Metagame np: SM UU Stage 10.5 - Water Me (weather test)

Hogg

grubbing in the ashes
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For two and a half years now, Drizzle has been banned from UU. It is easy to just assume that rain is simply far too overwhelming to be considered; after all, rain HO is a top offensive playstyle in OU. However, at the time, it was a very controversial ban. Drizzle was voted on by the UU Council during its beta period three times before finally getting banned in a very close vote. This final vote occurred just before a tier shift that would have seen Mega Swampert and Kingdra dropping to UU. Many people felt then that Drizzle was not consistent enough to be worth banning, and others felt that if it turned out Mega Swampert or Kingdra unbalanced rain, we should ban them rather than the ability.

Fast forward to the present and we have a markedly different metagame than the one of February of 2017. Many of rain's previous staples have departed: both of the Thundurus formes have been banned, Azumarill is back to UUBL, Keldeo is a distant memory. While powerful Swift Swim threats like Kingdra, Kabutops and Ludicolo remain, Drizzle stands out among UUBL as an element that could perhaps use a second look, and therefore we have decided that it deserves a public suspect test.

And what about Drought? This has its own storied history in the tier, and remains one of our tier's most controversial bans. Drought was always the lesser of the two weathers, and very few people found it remotely unhealthy, especially once the deadliest Fire-type in UU, Victini, was banned. From there it existed comfortably in the tier, never being anything more than an extremely niche option, until June of 2017, when Hikari posted about how potentially threatening Mega Houndoom was under sun. Add up Mega Doom's naturally great Special Attack, Solar Power, STAB, the high BP of Fire Blast and sun's boosting of Fire-type moves and you have an absolute nuke capable of doing things like 2HKOing Blissey without a boost. The reaction was swift as people all began sharing calcs of just how threatening Solar Power-boosted Doom could be, and the council immediately voted to ban Mega Houndoom.

This ban was immediately controversial. After all, Mega Houndoom was certainly far from banworthy without Drought, and hadn't we banned Drizzle less than six months prior? Why deny the tier access to Mega Houndoom when we could just ban Drought? And so, six months later, we reversed the ban, freeing Mega Doom and banning Drought to become more consistent with our previous ban of Drizzle. Of course, this too was met with controversy and outrage: why ban an entire playstyle (albeit a niche one) and effectively ban a Pokemon just to preserve Houndoom? Firium Z Ninetales had been beginning to see some play, and suddenly that was taken away in favor of a niche Mega (one that still to this day only sees approximately 1% usage in UU). And to add insult to injury, tiers below UU campaigned to break transitivity so that they could continue using Drought, where it was amply demonstrated that in RU at least, Drought was far from gamebreaking. And now, with the discussion of potentially freeing Drizzle, Drought rears its ugly head again: if the main impetus for reversing the original Houndoom ban was to make things more consistent with the Drizzle ban, then doesn't freeing Drizzle mean we should also go back to the original Mega Houndoom ban?

And another question that hasn't even been asked: were we too hasty in banning the combination of Drought + Houndoom in the first place? Mega Houndoom was banned so quickly that the metagame never was allowed the opportunity to adjust to it. It is an absolutely terrifying wallbreaker with the sun out, and it has a great Speed tier and resistance to the most common priority in the tier. However, its mediocre bulk, Stealth Rocks weakness and Solar Power damage sharply limit the number of turns it can come in. It's also something that can be awkward to bring in safely while the sun is out, as most of the good switchins to Ninetales or Torkoal are also things you would not want to switch a Houndoom into. It often requires Nasty Plot to successfully threaten stall or Flame Charge to keep from immediately getting revenge-killed by non-stall teams, but its awkward bulk and typing afford it few setup opportunities.

So with all of that said, we have decided to allow the public to decide. Voters will first be asked whether they wish to unban Drought or keep it UUBL, and then will look at Mega Houndoom itself to consider whether it is banworthy.

And so, we are suspecting Drizzle and Drought. This suspect test will operate similarly to all of the most recent suspect tests. There will be no suspect ladder. Instead, the standard UU ladder will remain open, and Drizzle and Drought will be allowed on it. Those who wish to participate in this suspect test will instead use a fresh, suspect-specific alt. The requirements for the suspect will be as follows:
  • All games must be played on the Pokemon Showdown! UU ladder on a fresh alt with the following format: "WTUU (Nick)." For example, I might register the alt WTUU Hogg to ladder with. You must meet the listed format in order to qualify.
  • To qualify for voting, your alt must play a minimum of 45 games, and
  • You must have a minimum GXE of 81.
You have until Sunday, August 18 at 11:59 PM GMT -4 to meet voting requirements. Feel free to post if you have any questions about the current suspect format. Happy laddering!

PSA: While a little humor has never killed anybody, please refrain from clogging up the thread with posts that don't add anything of substance to the discussion at hand. Use your judgment, really. You can post all memes you want (within Smogon's rules, of course), but make sure to at least try adding a short paragraph to get the discussion going. Same for voting requirement posts; there will be a thread for those. If you want to post them here, that's fine. But posts such as "I just qualified, I'm voting x" without anything else will be deleted. That should be it, I think. Happy posting!

 
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Possibly unpopular opinion, but I think we all know rain is going to be a massive ban vote here. Rain is just going to make it harder to judge what sun will be like without rain in tier though, and I think it would be better off to scrap rain suspect and do sun on it's own, so we can really get a feel of what it'll be like, as its the one that might actually stand a chance of being unbanned, as doing it with rain at same time is going to give warped opinions on sun. Revisiting rain after could be an option, but I heavily disagree with doing them together.

Another good alternative imo would be to just unban them on ladder for a few days, and then let council vote on whether we should have a suspect like what happened with the RU retests, instead of immediately jumping into the suspect, as this gives practical experience instead of mere speculation to see whether rain is busted beyond a doubt without wasting an entire suspect on it if it is.
 
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I agree with Estarossa here. Personally, I believe that rain will be 100% broken and that we should just scrap it. We could possibly suspect sun first, and then rain. Rain and sun being suspected together is probably going to warp opinions on sun, like Esta said, which may result in rain being banned and sun being unbanned, then sun being suspected and banned again because it's too much to handle w/o rain. Also, for early thoughts on the suspect, I haven't tested anything yet, but here are my initial thoughts:

-Rain is definitely broke, ban that shit.
-Ninetales is probably better than Torkoal as a Drought user thanks to being a potential breaker w/ NP + Fire Blast in the sun.
-Growth Venu looks really dangerous for stall if sun does get unbanned, especially since it can run mixed thanks to the +2 attack boost.
-Kabutops in the rain demolishes offense if it gets a boost. From what I can tell the only way to deal with it is like Vacuum Wave Infernape into Scizor Bullet Punch, but that still leaves you open to other threats. (edit: Kabutops can still run aqua jet if it really wants to. Which means offense has even less counterplay, hooray...)

I might add more thoughts later, but I just wanted to give my two cents on this whole topic first.

Edit 2: Have a garbage meme that I made in a few minutes.
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Looking forward to unleashing this beast

Also I agree that rain has the potential to be overbearing but I think saying outright we should scrap the test then saying you haven’t actually tested with it at all is just a bit questionable. I don’t agree with every tiering decision ever made, and people probably disagree with my opinions a fair bit aswell, but I think it would show a lot more respect if you backed up your claims with evidence of rain being completely unreasonable than just theory. Suspects aren’t just decided with a “fuck it how bad can it be” mentality (I hope anyway! :p), the council have obviously decided there’s a chance rain might not be instantly ban worthy so we should give it the same chance aswell.
 
Not feeling optimistic with drizzle and swift swim being legal together as that was definitely broken in BW even without mega swampert or fairy-type azu (though keldeo and thundurus-t are still staples in BW rain). I mean, scald is less good than it was and obviously there's the turn limit on rain now, forcing toed to run damp rock making it even more of a dead slot outside of generating rain without lefties. I just don't see what's going to stop specs kingdra in rain to be honest especially when rain as an archetype focuses on just flattening water resists, emp and primarina don't have good consistent recovery. I think things like mola, mantine and tentacruel are going to be staple on pretty much every team while this suspect lasts to be honest.

I get that time is limited before gen 8 but I agree that I don't think drizzle (especially with SS) will give us a good indicator of the healthiness of sun if they're suspected simultaneously.
 
I definitely am on the side of separate tests and possibly scrapping rain altogether. Rain simply activates too many things to be balanced in a tier like this.

Hurricane accuracy: Tornadus, Moltres, Articuno, Shiftry, Swellow, Noivern, Vivillion
Thunder accuracy: Nidoking/queen, Gengar, Literally any electric type (looking at you Mega Manectric), Goodra theres a million mons here
33% water move boost: Literally any water type
Swift Swim: Kabutops, Sombrero, Seismitoad, Carracosta, Kingdra
Hydration: Vaporeon, Goodra, maybe 1 other mon (this skill isn't very relevant)
Fire power reduction: SCIZOR

Some of these mons are just not very good until rain is introduced. A lot of them are good in the first place and simply get better. This makes it easier to build around being in and out of rain. Goodra becomes super good anti-anti rain.

Sun only gets:
1 Turn Solarbeam: Mega Doom, Mega Scep, Venusaur, Moltres, Chandelure, Charizard
33% Fire Boost: Literally any fire type
Chlorophyll: Venusaur, Shiftry, Leafeon, Lilligant
Solar Power: Mega Doom, Helioptile, Charizard
Water Power Reduciton: Not a whole lot really benefits from this.

These mons mostly aren't very strong until sun is out. This means that as soon as the setter dies you're on a timer to win, otherwise your mons just become useless.

Obviously I'm missing some stuff but I don't have time to go through all the options and you don't want to slog through them all.

The point here: Rain is low risk high reward - Sun is high risk high reward.

For you Neanderthals: RAIN GOOD SUN BAD
 
I don't really like the structure of this suspect. Why have a separate vote for Sun and Mega-Houndoom ? If you think Houndoom is broken with Drought then you shouldn't vote for Sun to be allowed and wait for the Houndoom suspect to finally vote ban, it feels unintuitive to me. The real vote here is actually : "Which mon do you want to see in UU, Drought Ninetales or Houndoom-Mega without Drought?". And for that question the latter seems better to me as Houndoom, although using the mega slot provides a nice check to offensive threat such as Celebi and Bisharp while having a great speed, good offensive stats and good coverage. Ninetales can be a more immediate threat with its choice specs set but is also slower and only really checks Scizor so it needs to be brought in on double switches or on a weak defensive pokemon.
Regarding the weathers themselves they both should be tested but the problem is that if one of the two ends up being ridiculous we won't have a good chance to properly test the other one. However testing both at the same time can be pretty interesting because they could end up nerfing each other and allow both to stay in the tier thanks to the other one, but that might be a bit unhealthy.
My suggestion is : if only one of the two weathers gets banned discussion the other one needs to be looked at another time and potentially make a new suspect. If rain is banned and Sun is not banned however, make it a suspect where voters can choose between banning Drought, Banning Houndoom or allowing both.
All I wrote is simply supposition in case Mega-Houndoom ends up being broken alongside Drought, so I guess that could wait until the votes but I feel it is important to take the time to think about it before voting.
 
I don't really like the structure of this suspect. Why have a separate vote for Sun and Mega-Houndoom ? If you think Houndoom is broken with Drought then you shouldn't vote for Sun to be allowed and wait for the Houndoom suspect to finally vote ban, it feels unintuitive to me. The real vote here is actually : "Which mon do you want to see in UU, Drought Ninetales or Houndoom-Mega without Drought?". And for that question the latter seems better to me as Houndoom, although using the mega slot provides a nice check to offensive threat such as Celebi and Bisharp while having a great speed, good offensive stats and good coverage. Ninetales can be a more immediate threat with its choice specs set but is also slower and only really checks Scizor so it needs to be brought in on double switches or on a weak defensive pokemon.
Regarding the weathers themselves they both should be tested but the problem is that if one of the two ends up being ridiculous we won't have a good chance to properly test the other one. However testing both at the same time can be pretty interesting because they could end up nerfing each other and allow both to stay in the tier thanks to the other one, but that might be a bit unhealthy.
My suggestion is : if only one of the two weathers gets banned discussion the other one needs to be looked at another time and potentially make a new suspect. If rain is banned and Sun is not banned however, make it a suspect where voters can choose between banning Drought, Banning Houndoom or allowing both.
All I wrote is simply supposition in case Mega-Houndoom ends up being broken alongside Drought, so I guess that could wait until the votes but I feel it is important to take the time to think about it before voting.

Just would like to pointed out the fact that you shouldn't compare Mega-Houndoom and Ninetales because they're not close. Mega-Houndoom is meh and doesn't bring anything to a team. You want a fast Mega which can check Scizor then go for Mega-Manectric and you'll have it (plus you get some Momentum thanks to Volt-Switch). You want a great Fire or Dark Sweeper, lmao just opt for Nasty Plot Infernape or Scarf/Specs Hydreigon.
Atm Mega-Houndoom is just bad and I trully believe that we shouldn't unbanned it a few months ago because Sun Team were legit and had a true nice niche. Nasty Plot Firium Z Ninetales was a really cool Pokemon to use which was also able to pressure Stall which means you didn't have to make a 100% Sun Team. You could just play Ninetales + Growth LO Venusaur and the rest of the team would be more "classic".

However I agree with some players that this suspect is a bit iffy because we're suspecting both weather together. I can't deny that Rain seems better on the paper than Drought but let's wait and see how it goes before saying smth is broken or not.
 
Just would like to pointed out the fact that you shouldn't compare Mega-Houndoom and Ninetales because they're not close. Mega-Houndoom is meh and doesn't bring anything to a team. You want a fast Mega which can check Scizor then go for Mega-Manectric and you'll have it (plus you get some Momentum thanks to Volt-Switch). You want a great Fire or Dark Sweeper, lmao just opt for Nasty Plot Infernape or Scarf/Specs Hydreigon.
Atm Mega-Houndoom is just bad and I trully believe that we shouldn't unbanned it a few months ago because Sun Team were legit and had a true nice niche. Nasty Plot Firium Z Ninetales was a really cool Pokemon to use which was also able to pressure Stall which means you didn't have to make a 100% Sun Team. You could just play Ninetales + Growth LO Venusaur and the rest of the team would be more "classic".

However I agree with some players that this suspect is a bit iffy because we're suspecting both weather together. I can't deny that Rain seems better on the paper than Drought but let's wait and see how it goes before saying smth is broken or not.
I compare them because we might have to pick one of them to stay in the UU tier. Houndoom provides defensive and offensive utility that none of the mons you presented provide. I'm not saying it's an amazing mon, I agree with the viability ranking putting it in the B rank but it can be justified over other higher ranked mons especially given how hard checking Celebi is. I would rank Ninetales lower for now because some popular stall teams run Nihilego, Aerodactyl-Mega and SpD Pyukumuku and Roost Aero and Terrakion are more common than in january 2018 but we have a whole suspect to test it out and see if it's really hot or if it's just a niche pick.
 
I was wondering, what if we had Drizzle, without Damp Rock? I'm not joking, a huge amount of Rain's viability comes from this one item. I'm just saying if Drizzle is too much, we should try testing it after without the Rock. 5 turns is a really strict amount of time compared to 8 turns of Damp Rock, so Rain Teams would definitely have more high risk too them. Feel free to disagree with me on this, but in my opinion we should try and test Damp Rock instead.

Same can be said about Heat Rock if Drought is too much. If both are still too powerful even without the Rocks then sure, ban them.

Edit: If want to try out rain? I made sample!

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I definitely am on the side of separate tests and possibly scrapping rain altogether. Rain simply activates too many things to be balanced in a tier like this.

Hurricane accuracy: Tornadus, Moltres, Articuno, Shiftry, Swellow, Noivern, Vivillion
Thunder accuracy: Nidoking/queen, Gengar, Literally any electric type (looking at you Mega Manectric), Goodra theres a million mons here
33% water move boost: Literally any water type
Swift Swim: Kabutops, Sombrero, Seismitoad, Carracosta, Kingdra
Hydration: Vaporeon, Goodra, maybe 1 other mon (this skill isn't very relevant)
Fire power reduction: SCIZOR

Some of these mons are just not very good until rain is introduced. A lot of them are good in the first place and simply get better. This makes it easier to build around being in and out of rain. Goodra becomes super good anti-anti rain.

Sun only gets:
1 Turn Solarbeam: Mega Doom, Mega Scep, Venusaur, Moltres, Chandelure, Charizard
33% Fire Boost: Literally any fire type
Chlorophyll: Venusaur, Shiftry, Leafeon, Lilligant
Solar Power: Mega Doom, Helioptile, Charizard
Water Power Reduciton: Not a whole lot really benefits from this.

These mons mostly aren't very strong until sun is out. This means that as soon as the setter dies you're on a timer to win, otherwise your mons just become useless.

Obviously I'm missing some stuff but I don't have time to go through all the options and you don't want to slog through them all.

The point here: Rain is low risk high reward - Sun is high risk high reward.

For you Neanderthals: RAIN GOOD SUN BAD

To clarify for the neanderthals, rain and sun raise the power of their respective moves by 1 stage. In other words, 50%, not 33%. Also, water reduction helps the setters themselves and its naive to ignore that.
 
Just would like to highlight an issue which may be problematic in my opinion.

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Drought and Drizzle are not yet available on the Ladder but there is some players which have already grinded on the ladder to get their reqs.
I'm my opinion it's an issue since we are suppose to get our reqs to know how a Pokemon / whatever is suspected is in the tier and how it impacts it. If you get your reqs before the Pokemon / whatever is available, how are you suppose to know what is the best to vote. Some players may answer me that people can still do some games even after they get their reqs but still, I would like to have UU's moderation opinion on this. I do think that laddering without Weather is easier than when they will be available so yeah, seems a bit unfair for the player waiting the ladder to be updated.

I deliberately blurred players's name because I just want to point out the problem and not the attitute of the players.
Please, feel free to delete this post if you think it may be inappropriate.

Edit : gg wp someone managed to get his reqs before the ladder is updated :pikuh:

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Just would like to highlight an issue which may be problematic in my opinion.

dsr6.png


Drought and Drizzle are not yet available on the Ladder but there is some players which have already grinded on the ladder to get their reqs.
I'm my opinion it's an issue since we are suppose to get our reqs to know how a Pokemon / whatever is suspected is in the tier and how it impacts it. If you get your reqs before the Pokemon / whatever is available, how are you suppose to know what is the best to vote. Some players may answer me that people can still do some games even after they get their reqs but still, I would like to have UU's moderation opinion on this. I do think that laddering without Weather is easier than when they will be available so yeah, seems a bit unfair for the player waiting the ladder to be updated.

I deliberately blurred players's name because I just want to point out the problem and not the attitute of the players.
Please, feel free to delete this post if you think it may be inappropriate.
yea i feel like these suspect posts should be made immediately AFTER whatever is being suspected is open on ladder
 
Just would like to highlight an issue which may be problematic in my opinion.

dsr6.png


Drought and Drizzle are not yet available on the Ladder but there is some players which have already grinded on the ladder to get their reqs.
I'm my opinion it's an issue since we are suppose to get our reqs to know how a Pokemon / whatever is suspected is in the tier and how it impacts it. If you get your reqs before the Pokemon / whatever is available, how are you suppose to know what is the best to vote. Some players may answer me that people can still do some games even after they get their reqs but still, I would like to have UU's moderation opinion on this. I do think that laddering without Weather is easier than when they will be available so yeah, seems a bit unfair for the player waiting the ladder to be updated.

I deliberately blurred players's name because I just want to point out the problem and not the attitute of the players.
Please, feel free to delete this post if you think it may be inappropriate.

Edit : gg wp someone managed to get his reqs before the ladder is updated :pikuh:

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I mean yes the suspect has started but there isn't much of point for a test if the suspected thing isn't even around to be tested, at this point you're just playing normal ladder, give some time people.
 
My brief thoughts on rain. I’ve seen rain on the ladder without an automatic setter and it’s mediocre. Politoed doesn’t have the utility and coverage that Pelliper provides with dual Stabs, 100% accuracy Hurricane, and U-turn. Rain will always be stuck with Politoed which is slow and not very bulky. It’s very easy to counter lead and not at all hard to switch into. I don’t think UU has the tools to abuse rain because, like Hogg said, we don’t have Keldeo and Mega Swampert. Fairy-types like Sylveon and Mega Altaria look to be quite good versus Rain sweepers. I’m not certain rain will be bad but I think that Politoed will far short as a setter by not having any pivot moves allowing opposing teams to take advantage of it.
 
I agree with vivalospride, rain will probably be mostly fine once the ladder adjusts to it. For now though it makes for the literal worst laddering experience with rain mirrors in literally every matchup. In the end though I think having to use Politoed on a team will keep rain teams from ever being able to have a truly great matchup versus every playstyle. Stall in particular seems irritating with Blissey walling Kingdra.

That Psychium Tsareena though, that's pretty sick.
 
got reqs

This was the most depressing laddering I've done in a long time, all 8 of those losses were depression reincarnate and it's b/c literally 87% of games on the ladder were only fuckin rain and I couldn't handle the amount of games that just come down to who hits more Hydro Pumps and shit like that is so fuckin annoying I can't even describe the frustration of losing like three games ina row in this ladder's current climate.

Anyways I have absolutely no idea at all what my opinion is on rain b/c as I said the ladder was a pos and next to impossible to help me form an actual opinion on what im using. Through the early stages of the ladder you're probably gonna be telling yourself "wow this shit is broken" when in reality you just keep running into people with no water resists and go hard Scizor on Kingdra or some shit. I found that Politoed is a p consistent Nidoking check which is really cool tho

Sun seems fine but I don't really know about that either b/c I only used rain and I p much exclusively faced rain, with rain in the tier sun is definitely nothing to be excited about but if for example rain is banned and sun isn't then I'm not really sure.

This post is saying absolutely nothing of value so far, so I'll give the team I used it was literally the only thing making this ladder sesh of 45 games enjoyable.


The first four mons are about as brainless as it can get, just did typical rain shit idek what to say. Toad I think is the best rocker on rain it actually like runs through offense all by itself and can get rocks up p reliably w/ it's coverage, also kinda "lures" malt/prima ig for kingdra but super loosely considering poison coverage isn't exactly a tech on offensive toad. Keys just gives a secondary rain setter and spike setter and twave support which is all v appreciated. Doub I felt would be super cool on this b/c it takes pressure off of keys and checks all the fighting types that are problematic otherwise aka all of them aside from nape which can still be sus. I went with SD + Toxic to give a setup mon/wincon that helps with fat matchup, not sure about Iron Head or Shadow Claw in hindsight since ghost coverage is way more safe than steel but whatever I did it with Iron Head lmao. Tsareena rounds the team out to help w/ the fat mu a bit as well since it's a physical grass, also helps rain matchup, also also gives hazard removal which is very cool on this. I did Psychium Z Tsareena to lure Amoonguss primarily but it honestly came in handy in a few matchups even if they didn't have guss, but ye luring guss is beneficial on rain for obvious reasons.

Team has no floaty mons but definitely not even close to an issue imo considering it's rain.
 
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I agree with vivalospride, rain will probably be mostly fine once the ladder adjusts to it. For now though it makes for the literal worst laddering experience with rain mirrors in literally every matchup. In the end though I think having to use Politoed on a team will keep rain teams from ever being able to have a truly great matchup versus every playstyle. Stall in particular seems irritating with Blissey walling Kingdra.

That Psychium Tsareena though, that's pretty sick.
what the fuck
 
Yes... A Nice Exciting Suspect I Can Support And Enjoy...

First Of All I Have Seen Some Cobalion On Ladder Named Prikshit And Would Like To Say Thank You For Thinking Of Me In Your Teams, Even If This Beast Is Not Very Good... :pikuh: Maybe This Is An Insult Against My Good Name?


My Initial Thoughts On Suspect Are As Follows. Ninetales Is Vastly Becoming The Most Sewage Pokemon I Have Ever Seen Created On This Earth. Total Gutter Filth That Must Be Cleaned And Disposed Of. This Pokemon Cannot Contribute Anything Of Value To Team And Makes The Battle Feel Like 5v6 Right Away. Therefore, I Do Not Use Sun.

On The Other Hand, While Politoed Is Equally Garbage Straight From Trash Can Rain Teams Are A Lot Better. Stronger Pokemon On These Teams And A Fun Hyper Offence Playstyle Make This Fun To Play And Versus. I Do Not Think These Metagame Teams Have Been Fully Explored Yet So I Cannot Comment Fully But They Are Most Definitely Viable.

I Would Like To Share A Prikshit Signature Set I Have Used With Success To Anti Metagame This Suspect:

Gardevoir @ Choice Specs
Ability: Trace
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Psychic
- Moonblast
- Shadow Ball / Thunderbolt
- Trick

Fairy Types Are Broken Even Before This Suspect And Trace Gardevoir Is Very Fun Way To Abuse The Less Good Rain Teams On Ladder. Switch Into Kingdra Expected Dragon Attack Or After Some Pokemon On Your Team Dies And Sweep With Trace Swift Swim Moonblast Or Other Moves. Specs Sylveon Is Also Another Fun Gimmick.

More Thoughts Will Come Shortly!! :pimp:
 
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I agree with pretty much everyone here that it would be extremely busted and unhealthy for the metagame if drizzle were to be unbanned. I will be going over some reasons in why I think this way.

The swift swimmers are way to much to deal with, since they all get a powered up stab water type moves that just wreak havoc. Ludicolo gets stab grass type moves and an option to use a bulky set with Rain Dish, reliable recovery, boosted Scalds, Leech Seed and a decent defensive typing. Kingdra gets amazing coverage in Draco Meteor, Ice Beam, Flash Cannon and a Hidden Power of your chosing. Omastar has the highest special attack out of any of the swift swimmers and gets access too earth power to wreck volcanion.

The physical swift swimmers are alot more niche and gimmicky compared to the special ones thanks to the likes of Alomomola and Quagsire, but they still deserve a mention. Kabutops gets banded waterfall to annihilate Quagsire and the option to use sd + z edge to ohko Alomomola. Qwilfish gets stab poison type moves to wreck grass types and a banded explosion. Seismitoed is basically a less predictable, but weaker Mega-Swampert already makes it pretty decent, it gets amazing coverage in poison jab, grass knot, drain punch, knock off, focus blast, ice punch and sludge wave.

Tentacruel basically making any other spinner obselete and additionally just beating klefki unless it gets super lucky over a considerable amount of turns, nothing aside from special walls that don't threaten it and give it free t spikes want to switch in on a rain boosted scald anyway so unless you are using xatu against non knock off variants then you're kinda screwed.

Scizor and Latias getting some pretty nice buffs in less damage from hp fire for Scizor and boosted surfs + 100% accurate thunders for Latias. Latias also having the ability to beat most rain mons with cm + z thunder gives it a massive boost in utility.

I will also have to say that suspecting drought and drizzle at the same time is a very weird thing to do, for one reason, rain basically makes sun unviable unless the sun team is tailor made to beat rain, this makes it hard to evaluate wheather sun is broken or not, since most people aren't using it seriously.
 
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Alright, time to give my thoughts on this super iffy suspect :blobnom:

First of all, I would like to support some opinions of player which claim that we shouldn't suspect Drizzle and Drought together. Indeed, while I was laddering, I faced a vast majority of Rain teams and not a lot of Sun teams which means it's trully hard to have an opinion on Drought because Drizzle is ubiquitous on the current ladder. The fact that Rain has the advantage over Sun or Sand teams means that those teams struggle to stand out. I played a couple of games with a Sun Team and I had to switch after a couple of games my Ninetales's set for Grassium Z Solar Beam over Firium Z Fire Bast just to be able to lure Politoed and win the weather war. But it kinda sucks tbh since Ninetales lost its fire nuke which is one of its best strenght in my opinion. I know that you can also play Torkoal with Drought to get 2 Sun Inducer but still, I don't think this is the best way to play Sun Teams atm.


Drizzle : Fear the power of the Flood !


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Politoed is the true figurehead of Rain Teams thanks to its ability Drizzle. Although it doesn't have the utility of Pelipper nor a good way to heal itself, Politoed has a decent special bulk which allows it to check pretty effectively Ninetales (it can handle a neutral Z-Solar Beam which is kinda insane). I played in my team the same set than vivalospride but I do think Politoed may be use in a better way with maybe Whirlpool + Perish Song since it allows it to remove some Pokemon like Blissey, Empoleon etc.. which can handle to a certain extent Rain teams.

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Kingdra, Kabutops, Tornadus and Ludicolo are in my opinion the best Sweeper for Rain Teams. While Kingdra is special and Kabutops physical, it's interesting to note that Ludicolo has access to Swords Dance and can be used as a physical lure to pressure Pokemon like Blissey (it has some decent options such as Waterfall, Seed Bomb, Ice Punch, Knock Off or even Thunder Punch). On its side, Tornadus can abuse of Hurricane thanks to the Rain. Those 3 Pokemon are the best Swift Swim users.

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Seismitoad and Qwilfish can be used as Rain Sweeper but I think there are less effective than the 3 Pokemon I talked about before. However, they're effective and can provide some hazard support (Stealth Rock for Seismitoed and Spikes for Qwilfish).

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Scizor, Ferroseed, Tentacruel and Klefki are more defensive options for Rain Teams. While Scizor and Ferroseed benefit from the reduction of their weakness to Fire-type under the Rain, Tentacruel wins some passive recovery thanks Rain Dish (it's actually really cool when it's paired with Protect). Last but not least, Klefki can support its teammates thanks to its Screens / Spikes / Thunder Wave / Rain Dance and benefits like Scizor and Ferroseed of the reduction in power of Fire-type move.

My thoughts for Drizzle :

There is obviously way more Pokemon which benefit from the rain like Mega-Manectric, Crawdaunt and basically any powerful Pokemon which can abuse of Water-type or Hurricane/Thunder 100% accuracy. Overall, Drizzle is really good and threatening in Underused. This archetype stood out in less than 24h as a premier threat archetype which requires more than 1 Pokemon to be able to deal with. Even if I liked a lot the games I did with my Rain Team in order to get my reqs, I do believe that Drizzle is too restrictive for the tier and too good to come back.

Although I'm not yet sure of what I'm going to vote, I’m leaning more currently to a "Stay BL" vote for Drizzle.


Drought : Heatwave in the game !


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Unlike Drizzle which only has one inducer, Drought has two inducer : Ninetales and Torkoal ! While Ninetales doesn't provide as much support as Torkoal (great bulk + Rapid Spin & Stealth Rock), I do believe that Ninetales is a way better Sun Inducer than Torkoal even if it lost the Lead Weather War (since it's faster than Politoed). Indeed, thanks to Nasty Plot and it's great coverage (Solar Beam), Ninetales is able to pressure a lot of Pokemon and requires dedicated check (such as Diancie, Nihilego, Terrakion, Empoleon and Tentacruel to a lesser extent etc..). Thanks to its speed and better offensive presence, Ninetales can pressure way more Pokemon than Politoed on its own. However, it's bulk is kinda worst.

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Mega-Houndoom and Chlorophyll Venusaur are without a doubt the best abuser under the sun. While Mega-Houndoom is able to pressure almost everything under the Sun thanks to its ability Solar Power and its access to Nasty Plot ; Venusaur acts as an outstanding fast Sweeper thanks to Chlorophyll. Venusaur also appreciates the sun since it allows it to get +2 (instead of +1) in its offensive stats with Growth. Overall this two Pokemon are really threatening to face and can be really hard to handle if you don't have the correct answers.

Like Rain Teams, there is more options for Sun Teams like Fire-types such as Infernape, Darmanitan or Entei which are able to abuse of their STAB or other Chlorophyll's users such as Victreebell or Shiftry but they're less effective than Venusaur and a bit harder to support.

My thoughts for Drought :

Like I said in the introduction, this suspect is iffy as fuck because Drizzle is way more common and effective than Drought. With that in mind, it's super hard to have a solid opinion weather or not this weather is too good or too hard to handle in Underused. I feel like we're in the same spot as when Buzzwole and Conkeldurr were in Underused. When Buzzwole was in the tier, Conkeldurr wasn't as dangerous because Buzzwole was able to handle its hits and retaliates back. Buzzwole was able to contain Conkeldurr and I feel like it's the same issue atm. Of course Drought doesn't seem as threatening as Drizzle but what happens if Drizzle is banned ? I was the first to complain about the ban of Drought but at the moment I'm trully not sure if it's a good thing if this weather stays in the tier if Drizzle had to be banned...

Since I do believe that Drizzle will undergo the banhammer, I'm leaning to vote "Stay BL" as well for Drought because I feel like this weather will be too much with its current abusers.

tl;dr : double weathers suspect wasn't a good idea, I don't want Weather War like in gen' five :psycry:


By the way, if some players wanna try the team I used to get my reqs, feel free to use it. You can opt for Whirlpool + Perish Song Politoed and change Foul Play on Klefki for Dazzling Gleam or Play Rough. Thanks for reading me, good luck for your reqs and take care !

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Politoed @ Damp Rock
Ability: Drizzle
EVs: 248 HP / 172 SpD / 88 Spe
Calm Nature
- Scald
- Toxic
- Encore
- Rest

Crawdaunt @ Waterium Z
Ability: Adaptability
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Swords Dance
- Crabhammer
- Aqua Jet
- Knock Off

Scizor @ Iron Plate
Ability: Technician
EVs: 152 HP / 252 Atk / 104 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Swords Dance
- Roost
- U-turn
- Bullet Punch

Tentacruel @ Black Sludge
Ability: Rain Dish
EVs: 248 HP / 240 Def / 20 Spe
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Rapid Spin
- Toxic
- Protect
- Scald

Seismitoad @ Leftovers
Ability: Water Absorb
EVs: 248 HP / 240 Def / 20 Spe
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Stealth Rock
- Protect
- Scald
- Earth Power

Klefki @ Leftovers
Ability: Prankster
EVs: 248 HP / 96 Def / 156 SpD / 8 Spe
Calm Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Spikes
- Magnet Rise
- Thunder Wave
- Foul Play
 
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I think the suspect makes sense- rain is slightly worse with sun existing (only slightly though) so if it’s balanced, it will be because of extra counter play. I agree though that testing damp rock would be a good way to go about things. Rain is by far the best weather in the game, and beats most other weather setters due to typing. Plus toed has more longevity.

One thing I haven’t seen more of is toxicroak- he’s probably one of the better switchins to anything not named Kingdra or Seismitoad.

I think rain will probably be deemed broken even with damp rock banned, but I think it’s a fresh take on the playstyle for sure.

Also I’d rather ban Doom than drought, nobody uses Doom, it’s clear that it doesn’t have a true place and it makes things less complicated for RU.

Haven’t had a team to test this yet, and may be busy this weekend but I’m interested what everyone thinks.
 
Unfortunately, I can't contribute to this suspect this time, even though I really want to. This is a suspect that I've been looking forward to, as Sun is one of my favorite archetypes in lower tiers. However, from playing on and off on the ladder (Using both more traditional teams and weather), I've seen a couple of quricks this meta brings.

First, I want to address Sun. In my opinion, Houndoom alone wasn't enough to ban Drought outright. It has amazing breaking potential, however, it's easily offensively pressured and abused because of its reliance on the Sun being out. Torkaol and Ninetails simply don't have the same utility or bulk that Pelipper, Tyranitar/Hippowdon have to circumvent the weaknesses brought about by their archetypes. Sun definitely isn't a meme or a troll pick, it's breakers and sweepers are extremely potent when piloted smartly. Sun seems a-okay from a balance point of view.

I played as much rain, but I can definitely see it as a problem. It's extremely hard to beat a rain team especially if the rain user plays exceptionally well unless you Cheese them. Standard BO teams can get dismantled by the combination of Politoad's utility and Kingdra and other Swift Swimmers' sheer power. Even non-Swift Swim make rain disgustingly strong. Scizor and Ferroseed begin to laugh in the face of flames and Crawdaunt and Sharpedo can straight up muscle through their checks. I can see that within a couple of developments, rain could be made extremely centralizing and broken.

But, with that said and done, I'm looking forward to what the consensus of this suspect is. Take a meme for your troubles.
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well so at first I was like rain would be broken ban that shit, but now after going against it several times, it was actually pretty underwhelming.

I originally didn't use this team specifically for rain, I used it just cuz its good. But it has proper counters for kingdra (empoleon), klefki (band crawdaunt), seismitoad (amoonguss), and scizor (bulky altaria and foul play amoonguss).
Politoed is also hella easy to take care of cuz crawdaunt as an easy lead does 81-95% to max defense.

Anyway, i think i just had little trouble cuz my team coincidentally has easy checks, but I think other teams without empoleon, blissey, bulky primarina, and av muk-alola (with full hp and even thats a maybe) wouldn't be able to switch into it at all, and thats just for kingdra. Over half of THOSE mons lose to band scizor.

Some calcs:
252+ SpA Choice Specs Kingdra Hydro Pump vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Sylveon in Rain: 214-253 (54.3 - 64.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ SpA Choice Specs Kingdra Hydro Pump vs. 4 HP / 252 SpD Assault Vest Muk-Alola in Rain: 187-222 (53.1 - 63%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252+ SpA Choice Specs Kingdra Hydro Pump vs. 72 HP / 0 SpD Altaria-Mega in Rain: 171-202 (55.3 - 65.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252+ SpA Choice Specs Kingdra Hydro Pump vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Tentacruel in Rain: 153-180 (42 - 49.4%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Black Sludge recovery (Sure, it doesnt do half but tf is a tentacruel gonna do to a kingdra)

Anyway, personally I think Life orb kingdra is way better than specs cuz it doesnt have to come down to predicting, but hopefully this meta won't come to that cuz rain is just too hard to deal with and every team would need one of those 3 and a half pokemon to counter rain successfully.

Voting Ban on that hoe.
 
I had an OG rain team that didn't need no drizzle to win.

But I knew better than to bring that mess on ladder. Didn't use a rain/sun team as I get how you play it, focused more on how it feels to play against it.

With that I can confidently say that both are definitely centralizing to the meta. One more than the other.

Rain:
Rain is more centralizing than sun, because I straight up needed to get lucky (which I did lol) against rain to win. Kingdra is the biggest issue, because its the worst type of guessing game. As in, you can still be right, and hydreigon takes more than 50% from hydro pump. If you don't want luck, get ready to add amoonguss to every team. And even then, you gotta preserve it, which means sacking the rest of your team. LO Freeze Dry Mamoswine is also a very good pick against rain. Give that boy enough speed to outspeed the modest/adamant rain sweepers and you might just get good results. But that means you need huge chip on politoed already.

EDIT: ALMOST FORGOT, BULKY PRIMARINA DOES WORK TO RAIN avoid that seismotoad sludge tho

Sun:
Houndoom and Venu go fast. Better save your sacks or poison/grass resists. Not as threatening considering you can still bullet punch/ice shard venu a lot easier and there are faster revenge killers for Mdoom. Also rocks work wonders. Really messes up most sun setters. If the team is ill prepared for sun, then yeah you'll struggle. But that's like building a team that can't handle stall. A solid team should be able to handle sun most if not all times. Reason why I still consider this centralizing is because grass/poison is an incredible typing. You kinda need a blissey to safely switch into venu under sun. 5 turns is a lot of time to do a lot of damage to a squishy team.

TLDR: I'm leaning towards keeping drizzle banned. But Houndoom and Sun may be fair game, not sure yet.

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