Announcement np: Stage 19: Winter Falls (Frosmoth Suspect)

[DugZa]

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Following the October tiering survey, it was apparent that Snow—Ninetales-A and Frosmoth in particular—were major points of contention in the tier, with both Pokemon being scored over 3.5 by the qualified voters. The council opted for a Ninetales-A suspect first given the slightly greater support on the survey but it resulted in landslide do not ban outcome despite the great support on the survey. Over the course of the Ninetales-A suspect test, it was more evident to many that Frosmoth, rather than Ninetales-A, pushed the playstyle over the top. As such, we have decided to follow up immediately with a Frosmoth suspect given the support from both the community and the council.

Frosmoth has easily been one of the most potent offensive Pokemon in the tier, this has been the case even prior to Ninetales-A dropping to PU in October. However, Ninetales-A dropping to PU and significantly buffing it and one of the most splashable checks in (AV) Slowbro-G leaving the tier resulted in Frosmoth emerging as an offensive threat with very limited counterplay. The Substitute sets in particular have proven to be extremely difficult to account for, being able to comfortably setup on Pokemon such as Milotic, Amoonguss, and Palossand. This is further exacerbated by the myriad of different tera types it could run—Ground, Fire, Water, Electric, Rock, Ghost—while also allowing it to deal with would-be checks such as Sandslash-A and Cramorant among others. Its ability Ice Scales gives it more setup opportunities too, and while its physical bulk leaves much to be desired, Snow and Aurora Veil support from Ninetales-A ameliorates this to a significant extent, allowing it to take hits which it would otherwise struggle against.

All that said, Frosmoth does have its flaws. The most noteworthy one being its high reliance on tera to effectively break through teams, making it much more manageable if tera has already been expended elsewhere on the team. Moreover, Substitute Frosmoth is most effective with Leftovers; this forces certain team structures that are highly dependant on keeping hazards off the field and even then, if the player fails to keep Stealth Rocks off the field consistently, Frosmoth is significantly limited in its breaking potential. As mentioned previously, Frosmoth has a lackluster Defense stat, and while Ninetales-A’s support helps with this, it remains vulnerable to physical attacks when Snow is not active. Its mediocre Speed tier doesn’t help either — even at +1, it is slower than most Choice Scarf users in the tier, further highlighting its defensive shortcomings.

All in all, Frosmoth has its fair share of pros and cons; therefore, we have opted for a suspect test and let you, the community, determine whether the Moth stays or goes. The ball is in your court now. Please share your thoughts on Frosmoth's role in the metagame, and if you think it should be banned or not!

• To participate in this suspect test, create a new account on PS. You do not have to follow any specific naming convention, but your suspect account must have never played a game in PU before this suspect test went up, or you will not receive valid requirements (resetting W/L does not count for this - the account you use must never have played PU before the test, full stop.)
• At any point on your new account, use the command /linksmogon on Pokemon Showdown! You will receive instructions on what to do once you run this command.
• You have to reach a COIL of 2800 to get reqs. For reference, the B-value for this suspect will be 7.
• This suspect test deadline will be on Saturday, November 22nd, 2025 at 11:59 PM (GMT -4).
• Check HERE to see if you have reqs.
• A simple majority (>50%) is required to ban Frosmoth.
• If you have any questions about this new process, feel free to PM me or asa or post here!

minimum games required

GXE = Games Required
71 = 343
72 = 173
73 = 116
74 = 88
75 = 71
76 = 59
77 = 51
78 = 45
79 = 41
80 = 37
81 = 34
82 = 31
83 = 29
84 = 27
85 = 25

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Regarding the Tiering Contributor badge

• TC is awarded to those with 10 tiering-related votes across all tiers or 4 tiering-related votes in PU suspect tests.

If you have achieved the above threshold, feel free to PM asa or I with the links to your votes so we can process your request.

 

[DripLegend]

got reqs and currently leaning dnb as I alluded to in the ninetales suspect thread. I think moth is obviously a great mon in the meta and has the toolkit to consistently get setup opportunities throughout the course of a game, but I don't consider it to be the boogeyman autowin cheeser that most deem it to be.

qd + ice scales is pretty potent and while i think lefties qd is the most broken set, it does require a lot of consistent support in the way of hazard control and usually tera on most qd sets to actually steamroll. this mon has so much general cost for each move choice / tera option which makes supporting a mon you'd think would just need reliable removal pretty difficult in practice and builder. i think sub is also kinda insane on it for actually being able to trade for ambi if it gets one off but since it is becoming more common it's harder to keep it up, especially against opposing spdef moth. elec is most common for a reason since bolt beam is op and ground is still in the dex sets for it at least in regard to common teras, ghost is something i've seen a few people mention but nothing that's reared itself too much. in spite of being able to get opportunities often and having nuking potential, it is pretty exploitable defensively and is slow pitting it against common scarfers (zoro, brux- bolded since psyfang breaks veil as well, pawmot) and needing to actually invest in speed to not lose the 1v1 to the fast frailer mons (ambipom, espeon, lazzle, viriz). alongside being weak to prio it's not very difficult to revenge kill consistently without moth needing a decent amount of advantage already (boosted with a sub). outside of this set i believe moth to be well balanced and healthy as a spdef glue and removal option to aid balance, with boots qd sets having way less potential than lefties variants. while i do think moth can toe the line i don't think moth is currently developed enough into this role as a sweeper for me to decide ban instantly, and it has multiple pretty glaring flaws that take away from this role. moth developed a LOT during scl with more people opting to commit to more of the lefties variations, but I don't believe moth is beyond being able to have counterplay develop alongside it.

 

[Dutchum]

Just got reqs. After playing a good amount of games this suspect, I’ve come to the conclusion that Frosmoth is the definition of an unhealthy Pokémon for the tier.

There are simply too few consistent counters to it, which drastically limits teambuilding options. Every team feels forced to include very specific checks or priority users to avoid getting swept. What makes things even worse is the variety of Tera types Frosmoth can run — Ground, Fire, Water, Electric, Rock, or even Ghost — making each game feel random depending on which Tera it chooses, much like Kingambit in OU. It’s extremely hard to prepare for all its possible combinations without compromising the rest of the team.

Frosmoth can also set up almost freely on nearly every special attacker in the tier thanks to Ice Scales, and Aurora Veil support from Ninetales-A even patches up its weaker physical bulk. Once it gets going, there’s very little that can stop it unless you have the perfect counter in position — and that’s not a healthy dynamic for the metagame.

I will be voting BAN on Frosmoth, although I personally believe the real issue lies in Ninetales-A’s Icy Rock, which deserves its own suspect test in the near future. Extending Snow turns and providing free Veil support makes already strong sweepers like Frosmoth even harder to handle, and addressing that could help balance the archetype more effectively in the long run.

 

[Excal]

i'm not getting reqs this time but wanted to voice that, in my opinion, frosmoth is outright broken and should be banned without hesitation. this tier lacks counterplay to a quiver dancing, 125 base special attack pokemon that easily fits tera blast to form strong coverage with ice stab and has obscene special bulk with ice scales.

i don't see moth having to make concessions between its teras; i see moth having high flexibility to use whichever tera it wants. for example, while tera electric is the most popular choice, tera ground is exceptionally strong in defeating balance teams that opt to use their own tera to shut down the set. one such example is this team used by drud in scl, a solid balanced team, which relies on tera steel goodra to check qd moth. the issue is if moth decides to use tera ground instead, his strategy is thwarted and he probably loses, especially if the qd moth has initial support via snow. covering all viable and potential qd moth teras is not a possible ask. most conventional balance teams lose to or have a bad matchup against qd moth with the appropriate tera. because of this, our scl team used tera ice goodra in an attempt to answer frosmoth and not lose to elec/ground. still loses to tera rock tho.

a popular strategy in this metagame is to use avalugg hisui and tera it to handle a variety of physical attackers. these builds are created such that you assume that avalugg will tera every game. it is not difficult to build a team such that the plan is to use frosmoth's tera to flip a match.

as for using priority to brute force through frosmoth, it doesn't work that well. blackglasses sucker zoro + orb mach pawmot are unable to revenge kill frosmoth through a combined effort. this is without tera. additionally, this replay shows that frosmoth does not need to rely on tera to defeat milotic, which seems to be a common point from the dnb side.

hazard control is strong in pu. i think it is quite easy to consistently create scenarios in which sub qd lefties frosmoth has setup opportunity and hazards are not on your side. without articuno galar in the metagame, defog is much less punishable and pu has the issue of stealth rock setters being pretty bad at keeping up. having to deal with spin avalugg, taunt lycanroc offenses, defog hecid/cramorant, espeon, etc is not that easy a task, and all of these pokemon/styles can pair well with frosmoth bc its special bulk makes it splashable on balance and offensive teams.

my opinion overall is that making a balanced team while accounting for both the general metagame and sub qd frosmoth is extremely difficult. this tier has a lot of issues with being able to check slow setup with tera flexibility as well as status, and removing frosmoth from the equation is a significant step in the right direction, especially since alolatales was not banned in the previous suspect.

 

[DD Joe]

Busted ass defensive mons like Frosmoth and Havalugg who have absolutely absurd defensive stats with access to tera are making this tier horrendous to play.

Fat teams are just horrendous to play into and really curtail building as you have to pack stuff to 1- Deal with mega offense (qd moth and friends) as well as have the tools to break through the ridiculous paraspamming fat teams with Havalugg, Bombirdier and the Oven.

I think the tier is better off without these mons with overtuned defensive capabilities.

This includes - Havalugg, Dudunsparce, Goodra?

I'm not saying I want them all banned but these mons consistute a really problematic theme in the tier rn.

Anyway, to focus harder on Moth, yeah, it's a bit ridiculous. The defog set is absurdly splashable. Stun spore with slow turn paired with Wish+Pass is very difficult to handle consistently unless you can trick it. The QD set is equally dangerous. In Snow you can survive all the priority Roark and Mot throw at you as well as relying on tera to break through any potential walls. Tera Ground for Snowslash, Tera Fire for any Steels, Tera Electric to kill Milo.

It feels like prepping for Moth in snow is also extremely difficult. It hijacks momentum like nothing else and with E Button mons to enable it, its ins are various.

I don't want to get rid of another removal option but I do think Moth contributes negatively to both building and metagame health.

BAN

 

[I'm Tapu Bulu]

Update: I got reqs using these teams turns out swapping Taylor Swift for Mongolian metal was a genius move

I'm on the fence regarding Frosmoth, but I'm leaning towards a ban. Frosmoth is just quick enough to outspeed Salazzle, Whimisicott, and Ambipom after a Quiver Dance boost, which for me meant a lot of awkward teambuilding; this is also confirmed by watching some PUWC replays passed around.

I personally don't like using Frosmoth nor snow (nor QD users) in general. I feel like it doesn't bring enough to the tier; that Defog set is one knock off away from being turned into death fodder tbh, and you can't convince me to rely on stun spore on ladder runs either. DD Joe cites how supposedly splashable this set is, but I honestly think Defog Frosmoth is extremely bad. Stun Spore? That move is garbage... cant hit grasses, and that accuracy exposes how much the moth wishes it had reliable recovery to afford to waste turns. Seed Flare, Shaymin's signature move with an 85% accuracy check, is enough to drive me furious at times. I honestly think there are just better hazard control pokemon in the tier and we do not need to rely on moth's strong ice beam especially when Alolan Sandslash also fits the role of an "ice-type rapid spinner".

Frosmoth shares a lot of similarities with OU/Uber's Volcarona - set up a quiver dance and hope to have the right tera. More obscure wicked fast mons like Jolteon and Electrode-H will find themselves blocked by the Ice Scales so you have to use a physical scarf mon as the best way to get rid of Frosmoth. Then Alolan Ninetales kicks in and suddenly you have to knock off its icy rock or boots. Which is not easy, since Ninetales itself is very fast, outspeeding most knock users. Frosmoth does not need to hold a one-time item on such playstyles like Oricorio-F for example.

That said, I'm sure we have a lot of room for innovation to limit Frosmoth and looking into banning Icy Rock or Aurora Veil might also be worthwhile. If Frosmoth goes you can bet you're not going to see a retest of it should one of these prove to be broken especially since Alolan Ninetales itself is not the problem but rather what it enables. Roar, Dragon Tail, and Knock Off, plus scarfed physical mons are still good one time ways to stop a +1 moth. Though I've just learned Ice Scales procs against Scarf Hoopa's Psyshock...

Snorlax and Glastrier are two more fairly obscure mons that can be used to clown on Frosmoth, and at +2, Glastrier will be able to be very dangerous against opposing snow teams, but both have poor matchups vs Milotic and cannot afford to run the coverage they want - Snorlax especially can only really afford to run one coverage move. Hisuian Sneasel can take a hit from +1 Frosmoth and bring it into Extreme Speed range, as can regular Sneasel since Frosmoth doesn't really run Bug Buzz - these are both fast physical attackers that can afford to take a hit if needed.

Most likely this is a ban for me

 

[Itoshiflwr]

Alright, i finally got reqs, my sentiment towards moth is very much leaning towards a Ban, i find this to be because of 3 main reasons, maybe if moth had 1 or 2 of these problems, it would be acceptable, but i feel like those 3 in unison make it quite an unhealthy pokemon.
1: Moth is very much a tera coinflip and incentivizes these kinds of situations, everyone knows it has a plethora of tera types that can clean teams and they all are quite problematic in of themselves, and losing to an unexpected tera type is very much not competitively healthy.
2: Moth facilitates defensive structures that the tier has a limited amount of answers to, as wishpass + defog moth is very complicated to deal with unless you trick it.
3: These 2 problems in it of itself wouldn't be as much, but the fact that moth is a mon that both enhances super bulky teams and hyper offense makes it incentivize a quite unhealthy matchup fish dynamic, as it's highly unlikely your team is capable of handling full blown snow HO and absurdly bulky teams at the same time.
I believe that's why ban on this mon is my verdict, but i am also not opposed towards an icy rock suspect, as it would make snow ho much more bearable aswell moth by consequence of that.