdaunt, Greninja, Bisharp, Houndoom, Honchkrow, Krookodile, Weavile, Drapion, Sharpedo, and Scrafty are all viable and provide tremendous offensive support to Mega Sableye, eliminating threats, checks, and counters, through wallbreaking, glass-cannons that can take out a Pokemon or two, other potential sweepers who can at the very least chop up the opposing team a bit, and multiple priority users. Heck, it even gets Zoroark mind games, and if you have it last in your party, then Zoroark can potentially eliminate your opponents go-to Mega Sableye check, or at least scout who it is and damage it a bit. It also has a few equally destructive sets. The most common moves will usually be Calm Mind and Recover, but it can then run WoW/Dark Pulse or Dazzling Gleam, Dazzling Ball, or even Taunt, Knock Off, Confuse Ray, Snarl, or Foul Play. It receives tremendous support and can sweep many teams when used effectively, and even if a counter can beat one set, it might lose to a coverage move, such as Dazzling Gleam, Snarl, or Confuse Ray hax. To conclude, BAN ON DARK.
On Ghost I think it is alright, so don't ban. Knock Off can really screw Ghost over, as can Dark teams, or random Shadow Ball coverage on something like Yanmega (I used to use that to have an easy time with Ghost--I used Metronome on it too to increase the damage, and it swept almost every Ghost team, usually from the start), Gardevoir, or Lati@s. Mega Sableye finally gives them a good answer to this, as it is neutral to both of their weaknesses, and can't have its item knocked off. Ghost also doesn't supply great defensive support. Some of its main walls are Dusclops (Knock Off weak), Dusknoir (single-Ghost typing is plain, and offers bad team synergy, no reliable recovery means Knock Off screws it too, as it relies on Lefties a lot), Gourgeist/Trevenant (weaknesses to both of Ghost's weaknesses as well as common coverage moves in Fire/Ice/Flying), and Jellicent (again weak to both of Ghost's weaknesses and common coverage in Electric/Grass). All of these have disadvantages. Ghost has no Wish passers, and the only Heal Beller is Mismagius, who sucks. Ghost actually does have decent offensive pressure in Gengar, Chandelure, and Aegislash, but that's about it. Mega Sableye actually helps Ghost become more viable and assists it in many type matchups, and because it assists in making Ghost a more competitive type in this metagame, it helps more than it hinders on Ghost, so, again, DON'T BAN ON GHOST.

Mega Medicham/Mega Gallade:
On Psychic, I believe they both need a ban. Mega Medicham offers tremendous walbreaking power, being able to 2HKO almost everything that isn't immune to or resists HJK. With coverage moves in Ice Punch, Poison Jab, and Psycho Cut, as well as priority in Fake Out (to break Sashes) and Bullet Punch (to finish off Sashed Pokemon and threaten Fairy types) it is an amazing wallbreaker. It has 100 base speed, which is average, but is enough for its job on Psychic, as it will outspeed everything it needs to kill (like Chansey, Porygon2, Skarmory, Ferrothorn, and Mandibuzz). Mega Gallade is an awesome sweeper. With incredible 165 base attack and access to Swords Dance or Bulk Up to boost that, it will hit hard. It also has a nifty base 110 speed tier, outspeeding most non-Scarfs, including Pokemon like Landorus, Thundurus-T, Terrakion, Keldeo, Infernape, and Garchomp, as well as the crowded base 100 speed tier and everything below it. With incredible STABs in Close Combat and Zen Headbutt, and then awesome coverage in Ice Punch, Thunder Punch, Knock Off, Shadow Sneak, or even SubPunch it can nail anything you want it to. Pokemon like Azumarill who may wall one set (in this case, it walls SD/Knock Off/CC/Ice Punch) are nailed hard by coverage (in this case, Thunder Punch, or even simply Zen Headbutt does a lot). It also has above average bulk to be able to set up. On their own, I actually don't think they are broken--just very powerful. It is the support Psychic provides that makes them broken. They get Heal Bell support from Meloetta, Mew, Gardevoir, Latias, or Celebi. They get Wish passing support from Gardevoir, Espeon, Jirachi, or Latias. They get Healing Wish support from Gardevoir, Latias, or Jirachi. They get offensive support from Victini, Metagross, Latios, Meloetta, Alakazam, Starmie, or Gallade (for Medicham only, obviously). They have access to bona fide walls to switch to in Slowbro, Meloetta, Cresselia, Deoxys-D, Jirachi, Mew, Gardevoir, or Latias. This is tremendous support, with amazing variety. Every one of the support categories contains at least 3 Pokemon, and usually more. When you combine this with what they already do extremely effectively, it makes them broken, as this support lets them perform their roles multiple times. For example, you can play recklessly with either Mega mid-game, before going to a Healing Wish user and bringing them back to full health to fight again. So, they are both fantastic Pokemon on their own, but then they receive absolutely fantastic support which pushes them over the top, BOTH MEGA-MEDICHAM AND MEGA-GALLADE NEED A BAN ON PSYCHIC.
On Fighting, I actually think neither is broken, so don't ban. They do of course receive amazing offensive pressure on Fighting, as it generally runs a Hyper-Offensive playstyle and has access to a variety of fast hard-hitters, including excellent Band/Specs/Scarf users. They don't, however, have access to any other support, really. Fighting has no Heal Beller, no Wish passer, no Healing Wish user, and below average walls (except Cobalion). Cobalion is actually a great physical wall that provides good support through Stealth Rock, Thunder Wave, and a slow Volt Switch to bring them in safely without having to sacrifice something. Their special walls however, are pretty much limited to Assault Vest Conkeldurr and Assault Vest Hitmontop. In my opinion, both serve their role without being too broken on Fighting, although I am slightly on the fence about Mega Gallade, because if their Scarfers or fast Pokemon are eliminated or Paralyzed, it can come in, set up, and sweep almost every type. This can be easy to accomplish with Fighting's own powerful Scarfers and Cobalion being able to tank a hit and Thunder Wave back. So, definitely DON'T BAN MEGA-MEDICHAM ON FIGHTING and MAYBE BAN MEGA-GALLADE ON FIGHTING. I am leaning towards no ban, but I could be convinced that it needs a ban.

TL; DR: See the bolded bits. Capitalized bolded bits are my main opinions.
 
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