With all the new bugs in pinsir and jinjask, i seriously think grassvally coulbd be healthy
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Metagame np: PU Stage 2 - Let's Go Crazy (Crown Tundra is out)
- Thread starter MZ
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Hitmonchan (M) @ Assault Vest
Ability: Iron Fist
EVs: 252 HP / 24 Atk / 184 SpD / 48 Spe
Careful Nature
- Drain Punch
- Throat Chop
- Rapid Spin
- Mach Punch
Ability: Iron Fist
EVs: 252 HP / 24 Atk / 184 SpD / 48 Spe
Careful Nature
- Drain Punch
- Throat Chop
- Rapid Spin
- Mach Punch
As Rotom-Frost has established itself as a premiere offensive threat, I was trying to figure out a way to reliably stop it. Thus, this Hitmonchan set came into existence. The spread lets Hitmonchan live two Nasty Plot-boosted Thunderbolts from Frostom after Stealth Rock damage, with 48 speed EVs to outrun Adamant Perrserker. It's a rather specific set, but the compression it offers is incredible. On a related note, I'm expecting to see a lot of Hitmonchan (probably not this particular set, but we'll have to see) as the meta develops, as it provides a unique mix of offensive and defensive utility, not too much unlike how Hitmontop used to function.
So I decided to make a post about how the new unbans fare against all the new drops and what new drops can check/counter them. (btw the sets i'll be using for dlc/drops mons will be the ones posted by zS)
(Normal)
1st Check: 
Kangaskhan is a bit of a shaky check. Fake Out into Double Edge will always OHKO, but only with Stealth Rock. Specs Draco obliterates it too.
2nd Check:
Perrserker always outspeeds and does 86.6 - 101.9% with a Tough Claws boosted U-Turn which would have a 93.8% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock. If the Appletun lives you will take 78.2 - 92.1% from a Specs Draco.
3rd Check:
Again, Perrserker always outspeeds and does 16.8 - 19.8% with Fake Out. Iron Head will then do 49.7 - 58.6% leaving Appletun at about 21.6% and in return Perrserker takes about 52.3 - 61.5% from a Specs Draco. U-turn will kill Appletun and help switch into another Pokemon.
4th Check: 
Pinsir will always OHKO with a banded X-Scissor.
5th Check:
/
/ 
I put these three together because they basicallly all do the same thing. Blizzard will always do 92 - 109.9% and guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock damage. If you miss or Blizzard doesn't kill, Specs Draco will always OHKO Rotom.
6th Check:// 
I also put these together because they basically do the same thing. Brave Bird will always OHKO regardless if you are banded or not.
7th Check:
Wigglytuff's Dazzling Gleam does 83.6 - 99% damage, or a 75% chance to OHKO with Stealth Rocks damage. Wigglytuff will take 68.8 - 81% from a Apple Acid and also gain a SpA boost from a SpDef drop. Then you will finish the Appletun off with your next Dazzling Gleam.
8th Check:
This Wigglytuff does basically the same thing. Dazzling Gleam will always 2HKO and Apple Acid will do 45.9 - 54.3% to AV Wigglytuff.
9th Check:/
// 
QD Butterfree will never OHKO with Hurricane unless Appletun has taken Stealth Rocks damage. Specs/LO on the other hand will always OHKO
with Hurricane.
10th Check: 
Dedenne has a 6.3% chance to OHKO with Dazzling Gleam and a 87.5% chance with Stealth Rocks damage.
Last Check:
Sub up until you have the Unburden and Attack boost and then Acro OHKO's.
Kangaskhan is a bit of a shaky check. Fake Out into Double Edge will always OHKO, but only with Stealth Rock. Specs Draco obliterates it too.
2nd Check:
Perrserker always outspeeds and does 86.6 - 101.9% with a Tough Claws boosted U-Turn which would have a 93.8% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock. If the Appletun lives you will take 78.2 - 92.1% from a Specs Draco.
3rd Check:
Again, Perrserker always outspeeds and does 16.8 - 19.8% with Fake Out. Iron Head will then do 49.7 - 58.6% leaving Appletun at about 21.6% and in return Perrserker takes about 52.3 - 61.5% from a Specs Draco. U-turn will kill Appletun and help switch into another Pokemon.
4th Check:
Pinsir will always OHKO with a banded X-Scissor.
5th Check:
// I put these three together because they basicallly all do the same thing. Blizzard will always do 92 - 109.9% and guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock damage. If you miss or Blizzard doesn't kill, Specs Draco will always OHKO Rotom.
6th Check:
// I also put these together because they basically do the same thing. Brave Bird will always OHKO regardless if you are banded or not.
7th Check:
Wigglytuff's Dazzling Gleam does 83.6 - 99% damage, or a 75% chance to OHKO with Stealth Rocks damage. Wigglytuff will take 68.8 - 81% from a Apple Acid and also gain a SpA boost from a SpDef drop. Then you will finish the Appletun off with your next Dazzling Gleam.
8th Check:
This Wigglytuff does basically the same thing. Dazzling Gleam will always 2HKO and Apple Acid will do 45.9 - 54.3% to AV Wigglytuff.
9th Check:
/// QD Butterfree will never OHKO with Hurricane unless Appletun has taken Stealth Rocks damage. Specs/LO on the other hand will always OHKO
with Hurricane.
10th Check:
Dedenne has a 6.3% chance to OHKO with Dazzling Gleam and a 87.5% chance with Stealth Rocks damage.
Last Check:
Sub up until you have the Unburden and Attack boost and then Acro OHKO's.
(Normal)1st Check: 
Emolga is a very shaky check. Air Slash has a 43.8% chance to OHKO, but only with Stealth Rocks damage.
2nd Check:
Kangaskhan's Fake Out into Double Edge will always OHKO if you get the highest possible rolls for each move, or if the Gourgeist has taken Stealth Rocks damage. Some Gourgeist's do run Explosion, and in that case your Kangaskhan will be outsped and then OHKO'd by it.
3rd Check:
Ninjask's Acrobatics always has a 68.8% chance to OHKO, and a guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rocks damage.
4th Check://
Like before with Appletun, these basically all do the same thing. Blizzard always OHKO's, though there is a chance of it missing.
5th Check://
I also put these together because they basically do the same thing. Brave Bird will always OHKO regardless if you are banded or not.
Emolga is a very shaky check. Air Slash has a 43.8% chance to OHKO, but only with Stealth Rocks damage.
2nd Check:
Kangaskhan's Fake Out into Double Edge will always OHKO if you get the highest possible rolls for each move, or if the Gourgeist has taken Stealth Rocks damage. Some Gourgeist's do run Explosion, and in that case your Kangaskhan will be outsped and then OHKO'd by it.
3rd Check:
Ninjask's Acrobatics always has a 68.8% chance to OHKO, and a guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rocks damage.
4th Check:
// Like before with Appletun, these basically all do the same thing. Blizzard always OHKO's, though there is a chance of it missing.
5th Check:
// I also put these together because they basically do the same thing. Brave Bird will always OHKO regardless if you are banded or not.
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: I really don't know how good will it be in PU tbf, it is the second fastest pokemon in the tier and hits decently hard with its Strong Jaw boosted Fangs moves, but doesn't seem hard to check it with things like Palpitoad, Marowak, Sandslash, Vibrava (if Play Rough is not used), Dubwool, Appletun (if Play Rough is not used/Choice-locked into another move), Lickilicky (even if Def is not invested it is not 2HKO`d by Banded Thunder Fang after Lefties, Phys. Def Mawile, Type:Null, Seaking. That being said I don't think Boltund will be meta-defining but it could be pretty good with its enormous Speed. At least I think that it will outclass Pikachu as a Physical/Mixed Wallbreaker Electric-type, as Boltund is faster and bulkier. : I think it will be a terror in PU with its new access to Hurricane combined with Quiver Dance and Sleep Powder, basically a worse Vivillon. It can get a lot of setup opportunities against the slower-paced meta (even though it happens to be faster rn), and the drop of pokemon that deal with Rock, Steel and Electric types makes it even better and they give the support to Butterfree sweep. I don't know if it is broken, maybe not.
: That is the first pokemon I'm listing here that might be broken. It has a lot going for it, a high Attack stat, a good Physical bulk, OK speed, good STABs, great abilities. It could be a suicide lead with Stealth Rock and Head Smash, a Choice Scarf or Band user, a sweeper with Swords Dance (awesome with Sticky Web) and manual Rain Dance. I see this pokemon being a problem to this tier. : This might be the tier that it finally can shiny and prove its worthy. It also has a lot going for it and versatility. Looks like it will be a great Defogger in the tier, it can sweep with access to Calm Mind and the ability Unburden. Maybe the premier set will be the speedy-bulky Defog with Strenght Sap, Will-O-Wisp and Hex/Night Shade/Shadow Ball. Maybe it could be the best defogger in the tier, we'll have to wait and see.
: This thing is back and it looks as annoying as ever, we already know what it does but I really don't like this thing back. It can come in almost any hazard setter in the tier.
: It was very good in Gen 7 and I'm not surprised to see it being good here aswell. It is fairly strong, it has a great SpDef stat, it has priority in Mach Punch and Bullet Punch, it has good STABs in Drain Punch and Close Combat, a great coverage with the elemental punches and Throat Chop to deal with spinblockers, and what differs it with other Fighting types in the tier is its access to Rapid Spin. It is a excellent offensive spinner and it adds another option of offensive spinner other than Mr. Rime (both have their reasons to be used).
: Klinklang is a hard one. Its good bulk, speed and Attack stat and access to Shift Gear sounds dope, but what hinders it is its scarce movepool. It was already a problem for it last gen, but it had access to Return, that gave Klinklang a coverage option other than Wild Charge, but now that Return doesn't exist anymore it really lacks a good coverage to break past pokemon such Stunfisk, Manectric, Raichu, Seaking and Palpitoad. The lack of Return sucks for Klinklang but I don't underestimate its potential as a sweeper with the right support. : My boy is back at business and it looks even better as before with its access to the newly-added Dual Wingbeat, allowing Ninjask to use Heavy-Duty Boots, obviously the Acrobatics set still fine, Dual Wingbeat just adds a new option. It does the same as it did back before it rose, it is maybe the best Revenge Killer in the tier being the fastest pokemon in the tier, revenge killing even +1 Timid Lilligant with Jolly Ninjask and Scarf Pinsir, Kadabra, etc and can pivot out of bad matchups and even act as a sweeper. I see it being a force to reckon with in the metagame.
: Probably the most versatile pokemon that dropped from NU. Seriously, it can do SO MUCH, from being a Choiced pivot to a Sticky Web lead to a sweeper, it has a plethora of options with its notable movepool (Sticky Web, U-turn, Trick, Calm Mind, Iron Defense, Agility, Stored Power, Body Press, Recover, Bug Buzz, Psychic, Psyshock, Reflect, Light Screen). I can already see it being ridiculous good if not too much for the tier, it can really do a lot and its unpredictability could lead it to a privileged spot in the tier. : I don't really know how it will affect the metagame. It has a good movepool combined with an awesome ability in Tough Claws making it a fearsome physical wallbreaker, and with U-turn it can be a great Band user. It can also use Assault Vest to solve its frailty in the Special side and take on better against Kadabra, Butterfree, Lilligant, Mr. Rime, Rotom-Frost, etc. The downside is its low Speed stat making it prone to revenge killing, since its not that bulky. : Get this thing out of here. It is for sure too much for the tier, it has STAB Boltbeam, Defog, Pain Split, Nasty Plot, Status, Trick, Volt Switch. Basically it can do everything well, its an awesome defogger in the tier, it can easily sweep (if you're not unlucky by missing several Blizzards), it can check some pokemon like Sandslash, Butterfree, Drednaw, Lapras, Mareanie and a lot more, it is by far the best pivot in the tier, it can be Specs, Scarf, Heavy-Duty Boots, it fits well in almost every archetype except Stall. I think and hope that it gets banned soon. : Another excellent drop imo, I hyped that pokemon a lot when it was NU in the first month it got there but the NU meta developed against it but now it is here and I hope it is not broken down here. It adds another Flying-type pokemon in the tier, which the tier lacked pre-shift. It is an excellent offensive pivot in the tier with its access to U-turn, an amazing 115 Attack and its great 93 Speed. It can be a offensive defogger with Heavy-Duty Boots or a Choice Band or Scarf user. The problem with this pokemon is the lack of coverage but having U-turn helps with it a lot in a term. I believe it will be a great pick.
: The usual Webs lead is back, it would be better if it never left the tier, as Charjabug was the main Webs lead in the Shuckle absence, but Orbeetle dropped here aswell, so the competition is tough even though Shuckle has Stealth Rock to differ it from its competition. : I don't see it being effective at all in PU. I don't consider it unusable but we don't have an excuse to use it if we already have Manectric, Raichu and the new Rotom-Frost. It is fast (not as fast as Manec and Raichu) but it is very weak even with Specs and its movepool doesn't help either.
: He really needs an evolution, cmon GameFreak. : It is a interesting case. It has a really good support movepool with Defog, Encore, Knock Off, U-turn, Nuzzle and Taunt.it has reliable recovery in Roost but its stats outright KILLS this pokemon. Its only good trait talking about stats is its Speed, everything else sucks, awful bulk and bad offensive stats. Unfortunately it is just bad but it would have a place if were not by its stats.
: Its great overall bulk and SpAtk seem appealing but the problem is with its typing, mainly in the post-shift meta that brings Orbeetle, Unfezant, Rotom-Frost, Butterfree, Drifblim, Pinsir, Klinklang, Perrserker, they're all a problem to Exeggutor. I don't think it is bad but at least for now I don't see it doing too much with so many threats praying on its typing.
: I think it suffers more from competition than anything. It has OK-rounded stats and the new access to Flip Turn, but it suffers competition as a Water-type pivot from Seaking, which, although it is quite slower than Golduck, it has a better movepool and the incredible access to Lightning Rod, which makes it from being a prey to Electric-types to being their predator, since it checks very well Manectric and Raichu. It can act as a Calm Mind sweeper but its underwhelming Speed stat makes it vulnerable from being revenge killed by Leafeon, Manectric, Raichu, Boltund, Lilligant, Pikachu and Rotom-Frost. And as a manual Rain Setter/Abuser it is outclassed by Ludicolo since it has a great secondary type in Grass to break through other Water-types. : Kangaspikes. It is for sure too much to handle in PU. Great bulk with 105/80/80, great Speed, great Attack, awesome ability in Scrappy, great movepool, it has priority in Fake Out and Sucker Punch, it threatens every PU mon. I don't need to say more ig.
: This thing is way better than I expected. It has AMAZING bulk (110/95/95) able to take hits from both of the spectrums even when you're not investing on it, it is the best wishpasser in the tier, passing very high amounts of HP with its blisteringly high HP stat, it also has access to Heal Bell, Knock Off, Toxic, Body Press. It can also use Swords Dance to boost its OK Attack stat alongside with Double-Edge, Earthquake, Power Whip, Zen Headbutt, Knock Off. It can spread paralysis with its STAB Body Slam aswell. I think it will be truly a tier-defining pokemon.
: Another Quiver Dance in the tier that promises to terrorize the tier. Although it doesn't have a really notable ability that helps with its role (unlike Butterfree) it is bulkier, stronger and faster than it. It lost 2 big things from the last gen, Hidden Power and Z-Move, but it got Pollen Puff wich partially helps with its Hidden Power loss (it doesn't, who am I kidding?) but it can sweep easily when Steel, Fire and Flying-types are gone. Maybe it is too much for the tier, maybe not, it is really hard to say yet.
: It is indeed very fast and has a good movepool but it is so weak that it is hard to find a niche for Lopunny to perform.
: It looks alright in PU. It suffers competition as an offensive Rock-type from Stonjourner and Silvally-Rock. Lycan-midnight is faster than Stonjourner, stronger than Silvally-Rock and it has access to Stone Edge, which never miss thanks to its ability No Guard. The access to new moves such as Close Combat, Psychic Fangs and Play Rough helps it aswell in some extent. It has potential even with the competition around.
: There we go, we finally have a offensive viable-looking Ground-type again. Since the Silv-Ground ban, the only 2 ground types in the tier were Palpitoad and Vibrava, then Stunfisk dropped to PU, which is a Ground-type but a defensive one. In my opinion it is good for the tier being a Ground-type like Marowak since now it is important to have a Ground-resist/immunity, before the shift nobody was worried about Ground-type switch-ins, and for a good reason. Now talking about Marowak, it is just the strongest pokemon in the tier in terms of immediate power which also has coverage in Stone Edge, Fire Punch and Knock Off. It can act as a offensive Stealth Rock setter or just a Swords Dance sweeper to help breaking past Barrier Musharna and etc. I don't think Marowak is broken, its only good trait is its gargantuan Attack, but its very slow and its not frail but definitely not bulky. : It has 3 good abilities in Hyper Cutter, Mold Breaker and Moxie, it can perform as a setup sweeper, as a Scarfer with Moxie and even as a offensive Stealth Rock setter. It has great coverage options in Earthquake, Close Combat, Stone Edge and Knock Off. It has an amazing 125 Attack stat with a decent Speed stat which makes this pokemon looks a threatening wallbreaker in the tier. I think it is alright in PU since the tier still have some counterplay to deal with it, since its not that fast and its typing makes it vulnerable to be revenge killed by Ninjask and Unfezant and other faster and strong options in the tier.
: Its new access to Spikes is amazing since it performs a unique role as a Spikes setter that also spins and is not passive with its high Attack stat and access to a strong Earthquake and Knock Off. And with the buff Rapid Spin received this gen it can turn into a sweeper as it has Swords Dance and Rapid Spin speed-boosting it. It can function offensively or defensively pretty well so it might be very good in PU.
: When Kangaskhan is banned (if it gets banned) Stoutland will rise in viability drastically, since Kangaskhan is also a physical offensive Normal-type and Kangaskhan does everything better than Stoutland despite being weaker than the dog. The lack of Return hurts A LOT, now the strongest STAB it gets is Strenght which is 80 BP, pretty underwhelming compared to Return/Frustration. As I said it could be very good even with the loss of Return, but first Kangaskhan has to go.
: already banned thank God. : It is another pokemon that can act as a Cleric and it is not exactly overshadowed by Lickilicky. Lickilicky has more defenses and Speed and more sweeping potential with Swords Dance aswell, but Wigglytuff has a higher HP, which doesn't only influence on its own bulk but the amount of HP the Wish gets and it has access to Teleport, going all-out pre-dlc Clefable mode, and we already know how good Wish + Teleport is. Another thing Wigglytuff differs from Lickilicky is its secondary Fairy-type, which threatens Fighting-type such as Hitmonchan, Throh and Falinks with STAB Dazzling Gleam instead of suffer from them in the case of Lickilicky. It also has Heal Bell, Knock Off to its Cleric set. It can also setup Stealth Rock which is huge and it has an even better movepool than Lickilicky with access to Flamethrower, Fire Punch, Hyper Voice, Ice Beam, Thunderbolt, Thunder Wave, Shadow Ball, Psychic, Focus Blast, Play Rough, Body Slam, Double-Edge, etc (these are the most notable). It will be interesting to see how effective it will be.To anyone interested in reading all of this I hope the analysis has helped in some way. I just showed my opinion on every drop.
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The fact that Thievul is probably the shortest ban in the tier, (and maybe in all of Smogon but idk there), this year is just crazy all around. So many weird things are going on and we still got 5 months after July.
Kind of curious now since the reasonings for Thievul's quickban make it seem like it's likely to get that boot again pretty swiftly.
Kind of curious now since the reasonings for Thievul's quickban make it seem like it's likely to get that boot again pretty swiftly.
Not really, now that the best terrain setters in twackey and pinchurchin are gone unburden sets are harder to pull of, which requires thievul using less conventional tactics such as weakness policy which are easily revenged killed by priority users due to thievul’s mediocre bulk. Right now it is best used as prediction-heavy nuke which can blow back certain treats with stakeout but is nothing too broken to handle
Can't really think of a good introduction, let's just talk (possibly) broken Pokemon to hopefully spark more discussion.
Among all of the potentially broken Pokemon, I think Rotom-F is probably the most problematic. Its STAB combination has always been great and still puts a lot of strain on builds, but in my eyes, gaining access to Nasty Plot + it now being able to make use of Heavy-Duty Boots pushed it over edge. Counterplay definitely exists (see: Lickilicky, Munchlax, Type: Null, Seaking, specially defensive Hitmonchan, etc.), but notice how, besides Seaking, none of these responses necessarily prevent Rotom-F from setting up and/or pivoting out with Volt Switch. Furthermore, because of Heavy-Duty Boots, you can't exactly punish Rotom-F for continuously using Volt Switch to exploit these passive responses and generating free turns for another partner, which makes it harder to wear down. While I've only really used Defog + Nasty Plot, there's likely some merit to other sets (Choice Scarf, Choice Specs, SubSplit, SubWisp), meaning that Rotom-F also has the aspect of unpredictability going for it and can more immediately handle certain switch-ins depending on the set.
I'm not 100% sure whether I'd call Perrserker broken, though it's undeniably a top wallbreaker. Choice Band sets have very little defensive counterplay, and Perrserker has the coverage to tear through sturdier resists (see: Palpitoad, Pyukumuku, and Klang). On top of that, being able to generate momentum with a Tough Claws-boosted U-turn makes wearing down and exploiting other physical walls like Stunfisk and Tangela much easier. On the flip side, offensively pressuring Perrserker has been easy enough given its low Speed, bad special bulk, and vulnerability to Fighting, Ground, and Fire, which aren't uncommon offensive typings. Other sets exist and somewhat mitigate these flaws (Choice Scarf and Assault Vest), though I still believe Choice Band is the best set. The most direct comparison I can draw to Perrserker is SM Aggron, as they share a number of strengths and faults, which may be why it's difficult for me to say the former is broken.
I've seen some people bring up Kangaskhan, but I don't find it unhealthy at all. Rather, I find it a good wallbreaker (in a tier of many good wallbreakers) that ultimately does more good than harm. It's a powerful tool on offensive teams, which is notable given that these are sure to see more usage, but it's also a powerful anti-offense tool that really helps against setup sweepers like Butterfree and Lilligant as well as fast nuisances like Boltund. That's not to say that I don't see where people who find Kangashan overwhelming are coming from, though. Normal checks are a bit less clear-cut than they were in SM, and our defensive Pokemon aren't quite as good as they were before, but I haven't found managing and wearing down Kangaskhan to be too difficult.
Orbeetle is another Pokemon I've seen people discuss, and to be perfectly honest, I haven't really seen this Pokemon much at all yet. Orbeetle's another bulky setup sweeper that can boost its defenses, though unlike Dubwool and Gothitelle, it has access to more immediate recovery in Recover. While this means that Orbeetle doesn't have to gamble as it heals, it also means that status conditions are more annoying unless it runs Substitute, which costs an entire moveslot. If anything makes Orbeetle broken, it's the fact that it can bypass Dark-types with Body Press or Bug Buzz while not being walled by Ghost-types because of Stored Power, which objectively makes it harder to deal with than its contemporaries. It's probably worth keeping an eye on Orbeetle, though again, I haven't seen or used it much, so I can't make any sort of call for certain.
(edit: didn’t realize it earlier, but i think a point against orbeetle is that it more or less has to pick and choose what it loses to. while you can viably run both psychic STAB and an option for darks, you lose out on stuff like iron defense or sub, so there’s always going to be some sort of opportunity cost until “the perfect set” comes about.)
Among all of the potentially broken Pokemon, I think Rotom-F is probably the most problematic. Its STAB combination has always been great and still puts a lot of strain on builds, but in my eyes, gaining access to Nasty Plot + it now being able to make use of Heavy-Duty Boots pushed it over edge. Counterplay definitely exists (see: Lickilicky, Munchlax, Type: Null, Seaking, specially defensive Hitmonchan, etc.), but notice how, besides Seaking, none of these responses necessarily prevent Rotom-F from setting up and/or pivoting out with Volt Switch. Furthermore, because of Heavy-Duty Boots, you can't exactly punish Rotom-F for continuously using Volt Switch to exploit these passive responses and generating free turns for another partner, which makes it harder to wear down. While I've only really used Defog + Nasty Plot, there's likely some merit to other sets (Choice Scarf, Choice Specs, SubSplit, SubWisp), meaning that Rotom-F also has the aspect of unpredictability going for it and can more immediately handle certain switch-ins depending on the set.
I'm not 100% sure whether I'd call Perrserker broken, though it's undeniably a top wallbreaker. Choice Band sets have very little defensive counterplay, and Perrserker has the coverage to tear through sturdier resists (see: Palpitoad, Pyukumuku, and Klang). On top of that, being able to generate momentum with a Tough Claws-boosted U-turn makes wearing down and exploiting other physical walls like Stunfisk and Tangela much easier. On the flip side, offensively pressuring Perrserker has been easy enough given its low Speed, bad special bulk, and vulnerability to Fighting, Ground, and Fire, which aren't uncommon offensive typings. Other sets exist and somewhat mitigate these flaws (Choice Scarf and Assault Vest), though I still believe Choice Band is the best set. The most direct comparison I can draw to Perrserker is SM Aggron, as they share a number of strengths and faults, which may be why it's difficult for me to say the former is broken.
I've seen some people bring up Kangaskhan, but I don't find it unhealthy at all. Rather, I find it a good wallbreaker (in a tier of many good wallbreakers) that ultimately does more good than harm. It's a powerful tool on offensive teams, which is notable given that these are sure to see more usage, but it's also a powerful anti-offense tool that really helps against setup sweepers like Butterfree and Lilligant as well as fast nuisances like Boltund. That's not to say that I don't see where people who find Kangashan overwhelming are coming from, though. Normal checks are a bit less clear-cut than they were in SM, and our defensive Pokemon aren't quite as good as they were before, but I haven't found managing and wearing down Kangaskhan to be too difficult.
Orbeetle is another Pokemon I've seen people discuss, and to be perfectly honest, I haven't really seen this Pokemon much at all yet. Orbeetle's another bulky setup sweeper that can boost its defenses, though unlike Dubwool and Gothitelle, it has access to more immediate recovery in Recover. While this means that Orbeetle doesn't have to gamble as it heals, it also means that status conditions are more annoying unless it runs Substitute, which costs an entire moveslot. If anything makes Orbeetle broken, it's the fact that it can bypass Dark-types with Body Press or Bug Buzz while not being walled by Ghost-types because of Stored Power, which objectively makes it harder to deal with than its contemporaries. It's probably worth keeping an eye on Orbeetle, though again, I haven't seen or used it much, so I can't make any sort of call for certain.
(edit: didn’t realize it earlier, but i think a point against orbeetle is that it more or less has to pick and choose what it loses to. while you can viably run both psychic STAB and an option for darks, you lose out on stuff like iron defense or sub, so there’s always going to be some sort of opportunity cost until “the perfect set” comes about.)
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Before Perrserrker gets the axe (hopefully not), I'd like to bring up some benefits it brings to the tier
It has an amazing typing for this tier, we lack Steel-types who don't absolutely suck so it's a great addition to have something else sponge Ice, Bug, Steel and Psychic type attacks.
It is hard for alot of teams to deal with this however it does not have the tools or stats to sweep teams nor to go on a rampage that can cause a significant amount of the opposing team to just get blown away. A poor speed tier, bad sp.def and weakness to common types helps keep this thing in check.
Yes, you can run a scarf set and still have the benefit of running a choice band set (or life orb) for free but with this monster, you know what you're facing. Steel Beam can be used with Steely spirit as a last move to absolutely demolish Tangela after it switches into your previous move but once again, it does not "maul" a large portion of the tier.
Assault Vest Perrserker is what alot of people are using and it's a great pivot, hits pretty hard and allows you to avoid certain set up attempts snowballing into an outright defeat.
More importantly, Perrserrker helps us check/counter the following Pokemon who are very common, some are easily top tier threats.
Musharana
Klingklang
Uzefant
Glaceon
Rotom-F
Mr Rime / Mr Mime
Butterfree
Sp.Atk Rapidash G (This is huge as stall literally folds to this Pokemon (when it runs morning sun) without Perrserker)
Glaceon
Ninjask
Swoobat
Amongst a host of other Pokemon.
In short, I hope that this Pokemon stays for now and is given more time to really show how it is a key part of the equation for keeping certain things in the tier in check.
I'm finding Kanga pretty good for the tier, strong revenge killer is needed currently with all the set up sweepers we have. Klingklang seems a bit over the top for me but that's 100% biased as i am keep tryingto build new stall teams.
It has an amazing typing for this tier, we lack Steel-types who don't absolutely suck so it's a great addition to have something else sponge Ice, Bug, Steel and Psychic type attacks.
It is hard for alot of teams to deal with this however it does not have the tools or stats to sweep teams nor to go on a rampage that can cause a significant amount of the opposing team to just get blown away. A poor speed tier, bad sp.def and weakness to common types helps keep this thing in check.
Yes, you can run a scarf set and still have the benefit of running a choice band set (or life orb) for free but with this monster, you know what you're facing. Steel Beam can be used with Steely spirit as a last move to absolutely demolish Tangela after it switches into your previous move but once again, it does not "maul" a large portion of the tier.
Assault Vest Perrserker is what alot of people are using and it's a great pivot, hits pretty hard and allows you to avoid certain set up attempts snowballing into an outright defeat.
More importantly, Perrserrker helps us check/counter the following Pokemon who are very common, some are easily top tier threats.
Musharana
Klingklang
Uzefant
Glaceon
Rotom-F
Mr Rime / Mr Mime
Butterfree
Sp.Atk Rapidash G (This is huge as stall literally folds to this Pokemon (when it runs morning sun) without Perrserker)
Glaceon
Ninjask
Swoobat
Amongst a host of other Pokemon.
In short, I hope that this Pokemon stays for now and is given more time to really show how it is a key part of the equation for keeping certain things in the tier in check.
I'm finding Kanga pretty good for the tier, strong revenge killer is needed currently with all the set up sweepers we have. Klingklang seems a bit over the top for me but that's 100% biased as i am keep tryingto build new stall teams.
Banned Rotom-Frost and Orbeetle btw: https://www.smogon.com/forums/threa...nd-announcements-thread.3660650/#post-8530565
Council Happenings
Meta Discussion:
- For those of you who only get your news via the minutes and not the threads they're in, we got 30+ new mons between the tier shift and subsequent PUBL unbans. The shift info is in the OP of this thread and the unbans vote is here.
- Council felt it wasn't really worth keeping things in PUBL that aren't any more broken than what's already in the tier. We may end up needing to re-ban things like Galarian Rapidash or Appletun, but for the time being it seemed weird to put them as being more of an issue than things like Perrserker.
- On the other hand, we did not free Noctowl and Arctozolt. They'd both be pretty much uncounterable while not really adding anything valuable to the tier and there wasn't a feeling that releasing them could have much in the way of benefits. We also felt releasing Silvallies would be a massive can of worms that should not be gotten into at the current time.
- NU banned Tauros, which we would have banned if they weren't faster. 110 Speed and the coverage to destroy everything in the tier makes this a rather uncomplicated positive.
- Obviously it's very very hard to say what's going to be great and what isn't given this is a very new meta, most of us have been focused on old meta due to PUPL and Open, and there's a ton of new mons to try out and figure out how they interact with the tier. That being said, we all agree that Galarian Rapidash, Perrserker, Exeggutor, Klinklang, Kangaskhan, and Butterfree are some of the biggest threats to be watching right now.
VR and Other Votes:
- You might see a brand new vote right above this post in which the council opted to ban Rotom-Frost and Orbeetle. There's some reasoning on the sheet there but less than normal and it's worth saying a bit more here.
- Rotom-Frost: STAB BoltBeam coverage was already incredibly powerful in previous generations, but access to Heavy-Duty Boots and Nasty Plot really put this over the edge. It no longer needed Trick to cripple bulky defensive Pokemon not weak to its STABs, you'd ideally be able to beat it with fat walls like Lickilicky or Wigglytuff or Dusclops but they simply didn't cut it anymore. This ban was pretty immediate and unanimous.
- Orbeetle: This might feel out of nowhere to anyone who has not come across its bulky boosting set. To be clear, generic offensive Calm Mind, physically defensive, and Sticky Web sets were balanced and pretty cool. But Iron Defense + Calm Mind sets were pretty near unstoppable. Access to both Body Press and Stored Power would make pretty much any bulky booster scary, but Orbeetle also started with pretty good bulk and had an excellent Speed tier that allowed it to boost its defenses on pretty much anything slower and comfortably take the hit. Initial experiments with Weakness Policy proved extremely effective but it'd be simple enough to start running Flame Orb or other anti-Toxic measures. A majority of the council was concerned that, despite this set having very little time in the meta so far, there's a huge lack of reliable counterplay. Dark-types work versus mono-Stored Power sets, some fat Toxic users can check it, and there's always a few extremely fast Pokemon with super effective STAB attacks. But in terms of reliable, consistent counterplay, there was very little to be had. We'd love to revisit Orbeetle in a resuspect when possible (it certainly appears to be the best candidate in PUBL at the moment), but for now we'd rather the tier not be forced to deal with its presence. Teambuilding is strained enough as is.
- It's going to be a little bit before we're confident enough to do a full VR update. However, we are hoping to have a temporary viability list post out soon (other tiers have also done one of these). It's just easier than trying to determine exactly which new drop is B as opposed to B+.
Forum Happenings:
- There's Kickoff Loser's Semis+Finals, PUPL Week IV, and PU Open R1, so plenty of tours to watch. If you have not signed up for open, you can still get subbed in! I would strongly recommend joining if you have not.
- As I mentioned before, we're hoping to have a viability list out somewhat soon. We're also going to start working on sample sets for the new Pokemon and updating sample sets for Pokemon that now use DLC moves (Trevenant, Seaking, etc.).
- The PU resources thread features the Speed Tiers and Role Compendium projects, now updated for the tier shift, PUBL unbans, and new council bans. They're likely not perfect given the scope of the new meta we're working with, but it should come in handy trying to build for this new meta.
- In light of recent Smogon events, I think it needs to be restated that there is no place for bigotry in PU, whether it be racism, homophobia, transphobia, or anything similar. We are fully committed to making PU a welcoming and safe place, and you can always report instances of harassment or abuse to myself, Akir, or 2xTheTap.
If quickban pokemon is only requiring a more than 60% vote please to explain to me why trevenant was not placed into publ on june 22 when it received 80% quickbanning vote
link to the post if u wanna see: https://www.smogon.com/forums/threa...nd-announcements-thread.3660650/#post-8513440
Yes that is what I looked before making comment. there are 2 abstain votes and abstain vote is being treat as do not ban and not abstain
Abstain is treated as a do not ban vote because it is not a vote to ban said Pokemon. Abstain is simply not exactly knowing what the best course of action is yet, or not having enough information on the Pokemon (which was very fair at the time given how many threats were piled onto us with dlc moves) so you don't feel comfortable voting either ban or do not ban. It isn't exactly a do not ban vote, but yes it is treated as one when it comes to the numbers as we need a specific amount of actual ban votes.
okay thank you that is making some sense
hey friends, this will be my long awaited BAN HATTREM propaganda post. I know I was of this opinion during when the tier was in its early SS infancy, and it eventually left the tier so I never needed to make a post back then. Now its back, just as good as it used to be and now its my turn to try and convince you that PU would be a better tier without it. I'll try and keep the post in general not too long (I'm so fucking sorry - future hjad), so I'm sorry if I do ramble / repeat myself since I haven't done this type of post in a good while.
So, I don't think its unpopular to say "fuck hattrem" at the moment. I think a lot of the PUs playerbase will find playing against hattrem super frustrating at the moment but its quite hard to justify banning a pokemon which isn't as immediately broken as some of the other looming threats we are yet to deal with in this tier. In, fact the argument I will use to justify to ban hattrem is that "it allows for support which is too good in this meta and makes it unhealthy in the tier". To unpack that statement, I'll describe what hattrem does and why it's unhealthy for the tier.
So to answer what Hattrem does; its quite evidently a magic bounce user used to deny hazards from the enemy team (and infact bounce them back, ill get more into this later) amongst other things like status moves such as toxic. Its therefore quite easy to lump hattrem into the same group as icevally, rockvally, hitmonchan, sandslash, Mr Rime etc as "hazards control". My argument is that Hattrem's bulk, typing and movepool coupled with magic bounce as an ability make its ability to support and facilitate other pokemon in the tier unfair and indeed unhealthy to the tier. Hattrems set is commonly physically defensive with psychic / giga / mystical fire / nuzzle or psychic / nuzzle / with restalk for more longer term hazards control (it can also do hwish but that isnt overly popular yet), therefore, it would be good to look at the stealth rockers (and to a lesser extent spikers since spikes arent mandatory by any means whereas it can be argued sr is) and see how hattrem matches up vs all of them.
This is the main list of stealth rockers in PU, of which the only 1s with a shot at 2hkoing it come from pawniard, pinsir and marowak. crustle can get passed it with a 2hko if it runs absolute shite aka xscissor for coverage, so i wont put it on the list, and ston can also 2hko if it runs choice band, but cb rocks is fugaze as well so nots go down that rabbit hole too much. You can run calcs from the others to double check, nothing without a choice band or heavily compromising their set or role can get passed it. Other options from LC include big boi drillbur who can do the mold breaker SR (just like pinsir underlined above), but im not gonna dive down this either too much since that isnt the point of this post. The point is to show if you wanna get passed hattrem in its current state in the tier 100% of the time, you are limited to pinsir (more on this later) or most of the time with pawniard and marowak.
We are yet to see Pinsir and Marowak's influence on this meta, but its reasonable to assume neither would be popular stealth rockers in the tier based on previous precedent. Both are hugely relevant offensive threats and if they do occasionally stealth rock, its largely on some hyper offense if the stealth rock advantage is too good to pass up or you have a free turn and an attack isnt the best option. The implication from this is that in majority of games, people will not be using pinsir or marowak as a specific way to get round hattrem, but only to use them as neccesitys on offense so rocks can go up. A more popular option may be pawniard, who has a much nicer typing for balance teams, eviolite bulk and the ability to punish defoggers courtesy of defiant. Despite this, pawniard still only really finds itself on offensive archetypes due to the nature of pu balance at the moment. Compression is crucial especially in this ever developing SS meta, and pawn finds itself left off most balance teams in favour of stunfisk, mawile, stonjourner and now sandslash because it doesn't offer the same level of utility as these others do outside of stealth rocking. So to conclude this point, what choices does balance or indeed any archetype that plans to last actually have if it wants to beat hattrem? All the things I mentioned are capable of not allowing hattrem to get in the way. Also consider in maro and pawns case, that if it is indeed that you want to click stealth rock, and hattrem remains alive, there is a very real possibility it could switch in regardless. As any ORAS NU player will tell you, just because you have Rhydon, does not mean Xatu will just avoid coming in. The same applies for hattrem. If pawniard clicks anything other than knock, hattrem survives the proceeding knock and can then do lots of damage with mystical fire (defiant sucks but if your rocker is at 40ish% whats the likelihood you get rocks up in the rest of the game is very low, especially given its bulk.) Marowak also experiences this mindgame to a lesser extent since if you do mispredict, knock / eq still just has a overwhelming amount of damage coming out. That being said, if you do click stealth rocks even with marowak the user on the field, the momentum loss from sr being bounced back is massive.
Lets dive into that risk-reward a little more. One of the reasons I dont like that hattrem is lumped into the same bracket as other hazards control is that the interaction of stealth rocker vs hattrem is almost always biased towards the hattrem user. When you use defog (also spin, but there is a spinblock mechanic so its not entirely simple), most of the time if the opponent gets up some hazards that u want to remove, you either have to sacrifice offensive momentum or some health on your defogger. Likewise if you set up SR, its likely that you will need to do similar. When you have hattrem, and then the stealth rocks get bounced, the momentum difference before and after the bounce is absolutely horrific. You've not only wasted your own turn, but instantly given your opponent the best hazard with no repurcussions apart from having hattrem come in.
I just quickly want to segway here before I continue on this rant about the hattrem risk reward that hattrem is actually massively underrated as a purely offensive threat. The amount of things in the tier that can switch into psychic / mystical / giga coverage without quarrels is surprisingly limited. When you add nuzzle into the mix, you either dont have a switch in and hattrem is doing a lot of damage back (unlikely, because this interaction only arises when your using balance and cant instantly pressure hattrem) or (more likely) hattrem spreads para's all over your team or onto your main special meta check. This is often important as special meta checks on balance tend to need to wall multiple mons and having it para'd adds a lot of variance into whether you actually check certain things. So its very unlike natu where you can literally switch anything into it like the hardest breaker you can imagine to scare it out instantly, your actual switchins are limited to stuff which is also quite momentum draining as well. think along the lines of musharna, type null, lapras etc or you are taking a lot of damage on your breaker which obviously isnt ideal if you are using balance, thats a big key to your offensive winning strategy most of the time.
Back on track with the risk-reward scenario, especially in the case of balance vs hattrem. It can often be seen that the opposing hattrem user wont even click the hattrem knowing of that huge momentum loss, and instead go into one of the tiers many high power breakers. I'm sure everyone here who has played pu has experienced the scenario of just being overpowered by an offensive core because of the momentum deficiencies on a bulkier team. This is an inevitability that allows for this "second wave" loss in momentum, where if hattrem doesnt switch in (especially when switching in seems perfectly reasonable) your opponent can just not switch it in not only to preserve hattrem but gain large momentum. A lot of the tiers popular stealth rockers dont output huge amounts of damage especially when in there most popular defensive spreads, so if you do manage to hard heatmor as mawile play roughs looking for chip on hattrem, that mindgame can cause an inevitable sequence of questions on your defensive core. Its well documented that PU struggles to deal with those questions given our defensive options, so the fact hattrem enables this is part of the reason its stupid. Whether they decide to go hard heatmor or hattrem in this theoretical scenario with our mawile isn't even something where you can reasonably predict. Just because you have no counter to heatmor doesnt mean they wont go hattrem, the same that just because you have heatmor counterplay doesnt mean they wont go heatmor. In my experience, stealth rocking vs a magic bounce user and especially hattrem is ALWAYS a guessing game. This inconsistency in how people will go about playing with hattrem will often cause people to not call out when hattrems arent switching in without game fatal consequences, and as a result a hugely biased risk reward just by hattrem existing, it doesnt even need to come in.
Now I also mentioned above that if you do want your 100% out vs hattrem, you gotta run pinsir (or drillbur, shame sandslash had to ruin his niche ig). This clearly facilitates an offensive perspective of the meta, and with the defensive options and utility we have in the tier, offense becomes a better archetype than what it was already. All it needs is to look at the PUPL replays for the weeks that have happened to have a good grasp for the meta. Most of the teams tend towards an offensive core supported by a couple pivots (usually meta checks) and a stealth rocker, bulky offense, or some straight up offense (this passed week was mainly thwackey based stuff). Offensive archetypes based around fulfilling the function of the team before you lose out long term. Balance with defensive cores and the like is basically phased out of the tier at the moment in favour of stall due to how sparse our defensive options actually are. Hattrem therefore facilitates this more offensive perspective, not only by requiring that offensive pokemon are the main way of pressuring it (like pinsir, pawn etc) but also that balance pokemon currently employed; think mawile, stunfisk, mareanie, also massively struggle to beat it. The momentum deficit also favours offensive teams, and best case scenario, the game turns into who can best pivot into their breakers and force as much damage as possible. This favours offense based on the fact there will likely be a few more breakers than on bulkier archetypes, but even in the scenario where equal amounts of breakers are distributed, the game comes down even more so to who has the more effective breaker (comes down to variance and the builder) and less on who can manipulate their opponents team to best abuse their own breaker (ideal, more skillful). Offense generally brings a large amount of variance in the tier, its not ideal to have a tier to have mainly offense / bulky offense as there only main archetypes because its less likely in a game of few turns that the person who has indeed won is the more deserving winner, which at the end of the day, is what we want to achieve.
Jesus this went on far longer than I wanted, but oh well, enjoy the content ig. I want the tldr to be really good, so please if you havent read the whole post the tldr is more than enough, refer to the rest of the post if you are confused on my thought process or want some extra information. Also please dont hesitate to @ me in the PU discord or pm me if you also have questions but don't want to vent them on forums (but i do encourage forum interaction, its actually great to have posts written in a longer format so thoughts can come across more eloquently. I guess my final thoughts are that as players of PU we shouldnt only be looking at the biggest baddest breakers with the least counterplay even though thats often whats most tempting to do in a largely unbalanced meta like this, maybe banning hattrem isnt a solution, for the reasons ive listed above and below, I believe banning it would vastly help PU in dealing with these big bad breakers in the long term as well as increase the tiers playability.
tldr;
-hattrem has only 3 rockers which can reasonably pressure it, pinsir your 100%s and pawn/maro which are like 95%s, none of which are overly popular bar pawn which has a harder risk reward
-these rockers are only found on offense
-hattrem will therefore limit the effectiveness on balance
-biased risk reward especially vs balance make the playstyle a liability due to this pokemon ontop of the struggles it already faces -> bouncing is stupid
-underrated offensive threat, harding into most breakers in the tier is often off the table based on coverage + nuzzle
-a meta which favours offense is likely to be way more variant, worse player wins more of the time, less turns to allow for good thinking / skills to prevail
-meta is already struggling with the amount of offensive threats, hattrems support facilitates the use of every single big offensive threat in the tier by denying stealth rock pressure on anything which isn't an offense vs offense mu which is quite mu dependent and skill limited to a couple turns due to momentum
conclusion: if we ban hattrem, balance becomes more playable, offense needs to think about its strategy vs hazards more thoroughly which either nerfs the offensive core (we want this) or means that balance has a reasonable out vs it in more matchups. Therefore, I plea to my fellow council members to consider banning it.
BAN HATTREM propaganda post. I know I was of this opinion during when the tier was in its early SS infancy, and it eventually left the tier so I never needed to make a post back then. Now its back, just as good as it used to be and now its my turn to try and convince you that PU would be a better tier without it. I'll try and keep the post in general not too long (I'm so fucking sorry - future hjad), so I'm sorry if I do ramble / repeat myself since I haven't done this type of post in a good while.So, I don't think its unpopular to say "fuck hattrem" at the moment. I think a lot of the PUs playerbase will find playing against hattrem super frustrating at the moment but its quite hard to justify banning a pokemon which isn't as immediately broken as some of the other looming threats we are yet to deal with in this tier. In, fact the argument I will use to justify to ban hattrem is that "it allows for support which is too good in this meta and makes it unhealthy in the tier". To unpack that statement, I'll describe what hattrem does and why it's unhealthy for the tier.
So to answer what Hattrem does; its quite evidently a magic bounce user used to deny hazards from the enemy team (and infact bounce them back, ill get more into this later) amongst other things like status moves such as toxic. Its therefore quite easy to lump hattrem into the same group as icevally, rockvally, hitmonchan, sandslash, Mr Rime etc as "hazards control". My argument is that Hattrem's bulk, typing and movepool coupled with magic bounce as an ability make its ability to support and facilitate other pokemon in the tier unfair and indeed unhealthy to the tier. Hattrems set is commonly physically defensive with psychic / giga / mystical fire / nuzzle or psychic / nuzzle / with restalk for more longer term hazards control (it can also do hwish but that isnt overly popular yet), therefore, it would be good to look at the stealth rockers (and to a lesser extent spikers since spikes arent mandatory by any means whereas it can be argued sr is) and see how hattrem matches up vs all of them.
This is the main list of stealth rockers in PU, of which the only 1s with a shot at 2hkoing it come from pawniard, pinsir and marowak. crustle can get passed it with a 2hko if it runs absolute shite aka xscissor for coverage, so i wont put it on the list, and ston can also 2hko if it runs choice band, but cb rocks is fugaze as well so nots go down that rabbit hole too much. You can run calcs from the others to double check, nothing without a choice band or heavily compromising their set or role can get passed it. Other options from LC include big boi drillbur who can do the mold breaker SR (just like pinsir underlined above), but im not gonna dive down this either too much since that isnt the point of this post. The point is to show if you wanna get passed hattrem in its current state in the tier 100% of the time, you are limited to pinsir (more on this later) or most of the time with pawniard and marowak.
We are yet to see Pinsir and Marowak's influence on this meta, but its reasonable to assume neither would be popular stealth rockers in the tier based on previous precedent. Both are hugely relevant offensive threats and if they do occasionally stealth rock, its largely on some hyper offense if the stealth rock advantage is too good to pass up or you have a free turn and an attack isnt the best option. The implication from this is that in majority of games, people will not be using pinsir or marowak as a specific way to get round hattrem, but only to use them as neccesitys on offense so rocks can go up. A more popular option may be pawniard, who has a much nicer typing for balance teams, eviolite bulk and the ability to punish defoggers courtesy of defiant. Despite this, pawniard still only really finds itself on offensive archetypes due to the nature of pu balance at the moment. Compression is crucial especially in this ever developing SS meta, and pawn finds itself left off most balance teams in favour of stunfisk, mawile, stonjourner and now sandslash because it doesn't offer the same level of utility as these others do outside of stealth rocking. So to conclude this point, what choices does balance or indeed any archetype that plans to last actually have if it wants to beat hattrem? All the things I mentioned are capable of not allowing hattrem to get in the way. Also consider in maro and pawns case, that if it is indeed that you want to click stealth rock, and hattrem remains alive, there is a very real possibility it could switch in regardless. As any ORAS NU player will tell you, just because you have Rhydon, does not mean Xatu will just avoid coming in. The same applies for hattrem. If pawniard clicks anything other than knock, hattrem survives the proceeding knock and can then do lots of damage with mystical fire (defiant sucks but if your rocker is at 40ish% whats the likelihood you get rocks up in the rest of the game is very low, especially given its bulk.) Marowak also experiences this mindgame to a lesser extent since if you do mispredict, knock / eq still just has a overwhelming amount of damage coming out. That being said, if you do click stealth rocks even with marowak the user on the field, the momentum loss from sr being bounced back is massive.
Lets dive into that risk-reward a little more. One of the reasons I dont like that hattrem is lumped into the same bracket as other hazards control is that the interaction of stealth rocker vs hattrem is almost always biased towards the hattrem user. When you use defog (also spin, but there is a spinblock mechanic so its not entirely simple), most of the time if the opponent gets up some hazards that u want to remove, you either have to sacrifice offensive momentum or some health on your defogger. Likewise if you set up SR, its likely that you will need to do similar. When you have hattrem, and then the stealth rocks get bounced, the momentum difference before and after the bounce is absolutely horrific. You've not only wasted your own turn, but instantly given your opponent the best hazard with no repurcussions apart from having hattrem come in.
I just quickly want to segway here before I continue on this rant about the hattrem risk reward that hattrem is actually massively underrated as a purely offensive threat. The amount of things in the tier that can switch into psychic / mystical / giga coverage without quarrels is surprisingly limited. When you add nuzzle into the mix, you either dont have a switch in and hattrem is doing a lot of damage back (unlikely, because this interaction only arises when your using balance and cant instantly pressure hattrem) or (more likely) hattrem spreads para's all over your team or onto your main special meta check. This is often important as special meta checks on balance tend to need to wall multiple mons and having it para'd adds a lot of variance into whether you actually check certain things. So its very unlike natu where you can literally switch anything into it like the hardest breaker you can imagine to scare it out instantly, your actual switchins are limited to stuff which is also quite momentum draining as well. think along the lines of musharna, type null, lapras etc or you are taking a lot of damage on your breaker which obviously isnt ideal if you are using balance, thats a big key to your offensive winning strategy most of the time.
Back on track with the risk-reward scenario, especially in the case of balance vs hattrem. It can often be seen that the opposing hattrem user wont even click the hattrem knowing of that huge momentum loss, and instead go into one of the tiers many high power breakers. I'm sure everyone here who has played pu has experienced the scenario of just being overpowered by an offensive core because of the momentum deficiencies on a bulkier team. This is an inevitability that allows for this "second wave" loss in momentum, where if hattrem doesnt switch in (especially when switching in seems perfectly reasonable) your opponent can just not switch it in not only to preserve hattrem but gain large momentum. A lot of the tiers popular stealth rockers dont output huge amounts of damage especially when in there most popular defensive spreads, so if you do manage to hard heatmor as mawile play roughs looking for chip on hattrem, that mindgame can cause an inevitable sequence of questions on your defensive core. Its well documented that PU struggles to deal with those questions given our defensive options, so the fact hattrem enables this is part of the reason its stupid. Whether they decide to go hard heatmor or hattrem in this theoretical scenario with our mawile isn't even something where you can reasonably predict. Just because you have no counter to heatmor doesnt mean they wont go hattrem, the same that just because you have heatmor counterplay doesnt mean they wont go heatmor. In my experience, stealth rocking vs a magic bounce user and especially hattrem is ALWAYS a guessing game. This inconsistency in how people will go about playing with hattrem will often cause people to not call out when hattrems arent switching in without game fatal consequences, and as a result a hugely biased risk reward just by hattrem existing, it doesnt even need to come in.
Now I also mentioned above that if you do want your 100% out vs hattrem, you gotta run pinsir (or drillbur, shame sandslash had to ruin his niche ig). This clearly facilitates an offensive perspective of the meta, and with the defensive options and utility we have in the tier, offense becomes a better archetype than what it was already. All it needs is to look at the PUPL replays for the weeks that have happened to have a good grasp for the meta. Most of the teams tend towards an offensive core supported by a couple pivots (usually meta checks) and a stealth rocker, bulky offense, or some straight up offense (this passed week was mainly thwackey based stuff). Offensive archetypes based around fulfilling the function of the team before you lose out long term. Balance with defensive cores and the like is basically phased out of the tier at the moment in favour of stall due to how sparse our defensive options actually are. Hattrem therefore facilitates this more offensive perspective, not only by requiring that offensive pokemon are the main way of pressuring it (like pinsir, pawn etc) but also that balance pokemon currently employed; think mawile, stunfisk, mareanie, also massively struggle to beat it. The momentum deficit also favours offensive teams, and best case scenario, the game turns into who can best pivot into their breakers and force as much damage as possible. This favours offense based on the fact there will likely be a few more breakers than on bulkier archetypes, but even in the scenario where equal amounts of breakers are distributed, the game comes down even more so to who has the more effective breaker (comes down to variance and the builder) and less on who can manipulate their opponents team to best abuse their own breaker (ideal, more skillful). Offense generally brings a large amount of variance in the tier, its not ideal to have a tier to have mainly offense / bulky offense as there only main archetypes because its less likely in a game of few turns that the person who has indeed won is the more deserving winner, which at the end of the day, is what we want to achieve.
Jesus this went on far longer than I wanted, but oh well, enjoy the content ig. I want the tldr to be really good, so please if you havent read the whole post the tldr is more than enough, refer to the rest of the post if you are confused on my thought process or want some extra information. Also please dont hesitate to @ me in the PU discord or pm me if you also have questions but don't want to vent them on forums (but i do encourage forum interaction, its actually great to have posts written in a longer format so thoughts can come across more eloquently. I guess my final thoughts are that as players of PU we shouldnt only be looking at the biggest baddest breakers with the least counterplay even though thats often whats most tempting to do in a largely unbalanced meta like this, maybe banning hattrem isnt a solution, for the reasons ive listed above and below, I believe banning it would vastly help PU in dealing with these big bad breakers in the long term as well as increase the tiers playability.
tldr;
-hattrem has only 3 rockers which can reasonably pressure it, pinsir your 100%s and pawn/maro which are like 95%s, none of which are overly popular bar pawn which has a harder risk reward
-these rockers are only found on offense
-hattrem will therefore limit the effectiveness on balance
-biased risk reward especially vs balance make the playstyle a liability due to this pokemon ontop of the struggles it already faces -> bouncing is stupid
-underrated offensive threat, harding into most breakers in the tier is often off the table based on coverage + nuzzle
-a meta which favours offense is likely to be way more variant, worse player wins more of the time, less turns to allow for good thinking / skills to prevail
-meta is already struggling with the amount of offensive threats, hattrems support facilitates the use of every single big offensive threat in the tier by denying stealth rock pressure on anything which isn't an offense vs offense mu which is quite mu dependent and skill limited to a couple turns due to momentum
conclusion: if we ban hattrem, balance becomes more playable, offense needs to think about its strategy vs hazards more thoroughly which either nerfs the offensive core (we want this) or means that balance has a reasonable out vs it in more matchups. Therefore, I plea to my fellow council members to consider banning it.
Hattrem often annoys me because I like pressuring teams with hazards, something I have been used to doing for many years across all playstyles. Hattrem is a part of this, but so is the incredible prevalence of Heavy-Duty Boots as well as increased amounts of Spinners and Defog users. Yes, absolutely you can make hazards-centered offense team work with stuff like Dusknoir and Pawniard to pressure removal, but you have to play extremely well in order to keep them up and get your full worth out of them.
However, I think the idea that Hattrem has nerfed balance is sort of a false premise though. If anything, the best teams in the meta right now are balanced teams with some Anti-offense stuff to round them out. Fat cores like Tangela/Appletun + Lickilicky/Throh and some anti-offense mons like Ninjask and Kangaskhan I think are fairly effective right now. If anything, lack of ability to pressure these mons with hazards as well has made them better. Hattrem itself is usually no huge threat to these teams aside from preventing Stealth Rock, while it is much more of a threat to other pure offenses due to Nuzzle and its bulk. True, preventing Stealth Rock is quite the important role, but its not as important as one would think in this generation when often the mon that you'd want to pressure the most with Rocks is actually wearing Boots. Meanwhile there's not much preventing balanced teams from using their own Hattrems. It's just that they usually don't need to because at the end of the day, the mon really isn't THAT amazing.
I feel Hattrem itself isn't broken enough or even unhealthy enough to warrant banning. But it is part of a larger picture of a new metagame which isn't focused on hazards to the extent that previous metagames and generations were. And despite my personal dislike of that aspect, I think it's also worth considering it as something we should get used to.
However, I think the idea that Hattrem has nerfed balance is sort of a false premise though. If anything, the best teams in the meta right now are balanced teams with some Anti-offense stuff to round them out. Fat cores like Tangela/Appletun + Lickilicky/Throh and some anti-offense mons like Ninjask and Kangaskhan I think are fairly effective right now. If anything, lack of ability to pressure these mons with hazards as well has made them better. Hattrem itself is usually no huge threat to these teams aside from preventing Stealth Rock, while it is much more of a threat to other pure offenses due to Nuzzle and its bulk. True, preventing Stealth Rock is quite the important role, but its not as important as one would think in this generation when often the mon that you'd want to pressure the most with Rocks is actually wearing Boots. Meanwhile there's not much preventing balanced teams from using their own Hattrems. It's just that they usually don't need to because at the end of the day, the mon really isn't THAT amazing.
I feel Hattrem itself isn't broken enough or even unhealthy enough to warrant banning. But it is part of a larger picture of a new metagame which isn't focused on hazards to the extent that previous metagames and generations were. And despite my personal dislike of that aspect, I think it's also worth considering it as something we should get used to.
If you want to influence the outcome of a vote before we start doing suspect tests, now is absolutely the time to make a forum post. We're going to have a new slate over the next few days (out Sunday night-ish probably) for a brand new meta with a ton of new threats and I'd love to see what people think about the stuff we'll probably be voting on. Also normally I'd have replays but right now I have no clue what might get used in PUPL so rip. Oh and this is approximately ordered by my personal level of desire to ban this Pokemon.
The only thing I'm fairly confident I'll vote ban on. Sleep and Tinted Lens Hurricane and Quiver Dance all at once is really restricting. Even just two of those together are really good, I had a lot of success with a more jokey team with a Sleep+U-Turn Butterfree. There's simply not a lot to do about this mon, it feels like it forces building in very similar patterns to avoid just getting slept. And no matter how prepped you are, you can still just lose (up to a point, there's a few incredibly niche things that do 100% beat this but who cares).
Again sorta leaning no ban but I need to keep using it. Very powerful, not a ton of switchins, can often run games, and CB is a real chore to handle. And yet I do feel able to consistently beat it and I clearly see the positives it has for the meta. The big thing I think will make me vote ban on this is actually Healing Wish, which is incredibly easy to fit on teams and is even better support for Kangaskhan than Spikes if we're being honest.
Not sure where I come out on this mon yet. Very powerful yet it does kinda feel like a lot of things can check it effectively. Not a big deal for offense to face at all. My biggest annoyance is that it can Tough Claws U-Turn on whatever switch-in it wants to, but a lot of very powerful Pokemon can pivot right now too and at least it's a bit punishable by Static and Helmet. Also AV does add quite a bit to the meta. Leaning no ban but we'll see what happens when I use more CB.
Pretty solidly no ban at the moment. Which again like, real hard to switch into, real powerful, excellent speed, I get all those qualities. But it's hard or soft checked by a ludicrous amount of the meta. I simply haven't seen its sets diversify to the point where it's bodying all those potential switchins with coverage moves (i.e. High Horsepower on the Perrserker) to where its on paper potential has been reached. It certainly doesn't feel unfair right now, like it benefits the less skilled player unduly the same way Kangaskhan can and Butterfree almost always does. Very similar to the next mon.
Also pretty solidly no ban even though I have no clue how we beat this. Aside from Stunfisk and Pyukumuku and Papitoad and Carkol obviously, it should kinda be bodying most offense. But it's not because almost everything runs mandatory Steel coverage, it ends up somehow being unreliable at setting up despite its amazing bulk. Stunfisk is everywhere but even when I'm not facing it Klinklang doesn't seem to do all that much really. Replays of this and G-Rap doing work might go a long way to convincing me we have a current problem.
I don't like facing this mon, it's incredibly annoying. But until we actually see it running the meta I think any ban would be premature. There's a large difference between "Orbeetle is pretty much uncounterable so we can remove it right now" and "Hattrem has all these qualities that make it seem like it would dominate the meta problematically on paper and we should remove it before we get any chance to see if that's the case". I do not think another round of PUPL and Open would be ruined by its presence.
Another real bad on paper but I think we have to leave it because it's not doing a ton right now-type Pokemon. VoltTurn can be pretty crazy when it gets going, but there's so much pivoting in this meta in general (plus punishing it with Helmets and Static) that it doesn't feel too unfair to get momentum back versus it. Worth keeping an eye on and including in our votes but I'm not too perturbed by this.
Again, I'd love to see people's thoughts on these mons and anything else that might end up on the sheet.
A few other random meta thoughts- Lickilicky is quite good but Wigglytuff kinda sucks :/ also Appletun is amazing and G-Mime and Rime continue to be very good despite all the new checks.
The only thing I'm fairly confident I'll vote ban on. Sleep and Tinted Lens Hurricane and Quiver Dance all at once is really restricting. Even just two of those together are really good, I had a lot of success with a more jokey team with a Sleep+U-Turn Butterfree. There's simply not a lot to do about this mon, it feels like it forces building in very similar patterns to avoid just getting slept. And no matter how prepped you are, you can still just lose (up to a point, there's a few incredibly niche things that do 100% beat this but who cares). Again sorta leaning no ban but I need to keep using it. Very powerful, not a ton of switchins, can often run games, and CB is a real chore to handle. And yet I do feel able to consistently beat it and I clearly see the positives it has for the meta. The big thing I think will make me vote ban on this is actually Healing Wish, which is incredibly easy to fit on teams and is even better support for Kangaskhan than Spikes if we're being honest. Not sure where I come out on this mon yet. Very powerful yet it does kinda feel like a lot of things can check it effectively. Not a big deal for offense to face at all. My biggest annoyance is that it can Tough Claws U-Turn on whatever switch-in it wants to, but a lot of very powerful Pokemon can pivot right now too and at least it's a bit punishable by Static and Helmet. Also AV does add quite a bit to the meta. Leaning no ban but we'll see what happens when I use more CB. Pretty solidly no ban at the moment. Which again like, real hard to switch into, real powerful, excellent speed, I get all those qualities. But it's hard or soft checked by a ludicrous amount of the meta. I simply haven't seen its sets diversify to the point where it's bodying all those potential switchins with coverage moves (i.e. High Horsepower on the Perrserker) to where its on paper potential has been reached. It certainly doesn't feel unfair right now, like it benefits the less skilled player unduly the same way Kangaskhan can and Butterfree almost always does. Very similar to the next mon. Also pretty solidly no ban even though I have no clue how we beat this. Aside from Stunfisk and Pyukumuku and Papitoad and Carkol obviously, it should kinda be bodying most offense. But it's not because almost everything runs mandatory Steel coverage, it ends up somehow being unreliable at setting up despite its amazing bulk. Stunfisk is everywhere but even when I'm not facing it Klinklang doesn't seem to do all that much really. Replays of this and G-Rap doing work might go a long way to convincing me we have a current problem. I don't like facing this mon, it's incredibly annoying. But until we actually see it running the meta I think any ban would be premature. There's a large difference between "Orbeetle is pretty much uncounterable so we can remove it right now" and "Hattrem has all these qualities that make it seem like it would dominate the meta problematically on paper and we should remove it before we get any chance to see if that's the case". I do not think another round of PUPL and Open would be ruined by its presence. Another real bad on paper but I think we have to leave it because it's not doing a ton right now-type Pokemon. VoltTurn can be pretty crazy when it gets going, but there's so much pivoting in this meta in general (plus punishing it with Helmets and Static) that it doesn't feel too unfair to get momentum back versus it. Worth keeping an eye on and including in our votes but I'm not too perturbed by this.Again, I'd love to see people's thoughts on these mons and anything else that might end up on the sheet.
A few other random meta thoughts- Lickilicky is quite good but Wigglytuff kinda sucks :/ also Appletun is amazing and G-Mime and Rime continue to be very good despite all the new checks.
Of all the Pokemon on the voting block this week, there are none that I dislike as much as Butterfree.
Butterfree may not be the most viable drop, but it feels like the least competitive Pokemon of the bunch. Having naturally high speed and a 97% accurate sleep move are enough to make Butterfree good in this tier, but the added ability to use substitute and quiver dance -- or to run a tinted lens set to break through defensive checks -- is enough to make counter-play impossible without dual wingbeat Ninjask.
To emphasize this point, I wanted to share a replay from a random ladder match that occurred after the shifts (turns 15-28 are the relevant turns). My opponent brought sleep talk gear grind Klinklang, which they reasonably believed would check Butterfree. All this set did, however, was create a series of 50/50s revolving around how long their sleep would last and whether I would click sleep powder when they were awake. This happens to any Butterfree check that is not immune to sleep or named Ninjask, or the opponent is forced to predict which turn you click sleep powder and hope that they didn't need the Pokemon that is now asleep.
Because of the presence of Ninjask, Butterfree hasn't dominated the meta in a major way, but it's hard to consider a Pokemon with one consistent check healthy. Bringing a team without Ninjask to any serious game is extremely scary for me because of this bug and I think it deserves a ban.
Butterfree may not be the most viable drop, but it feels like the least competitive Pokemon of the bunch. Having naturally high speed and a 97% accurate sleep move are enough to make Butterfree good in this tier, but the added ability to use substitute and quiver dance -- or to run a tinted lens set to break through defensive checks -- is enough to make counter-play impossible without dual wingbeat Ninjask.
To emphasize this point, I wanted to share a replay from a random ladder match that occurred after the shifts (turns 15-28 are the relevant turns). My opponent brought sleep talk gear grind Klinklang, which they reasonably believed would check Butterfree. All this set did, however, was create a series of 50/50s revolving around how long their sleep would last and whether I would click sleep powder when they were awake. This happens to any Butterfree check that is not immune to sleep or named Ninjask, or the opponent is forced to predict which turn you click sleep powder and hope that they didn't need the Pokemon that is now asleep.
Because of the presence of Ninjask, Butterfree hasn't dominated the meta in a major way, but it's hard to consider a Pokemon with one consistent check healthy. Bringing a team without Ninjask to any serious game is extremely scary for me because of this bug and I think it deserves a ban.
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Just wanna share some points on some of my thoughts regarding recent changes in the tier, including obviously some of the mons I consider problematics and others that have been brought up.
Kangaskhan is in my opinion the most dangerous Pokemon in the meta, but I feel like its way of functioning stops it from being seen as a “broken mon” due to the way it functions. Kanga isn’t exactly a mon that flat out sweeps or breaks a team from the get go, unless youre using the fantastic Band set youre also not destroying defensive cores, but what kanga simply provides is too much offensive and even defensive utility vs. pretty much any team you face. Its combination of Fake Out + Sucker is fantastic for dealing with other problematic threats, but Ive personally been put in many situations in which its Kanga vs. Kanga and tryna see whos able to do the most damage, as well as figuring out whos able to play their Kangas better thru the whole match. The issue with Kanga lies in how much it pressures practically every team, also including the fact that a lot of its defensive counterplay in Tangela, Stunfisk are incredibly exploitable by other Pokemon or even certain Kanga sets, and the offensive mons that are often able to revenge kill it don’t appreciate being hit by its priority, or simply isn’t able to take it from full.
I think it’s a shame that Kanga is so overbearing while also bringing so many good attributes to the tier, but as it is, I believe that the existing counterplay is poor, and the offensive pressures it puts is simply way too much. We gonna lose Kanga to NU anyways but I still believe that its worth focusing on its effect in the tier.
Regarding Butterfree, I share the same opinion as MZ and Procopius. Not the most consistent mon by any means, but one that is simply too uncompetitive w the cursed Sleep Powder + Quiver Dance combination.
I honestly love what Perserrker brings defensively to teams, and while I haven’t played around w offensive sets as much as I wish, I believe that this mon, in the current meta, is quite manageable. Its low speed, mediocre spdef in non AV sets and plethora of Grounds to check it defensively makes it a really fun wallbreaker for the tier with decent counterplay that’s also able to function as a slow spdef pivot that doesn’t just sit there like Type: Null.
On the fence about Rapidash-G. I didn’t believe that this mon should’ve been unbanned on the first place, and while a lot of the issues that have arisen regarding its viability stay in the builder, I am so not looking forward to predicting the wrong set and losing whatever my switch in might be. Even mons like Kanga pressure it offensively as well as the aforementioned Perserrker, but as it is, Rapidash remains a terrifying mon that still seems to have the capability of flat out sweeping teams. Id love to know some more experiences that players have had while dealing with this mon.
Blim is another mon that could be potentially dumb, but that I believe is definitely more consistent than Rapidash-G at functioning as a wincon. This Pokemon is simply dealt with via offensive pressure, predicting the right set between Sap/Substitute, or having one of those Darks that get absolutely bopped by T-Bolt, Thunder at +1. Ive honestly had more issue with Blim than Ive had with Dash, and while defensive Defog sets are a saving grace for a tier that once really required better removal options, this is definitely one to look at closely. So far its put in a lot of work in PUPL nad I dont expect that to change anytime soon, mostly after Kanga goes one way or another.
Regarding…Hattrem. I do not share HJADs opinion on the mon, despite not exactly liking how its ability works. While a lot of the common rockers don’t flat out beat it, most are able to cripple it in some way, and while Hattrem was a potentially problematic mon before it rose to NU, I believe that the power of the tier has increased to the point where it’s a lot easier to pressure by a lot of the wallbreakers in the tier (some of which can also function as offensive rockers that beat Hat). Some of my other thoughts regarding this mon are echoed by Many, who made a post that I agree with for the most part. While I do agree that balance generally struggles right now, it has been used and probably will be used more in upcoming PUPL SS battles, and the main issue that said playstyle has to deal with are imo much more hindered by other Pokemon such as Rapidash, and even super strong wallbreakers such as Butterfree, offensive Rime. If balance was to get better, Hattrem simply wouldn’t be my initial priority towards improving it, and I think willing to see where the tier goes and how it changes in relation to Hattrem in recent weeks will be a good indication of the course of action that should be taken with it.
Ty for reading!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! VROOM VROOM!!!
Kangaskhan is in my opinion the most dangerous Pokemon in the meta, but I feel like its way of functioning stops it from being seen as a “broken mon” due to the way it functions. Kanga isn’t exactly a mon that flat out sweeps or breaks a team from the get go, unless youre using the fantastic Band set youre also not destroying defensive cores, but what kanga simply provides is too much offensive and even defensive utility vs. pretty much any team you face. Its combination of Fake Out + Sucker is fantastic for dealing with other problematic threats, but Ive personally been put in many situations in which its Kanga vs. Kanga and tryna see whos able to do the most damage, as well as figuring out whos able to play their Kangas better thru the whole match. The issue with Kanga lies in how much it pressures practically every team, also including the fact that a lot of its defensive counterplay in Tangela, Stunfisk are incredibly exploitable by other Pokemon or even certain Kanga sets, and the offensive mons that are often able to revenge kill it don’t appreciate being hit by its priority, or simply isn’t able to take it from full.
I think it’s a shame that Kanga is so overbearing while also bringing so many good attributes to the tier, but as it is, I believe that the existing counterplay is poor, and the offensive pressures it puts is simply way too much. We gonna lose Kanga to NU anyways but I still believe that its worth focusing on its effect in the tier.
Regarding Butterfree, I share the same opinion as MZ and Procopius. Not the most consistent mon by any means, but one that is simply too uncompetitive w the cursed Sleep Powder + Quiver Dance combination.
I honestly love what Perserrker brings defensively to teams, and while I haven’t played around w offensive sets as much as I wish, I believe that this mon, in the current meta, is quite manageable. Its low speed, mediocre spdef in non AV sets and plethora of Grounds to check it defensively makes it a really fun wallbreaker for the tier with decent counterplay that’s also able to function as a slow spdef pivot that doesn’t just sit there like Type: Null.
On the fence about Rapidash-G. I didn’t believe that this mon should’ve been unbanned on the first place, and while a lot of the issues that have arisen regarding its viability stay in the builder, I am so not looking forward to predicting the wrong set and losing whatever my switch in might be. Even mons like Kanga pressure it offensively as well as the aforementioned Perserrker, but as it is, Rapidash remains a terrifying mon that still seems to have the capability of flat out sweeping teams. Id love to know some more experiences that players have had while dealing with this mon.
Blim is another mon that could be potentially dumb, but that I believe is definitely more consistent than Rapidash-G at functioning as a wincon. This Pokemon is simply dealt with via offensive pressure, predicting the right set between Sap/Substitute, or having one of those Darks that get absolutely bopped by T-Bolt, Thunder at +1. Ive honestly had more issue with Blim than Ive had with Dash, and while defensive Defog sets are a saving grace for a tier that once really required better removal options, this is definitely one to look at closely. So far its put in a lot of work in PUPL nad I dont expect that to change anytime soon, mostly after Kanga goes one way or another.
Regarding…Hattrem. I do not share HJADs opinion on the mon, despite not exactly liking how its ability works. While a lot of the common rockers don’t flat out beat it, most are able to cripple it in some way, and while Hattrem was a potentially problematic mon before it rose to NU, I believe that the power of the tier has increased to the point where it’s a lot easier to pressure by a lot of the wallbreakers in the tier (some of which can also function as offensive rockers that beat Hat). Some of my other thoughts regarding this mon are echoed by Many, who made a post that I agree with for the most part. While I do agree that balance generally struggles right now, it has been used and probably will be used more in upcoming PUPL SS battles, and the main issue that said playstyle has to deal with are imo much more hindered by other Pokemon such as Rapidash, and even super strong wallbreakers such as Butterfree, offensive Rime. If balance was to get better, Hattrem simply wouldn’t be my initial priority towards improving it, and I think willing to see where the tier goes and how it changes in relation to Hattrem in recent weeks will be a good indication of the course of action that should be taken with it.
Ty for reading!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! VROOM VROOM!!!
Kangaskhan (F) @ Silk Scarf
Ability: Scrappy
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Fake Out
- Double-Edge
- Earthquake
- Sucker Punch
Kangaskhan (F) @ Choice Band
Ability: Scrappy
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Fake Out
- Drain Punch
- Earthquake
- Double-Edge
Kangaskhan (F) @ Blunder Policy
Ability: Scrappy
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Power-Up Punch
- Double-Edge
- Earthquake
- Sing
Kangaskhan (F) @ Assault Vest
Ability: Scrappy
EVs: 252 HP / 40 Atk / 216 SpD
Careful Nature
- Fake Out
- Drain Punch
- Sucker Punch
- Body Slam
Kangaskhan @ Lum Berry
Ability: Scrappy
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Power-Up Punch
- Double-Edge
- Drain Punch
- Sucker Punch
Kangaskhan (F) @ Leftovers
Ability: Scrappy
EVs: 252 HP / 200 Atk / 56 SpD
Adamant Nature
- Substitute
- Toxic
- Double-Edge
- Power-Up Punch
Ability: Scrappy
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Fake Out
- Double-Edge
- Earthquake
- Sucker Punch
Kangaskhan (F) @ Choice Band
Ability: Scrappy
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Fake Out
- Drain Punch
- Earthquake
- Double-Edge
Kangaskhan (F) @ Blunder Policy
Ability: Scrappy
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Power-Up Punch
- Double-Edge
- Earthquake
- Sing
Kangaskhan (F) @ Assault Vest
Ability: Scrappy
EVs: 252 HP / 40 Atk / 216 SpD
Careful Nature
- Fake Out
- Drain Punch
- Sucker Punch
- Body Slam
Kangaskhan @ Lum Berry
Ability: Scrappy
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Power-Up Punch
- Double-Edge
- Drain Punch
- Sucker Punch
Kangaskhan (F) @ Leftovers
Ability: Scrappy
EVs: 252 HP / 200 Atk / 56 SpD
Adamant Nature
- Substitute
- Toxic
- Double-Edge
- Power-Up Punch
Don't have much to add, basic overwhelming things with accurate moves or boosted ones.
I actually really like this mon in the tier, it has a lot of versatility and could see more exploration in what we've seen thus far. I have yet to actually struggle against it but it can capitalize on its mix of sets for sure. Hope it stays in the tier and can be fleshed out.
When I intitially saw this mon get unbanned I was very confused since during its stay originally I thought it was better than most of the Silvally and didn't even rely on Terrain a lot. However, in practice it has proven to be rather underwhelming. It still has a nice speed tier but new additions like Boltund and Ninjask outpace it easily. I don't think its entire range of sets have been utilized in this new meta and as some sets gain traction over others it may become overwhelming in the future, but for now I think it's fine. Often you can end up being prepped for LO Two Attacks, CM Stored Power, etc. just by making sure you don't lose to other mons. This can easily change if Pokemon like Kangaskhan and Ninjask leave though.
I appreciate the Defog sets it brings to the tier and I find it really interesting how it can be used as either a physical or special sweeper. I haven't found it overwhelming at all really. I find it way easier to fit onto teams compared to Rapidash-G even if it isn't as diverse in what it can do for a team.
Magic bounce is annoying but not broken, echoing keppy in that we have the means of breaking it easier/faster now. A good amount of rockers can hit it hard to punish it going for the bounce on Stealth Rock/Spikes. Even Mareanie can annoy it with Knock Off for another mon to hit it harder later. I don't see anything particularly problematic with it.
Ninjask gets to U-turn without punishment due to boots and has a surprising amount of options. Swords Dance can make it actually threatening late game without needing a lot of chip, Protect can prevent Kangaskhan from nailing it with Fake Out, Toxic can lure in Stunfisk pretty easily for something like Klinklang in the back, and even Defog can be ran to quickly remove hazards for the rest of the team. I'd lean toward ban but it can be manageable with our decent amount of defensive mons since it lacks the immediate power.
Without Hidden Power and Z-Moves Lilligant is not as immediately scary as it was last gen. Though, it still has a good amount of options. Its Sleep Powder may not be as consistent as Butterfree's but it overall does better as a QD sweeper since it isn't as hard to fit onto teams imo. It also has some cool additional options as Choice Scarf or Specs, but QD versatility with moves like Healing Wish, Aromatherapy, or Substitute all have potential. Pollen Puff and Nature Power/Tri Attack give it some room even if most it can do to Steel is put them asleep. Nature Power has the cool perk of avoiding Sucker Punch as a status move too. Overall a very threatening mon I'm surprised to not have seen as much and should be watched closer imo.
Thanks for reading
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I don't play much any more but I just wanted to drop a Perrserker set to highlight its unhealthy aspects.
Perrserker @ Metal Coat
Ability: Steely Spirit
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Iron Tail
- Iron Head
- Swords Dance
- U-turn / Crunch / Taunt / Substitute / whatever
Metal Coat Iron Tail has the same power as a band Iron Head, so you have absurd immediate power and the ability to completely blow back resists when set up while still having access to a reliable STAB Iron Head when you need it. Here's why you don't need coverage:
+2 252+ Atk Metal Coat Steely Spirit Perrserker Iron Tail vs. 100 HP / 0 Def Klinklang: 254-299 (88.8 - 104.5%) -- 68.8% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
+2 252+ Atk Metal Coat Steely Spirit Perrserker Iron Tail vs. 248 HP / 252+ Def Eviolite Mareanie: 184-217 (60.7 - 71.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock
(with rocks up a follow up Iron Head after the Haze almost always kills. Another Iron Tail definitely will)
+2 252+ Atk Metal Coat Steely Spirit Perrserker Iron Tail vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Stunfisk: 231-272 (54.7 - 64.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock and Leftovers recovery
(Earth Power has a 25% chance to 1hko back, an Iron Tail + Iron Head will kill)
+2 252+ Atk Metal Coat Steely Spirit Perrserker Iron Tail vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Eviolite Tangela: 250-295 (74.8 - 88.3%) -- 6.3% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
Your last slot is open to decide which defensive counterplay options you'd like to invalidate - U-turn to chip Stunfisk so you can sweep later more safely, Crunch for Shedinja or Taunt for Pyuku. This mon gets switches and set up opportunities so easily and has such limited defensive counterplay that I cannot see it being healthy for the tier moving forwards.
Perrserker @ Metal Coat
Ability: Steely Spirit
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Iron Tail
- Iron Head
- Swords Dance
- U-turn / Crunch / Taunt / Substitute / whatever
Metal Coat Iron Tail has the same power as a band Iron Head, so you have absurd immediate power and the ability to completely blow back resists when set up while still having access to a reliable STAB Iron Head when you need it. Here's why you don't need coverage:
+2 252+ Atk Metal Coat Steely Spirit Perrserker Iron Tail vs. 100 HP / 0 Def Klinklang: 254-299 (88.8 - 104.5%) -- 68.8% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
+2 252+ Atk Metal Coat Steely Spirit Perrserker Iron Tail vs. 248 HP / 252+ Def Eviolite Mareanie: 184-217 (60.7 - 71.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock
(with rocks up a follow up Iron Head after the Haze almost always kills. Another Iron Tail definitely will)
+2 252+ Atk Metal Coat Steely Spirit Perrserker Iron Tail vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Stunfisk: 231-272 (54.7 - 64.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock and Leftovers recovery
(Earth Power has a 25% chance to 1hko back, an Iron Tail + Iron Head will kill)
+2 252+ Atk Metal Coat Steely Spirit Perrserker Iron Tail vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Eviolite Tangela: 250-295 (74.8 - 88.3%) -- 6.3% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
Your last slot is open to decide which defensive counterplay options you'd like to invalidate - U-turn to chip Stunfisk so you can sweep later more safely, Crunch for Shedinja or Taunt for Pyuku. This mon gets switches and set up opportunities so easily and has such limited defensive counterplay that I cannot see it being healthy for the tier moving forwards.
Butterfree and Kangaskhan were banned: https://www.smogon.com/forums/threa...nd-announcements-thread.3660650/#post-8535959
Quick question, what exact factor was the one that made the council Quickly change its views on Kanga and butterfree in such a few time period? Were orbeetle and rotom the Reasons why these mons were kept in check? Or was it simply because the council hadnt experimented with these mons enough to see their wall breaking potential?
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