Stall it with what? Had you read this thread you'd realize that when Rain is up these things are walled by a grand total of Jack, and Shit. It's cute how you think Rain mechanics change simply because the duration has.
-
Check out the relaunch of our general collection, with classic designs and new ones by our very own Pissog!
-
Welcome to Smogon! Take a moment to read the Introduction to Smogon for a run-down on everything Smogon, and make sure you take some time to read the global rules.
np: OU Suspect Testing Round 2 - Who am I to break tradition?
- Thread starter Philip7086
- Start date
- Status
Stall it with what? Had you read this thread you'd realize that when Rain is up these things are walled by a grand total of Jack, and Shit. It's cute how you think Rain mechanics change simply because the duration has.
Do you not know how to stall either? Outside of the usual, with a damp rock team one can make sacrifices that actually matter since a position to take down the inducers and prevent rain from going up is much easier to attain with proper planning. That strategy is completely moot under drizzle, where an endless barrage of attacks confront one's team mercilessly. It also matter with item choice. What's scarier, a Kingdra with choice specs or one with a damp rock?
Okay, this has been tugging at me for a few days now, but I haven't had the chance to type it up. Okay, so in order to be legitimate for nominations, do you absolutely have to be registered under your own username? My alt has been very fortunate lately, and I feel I could reach 1400~1500 in the meantime.
If we don't, I'll just identify myself or go under AccidentalGreed on PO.
If we don't, I'll just identify myself or go under AccidentalGreed on PO.
I'm tired of seeing this "this is broken and not this" nonsense. And why are we bringing up Luvdisc and Lumineon as examples in a discussion about bans for the OU Tier?
People try to logistically disconfigure the "what is" and "what isn't" causes for why a Pokemon is overpowered or not, and they lose sight of the important facts at work. Is Shadow Tag broken, or is Shandera broken? If Shadow Tag is the culprit, then why is Gochiruzeru and Wobbuffett not seeing any play? If it's Shandera, then why is no one using it when it doesn't have Shadow Tag?
I mean, really. Do you guys enjoy wasting time debating over Pokemon politics unnecessarily? Pokemon is a complex game with a lot to consider. When discussing the point of banning something, you don't need to go out of your way to decisively narrow down the singular cause of what the culprit is for the sake of political clarity. It's obvious the whole package is the problem, and dealing with it is what is actually important. Not all this "no that's not the problem this is" bullshit.
You guys have three options:
1: Ban Drizzle
2: Ban Swift Swim
3: Ban the Pokemon that abuse Drizzle
Consider those options for a moment.
If you choose option 3, you're essentially losing 2-3 (or however many you remove) competitively viable Pokemon from your roster of choices, when banning the ability would preserve these Pokemon as available. You also run the risk of, as some of you have pointed out, having lesser Swift Swim users rise up to fill the spots left behind by those you banned and the entire mess starts all over again.
If you choose option 1, you're limiting the use of many Pokemon that enjoy the benefits of rain, as well as downsizing or outright eliminating a viable play style. Yes, Rain Dance and Damp Rock are alternatives, but not ones that are competitively viable by comparison to what is already available in OU outside of rain. If you need any proof of this, look at Gen IV and the rate at which Rain Dance was used, then compare it to the overwhelming amount of new threats we have this generation. Yeah.
If you choose option 2, you effectively reduce the power rain teams have without banning any Pokemon (more to choose from, 1+), and you help to preserve a play style that may comfortably sit in the OU tier.
When the time comes, Phil will notify everyone of the accounts that have reached the bench mark, and will call out people to confirm that their account, including the alt, is theres. So you're fine.
If it's easy to take out inducers why is Rain a big deal? Why aren't we just "taking out" the Politoed, and then bringing in our own weather? Furthermore, why is one of your sweepers being made into your inducer? That wastes a moveslot that doesn't need to be wasted. You'd use the damp rock on your dedicated Rain Support, then Spam Choice Specs Kingdra/ SD Kabutops/ LO Ludicolo for 5 turns and completely cripple your opponents team, stall or not. Switch out to the support Pokemon, and repeat process when rain is up. Sure it'd be harder to use, but the things that are broken under Rain, are still broken under rain, it doesn't magically stop.
The thing is, Drizzle only breaks a couple of Rain sweepers, notably Manaphy and Kingdra; nobody's complaining about Luvdisc being broken. Drizzle is just a tool; many can utilize it, but only a few can master it. It doesn't matter if they aren't broken without Drizzle; if you aren't going to use them in optimal conditions, why use them at all? Drizzle is seen to be broken because it's new, and "obviously" the new thing is broken. But it's not; it only reveals the latent brokenness of some old Pokemon. Thing is, in Gen 4 Kingdra was already quite viable in Ubers due to Kyogre's Drizzle; all Drizzletoad does for Kingdra is allow it to destroy in OU as well (while a Pokemon's Uber performance doesn't really affect its tiering, this is just to show that Kingdra is plenty powerful, and probably should be looked at before Drizzle). I feel we should look at the broken abusers instead of Drizzle.
Basically, I agree with Xien Zo wholeheartedly.
Also, while banning 1 ability is simpler than banning 2 or however-many-there-are broken Rain sweepers, that's all it is: simpler. It's not logical or beneficial to the metagame at all. Imo, what Drizzle offers to OU is worth the trade-off of a couple broken Rain sweepers, most of whom would probably not be used if Drizzle was banned anyways. Just because we set a new precedent in banning abilities with Inconsistent (which, btw, is completely irrelevant, as Inconsistent and Drizzle operate in a completely different way) doesn't mean we should just use it as a quick-fix solution to our problems.
If the lesser Swift Swim users rise up, they'll certainly become a threat, but would be far less likely to be broken. That is, rain would still remain a powerful threat, but it wouldn't be overcentralizing before.
Furthermore, the very action of "lesser Swift Swim users rising up" implies that those pokemon would become more viable than before. So it's a risk of EITHER having lesser Swift Swim pokemon rise up to the extent where they're broken, or having lesser Swift Swim pokemon fail to rise up to the extent that they're viable members of the team, thus depriving rain teams of options.
Not only can, at most, just ONE of those situations occur, but either is also unlikely; it's far more likely that lesser Swift Swim pokemon rise up so they become viable choices, but don't skyrocket all the way to Uber.
Even in such a situation, the problem would be solved in simply just another suspect test, at most.
You effectively LIMIT pokemon instead of banning them. This strictly goes against smogon policy that if a pokemon is broken, it's banned, not limited. That is, restricting a pokemon is worse than banning it, so this would basically be WORSE than just banning all Swift Swim users outright.
This is all outside of the fact that you're restricting things that wouldn't be broken with Swift Swim anyway, effectively leading to "collateral" damage.
Furthermore, offensive rain would be hit fairly hard by the lack of Swift Swim.
Finally, once again, I would like to ask why we're having a double standard on rain suspects versus sand suspects, or even against regular suspects. Any other suspect is simply run through the suspect testing system, and banned as a Pokemon. There's no reason this process wouldn't work with our new rain suspects, so why are we even discussing all of these "alternate" ban schemes when the original still works perfectly?
Alright, so I've been playing this meta for some days now, and here are some of my thoughts.
Specs Latios is a fucking beast. It can single-handedly take out Rain Teams provided you can change the weather. Draco Meteor takes out anything, steel-type or not. A true monster.
Wobbuffet is amazing. Amazing. Why isn't this motherfucker banned yet? Half my wins against Rain/Sun teams have come just because Wobb trapped their weather inducer. Sorely underestimated in this metagame.
Terakion is awesome, as is Doryuzuu or however you spell it.
And on the subject of rain teams. Just fucking ban Drizzle and be done with it. Anyone who played rain in gen 4 can realize that it's the permanent rain that's broken, not any of the swift swimmers. Rain without Drizzle is much harder to pull off successfully.
Specs Latios is a fucking beast. It can single-handedly take out Rain Teams provided you can change the weather. Draco Meteor takes out anything, steel-type or not. A true monster.
Wobbuffet is amazing. Amazing. Why isn't this motherfucker banned yet? Half my wins against Rain/Sun teams have come just because Wobb trapped their weather inducer. Sorely underestimated in this metagame.
Terakion is awesome, as is Doryuzuu or however you spell it.
And on the subject of rain teams. Just fucking ban Drizzle and be done with it. Anyone who played rain in gen 4 can realize that it's the permanent rain that's broken, not any of the swift swimmers. Rain without Drizzle is much harder to pull off successfully.
Try doing your calculations with Damp Rock and 3 move movesets... then tell me there aren't any pokes that can stop them. And thats aside from the fact that you can't think of it as the whole set, you have to think for each individual.
Natt walls kingdra and often carries para, crippling anything that switches in or kingdra if it tries to do anything. This is one example. It may not wall the other two, but skarmory walls kabu, and sdef+ blissey can wall even focus blast ludicolo.
Damp Rock instead of LO and 3 moves makes a HUGE difference, as well as the fact that when you get walled by a phys/special wall and have to switch you commonly catch a para WHILE wasting a turn.
There is NO way that swift swim is even near where it is in drizzle. I'll admit that in drizzle with LO they really pack a punch... but the ability to use LO and 4 moves is a huge part of the reason for the OP coverage and damage, as well as the fact that there is no way to taunt the setup and it doesn't take a turn to put up where you can't make a move.
Edit:
For instance, Ludicolo never really used to carry focus blast. It doesn't have to moveset to cover everything since it has to choose between ice or fighting. And if a LO set is used, it causes the team problems from lack of crucial dancers.
In this thread i've read lots of theories about how broken rain is, but i have yet to see a log or some other sort of proof to support such a claim. B4 the Shaymin-S ban, i ran a team with a scarved Shaymin-S and no other water-type resistance or a weather setter, yet i never found it hard to counter drizzle teams. Now i use rain too and i have had only mediocre results with it. In practice, rain is much less threatening than what theory makes it out to be. There are countless ways to beat a drizzle team, even without a member specifically designed for that purpose, such as forcing Kingdra to lock itself in on Outrage or choiced attacks and revenging with a steel, KOing Kabutops with Mach punch, striking Manaphy with an attacker that outspeeds, while Ludicolo loses to any semi-bulky poke not weak to its STABs (Metagross, Latios, Breloom, Zuruzukin) due to its only average offensive capacity. Nattorei can also use any Kingdra as setup fodder to lay down spikes, which hurt toad every time it comes in to renew the rain, so clever switching among Ttar and Natt can stop such teams by itself (a common situation in my experience). Politoad's also a relatively bad pokemon for OU, unlike Ttar or Hippowdon. However, the main issue drizzle teams tend to face is how bad they operate outside their beneficial weather, unlike sun or sandstorm; a dead Politoad usually means GG, as any relatively fast and powerful pokemon (Latios, Gengar, Jolteon), will destroy a core of water-type sweepers. Paralysis also ruins the SS strategy, and some of its most common users just so happen to be nearly perfect to deal with drizzle teams, with Porygon2/Blissey shrugging off any attack Kingdra can throw and Voltlos/Erufuun crippling with priority, while the first has a STAB more often than not lethal for waters and the latter a resistance to surf/thunder. Storm drain Cradily uses any SS sweeper as setup fodder too. Trick Room is a pain as well.
In short, i find rain is overhyped. Unless somebody can provide proof to support the opposite, like a log of a low skilled player with a drizzle team easily defeating a skillful one with a non-weather or sand team, i believe in a metagame with so many competitively viable rain dance counters, drizzle teams are manageable. Trick Room Slowking/ Rankurusu/ Celebi, Sunny Day Chansey/ Blissey, Thunder Wave Gyarados/ Porygon2/ Voltlos/ Erufuun, Hail Kyurem, Water Absorb Suicune, Storm Drain Cradily, Nattorei, Calm Mind Kerudio/ Virizion, scarved Jolteon, Cloud Nine Lickilicky, are all examples of viable pokes which can severely cripple or even 6-0 most drizzle teams by themselves.
Regarding the argument "I must dedicate a teamslot to specifically counter rain teams": this doesn't mean that drizzle is broken. Dedicating a teamslot to counter a single pokemon is definately disturbing and constitutes to Uber status, however by using Nattorei or Virizion you become able to counter an entire playstyle; this is like claiming "stall is broken, because i must dedicate a teamslot to a wallbreaker". If a single pokemon (like Nattorei) or a single move (like Sunny Day on Chansey) allows you to essentially destroy an entire playstyle, then it might not be a bad idea to dedicate a team/moveslot to it.
Assessment: Drizzle is imo not broken. Gen 5 brought infinite rain in OU, but it also brought some near-perfect counters to accompany it. Banning Drizzle will not balance the metagame at all, it will just make sand the prominent weather and next suspect round people will start searching for other threats to ban.
In short, i find rain is overhyped. Unless somebody can provide proof to support the opposite, like a log of a low skilled player with a drizzle team easily defeating a skillful one with a non-weather or sand team, i believe in a metagame with so many competitively viable rain dance counters, drizzle teams are manageable. Trick Room Slowking/ Rankurusu/ Celebi, Sunny Day Chansey/ Blissey, Thunder Wave Gyarados/ Porygon2/ Voltlos/ Erufuun, Hail Kyurem, Water Absorb Suicune, Storm Drain Cradily, Nattorei, Calm Mind Kerudio/ Virizion, scarved Jolteon, Cloud Nine Lickilicky, are all examples of viable pokes which can severely cripple or even 6-0 most drizzle teams by themselves.
Regarding the argument "I must dedicate a teamslot to specifically counter rain teams": this doesn't mean that drizzle is broken. Dedicating a teamslot to counter a single pokemon is definately disturbing and constitutes to Uber status, however by using Nattorei or Virizion you become able to counter an entire playstyle; this is like claiming "stall is broken, because i must dedicate a teamslot to a wallbreaker". If a single pokemon (like Nattorei) or a single move (like Sunny Day on Chansey) allows you to essentially destroy an entire playstyle, then it might not be a bad idea to dedicate a team/moveslot to it.
Assessment: Drizzle is imo not broken. Gen 5 brought infinite rain in OU, but it also brought some near-perfect counters to accompany it. Banning Drizzle will not balance the metagame at all, it will just make sand the prominent weather and next suspect round people will start searching for other threats to ban.
Right, several things to say:
1: All those trashing Floatzel, bear in mind it has Base 115 Speed, which makes it outspeed almost anything which isn't boosted, Base 105 Attack, Bulk Up, and Brick Break. Yeah. Switch your Tyranitar into Floatzel, and then watch as you lose your inducer, Poli switches back in, and Rain dominates.
Floatzel @ Life Orb
252 Attack, 252 Speed, 4 Def
- Waterfall
- Brick Break
- Bulk Up
- Coverage Move/Baton Pass
Bulk Up if you get a free turn, and all of a sudden, Floatzel isn't so frail anymore. Brick Break will OHKO Tyranitar, no questions asked, so switching him in is not an option, while Hippowdon won't like Waterfalls, nor does he like Politoad.
So stop saying the non-used weather abusers can't be broken, because guess what, they can. [And Floatzel arguably is a better T-Tar counter to any of the common Rain Abusers]
2: Drizzle dosen't need Swift Swim to be broken. Scarfed Starmie spamming what is effectivly a BP 240 move? Or even worse, SPECS Starmie.
DD Gyarados with a Rain boost, so it effectivly starts at +1 in terms of Waterfall?
Removing a weakness from your Steel types, so they don't have to fear a Dragon using Fire Blast?
Scizor having only a x2 weakness to Fire, allowing it to, with the assistance of an Occa Berry, set up even against Fire attacks?
Then there's things like Hydration Vaporeon, which is a pain to take out as it is with the Wish support set, or pokemon who use a water-type coverage move, such as Latios.
CB Azumarill having ANOTHER boost in power to it's Aqua Jet sounds oodles of fun. [Yeah, what is basically an 80 BP priority, with Huge Power and a CB! Great idea!]
Agilty Emploeon starting with an effective Petaya boost in it's Surf/Boil Over/Hydro Pump, and effectivly resisting Fire now? God forbid it's AgilitySub Peteya.
And, of course, removeing the benifits of other weathers.
Hell, any powerful water attacker with STAB + Water Gem + Rain boost is gonna massivly dent ANYTHING without Water Absorb or a x4 Resistance with Hydro Pump.
Drizzle does more than just Swift Swim. We could ban Swift Swim, we could ban the 'Big three' and Manaphy, but then we could easily find Rain breaks any of the above as well, especially if we end up removing Landos/Dory afterwards.
Banning Swift Swim is not the answer. Rain offense has far more to offer, and it will still have brutal power behind it.
The route which will stop anything which could be broken under the rain, which is a massive list, is to just ban the root of the problem, Drizzle.
1: All those trashing Floatzel, bear in mind it has Base 115 Speed, which makes it outspeed almost anything which isn't boosted, Base 105 Attack, Bulk Up, and Brick Break. Yeah. Switch your Tyranitar into Floatzel, and then watch as you lose your inducer, Poli switches back in, and Rain dominates.
Floatzel @ Life Orb
252 Attack, 252 Speed, 4 Def
- Waterfall
- Brick Break
- Bulk Up
- Coverage Move/Baton Pass
Bulk Up if you get a free turn, and all of a sudden, Floatzel isn't so frail anymore. Brick Break will OHKO Tyranitar, no questions asked, so switching him in is not an option, while Hippowdon won't like Waterfalls, nor does he like Politoad.
So stop saying the non-used weather abusers can't be broken, because guess what, they can. [And Floatzel arguably is a better T-Tar counter to any of the common Rain Abusers]
2: Drizzle dosen't need Swift Swim to be broken. Scarfed Starmie spamming what is effectivly a BP 240 move? Or even worse, SPECS Starmie.
DD Gyarados with a Rain boost, so it effectivly starts at +1 in terms of Waterfall?
Removing a weakness from your Steel types, so they don't have to fear a Dragon using Fire Blast?
Scizor having only a x2 weakness to Fire, allowing it to, with the assistance of an Occa Berry, set up even against Fire attacks?
Then there's things like Hydration Vaporeon, which is a pain to take out as it is with the Wish support set, or pokemon who use a water-type coverage move, such as Latios.
CB Azumarill having ANOTHER boost in power to it's Aqua Jet sounds oodles of fun. [Yeah, what is basically an 80 BP priority, with Huge Power and a CB! Great idea!]
Agilty Emploeon starting with an effective Petaya boost in it's Surf/Boil Over/Hydro Pump, and effectivly resisting Fire now? God forbid it's AgilitySub Peteya.
And, of course, removeing the benifits of other weathers.
Hell, any powerful water attacker with STAB + Water Gem + Rain boost is gonna massivly dent ANYTHING without Water Absorb or a x4 Resistance with Hydro Pump.
Drizzle does more than just Swift Swim. We could ban Swift Swim, we could ban the 'Big three' and Manaphy, but then we could easily find Rain breaks any of the above as well, especially if we end up removing Landos/Dory afterwards.
Banning Swift Swim is not the answer. Rain offense has far more to offer, and it will still have brutal power behind it.
The route which will stop anything which could be broken under the rain, which is a massive list, is to just ban the root of the problem, Drizzle.
I think the main beef most players have against rain teams is that it offers so much power with very little effort. When you playing against a rain team, you are the one that has to make the predictions and you are the one that has to apply enough pressure on the opponent to prevent them from sweeping. Whenever I play against a rain team, or any weather team actually, I have to constantly juggle my pokemon while the opponent rams swift swimmer after swift swimmer down my throat. Only when I KO there weather pokemon can I finally launch my own offensive. Just like sxof said, there are plenty of viable counters against rain teams, it's just that many have not been popularized yet.
While rain teams are very powerful, I also believe that they do not deserve a ban at this point. At the very least, we should see how the metagame adapts to the resurgence of weather this gen.
While rain teams are very powerful, I also believe that they do not deserve a ban at this point. At the very least, we should see how the metagame adapts to the resurgence of weather this gen.
Adding Nattorei or Virizion does not auto mean that you beat rain. Nattorei gets 3KO'ed by Specs Kingdra (try locking that into Outrage), heck Ludicolo can run Focus Blast which will pretty much own Nattorei as well. Virizion is tougher for rain teams to beat however it can get worn down switching in. Also if we need to run stupid gimmicks such as Sunny Day Blissey to counter rain then it has become over centralising and possibly broken. Its not just shoving a Nattorei on a team and saying "Yeah I own Rain!" when a well made Rain team bulldozers through your Nattorei and then your rain check is gone and its GG. People are having to run sometimes more than one check to stop rain (unless they have a weather inducer) thus decreasing team diversity and weakening its viability vs other, non rain teams. I can create a team that can counter rain teams if I wish, however the tricky part is creating a team that matchs up well both with Rain and non Rain teams, something that is very difficult to do.
[
It is pretty much consensus that drizzle+swift swim is broken and over-centralizing... I'd say over 90% of people agree on that (can't speak specifics, just going by this entire thread and everything I've seen/heard on PO). I can guess that you are probably good at predicting them because they've become formulaic... but the ones that are played well can really be hard to beat, losing normally only to sandstorm teams built to counter them, or anti-meta teams specifically meant to counter weather.
There is also no single ban you can do that will balance the meta completely this test, so to say that just because drizzle ban won't auto fix the entire meta is pointless.
It is pretty much consensus that drizzle+swift swim is broken and over-centralizing... I'd say over 90% of people agree on that (can't speak specifics, just going by this entire thread and everything I've seen/heard on PO). I can guess that you are probably good at predicting them because they've become formulaic... but the ones that are played well can really be hard to beat, losing normally only to sandstorm teams built to counter them, or anti-meta teams specifically meant to counter weather.
There is also no single ban you can do that will balance the meta completely this test, so to say that just because drizzle ban won't auto fix the entire meta is pointless.
can ppl stop assuming that removing the two most broken rain abusers won't change a thing, just removing manaphy makes rain more bearable want proof look at the beta server their meta is ours with inconstant which is widely forwed upon by the better players and deoxys-n which i don't know y it's unused but without manaphy the only thing rain teams have that can cause problems is kingdra (admitedly i've gotten good @ containing it but that's beside the point) those two are the main reason rain is what it is.
so you are implying that the people that don't think drizzletoad is broken don't make logical arguements huh?fine!if you ask me all of your arguements were crap but i am not here to judge them...i am here to say my opinion not to judge others...so stop saying bullshit and learn to read!in one of your previous posts you said that you are here to listen to other opinions if they make some logical arguements.well a lot of fine arguements have been made but you just refuse to understand them....
manaphy is not really the broken aspect of rain, and higher on the ladder, a lot of teams run rain
No, I'm implying that the people on this thread debating FOR the keeping of Drizzle seem content to simply repeat their last point over and over even when it has been so thoroughly refuted by everyone on the other side of the argument. There have been no fine arguments made. There has been pretty much the "ban swift swim" argument, which has been refuted, and the "rain isn't broken" argument", for which the same is true. I'd like to direct your intention to a post I made some pages ago, asking for a single person to show an example of a team able to take on Drizzle without being severely hampered. THAT point still stands. If you are not familiar with the ways of argument, silence is consent. Since I have not had a truly legitimate response to that yet, it seems that our side has at the very least one point still standing, yet I struggle to find a single one of your that does not so mirror those of the previous posters.
Wobbuffet isn't that great vs Politoed. It can't Encore a Hypnosis - because it falls asleep - and if you try to Encore anything else, its STAB water move in the rain is a 2HKO. Just using Mirror Coat right away will also put you to sleep most of the times... I didn't get to try it vs Ninetales yet, but to me, Wobbuffet just takes up a valuable slot in my team without being all that useful.
Plus, you still need to change the weather after killing off Politoed, and even if you do, most Rain teams have a spare Rain Dancer... so it becomes a weather war which you'll lose most of the time.
even if i were to post a team which handles rain teams without using a weather inducer(which indeed i use)you would just go and say that the team is not good and is uncompetitive without even looking at it,like you always do with everything you don't agree...
besides i don't even have a reason to show my team to a person that doesn't respects my opinion,and is incapable of discussing anything due to stubborness and egoism...
i have wrote in my previous posts a lot of pokes and combinations that fare well against rain teams without being uncompeteitive without much thought...but of course you don't remember it 'cause you didn't even tried to understand what i meant instead of just straight up rejecting the ideas i proposed as bad(in your mind,not in your posts)....
so first of all regardless of what you and i beleive,you should show some respect to the people with which you are discussing about a matter even if you think that their arguements are incorrect...but according to your logic,in a discussion whenever you hear something that u don't like and you think that the other is saying invalid arguements you should just ignore him and act as if you never heard him...
well,fortunately,not a lot of people have the same manners with you and can keep a discussion to a decent level unlike you...when you learn to listen to someone else except your huge self,with some manners of course,come back and try to prove something...!
seriously why does everyone say what i want to say first :(
This is similar to what happened with Mence, you had to run multiple checks to stop it in case your opponent had it.
The way I see this whole drizzle vs Swift swim issue is...
In 4th Gen Swift swimmers weren't not considered or proven to be over powered..
In 5th Gen, Swift swimmers are being viewed as overpowered by some people
What relevant variable has changed between these two scenarios?... Infinite rain
Therefore if they were not overpowered previously, then why are they overpowered now, when it isn't the swim swimmers themselves that have changed, but another variable that has caused them to be overpowered which in this is case drizzle.
Therefore it makes the most sense to me that drizzle would be the basis for the overpowering and as such, would be the thing most logical to ban. If another "play style" had coincidently popped up (rain stall) as a result of infinite rain then thats too bad. A broken aspect should not be kept to conserve a style of play that in my opinion isn't even that widely used.
Don't get me started on the fact that swift swim is being widely over rated here. All it does is give its users +2 speed in rain! It's not some magic ability that ohko's everything in sight. The issue with rain in general is that it boosts water moves by 50%. If this was not the case then I don't think anyone would be finding swift swimmers an issue at all, as I'll repeat, swift swim just provides a +2 in rain. That ability in itself does not seem broken at all. The power to steamroll teams imo comes from the rain boost and not the speed boost and therefore I believe infinite rain, ie, Drizzle is the basis for the disturbance and the banning of swift swimmers should not considered, even more so if the sole reason for keeping drizzle is to conserve rain stall...
Another comparison you can make is with chlorophyll. It also provides a +2spd in weather, but of course no one is viewing the users of this as overpowered. Again, this is attributed to the fact its the weather not the ability that is the determining factor for the power of these pokemon and not the the +2speed ability that is associated with them.
In 4th Gen Swift swimmers weren't not considered or proven to be over powered..
In 5th Gen, Swift swimmers are being viewed as overpowered by some people
What relevant variable has changed between these two scenarios?... Infinite rain
Therefore if they were not overpowered previously, then why are they overpowered now, when it isn't the swim swimmers themselves that have changed, but another variable that has caused them to be overpowered which in this is case drizzle.
Therefore it makes the most sense to me that drizzle would be the basis for the overpowering and as such, would be the thing most logical to ban. If another "play style" had coincidently popped up (rain stall) as a result of infinite rain then thats too bad. A broken aspect should not be kept to conserve a style of play that in my opinion isn't even that widely used.
Don't get me started on the fact that swift swim is being widely over rated here. All it does is give its users +2 speed in rain! It's not some magic ability that ohko's everything in sight. The issue with rain in general is that it boosts water moves by 50%. If this was not the case then I don't think anyone would be finding swift swimmers an issue at all, as I'll repeat, swift swim just provides a +2 in rain. That ability in itself does not seem broken at all. The power to steamroll teams imo comes from the rain boost and not the speed boost and therefore I believe infinite rain, ie, Drizzle is the basis for the disturbance and the banning of swift swimmers should not considered, even more so if the sole reason for keeping drizzle is to conserve rain stall...
Another comparison you can make is with chlorophyll. It also provides a +2spd in weather, but of course no one is viewing the users of this as overpowered. Again, this is attributed to the fact its the weather not the ability that is the determining factor for the power of these pokemon and not the the +2speed ability that is associated with them.
Let's test some of the mentioned sets on this thread to see how viable they are instead of speculating their viability. I mean, two people can just agree to go on Pokemon Online, one with the standard Rain Dance team or at least one with the Politoed and the 'Broken Trio', and the other using the suggested counter/checks.
While Stealth rock should not be compared to an entire playstyle, you can still say that running rapid spin on a pokemon will be utterless useless when you face off against a team that doesn't run hazards. Then again, the difference here is that you don't lose when stealth rock is on the field, whereas you would if you weren't running something like Sunny Day Nattorei or Blissey/Chansey.
If you ban the broken abusers, drizzle and politoed won't be worth using. On the other hand, if you ban drizzle, rain still won't be worth using. Ban the broken abusers, or ban drizzle? Rain will suck either way.
Yeah, it can still be run in UU where it could potentially be a powerful force. But once again, what does UU lack that allows rain to ravage it there while it fails badly in OU?
And Machi, than you for linking to the thread.
After discussing rain, I think we might have to move onto other things. I'm looking at you, choice specs Latios...
If you ban the broken abusers, drizzle and politoed won't be worth using. On the other hand, if you ban drizzle, rain still won't be worth using. Ban the broken abusers, or ban drizzle? Rain will suck either way.
Yeah, it can still be run in UU where it could potentially be a powerful force. But once again, what does UU lack that allows rain to ravage it there while it fails badly in OU?
And Machi, than you for linking to the thread.
After discussing rain, I think we might have to move onto other things. I'm looking at you, choice specs Latios...
Big part of the issue with people trying to discuss rain is that its becoming clear here that many people never actually tried a rain dance team in gen 4, the point of why even sweepers would have to carry rain (Kabutops especially) is clear if you consider their speed so that rain can be successfully performed before a taunt - remember this is UU 4th gen so keep in mind the speed tiers fact that there are people who didn't realize why Electrode leads were so popular in rain dance teams in 4th gen pretty much shows how the gap in knowledge in playing rain. So its this discussion really should just stop and be left with those who qualify because frankly I see no reason for this to continue if there are people who don't even understand the basic concept of what infinite rain means compared to 8 turns and why certain speedy sweepers in 4th gen had to carry a damp rock and rain dance that makes the support value of Politoed a complete blessing to rain teams. Yet, the irony of this all is that people who never stuck to playing UU in gen 4 or really tried to use rain dance back then talk about it as if they know because they've used/using/played against a Drizzle team in gen 5 - which as repeated many times is a VERY different play style thanks to infinite rain (with drawbacks being minimized greatly).
Also keep in mind that Politoed pretty much can be EV'd to take hits from ground or rock STAB Pokemon's because of its typing granting it neutral damage, while Tyranitar/Hippowdon don't have the same luxury with water type Pokemon's STAB.
Can't people just stick to looking at specs Latios because its just a joke that its still around given how versatile and powerful that beast is. Heck even without rain we'd still have to deal with the fact that dragons are only threatening one another - that it becomes viable to simply run scarf on your Chomp/Salamence/Ono to revenge kill said Latios/Chomp/Mence/Onokurusu especially with the decline of ice as an offensive type. Thanks to Scizor/Nattorei/Heatran (steel types in general) that threaten part ice types (who are the main viable carriers of ice shard) and with Hidden Power at times being preferred to be fire type thanks to Nattorei. Heck we don't even have good new ice moves introduced, other than the 100% crit one that is basically carried by nothing that has Sniper ~_~. Don't even get started with the new ice types - only Kyuremu (who screams broken seriously why do people underestimate the bulk of this monster - yes he has weaknesses but no sane Scizor/Robushin/Breloom would be sane enough to switch in to this guys attack and at best is dealt with through revenge sure its speed isn't as good as the other dragons but offense wise this is no slouch still with bigger more broken threats out there I doubt he'll be going anywhere soon) and Rotom-F.
- Status