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Houndoom 2hkos blissey with rocks up, and nearly OHKOs the best natural switch being Scarf Hydreigon with rocks. Flame charge is an amazing filler as well when used on weak pokemon or predicted sacks.
Z Venu coverage is impossible to switch into and getting a growth off in sun is usually game over.
Torkoal is a fucking tank and lives almost any attack at full(the EVs i picked are random but they work). Access to explosion makes it easy to not waste any sun turns.
Blissey is a fantastic second Sun setter that also checks rain. Healing Wish is perfect to bring back a weakened sweeper after torkoal is dead while also letting you utilize maximum Sun turns.
Scizor is another Healing wish abuser that checks opposing Scizor and Mimikyu. You can play risky with Scizor since its so easy to Healing Wish it back up if needed.
Latias is more speed control and another Healing Wish user that also fits as a ground resist. The weakness to scarf Krook doesnt matter since if they click Knock off, Venu gets a Growth off and usually wins.
2 Healing Wish users on Sun is absurd and it works as well as you could imagine. This team is very fun, easy af to use, and BROKEN.
Seriously though, don't be stupid, ban this shit lol
I'm on mobile and can't go into great detail, but...
As several people have expressed that they feel it is difficult to properly test both sun and rain in the time frame provided, we will be extending the suspect test by one week, in order to give all participants a chance to fully explore both weathers.
We will also be having a runoff vote to address the Drought and Mega Houndoom issues. Expect more info on that early this coming week when I have access to a real computer again.
I got my reqs earlier today and I think I will be voting no ban on Drizzle. I did not really find rain overwhelming or a hindrance after playing on the ladder with various playstyles. As for Drought, I don't think it is overpowered by if you take away Houndoom, but Mega Houndoom is without a doubt broken in the Sun, which is why I would support unbanning both weather playstyles, but if Drought gets unbanned then there is no doubt that Mega Houndoom needs to go.
I started my reqs transitioning between using rain and sun teams and I honestly didn't enjoy using Sun too much, but Rain was fun to use and play against. I found the weather vs weather matchups to be the most enjoyable, but I really can't see Sun (without Houndoom) being a very big threat in the current UU tier, then again this opinion could shift a little if Rain stays banned, as many others have pointed out previously.
Sun as a playstyle is so limited and predictable when compared to Sand and Rain in team options. Outside of Houndoom (again this pokemon should be banned if Drought stays), I only really found Venusaur to be a good abuser of the play style and even then it wasn't too difficult to deal with.
Rain, on the other hand, is a great playstyle with some incredible Swift Swim options such as Kingdra, Ludicolo, and Kabutops. Over the course of laddering I did not really see any creative use of sun outside of fire types/chlorophyll, but with rain you can further take advantage of the weather by pairing it with Scizor to decrease the threat of fire types or Tornadus in order to get a Hurricane that doesn't miss as well as a prankster user that can help Politoed (pretty bad pokemon on its own) with the heavy load of keeping rain up. Overall I think Rain has enough options to be relevant and spice up the tier, but I think it's far from broken.
I played with stall a bit and although Rain seemed powerless if the stall was played correctly, Sun teams saw stall as a pretty easy win as long as Houndoom and Venusaur were not misplayed. Balance teams seemed to deal well against Rain when I used them, but Mega Houndoom in the sun did pose a really big threat in most matchups (leaning more towards just getting rid of Houndoom rather than the entire sun playstyle since teams lacking Houndoom were no problem at all).
I've only been laddering for a day and a half so my opinion might change over the remainder of the suspect test, but as of right now I am in favor of unbanning Drizzle and Drought, but I would be in favor of a ban on Mega Houndoom. I do not feel that it would be rational to ban the entire Drought playstyle just for Houndoom to go back to being a mediocre RUBL pokemon that barely sees usage anyways when just banning Mega Houndoom and allowing Drought to remain would add more fun options and variation to the tier.
Just would like to highlight an issue which may be problematic in my opinion.
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
I agree with this fully. It completely defeats the purpose of the entire suspect test for someone to get the reqs before the test even begins and the ladder updates. During the Mimikyu suspect test it took like a full day for the ladder to update and I got my reqs shortly after the post went up so I was literally halfway through laddering for reqs before I realized "wait a second, why is no one using Mimikyu? Oh wait it's not even available yet lol."
Not putting the blame on anyone for this, but in the future, I think it would be a lot better to just get the mons on the ladder before the post for the suspect test goes up to avoid this issue. Even if the suspect post to begin the test doesn't come until a day after the pokemon is made available on the ladder, it would still be less problematic than if the post came a day before the pokemon was made available on the ladder (which has been the case recently).
After playing with and against weather as well as reading some posts, I have to agree that weather is all around broken. Drought and Drizzle archetypes are pretty mindless having little wiggle room for innovation and being very very easy to use as Christo mentioned. Weather controls the way the game is played and, unless you have opposing weather or a very good match-up, you are making 50/50 plays and sacking Pokemon until weather ends. With 7 turns of weather that is really hard to do. A well played weather team should not lose in a good match-up and there is very little to be done to outplay a bad match-up. Regardless of being broken I think weather wars are going to make the tier quite boring. Rain and Sun teams are going to be near identical every match-up and Sun vs. Sun, Rain vs. Rain and Sun vs. Rain match-ups are going to be incredibly dull in tour and ladder game-play. Banning weather rocks won't change anything but I think a Mega Houndoom ban might make Drought a little more bearable. As for Drizzle I think that's going to be locked up once again.
I am sorry for the faults because I'm french and I don't speak English very well. So do not be surprised if you do not understand everything.
I am of the same opinion as itsjustdrew and I think that Drizzle and Drought would be restrictive for the opposing teams as for themselves. Houndoom-Mega is unmanageable after flame charge for the large majority of teams and I think it will be banned if we want to allow sun (The team of Christo is literally broken). The rain are really too difficult to manage for the tier and I know that I would vote for their ban. I still have a doubt about the sun but I think the best would be surely to unban sun and ban M-Houndoom.
It was my first suspect test and I agree with those who say that this suspect was very uncomfortable to do and I hope that the next will be more pleasant.
Personally I hope none of the weathers get a ban or their abusers(Looking at Mega Houndoom, and maybe Kingdra). Because we just need time to adapt to them.
I think special defensive Rest Talk Hakamo-o(with dragon tail) shuts down venusaur and Victreebel, however, should Venu or Victreebel decide to run Solar beam over giga then wish passing may ease the pressure. Other Pokémon to consider include, AloMuk, Dragalge as well as Golbat, and possibly others
While I'm aware the calculations below revolve around Venusaur. It does the same damage as Victreebel.
+2 252+ SpA Life Orb Venusaur Giga Drain vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Eviolite Hakamo-o: 87-104 (27.7 - 33.1%) -- guaranteed 4HKO
+2 252+ SpA Life Orb Venusaur Solar Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Eviolite Hakamo-o: 140-165 (44.5 - 52.5%) -- 22.3% chance to 2HKO
As for Mega-Houndoom I'd suggest weather war, what I mean by this replace Nihilego with Gigalith on stall, and try to amend the cons of using Gigalith over Nihilego with team selection
Personally I hope none of the weathers get a ban or their abusers(Looking at Mega Houndoom, and maybe Kingdra). Because we just need time to adapt to them.
I think special defensive Rest Talk Hakamo-o(with dragon tail) shuts down venusaur and Victreebel, however, should Venu or Victreebel decide to run Solar beam over giga then wish passing may ease the pressure. Other Pokémon to consider include, AloMuk, Dragalge as well as Golbat, and possibly others
While I'm aware the calculations below revolve around Venusaur. It does the same damage as Victreebel.
+2 252+ SpA Life Orb Venusaur Giga Drain vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Eviolite Hakamo-o: 87-104 (27.7 - 33.1%) -- guaranteed 4HKO
+2 252+ SpA Life Orb Venusaur Solar Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Eviolite Hakamo-o: 140-165 (44.5 - 52.5%) -- 22.3% chance to 2HKO
As for Mega-Houndoom I'd suggest weather war, what I mean by this replace Nihilego with Gigalith on stall, and try to amend the cons of using Gigalith over Nihilego with team selection
Aside from the fact that Hakamo probably gets too much damage from Z Sludge Bomb and Houndoom, I’m still interested in Gigalith. As long as Gigalith can beat Togekiss and set up Rocks, I think it can have a place on stall. But I’m unsure it actually beats most Togekiss, the threatening ones being NP Aura Sphere and Heal Bell. I believe since Togekiss can avoid the Stone Edge KO from 0 attack Gigalith and proceed to try to PP stall, Gigalith probably needs to invest in Attack to beat Togekiss.
Nevertheless, since Gigalith is where a Steel would often be, I find these stalls very weak to Dragons. And it doesn’t solve the Venusaur issue satisfactorily. So I was serious when I asked for defensive counter play - given that Gigalith is viable, can we fit in a viable stall team that beats weather? Or does Gigalith pose too many building issues. I don’t think there’s a clear answer without more effort put in to building.
+2 252+ SpA Solar Power Houndoom-Mega Fire Blast vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Volcanion in Sun: 120-142 (32.9 - 39%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock and 1 layer of Spikes
There's max Attack Adamant Assault Vest Goodra, which can tank a hit from both Venusaur and Mega Houndoom at +2 and do significant damage back.
+2 252+ SpA Life Orb Venusaur Sludge Bomb vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Assault Vest Goodra: 165-195 (42.9 - 50.7%) -- 2.3% chance to 2HKO
252+ Atk Goodra Fire Punch vs. 0 HP / 4 Def Venusaur in Sun: 260-308 (86.3 - 102.3%) -- 12.5% chance to OHKO
So assuming a low roll, you can trade Goodra's life to take down Mega Venusaur. If you get a good roll, you'd be left with a 50%ish Goodra.
+2 252 SpA Solar Power Houndoom-Mega Fire Blast vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Assault Vest Goodra in Sun: 200-236 (52 - 61.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252+ Atk Goodra Earthquake vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Houndoom-Mega: 218-258 (74.9 - 88.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Solar Power damage
Against Mega Houndoom, unless you get an absolute minimum roll, Mega Houndoom will be gone after 2 turns of Solar Power damage. A high roll means you can live with some health left.
A big problem with Goodra is that it just isn't very good in UU, but you almost certainly already knew that. I mean, it checks Chandelure (which is nice since that can be a threat to stall) and other relevant offensive Fire-types, but it doesn't do much else outside of that aside from checking countering Amoonguss. Goodra offers little to no role compression.
It's probably better off to just ban both Drizzle and Drought, which are two extremely centralizing forces.
As I dont know if ill have time to get reqs for this suspect, i figured that i would give a brief opinion on the test and how i personally would vote, along with some reasoning why:, based off the testing i have done during the suspecting period
First of all: I understand the rationale behind testing both together and seeing if they work in a "checks and balances" sort of fashion, with the factor of rain balancing sun to an extent and vice versa. HOWEVER, i dont necessarily agree with that line of thinking, as [like others have stated on this post] testing both together could easily warp people's opinions on one of them, and cause them to vote against what they would have done if it was just a singular weather being tested. Not saying that people will vote in that fashion, just that it is very possible due to the "checks and balances" system that i mentioned prior.
Second of all: Rain is just as centralizing as it was back when it was originally banned, as we all know the damage Kingdra does under rain and you have mons like Seismitoad, Kabutops, Ludicolo and Qwilfish [even if more of a niche option] that can act as secondary sweepers and help deal with mons that would normally "check" Kingdra, even with rain up. Most of the time, you find yourself having to deal with 50/50s, especially involving Kingdra and it becomes mainly more about Hoping it doesnt click the right move/coverage [Provided it hasnt already locked itself into something using specs] against what you might have to switch into it [sans Blissey, which can tank anything Kingdra wants to throw at it].
Amoonguss, Water Absorb Seismitoad [although niche compared to the Swift Swim version], Ludicolo and bulky Primarina are decent answers to Kingdra [provided in the case f Amoonguss that it is locked into a Water move, otherwise ice beam will 2HKO unless you are AV, max or near max SpDef, which will more than likely become the standard set throughout this suspect & into the future, should rain be unbanned] , whereas Primarina has to be mindful of poison coverage on Seismitoad and of Qwilfish/Ludicolo, which can both help handle it so that Kingdra can cut through the rest of the team that it finds itself on. Seismitoad has to be mindful of being dented with a Specs [or LO] Draco Meteor, which will 2HKO unless you are SpDef] + has to be weary of Ludicolo.
Kingdra Calcs v SpDef Amoonguss [assuming non-AV]:
252+ SpA Choice Specs Kingdra Draco Meteor vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Amoonguss: 234-276 (54.1 - 63.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252+ SpA Choice Specs Kingdra Ice Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Amoonguss: 216-256 (50 - 59.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
This isnt even touching on the mons like Tornadus and Manectric, which can both abuse rain and the fact it grants them 100% accurate Hurricanes/Thunders respectively [Torn being an additional answer to Amoonguss], mons like Ferroseed [Hazard support] and Scizor which appreciate the halving of fire damage that rain provides them and Klefki, who can offer Spikes/screens/t-wave support to ensure that Kingdra/whichever other sweepers and abusers you run have an easier time dealing with their respective checks/counters. + benefits from the halving of fire damage as well, essentially making it psuedo-neutral to fire. This isnt even touching on the mons like Tentacruel/Crawdaunt/Sharpedo who all benefit from rain in their own ways. Whether that be rain dish for tenta or being able to break past their checks in the latter duo's case
I would vote to keep rain banned, due to its centralizing nature, and how it restricts building and team composition in the tier.
Now, for Sun: This is a weird one, honestly. Both Houndoom and Venusaur are fantastic sweepers that can plow through teams, and Torkoal/Ninetales are both solid utility setters, with different uses and roles within the team itself [Ninetales being more offensive, Torkoal being a Stealth Rocker/Hazard control/Physically bulky mon].
HOWEVER, i believe it is easier to deal with than Rain. Simply because you can use Priority like Ice Shard or Bullet Punch more effectively against Venu than you can against the rain sweepers and there are scarfers/naturally faster revenge killers that can come in and deal with Houndoom [provided Houndoom hasn't yet gotten a flame charge off] . Though having a secondary sun setter [like sunny day Blissey] can mitigate the reliance on the two primary drought users [especially if rocks are on the field], that doesn't necessarily mean that sun is too centralizing.
Or even as centralizing to the meta-game as Rain is. Do i think it's inherently healthy? Not necessarily, as it does require you to build around it - although this can be applied to any team. Though as it stands, im more inclined to unban Sun and keep it in the UU tier.
This will probs be a short post because I honestly really don't have much of an opinion on any of this. I got my reqs today but I didn't even bother using rain or sun for them, though I have at least experimented with both for about 40 games. My brain can only handle so much Hydro Pump misses so I don't see myself mucking around with this much more. As a whole, I haven't found myself to be all that impressed by rain. I think people give it too much credit for how it warps the meta and start resorting to using wack shit to overcompensate for it. Regardless, I do think I both weathers aren't necessarily the best thing for the tier and I'll probs vote ban to both, but maybe I will vote to free Drizzle idk.
Just to talk about rain a bit more, I am definitely under the impression that this weather is much worse in comparison to Drought. Politoed is a very mediocre Mon imo and can only offer so much to a team. It's a cool special sponge I guess but I felt like it doesn't do a specific job that well, it is too weak to provide offensive presence and has no utility outside of the trapper set people are using which wastes your own turns of rain. Building rain teams are also weird and pretty restricting in what you can do with them imo. There are only so many approaches you can take it without making the team fall apart to the normal meta due to all the components it has to invest around Toed and its sweepers. Out of all the rain abusers, Kingdra is basically the problem in my eyes. It hits way too hard under rain even 2HKOing Blissey after 1 Spike and SR I'm pretty sure, which makes it hard for common answers to switch in due to the immediate power of Specs. While this is the case there are still means to handle and getting around it to an extent. The other rain abusers like Kabutops are still powerful, but I find them a lot easier to at least play around unlike Kingdra as it needs the turn to set up. I explored with a Waterium Z set for a bit and if this thing can get an SD off it kills a lot of shit lol...
+2 252+ Atk Kabutops Hydro Vortex (160 BP) vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Aggron-Mega in Rain: 375-442 (109 - 128.4%) -- guaranteed OHKO
+2 252+ Atk Kabutops Hydro Vortex (160 BP) vs. 252 HP / 176+ Def Amoonguss in Rain: 384-452 (88.8 - 104.6%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock
+2 252+ Atk Kabutops Hydro Vortex (160 BP) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Unaware Quagsire in Rain: 316-373 (80.2 - 94.6%) -- 50% chance to OHKO after 1 layer of Spikes and Leftovers recovery
If a weather was to be unbanned I think it would be this one tbh. If it did then maybe we will reach the point where Kingdra might be the actual issue with rain.
Anyways, I personally think Sun is absolutely disgusting in comparison to rain lol. Venusaur is actually so difficult to deal with. Grass / Poison is such an annoying typing to deal with, Roserade is annoying to pivot into and this basically takes it to a whole new level. Not being able to Toxic this thing just makes it near impossible for bulkier teams to stand a chance against it. It has way too much bulk to prevent easily revenge killing it and allowing it to easily set up a NP under sun essentially. It doesn't even need the +2 boost to start breaking and can outspeed most of the boosted metagame, like resorting to Scarf Latias is depressing to think about LOL. If the community does choose to free Drought then I think something needs to be done about banning Venusaur with it. I don't even think Mega Houndoom is that much of a threat/issue to handle in comparison as it is at least feasible to revenge kill it.
Maybe this is all just my opinion as an offense player that found playing around Drizzle fairly easy, Sun being a lot harder to get around ofc. That's about it, I'll probs build up the rest of my thoughts on what to vote based on the discussions in this thread. Here are the teams I mucked around with for weather if anyone is interested in using and improving them:
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TL;DR I will probably vote ban to both weathers, though I will consider voting to keep Drizzle as I think it has the potential to be alright. Venu broke, get rid of the grass frog
Hello UU Forum, i think this is the first time I post something that is not just my vote for some suspect and the truth is this suspect test in particular caught my attention because as OU player mostly, rain teams have become more relevant lately in the metagame so i wanted to make my own rain in the UU tier because it's a tier that I like to play a lot when I'm not playing OU.
This is the rain that I built to get the reqs quite easily along my way playing ladder I was changing small details but I think they both work very well oh and of course I chose to play rain offense with Band Craw because the Crabhammer damage in rain without the need of boost is incredibly good.
Here I was looking to use double hazzard Ferroseed at the beginning it was not doing badly but as the tentacruels and empoleons appeared I decided to switch to version 2
I lose my third rain setter putting rocks in seismitoad but I gain a lot of pressure against teams that have empoleon / rotom-h / tentacruel / torkoal i choose to use knock off in ferrosed as well because it help me with empoleon and tentacruel MU´s and give me some better odds against fat teams and you can catch heat rock from ninetales-torkoal.
And well they are only two small changes but they feel quite against several match ups, you guys can try the team if you want.
Under my personal opinion i dont want to unban weather teams they are fun but I think they would centralize a lot, maybe maybe try them without the rocks (damp rock and heat rock) would be interesting.
My apology if my English is bad but I really wanted to post for the first time here.
Before voting, I wanted to find out the effects of Drought and Drizzle on defensive play styles. To estimate the effects, I made a very defensive balance team that had anti-Drought and Drizzle tactics. This is the team: https://pokepast.es/ad33b41d308211c8
Compared to a standard balance with standard sets, this is what I did to adapt to Drought and Drizzle:
Ice Beam on Empoleon to check Venusaur: Ice Beam 2HKOs Venusaur although Venusaur can be saved by Giga Drain recovery. The idea though is that Venusaur often sets up Growth on you because Ice Beam is very unconventional - 14.507% on last month's 1630 Glicko stats (not Elo).
Max SpD Empoleon to better check Venusaur and Specs Kingdra instead of the standard 76 defense EVs. Unfortunately, even with Protect recovery, Venusaur has a high chance to 2HKO with +2 Life Orb Giga Drain.
AV Snorlax to be a a very strong Mega Houndoom, Ninetales, Venusaur, and Kingdra check. He easily beats all of them one on one, but switching into them with weather up is a bit harder. Still, you're favored to win in all of them except Kingdra which I have Empoleon for.
Facade and Fire Punch on Snorlax as Facade is needed for Ninetales that commonly run Will-o-Wisp (I think this is a bad set but I faced it on the ladder) and Fire Punch is needed to OHKO Venusaur in Sun most of the time (92.3 - 108.9% damage vs 0/4 Venusaur).
I considered but decided to forego Cloud Nine Altaria mainly because it doesn't actually beat any notable weather user with this set and I need this set for both Heal Bell support and to break stall. Mega Altaria by itself is still a strong check to prominent Drizzle attackers like Crawdaunt and Kingdra.
As I said I wanted to estimate the strength of Drought and Drizzle on defensive play styles like this bulky balance team. In order to do that, I ask two questions.
Do the adaptations actually work to beat weather?
Are the adaptations too extreme and making me too weak to the rest of the metagame (e.g. am I using Hakamo-o like someone suggested earlier, something clearly not viable).
To answer these two questions, I completed the requirements on the ladder and saved all my replays where I played versus Drizzle or Drought. I analyze the seven games below (five Drought, two Drizzle). Unfortunately, this only lets me have a good grasp on the first question since I already self selected out of all the non-Drizzle or Drought games. Nevertheless, I still have a lot of experience using this team otherwise and a strong grasp on the metagame previously so I still can comment on that. Game 1
The opponent is using a fairly unconventional Sun team, combining the Trick Room strategy with Drought. However, Camerupt shouldn't pose much more of a threat than Houndoom (it can more easily set up on Altaria but takes more from Scald and can be revenge killed outside of TR). And Stakaka struggles to badly threaten Alomomola. Turn 8 is one of the key turns, where pif over predicts and doesn't get a KO on Venusaur with Fire Punch, instead opting to EQ. Even though Fire Punch was not guaranteed to KO, it would have put Venusaur in an unhappy spot, easily revenged by Doublade and having to predict whether or not Doublade can switch in. More importantly, this could have saved a lot of HP for Snolax to deal with Camerupt later, which sweeps.
Another key moment is on turn 34, where the opponent reveals an unusual Camerupt set with Substitute, allowing an extra KO and another bad prediction the very next turn, where Gligar could have been immediately switched into, saving Snorlax as fodder still. After that, the game is pretty much dead for me because of the standard Healing Wish Cresselia.
I definitely could win this game, if the moments on the key turns mentioned went differently, so for the first question, yes the adaptions can definitely work to beat weather. For example, consider if he predicted correctly and OHKOd Venusaur. Snorlax would be free to counter Camerupt during the game and pif would be playing with a very large advantage instead of the pretty bad position he got from his mistake.
The opponent is using Christo's team posted above, relying on Houndoom, Venusaur, and Scizor to sweep. Seeing as I consider this the standard Drought team, I should have a good match up because I prepared for this specifically. Indeed my opponent plays ambitiously and tries to sweep on turn 2 with Venusaur, which costs him his Venusaur because of my Ice Beam adaptation.
The other key moment is on turn 12, where he decides to go for a Houndoom sweep even though Snorlax is still healthy. I have a nice position and can either try to Toxic Houndoom with Alomomola or go straight to Snorlax. Even though I prepared nicely for this, my opponent still has a pretty much straight 20% chance to win by Dark Pulse flinch, which does not occur. The game is over after that since Scizor cannot break Doublade.
Obviously I can win this match up, even if the opponent played more conservatively with Venusaur, but he could have posed much bigger problems if he decided to Healing Wish on one of his Drought sweepers.
The opponent uses the standard Sun sweepers but with different support Pokemon, including Ninetales over Torkoal. He achieves a very nice position by turn 5, with the help of a Sludge Bomb Poison he badly weakens Snorlax and just plays good moves. Unfortunately for him, he starts to play very badly after that and gives up Houndoom without me pressuring him to do so, which could have easily swept given that Snorlax was weak and he had a Healing Wish Cresselia in the back. I don't know why he tried to go for hax when the position was just good for him.
After he lets Snorlax heal and Venusaur die on turn 18, he loses all his offense and the game isn't interesting anymore.
This game could have been very tough if my opponent played better, but I think it's pretty obvious I still had chances to win. For example, I would have been in a nicer spot if Sludge Bomb did not Poison or even if I predicted the Sludge Bomb and went to Empoleon. It's not an auto win for either side.
This game isn't really worth commenting on since my opponent didn't reveal his Comfey set, and although he had a few nice moments (Rapid Spin prediction turn 8 and EQ prediction turn 6) I think he was very sad after Victribell got Ice Beamed. He also misunderstood the position, because even though he had a nice "prediction" on turn 8, it didn't help him since I kept SR on the very next turn which pretty much eliminated Torkoal. Nevertheless, he definitely could have won still (for example, infinite Dark Pulse flinch) but apparently is a quitter or his mom called him for dinner or something.
My opponent uses a fairly standard Sun team with Houndoom and Venusaur. Although he has a nice lead, his play is pretty iffy. I show on turn three I willingly switch to Empoleon on Venusaur but on turn five he switches Venusaur in on Empoleon. The obvious difference is Sun is up now, but he probably should have respected me more or at least been more careful. Nevertheless, it actually works out for him and I have to pivot around to get Doublade in to revenge Venusaur since +2 Life Orb Giga Drain 2HKOs Empoleon, even with Protect and max SpD investment.
I pretty much completely outplay him as he does weird things like try to break Empoleon with Psyshock Latias and I pivot around Venusaur again as he Healing Wishes it. Again, he has chances at the end with infinite Dark Pulse flinches but calls it quits instead.
It was a demolition but obviously my pivoting was not risk free and if he played better around one of the two times I pivoted around Venusaur, he could have had much better winning chances. The match up was not as lopsided as the play indicates.
My opponent has a pleasant game because he uses Ferroseed instead of the more standard Klefki, so he can keep his hazards in on Gligar. However, he does not run any attacking move on Ferroseed which might let Altaria sweep, but I had no way to really punish his Roost Scizor so overall he has a nice advantage from the start. I play pretty questionably in the beginning as I am very HP Ice Zeraora weak, another reason why he has a superior match up, but probably should have Roosted anyways with Altaria on turn 5.
He manages to keep hazards on Gligar which allows him to safely switch in Zeraora in on Gligar and just keep overwhelming my position. If he was the standard Rockium Z Kabutops, he could have won on turn 22, but even though my opponent gets outplayed and almost loses Kabutops for nothing, he still has a nice position because of how weak I am to Ferroseed and Zeraora.
On turn 32, he slips up some more and tries to use Kingdra to counter Empoleon which makes no sense at all to me. Nevertheless, he STILL has the advantage for the same reason, Zeraora is too powerful. That shows in the sequence starting turn 41, where pif is just very confused and trying fruitlessly to play around Zeraora. The idea was to gain minimal HP back on Empoleon with Protect but the obvious Grass Knot ruined it all for pif.
Once more, the opponent likely misplays by not going for a kill on Altaria with HP Ice as he seems very likely to be Expert Belt. He still plays on and eventually gets Spikes up which should spell the end for pif.
However, he yet again makes a certain misplay on turn 67, instead of Volt Switch basically getting a free KO with hazards up, he decides to Thunder which is only a 70% chance for a free KO. If he hits, pif basically can forfeit but he misses which turns the game around so now pif actually has a big advantage since I can with either Doublade sweep or Empoleon stalling. Neither player goes for anything dramatic so I pretty easily convert the advantage into a Doublade sweep.
This is the only game I thought I really had no winning chances. The combination of Ferroseed and HP Ice Zeraora should have overwhelmed me if my opponent played better. Funnily enough, they aren't the main Rain abuses though. If there was a game you had to question the effectiveness of this team versus weather, this would be it.
Another game with Ferroseed which should cause major problems as it still gets Spikes and presumably walls Altaria too. However, a fortunate prediction by me on turn 14 gives me a big advantage, although by then he really did not have a happy Snorlax switch in so it was not easy. He comes very Altaria weak because of this, and although neither of us play very accurately afterwards (I should not have set up Altaria on Seismitoad, he should not have Hydro Vortexed), it is enough for me to win still.
The match up was pretty reasonable this time, both sides have something to strive for, but since he lost his big player in Ferroseed early on, it was extremely hard for him to do much.
From these seven games, it's clear there is defensive counter play against Drought. Drizzle can also almost certainly be defended against, the rain sweepers were never the major issue, Ferroseed was, which indicates something about my building. Nobody would say Ferroseed is broken.
So for the second question, exactly how reasonable are the adaptations and do they work in the metagame? Empoleon's set is perfectly reasonable, the defense was never really needed (designed to survive Cobalion's Close Combat but it's not like you ever wanted to stay in anyways, especially if you have Doublade and Gligar). Ice Beam makes sense outside of Venusaur because it hits important Dragon and Grass types.
The biggest question is Snorlax. First of all, no matter what I find, we still need to do more work to see how stall can defend against weather because I'm unconvinced AV Snorlax can be used on stall because of the lack of utility and overlap with Blissey. Second, even on balance, Snorlax faces big competition with Muk-Alolan which can break stall with Poison Touch and takes Psyshock much better. Furthermore, the set in question cannot fit Pursuit which would otherwise be very useful in trapping Latias. Neither AV Snorlax nor AV Muk is an intuitive fit on the team if not for weather because Latias is already fairly well covered, but Scizor is hardly covered. Knock Off Roost Scizor threatens to run around the team, with Curse Gligar as the only stop to it but a very shakey one at that.
The questionable Scizor match up makes me think the team cannot deal with the meta game that well, although it's not bad. Furthermore, the team is extremely slow, making it quite weak to strong wall breakers like Infernape, NIdoking, Celebi, Bisharp, and Togekiss.
I'm not convinced this is a very good balance team although it has reasonable match ups with weather. It doesn't prove that it's impossible to make good anti-weather teams. Perhaps the team can be improved or perhaps there are other ideas like the Gigalith discussion. Still, I tried to make a good anti-weather balance and this average team is the best I came up with. More work needs to be done to be able to answer the questions I posed...
I got the reqs a while ago but I only got myself to ladder with the weather-based playstyles. The teams I used are a Kingdra + Kabutops team I made and Christo's Mega Houndoom + Venusaur team and I used both teams with success in the 1700s.
Not only are Drizzle and Drought + Mega Houndoom obviously broken playstyles, but they are also very linear and will not contribute to the development of the metagame (I don't consider using unranked Pokemon like Hakamo-o and Gigalith solely to counter the respective weather-based playstyles metagame development).
I took a few weather-based teams I found here in the forum and mine and rearranged them so you could see the linear pattern I am talking about:
Generally, they follow the pattern of two direct weather abusers (Swift Swim and Solar Power/ Chlorophyll users), a weather setter (Politoed, Torkoal, or Ninetales), a tank that contributes to the sweepers (Stealth Rock, slow U-turn, and/ or Healing Wish), another sweeper or breaker that's not directly related to the weather (Scizor, Doublade, and/ or Crawdaunt), and another Pokemon that's more of a supporting role, whether be it another indirect breaker that has a great utility (like Calm Mind or Choice Scarf Latias) or another weather setter (Tornadus or Klefki).
However, I would like to see a metagame in which both Drizzle and Mega Houndoom are banned again because I believe that Ninetales, as a standalone sweeper, has the potential to make the metagame more diverse and interesting and actually help the its development.
To end, I will share the rain team I made because it's a fairly straightforward and fun team to use (not too different from other rain teams, but I like my take on rain better than others').
I won't go into too much details on such a straightforward team, but I will explain some cool strategies the team uses:
Latias @ Life Orb
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Draco Meteor
- Psyshock
- Calm Mind
- Thunder
Thunder is generally not seen without Electrium Z but I figured that it'll be viable on rain teams because Thunder has 100% accuracy in the rain and because it helps to lure in Empoleon which is an annoyance for Kingdra and for rain teams in general.
Kabutops @ Waterium Z
Ability: Swift Swim
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Aqua Tail
- Stone Edge
- Swords Dance
- Aqua Jet
While the difference between Aqua Tail (90BP) and Liquidation (85BP) isn't big, A Z-boosted Aqua Tail has 15BP more than a Z-boosted Liquidation (175BP vs 160BP), which makes a significant change damage-wise.
Gligar @ Eviolite
Ability: Immunity
EVs: 252 HP / 156 Def / 100 SpD RelaxedNature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Earthquake
- Roost
- Stealth Rock - U-turn
Even though the minimum Speed + U-turn Gligar set has seen usage beforehand, I put it here because it's a very good way of safely bringing Politoed or one of the sweepers in safely.
Got my reqs but I made a mistake writing UUWT instead of WTUU, but it shouldn't matter right ? Since it is obviously a fresh account. Anw I laddered using this rain team that I made. The last mon can either be Qwilfish, Kabutops or Crawdaunt. All three of them are great win conditions against stall but provide different utility. Crawdaunt gives a better match-up against other weathers but is worse against opposing rain, whereas Kabutops and Qwilfish are worse against other weathers but are stronger against rain. Qwilfish is weaker but has an easier time beating stall and helps against Scizor. Kabutops is stronger and provides a secondary flying resist but can be revenge killed by priority more and dies from Rain boosted Surf.
Now, regarding the impact of weather on the metagame. It's a bit hard to judge from my ladder experience as most players had bad teams and didn't have any plan to beat rain. But what I noticed is that rain usually only needs rocks to be up to start getting 2HKOs, which are really easy to set up as Seismitoad beats most removers 1v1.
252+ SpA Choice Specs Kingdra Surf vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Hydreigon in Rain: 159-187 (48.9 - 57.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock
252+ SpA Choice Specs Kingdra Hydro Pump vs. 252 HP / 80 SpD Amoonguss in Rain: 195-230 (45.1 - 53.2%) -- 89.8% chance to 2HKO after Stealth Rock and Black Sludge recovery
252+ SpA Choice Specs Kingdra Hydro Pump vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Latias in Rain: 141-167 (46.8 - 55.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock
252+ SpA Choice Specs Kingdra Hydro Pump vs. 40 HP / 0 SpD Primarina in Rain: 156-185 (50.1 - 59.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock
Rain also often have Klefki or Ferroseed that provide spikes :
252+ SpA Choice Specs Kingdra Hydro Pump vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Primarina in Rain: 156-185 (42.8 - 50.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock, 1 layer of Spikes, and Leftovers recovery
252+ SpA Choice Specs Kingdra Hydro Pump vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Blissey in Rain: 274-324 (38.3 - 45.3%) -- 99.6% chance to 2HKO after Stealth Rock, 2 layers of Spikes, and Leftovers recovery
Some may say that rains needs to hit Hydro Pump but I barely even have to click it as surf already does enough damage and when you click hydro pump and you usually have to hit hydro pump against bulkier teams which can let you more opportunities to try again in case you miss one hydro pump. In my opinion, Drizzle shouldn't be unbanned because rain teams have unfair matchups against most teams in the current metagame and would force to run two bulky water resists.
As for Sun, I haven't tested it out that much but the team Christo posted feels pretty broken. I'll perhaps elaborate more later but Houndoom 2HKOing the entire tier + Venusaur being a great cleaner + double healing wish to make up for potential failed sweeps is ridiculous. It even has a decent match-up against rain thanks to Blissey. Here my own sun team : https://pokepast.es/53763e0cc4cfc80d
I went the CM Tias route to help Venusaur by luring the bulky steels and Seismitoad to improve the rain match-up.
Both on rain and sun teams Klefki can be run with leftovers instead ot the weather rock.
Yo UU community, I've just got my reqs using these two weather based teams:
I think I'll vote ban to both rain and sun, btw I feel like Ninetales would be a great mon to add in UU roster but both venusaur and mega houndoom should be banned due to their great offensive presence in the metagame. But waiting for their suspects isn't the best thing right now because with Grand Slam going on, UU meta would be less competitive with sunny teams destroying the whole tier
As many have expressed concern specifically about Mega Houndoom and Drought, when voting, we will be running an instant runoff vote with three options:
Keep Drought UUBL
Unban Drought
Unban Drought and ban Mega Houndoom
Voters will submit their preferred options ranked 1-3. Once the voting period is over, we will look at all #1 votes. If any option received more than 50% of the vote, we will go with that option. If none of the three options received more than 50% of the vote, we will discard the option that received the fewest #1 votes and check again.
So, for example, I might vote as follows:
1. Unban Drought and ban Mega Houndoom
2. Unban Drought
3. Keep Drought UUBL
Initially only the top choices will be reviewed. Let's say the voting broke down as Unban Drought 42%, Keep Drought UUBL 30% and Unban Drought and ban Mega Houndoom 28%. Since none of the options reached the >50% threshold required, the option with the fewest votes would be discarded (in this case my number 1 choice, Unban Drought and ban Mega Houndoom). Everyone who picked that as their number 1 choice would instead have their #2 choice submitted as their vote. So in my case, my vote would be changed to Unban Drought. With only two options remaining, we would then be able to establish a majority.
And reiterating/explaining because I've had a few people ask me questions:
1. What if we REALLY REALLY STRONGLY prefer one option? Do we have to submit as ranked votes? I don't want to help the option I don't like!
Yes, it is required. However, we will only be looking at your top choice. The only time your second choice vote will be relevant is if your number one choice got the fewest number of votes in the initial vote.
Instead of thinking of it as ranked votes, it might be simpler to think of it as your vote and your backup vote. You'll submit your vote in the Drought suspect, and your backup vote. If there is no >50% majority based on the initial votes, everyone who voted for the least popular option will instead have their vote changed to their backup vote.
2. Why Mega Houndoom instead of Venusaur?
Venusaur is definitely powerful under the sun; the fact that it has a strong setup move while also being immune to Toxic and able to break past Unaware users means it can be a potent threat to stall all on its own while still being a great offensive sweeper. However, Venusaur on its own is significantly easier to counter than the specific combination of Venusaur and Mega Houndoom. After the initial Mega Houndoom ban, Venusaur and Drought remained legal together for almost six months without incident, and with Sun remaining mostly a niche playstyle.
If a >50% majority chooses the "Unban Drought and ban Mega Houndoom" option, and Venusaur proves to continue to be overwhelming, we can return to the issue and potentially suspect Venusaur as well.
3. Why do an instant runoff instead of a more traditional runoff vote?
A more traditional runoff vote would mean holding a second voting period if none of the three Drought-related options received a >50% majority, where participants would then vote between the two most popular options from the first vote. An instant runoff vote effectively provides the same results, but does not require a second voting period. Basically just think of it as a standard runoff vote, only you submit your backup option right away just in case your preferred option is the least popular, rather than waiting for the second vote.
This one uses Ditto to reverse sweep quite a few weather sweepers. No steel-type is a bit of an oof versus Latias and some other Dragons so you have to Mega Alt as soon as possible. No Alomomola makes the Scizor match up harder but since I use Protect on Blissey, Choice Pokemon like Scizor can be played around more easily. The stall match up isn't great but most people play badly and immediately spam Knock Off, so if Ditto get's Knocked, you get a pretty good position in general with almost endless PP and HP as you copy opposing Alomomola.
This one uses Nihilego to beat most Venusaur and Houndoom (as well as a few important stall breakers like Togekiss) while Jellicent and Tangela put a death grip versus most rain sweepers. The main issue here is Nihilego is hard to rely on as it can get Pursuit trapped and has no reliable recovery or Wish support. However, Protect + Leftovers plus a slow U-Turn from Scizor to stall for more Leftovers recovery means Nihilego can actually do some decent recovery, although the Pursuit problem isn't resolved. Tangela is useful because the extra physical bulk compared to Amoonguss lets it handle Crawdaunt and Terrakion much better, plus Leech Seed and Knock Off are great supporting moves for stall, much better than Spore.
Other thoughts:
We still hadn't done enough work on Sun yet. Let's stop copying Christo's team and make our own teams. One of my friends was using Sawsbuck to strong effect and I would hate for us to make a decision on weather without actually knowing it's full strength.
Regarding defensive Sun counters, I've tried AV Incineroar and it's just awful for the rest of the metagame, mainly because the SR weakness.
Still don't see anyone trying to build and share their defensive responses to weather. I get that it's hard but when people spout off incredibly strong opinions suggesting stall is dead without bothering to put in the work to justify their opinions, I think this is a highly unproductive approach.
Goodra @ Assault Vest
Ability: Sap Sipper
EVs: 120 HP / 252 Atk / 136 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Outrage
- Power Whip
- Earthquake
- Fire Punch
While I was trying to make a team which was able to fuck up Sun and Rain Teams, I found that AV Goodra was a pretty decent pick.
Thanks to Sap Sipper and its typing, Goodra can handle pretty nicely both Venusaur and Mega-Houndoom.
+2 252 SpA Solar Power Houndoom-Mega Fire Blast vs. 120 HP / 0 SpD Assault Vest Goodra in Sun: 200-236 (56.9 - 67.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252+ Atk Goodra Earthquake vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Houndoom-Mega: 218-258 (74.9 - 88.6%) -- 93.8% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock and Solar Power damage
+2 252+ SpA Venusaur Acid Downpour (175 BP) vs. 120 HP / 0 SpD Assault Vest Goodra: 246-289 (70 - 82.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252+ Atk Goodra Fire Punch vs. 0 HP / 4 Def Venusaur in Sun: 260-308 (86.3 - 102.3%) -- 93.8% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
As you can see Earthquake and Fire Punch can deal pretty effectively with Mega-Houndoom and/or Venusaur although Goodra struggles to handle both of them. On the other hand Power Whip is nice to punish things like Politoed, Quagsire, Kabutops or Seismitoed. Outrage is pretty much there for the STAB.. Not the best Pokemon to deal with weathers but definitively not the worst.
Gastrodon-East @ Leftovers
Ability: Storm Drain
EVs: 248 HP / 88 Def / 172 SpD
Calm Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Recover
- Protect
- Toxic
- Earth Power
Gastrodon is probably on the best answers to non-Ludicolo Rain Teams since it handles almost every Rain Sweeper on its own. It's also nice that it can't be trapped by Whirlpool thanks to Storm Drain.
+2 252+ Atk Kabutops Continental Crush (180 BP) vs. 248 HP / 88 Def Gastrodon: 359-423 (84.4 - 99.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
0 SpA Gastrodon Earth Power vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Kabutops: 240-284 (91.9 - 108.8%) -- 50% chance to OHKO
252+ SpA Choice Specs Kingdra Draco Meteor over 2 turns vs. 248 HP / 172+ SpD Gastrodon: 373-441 (87.7 - 103.7%) -- 75% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery (thanks to Protect, Gastrodon can't be 2HKO).
252 SpA Life Orb Latias Psyshock vs. 248 HP / 88 Def Gastrodon: 185-218 (43.5 - 51.2%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
Overall it trully sucks that we have to find so much gimmicks in order to deal with those shitty weathers
Goodra @ Assault Vest
Ability: Sap Sipper
EVs: 120 HP / 252 Atk / 136 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Outrage
- Power Whip
- Earthquake
- Fire Punch
While I was trying to make a team which was able to fuck up Sun and Rain Teams, I found that AV Goodra was a pretty decent pick.
Thanks to Sap Sipper and its typing, Goodra can handle pretty nicely both Venusaur and Mega-Houndoom.
+2 252 SpA Solar Power Houndoom-Mega Fire Blast vs. 120 HP / 0 SpD Assault Vest Goodra in Sun: 200-236 (56.9 - 67.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252+ Atk Goodra Earthquake vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Houndoom-Mega: 218-258 (74.9 - 88.6%) -- 93.8% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock and Solar Power damage
+2 252+ SpA Venusaur Acid Downpour (175 BP) vs. 120 HP / 0 SpD Assault Vest Goodra: 246-289 (70 - 82.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252+ Atk Goodra Fire Punch vs. 0 HP / 4 Def Venusaur in Sun: 260-308 (86.3 - 102.3%) -- 93.8% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
As you can see Earthquake and Fire Punch can deal pretty effectively with Mega-Houndoom and/or Venusaur although Goodra struggles to handle both of them. On the other hand Power Whip is nice to punish things like Politoed, Quagsire, Kabutops or Seismitoed. Outrage is pretty much there for the STAB.. Not the best Pokemon to deal with weathers but definitively not the worst.
Gastrodon-East @ Leftovers
Ability: Storm Drain
EVs: 248 HP / 88 Def / 172 SpD
Calm Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Recover
- Protect
- Toxic
- Earth Power
Gastrodon is probably on the best answers to non-Ludicolo Rain Teams since it handles almost every Rain Sweeper on its own. It's also nice that it can't be trapped by Whirlpool thanks to Storm Drain.
+2 252+ Atk Kabutops Continental Crush (180 BP) vs. 248 HP / 88 Def Gastrodon: 359-423 (84.4 - 99.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
0 SpA Gastrodon Earth Power vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Kabutops: 240-284 (91.9 - 108.8%) -- 50% chance to OHKO
252+ SpA Choice Specs Kingdra Draco Meteor over 2 turns vs. 248 HP / 172+ SpD Gastrodon: 373-441 (87.7 - 103.7%) -- 75% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery (thanks to Protect, Gastrodon can't be 2HKO).
252 SpA Life Orb Latias Psyshock vs. 248 HP / 88 Def Gastrodon: 185-218 (43.5 - 51.2%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
Overall it trully sucks that we have to find so much gimmicks in order to deal with those shitty weathers
Anyone can make a set that deals with the mons. What I was asking for are full teams that use those Pokemon and can still deal with the rest of the metagame. That's much harder.
