Announcement np: SV CAP Stage 4: Fuel (Rage Fist Ban & Chuggalong Nerf)

[spoo]

Hi everyone! Following the recent conclusion of our very first community survey, the Metagame Council has decided to ban Rage Fist from the SV CAP metagame and go ahead with nerfing Chuggalong.

Since receiving Sketch back two months ago, Necturna has skyrocketed in viability, now capable of running any number of sets ranging from Salt Cure, Victory Dance, Shift Gear, Sticky Web, Belly Drum, its standard Shell Smash set, and of course, Rage Fist. Averaging a score of 3.1 among the general public and 2.8 among CAP Ladder Tour qualifiers on our recent community survey, opinions on whether or not to nerf Necturna were fairly split. However, among the Metagame Council, the sentiment regarding Necturna was nearly unanimous; for perspective, the average result among the six councilmembers was a 4.2. Additionally, given the overwhelming survey support for a Rage Fist ban as opposed to nerfing Necturna's native movepool or stats, we believed it to be a much more straightforward CAP to tackle than Kitsunoh, which received comparable survey results.

Rage Fist's mechanics demand passive counterplay, limiting the best responses to Necturna to direct status, contact punshiers, stacking up hazards, punting the issue by phazing, threatening with a direct OHKO––difficult given Necturna's large bulk, and failing in the face of Tera––or attempting to set up before Rage Fist's BP grows unmanageable. Necturna's own arsenal of passive damage options, namely Will-O-Wisp and Leech Seed, as well as its ability to heal off damage with Leech Seed, Pain Split, or even cure status with Rest, all further constrain the amount of reliable longterm counterplay. Necturna certainly requires skillful and calculated play to reach its performance ceiling, but at the same time, there is simply not much an opponent can do to respond on the field without devoting great resources in the teambuilder beforehand. Some users have expressed that Salt Cure sets are in fact even more problematic, and banning Rage Fist will do relatively little as a result, so the Metagame Council will keep a close eye on Necturna's performance in the following weeks in case it remains an unhealthy element.

​

Despite the nerf to Chuggalong's Speed as a result of its Post Play Lookback, it has only continued to plow forward at full speed through the SV metagame. Receiving an average score of 2.9 among the general public and 3.5 among qualified voters, Chuggalong was the CAP on the community survey that was most widely deemed to be a pressing issue. With an incredibly deep movepool, and an even deeper amount of viable Tera options to match, Chuggalong has the potential to break past essentially any of its checks and counters. Whether it's blowing up its defensive checks with Tera Water Surf, Tera Psychic Stored Power, or Tera Dragon Clanging Scales; preventing phazing, Thunder Wave, and recovery with Taunt, or going 1-for-1 at minimum with Destiny Bond; sniping bulky Steel-types like Gholdengo and Kingambit with Flamethrower; dodging Arghonaut's Circle Throw and Blissey's Seismic Toss with Tera Ghost; or even the rare Tera Flying to escape super-effective Ground attacks, Chuggalong can pull just about every trick in the book to brute-force through traditional counterplay and evade being revenge killed. There hardly exists a team composition that's safe versus every potential Chuggalong set. Naturally, however, Chuggalong can't pull all of this off at once. Its greatest strength is also its greatest pitfall; being able to freely spec into winning any matchup it wants, but not every matchup it wants. This is only exacerbated by the trouble it often faces safely setting up in the first place, especially with its reduced Speed. The notable lack of its dominance across post-PPL tournaments largely reflects this fact.

Important: The Metagame Council will not be unbanning Annihilape as a result of the Rage Fist ban. CAP's current tiering policy is to adopt all OU bans with the allowance of banning further elements ourself when necessary (SS Dugtrio, SS Clefable, SV Walking Wake). Posts about Annihilape will be subject to moderation.

1. The CAP Metagame Council identifies a broken/unhealthy threat. Input from the metagame discussion thread, Discord, high-level tournament replays, etc. are ways the community can voice their concerns to the CAP Metagame council.

2. The CAP Metagame Council begins a thread. The OP, written by the CAP Metagame Council, summarizes why the Pokemon is broken. Metagame shifts, game mechanics changing, or OU bans can be potential points. The CAP Metagame council will also include a checks and counters list. Hard-counters to soft-checks, hazard damage, relative ability to switch-in, etc. should be considered. Keep in mind that with the broken Pokemon in the metagame, we can continue to understand why it is broken.

3. In the thread, the community discusses the simplest solution(s) to making the CAP not broken. Here, we can well-define a new list of checks and counters. Some solutions may be changing its ability to one that's similar but not as good, reducing its speed tier, removing some of its bulk or attack, or removing a certain move or two from its movepool. The community will play a huge role in identifying what solutions are available, but CAP Metagame Council will have the final say on what nerf is implemented. Keep in mind that the nerf(s) that is(are) implemented MUST preserve the identity of the CAP (i.e. Necturna uses Sketch, Pajantom uses its powerful trapping move, etc.).

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Rules for posting in this thread:

• Do not post one liners, nor uninformed posts.
• Do not hold discussion on other potential nerfing processes.
• Do not hold discussion on the nerfing system.
• You are required to make respectful posts.
• If you fail to follow these rules, your post will be deleted and you may be infracted.

We're aiming for this Nerfing Process to last for approximately 2 weeks.

 

[spoo]

Some quick personal thoughts on Chuggalong, not representative of the council etc.

I think Chuggalong is not overpowered but is certainly unhealthy. It's not trivially sweeping every game, or even most games, and frankly not getting brought a ton in the first place. Still, facing Chugg can be a total nightmare, and building against it basically always is. It's a Cawm-type mon, with like, two or three times the amount of versatility and tech factor that any Cawm-type mon should rightfully have.

This mon can legit run whatever it wants, usually boiling down to something like:
Clangorous soul
Clang scales/Stored power (nuke move against non-steels)
Surf/Flame (something for steels)
Sludge bomb/Surf/Flame/Dbond/Taunt/Sub (extra coverage/utility)

Being able to run anything from Tera Water Clanging Scales/Surf/Sludge Bomb to Tera Psychic Stored Power/Surf/Dbond to Tera Ghost Stored Power/Flamethrower/Taunt and everything in between makes this mon a total nightmare to prep against or gameplan against. I briefly ran Resto Chesto during ladder tour qualifiers, which sacrifices consistency for a lot of surprise factor and owning Garg teams pretty hard. I've seen LO 4atk, Boots 3atk, and Scarf sets (steam buns...) all work to varying degrees. The way to deal with this insane versatility is cutting coverage and/or utility moves. I think Flamethrower letting it break past Steels, and Stored Power letting it break past pretty much everything else not named Ting Lu, are the two main culprits. I am in favor of cutting one of these moves.

I'm also in favor of returning its Speed alongside a movepool cut. Like I said, Chugg is roughly correct power-wise, but just a terribly unhealthy presence. Cut power in one area (moves), return power in another (speed), and maintain power level while reducing its insane variability. Outspeeding Ogerpon was also one of the few healthy things Chuggalong provided to the meta in the first place.

 

[SunshineFuture]

While I don’t know about returning its original Speed, I definitely have come to the conclusion that Chuggalong should lose Stored Power and Flamethrower. Losing Stored Power means Chuggalong is now stopped dead by Unaware walls, Arghonaut chief among them. Flamethrower being gone further reduces Chuggalong’s power by making Kingambit, Gholdengo, and Kitsunoh unable to be OHKOed by it. This lets them slow down its sweep/weaken it for a teammate, even if Chuggalong still wins 1v1. By making Chuggalong more predictable, hopefully it will be easier to consistently counter.

+2 252 SpA Chuggalong Surf vs. 104 HP / 0 SpD Kitsunoh: 223-263 (68.1 - 80.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
+2 252 SpA Chuggalong Surf vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Gholdengo: 201-237 (53.1 - 62.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
+2 252 SpA Chuggalong Surf vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Kingambit: 212-250 (62.1 - 73.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

 

[dex]

Remove Flamethrower
Remove Encore

I think that’s about all that needs to pass. Stored Power is an important tool to encourage Throat Spray use. I also kind of like Destiny Bond being in its movepool; I think Iron Valiant shows that it’s ok for a good sweeper to have that tech option.

I am deeply upset that my request for Peace Train by Cat Stevens to be the nerf song for Chuggalong went ignored. It just wants peace, man.

 

[uppa]

Going over some of the best Chugg checks and ones that currently work and which would function better if flamethrower is removed, which is the nerf I'm most partial towards, and I'll explain why I believe that's the best path for retaining chugg's viability while making it less obnoxious and more consistent to prep for.

"I always beat chugg but i kind of suck otherwise teehee"

Barring niche teras aiming to counterteam me specifically on ladder, these two are the only mons that are able to take on a chugg at +2 and actually Deal with it. Both of these are pretty difficult to fit on teams imo, with ting lu in particular being really easy to wear down in cap's meta, and kind of thudding into non-chugg structures. AV Hoopa is an extremely underrated mon, and can be a really solid answer to a lot of what chugg ho and standard balance wants to do, but its exceptionally hard to position vs most offense teams, and usually requires a slow pivot AND hazard removal in order to function. Regardless, these are the best answers to broken chugg in a vacuum without needing to tera, and neither of them are very splashable or ideal for most teams.

"I sort of beat chugg but i have to burn tera and the chugg still isnt dead afterwards"

These are the "checks" you'll see most often, and they're the most splashable answers for balance. Each of them relies on tera quite a bit to remove chugg, which kind of defeats the point and makes it really easy for chugg to soften and abuse balance teams. Tera dark mollux and argh are kind of the most blatant "ok chuggs broken" techs since they both kind of want different teras and really hate losing their typing afterwards, while libra almost always baits tera from chugg and makes it easier to check afterwards (theoretically). Its good that balance has tools to deal with it, but most teams having to rely on tera for chugg kind of spells doom for how chugg will terrorize later gens, and working towards making an archetype check chugg rather than specific mons with specific teras seems like it would make chugg less restricting and healthier overall.

"im a bulky steel and I check chugg if and only if ff is removed"

While every team structure kind of fights to stay afloat vs the endless variety of chugg sets, opposing offense has a particularly bad time. With the latter two being able to consistently paralyze chugg, and the former two offensively checking it, the lack of flamethrower makes the answers to chugg far more obvious and reliable. Unless tera electric chugg or tera fire Tera Blast start cropping up, bulky steels would have a far easier time dealing with the train without burning tera. I'm also not listing Kit here since it simply doesnt kill or cripple chugg in the same way the above four can.

Even with flamethrower gone, chugg still has the role of muscling through stuff with stored power and being mega polteageist for offense teams, but with an expanded list of checks it will hopefully give all team styles more leeway in dealing with it. In my opinion, a stored power removal disproportionately benefits Argh structures, and doesn't help offense deal with it in the slightest. Giving it one hard wall vs a myriad of new checks seems shortsighted imo, and I'd rather see how much easier teambuilding becomes when chugg is slightly worse into every team, rather than being broken vs some and thudding into others.

 

[Da Pizza Man]

I would much prefer it if we did not restore Chuggalong's Speed. One of the main reasons why I kinda liked the original speed drop to begin with was that it made it so that Walking Wake outspeeds Chuggalong outside of Sun, which gives the archetype a bit more freedom since it didn't really have to run a dedicated answer to Chuggalong as it already had one built-in. Sun is already quite formulaic in CAP in my opinion, and forcing it to run a dedicated check to Chuggalong instead of being able to use one that's very much built-in to the archetype is only going to exacerbate that problem.

I also disagree with spoo regarding the fact that Chuggalong outspeed Waterpon (I'm assuming this is the main one he's talking about) actually benefited the tier all that much. Chuggalong is already a fairly strong answer into Waterpon, with its speed not really affecting which way the pendulum swings that regard. Besides, the primary archetype that Waterpon often feels overwhelming against is not one that really runs Chuggalong to begin with (Waterpon is a balance killer, and Chuggalogn is a mon that fits pretty much exclusively on Hyper Offense), and the archetype that Chuggalong is actually run on (Hyper Offense) is far from ill-equipped at dealing with Waterpon as well.

I also don't think that there's really any reason we should be considering undoing previous nerfs in a process like this, if I'm being entirely honest. We are trying to tone this mon down to what we consider to be an acceptable power level, and adding more stuff onto it is the epitome of counter productive. There shouldn't be any real desire for us to want to preserve Chuggalong's power level if we are having this discussion, because the fact that we are here to begin with should be indicative of the fact that it's power level is simply just too high at the moment.

Anyways, I know that's a fairly hot take, but everything else I have to say regarding Chuggalong is pretty cold ngl. I agree quite a bit with the general consenus that Flamethrower should be removed from this mon, since there's really no reason Chuggalong should be able to break past bulky Steel-types as well as it should when it has so many tools that are traditionally answered by these types of mons. Also, while I don't think Stored Power needs to be removed, I would not be against its removal just too make Pokemon such as Arghonaut and Mollux more consistent answers.

 

[Docter_Peng99]

Ok chugg despite the speed nerf is still good I cannot lie but still I have not really used chugg in a while because it lost a bit of utility however I feel like removing flamethrower is not the way to go about things. Losing flamethrower means it will not have that much counterplay against steel types. It is more sensible to remove stored power and or taunt and maybe raise the speed but not completely unnerf it. This way can at least outspeed ogerpon after the removal of stored power. Mostly my thoughts on why chugg should be nerfed but maybe not to heavily as there is still counterplay. While I do admit it can be overbearing sometimes however paralysis from cresc has been great counter play as it allows cresc to spam moonblast afterwards and fish for full paras. Removing flamethrower also hurts it's Libra matchup as Libra already have chugg massive problems even before the nerf. So the nerf I feel makes more sense is the removal of stored power and maybe taunt.

 

[singaporygon]

I'm just thinking that brainless meh Gambit builds, by like noobs in the future, would still be dumb for Chugg to get past.

I expect a lot of push back on this and probably things I'm not considering, but what about we remove Flamethrower and give it Aura Sphere? So that it can still force Gambit to Tera to beat it, while allowing other Steels to MU against it better?

///

From reading this, I also take the stance that Stored Power should be kept, to encourage Throat Spray use and I think there are certainly 4mss drawbacks to having SP.

Like giving up Sludge Bomb for instance has significant drawbacks too. Such a situation may force Chugg to run Tera Psychic along with SP. Which means no Tera Ghost and now Tera Dark Argh can circle it out.

///

My opinion and my last point: if you haven't done so, you should put in the time to battle in room tours, and for yourself to try different good Chugg and non-Chugg teams (or at least face them).
There's a deeper level of understanding Chugg by observing how different sets are used, their challenges, and what they require from teammates. (sometimes can be hard to explain in words the challenges of using Chugg).

 

[kenn]

Figured I would chime in even though my opinions have already been expressed by a couple others in the thread.

I really believe that Chuggalong as is has just too many tools at its disposal to be able to not only set up, but to sweep more than it effectively should. Therefore while it isn't broken, it is unhealthy due to forcing multiple checks onto teams while still being able to tech in things like DBond which makes Chugg hard to reliably be taken down. As a few have mentioned, losing Flamethrower allows Steel-types such as Iron Crown, Gholdengo, and Kitsunoh to have an easier time checking Chuggalong and I am inclined to agree with this approach. Losing Flamethrower is what feels like the most effective nerf to keep Chuggalong in line while not nerfing it to unviability.

Losing Stored Power has also been brought up as an option, but as some have mentioned, it encourages Throat Spray use and it already has a difficult time finding a spot amongst Chuggalong's other moves and almost requires Tera Psychic to be somewhat effective (you need it to OHKO Argh for example) and therefore I think it is better off leaving Stored Power alone. Keeping Surf and Stored Power as coverage options allows Chuggalong to prey on the heavily used Argh+Libra cores as well, which is kind of a good thing for the offensive teams Chugg finds itself on as they tend to struggle against this core when facing more balanced teams.

To comment on any stat reversion, I don't agree we should give Chugg any Speed back. As Da Pizza Man mentioned, having Wake outspeed it allows Sun to have something against which is a good thing for the archetype's viability. Chuggalong can still soft check Ogerpon even if it doesn't outspeed it.

If anything, I could, however, see a further Speed nerf down to 103 ( idk if I see this in conjunction with losing Flamethrower but could work as another option) as at 103 Speed, Chuggalong fails to outspeed Deoxys-Speed at +1 which gives offensive teams an out against Chuggalong even after it sets up. This one is not as enticing as losing Flamethrower, but is one I could see merit in and makes it a bit harder to set up overall.

tl;dr -Flamethrower, keep Stored Power, possible -5 Speed

 

[earthflax]

Plainly put, I would much rather see Chugg be straight up bad rather than even a little bit too good post-nerf. In VR terms, UR>>>>A- for a mon like this. I am at the point where I do not care much for the optics of the resulting nerf, either: we already had to nerf it after a PPL, all within the same calendar year; it's even worse if it still ends up partially on the uncompetitive/unhealthy/broken side of things.

Axing Flamethrower and nothing else does not solve the core problem with Chuggalong. With Flamethrower, it could Tera past its checks and win because of set variety. If Flamethrower is nixed, it can do the exact same thing with Tera Blast Fire; all we are restraining in effect is specific Tera types.

A Pokemon like this does not need set variety to succeed in its role. In fact, all set variety does is obscure its counterplay in a very low-risk, high-reward way for the Chuggalong user: it forces scouting into a 'mon that can very easily just set up again and it causes reasonable gameplay lines to disappear because of a "misplay". I don't even have an example of a CG 'mon where all 4 moves are so easily tacked on because none of them are as ridiculously broken as Chugg. The closest I can think of is current Revenankh, and if Chugg ends up almost analogous in terms of gameplay, I would not complain. Rev typically runs the same 4 moves with slight variation (with a large opportunity cost), is very potent and can end a game if given the opportunity to set up, but still needs extensive team support in builder and game to do so; there will also be games where you have to play for a different wincon and use Revenankh to break holes in opposing team structure. This is a role which Chugg accomplishes currently, but its set variation means that it is too good at all of the aforementioned things.

I'll cut to the chase: -Flamethrower, -Stored Power, -Encore, -Destiny Bond.
This leaves Chugg with a nailed-on set of 4 moves: Clangorous Soul, Sludge Bomb/Wave, Clanging Scales, and Surf. There are also some techs left that are usable but come at a large opportunity cost, namely Taunt, Sub, Rest+Chesto.

Re: exclusion of Encore, DBond: I'd be much more comfortable with doing this and leaving the 'mon in a very one-dimensional spot than I'd be with leaving these very powerful techs on the table. The only reason these two moves haven't seen experimentation in tour setting is because Chugg is broken enough without them. Encore is very good on fast 'mons and can turn things like Equilibra Protect into setup opportunities. Destiny Bond can easily force 1 for 1 trades or better in situations where Chugg would otherwise clunk into defensive prep, opening up its teammates in a major way. There's no point in leaving Encore and Destiny Bond in Chugg's kit because we're just gonna end up seeing it tech them on in CAPCL to similar success.

I'm indifferent on giving its Speed back. No strong feelings one way or the other; the only thing the benchmark really changes is the matchup with sun so if that's something to be preserved we keep the speed as is.

That's all I have to say on the topic, Galarian Blades thoughts below (he has never written a smogon post before):

i do not condone these thoughts

 

[Amamama]

Chugg from the beginning only needed 4 moves period.
A set of Souls/Scales/Sludge/Flame or
Souls/Scales/Sludge/Surf is all that is required to make this Mon a threatening sweeper.
While being this predictable means, that it would require much more team support and correct timing to be the most successful, it would still remain a game ending sweeper under the right conditions, much as Cawm.

It's a Mon that you create opportunities for to freely set up and try to weaken it's counters with teammates before a sweep. And vice versa this is a Mon that you either don't give room to set up or have a healthy counter for in the back.
It's current versatility means that the latter is made much more difficult bc one check isn't necessarily safe against all sets.

Now I've seen people point out that even Cawm has Tech's. The difference in my opinion is, that Chuggs variety between Flamethrower, Surf, and Stored Power isn't so much techs but variations of the same set. Whereas Knock or Tera Blast on Cawm comes at a steep opportunity cost, the moves on Chugga are almost entirely interchangeable and create many possible configurations. This doesn't even include the actual tech options like dbond, encore, taunt, sub, resto chesto and different defensive teras to take a huge variety of checks out of commission.

The community is right to agree on the removal of flamethrower as opposed to surf, as this especially gives breathing room to offensive structures, which struggle the most vs Chugg, basically requiring a healthy steel type, or a faster booster energy Mon or Scarfer as checks (one reason I agree with DPM that reverting the speed nerf does nothing else than harm).

Overall I completely agree with Earthflaxs list of moves to remove, even if I don't agree, that we should disregard Chuggs viability entirely. But I also am not afraid that cutting more options than Flamethrower does enough harm to put Chugg anywhere near unviable.

All in all it is the nature of a One and done sweeper to be one dimensional, and given options like sub, taunt, tera blast and several good tera options still are available even with Earthflaxs proposal, Chugg would still have more options than necessary to pull a surprise.
This at the very least I'd want to see the removal of Flamethrower but my preferred option is -Flamethrower -Stored Power or more.

 

[spoo]

i made my stance clear already: chugg needs a movepool trim, but the mon is not far from the ideal power level. nerfs should be as minimal as possible while still achieving the desired result (a balanced CAP). i don't think a lot of the hate on chugg is totally well-founded. i said this in my last post, but empirically speaking, chugg is not running rampant in the tier. it needs to be the right set, it needs to find safe setup opportunities, it really wants to have hazards off, it relies heavily on its own tera, and it usually needs the opponent's tera to be exhausted if it wants to make exceptional progress. while there's a huge BS "hope it's not the set that owns my team" element to the mon that i think needs to be tuned down, chuggalong is failing way more in practice than it's succeeding. the rest of this post is replay analysis from CAPLT + a few rounds of summer ssnl.

words

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9cap-2215545919-i4bde5zl4wh5lh5mr7ov24ukb8spwjcpw steam buns vs elvira; CAPLT r1 (chugg W)
lefties chugg vs ambipom screens ho (wtf). chugg was able to find space to set up two consecutive clang souls, but came at the cost of letting grimm screen up, leading to an easy revenge kill from dnite. it's vs HO here, a style chugg is naturally strong against, and it went net positive at 2 kills. chugg presumably would have won on the spot if it were clang scales > stored power, but it was the wrong set. however, it arguably wasn't needed at this point anyways given the full health moltres and tera normal espeed nect in the back - it ended the game faster, but did not really seem to be a deciding factor.

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9cap-2216669112 poopidoopi vs shsp; CAPLT r1 (chugg L)
chugg was specs here and did fine work throughout the game: nuking an ogerpon, forcing a tera on mollux, claiming a heavily weakened gliscor, and hitting the field a couple of other times with less notable outcomes. overall, it was a decent performance but more than manageable. as a specs user with immunities blocking both of its stabs, the prediction reliant nature of this set is really on display here, especially against a team as fat as shsp's was

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9cap-2217146515-ws02xx83o9amfddsdnw1z6nrt2zza8apw spammernoob vs galarian blades; CAPLT r1 (chugg L)
our first throat spray chuggalong vs pretty standard balance, featuring good anti-chugg measures in both libra and argh as well as promising setup opportunities with hemo and venom. chugg sets up on venom in the endgame and sacks itself to put libra in range of gambit, ultimately going net negative in kills but securing some pretty crucial chip. the game was lost on a lucky thunderbolt crit from krilowatt the next turn.

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9cap-2217139565-afqfxku0rbff5r1rjf6prkg4v3d4igmpw spammernoob vs galarian blades; CAPLT r1 (chugg L)
chugg is specs here again (we are now at 25% throat spray usage). an early tera dragon forces a tera fairy from spammernoob's garg in response, and chugg shows its face again 30 turns later to correctly predict a great tusk switch and snipe it with surf. it forces a moltres sack a couple turns later, but was no use breaking through kitsunoh + protect fairy garg in the endgame, leading to a fairly straightforward loss

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9cap-2217407661-yvvlzgeqi060dx2bdgw4rafwsu1ubsfpw?p2 jayheaven vs v-creating victory; CAPLT r1 (chugg L)
super goofy game with quite the interesting matchup, quaquaval screens ho vs semi-sun bo, both teams very unconventional. chugg sets up as mala comes in; jay responds by terastallizing and using glare, successfully paralyzing chugg as it sets up a second time; chugg goes on to claim three kills, thanks to jay sacking his cresceidon for 0 gain (scald miscalc?). decent example here of chugg being able to force teras before even revealing any information; jay had to tera water out of caution for sludge bomb or flamethrower, but the chugg couldve lacked both in the end. youll see this too with arghs immediately tera darking to hedge their bets against stored power, only to have chugg reveal clanging scales, successfully wasting their opponents best resource. but regardless, it's too little too late, and jay is able to easily win from this position despite sacking half his team to the train.

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9cap-2218150980 d2thew vs earthflax; CAPLT r1 (chugg L)
standard setup chugg vs... hisuian goodra + fimp miasmaw wishpass, not looking good. chugg set up and did 35 before getting dragon tailed out by hoodra. with better rolls or a different hoodra spread, that chip may have mattered a lot in this endgame, but in the end it did not

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen9cap-796103 steam buns vs one last kiss; CAPLT r2 (chugg mirror)
buns's scarf tera dragon chugg claims a surprise kill on a +2 darkrai, picks off a weakened hemogoblin, and forces a tera and subsequent kill on OLK's full health caribolt as he sacks it to clear hazards. OLK's standard chugg does essentially nothing in comparison, clicking clang soul as encore valiant hard switches in. scarf chugg vs HO looked quite strong, though certainly relied on surprise factor to get the most mileage

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9cap-2234499877 shsp vs steam buns; CAPLT finals (chugg W)
chugg did not hit the field this game; it likely applied some pressure on buns from the back but giving it any more credit would be generous

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9cap-2234506518 shsp vs steam buns; CAPLT finals (chugg W)
tera dragon scarf chugg strikes again, putting in good work vs shsp's libra balance. first claiming a surprise KO on darkrai (why is it always a darkrai), heavily limiting shsp's tera steel zamazenta and forcing it out on two occasions, and finally KOing shsp's libra in the end after weakening it with NP ghold.

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9cap-2206685995-fn6g1q4i46dwtjbmsasae88uz8ssb8ppw spammernoob vs one last kiss; CAP summer ssnl r10 (chugg W)
HO wins, chugg does not come out

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9cap-2207252561-kly3fgh3tfbvzw9h7ku52kaa33fjhx0pw tempo di anguria vs galarian blades; summer ssnl r10 (chugg W)
HO wins, chugg does not come out

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen9cap-793679 tempo di anguria vs one last kiss; summer ssnl losers finals (chugg L)
after 60 turns of both players dancing around each other, chugg hits the field, reveals to be specs, thuds into an empoleon, and does nothing else

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen9cap-793677 tempo di anguria vs one last kiss; summer ssnl losers finals (chugg L)
interesting battle of positioning between a chugg glimm HO and wo-chien argh giga fat. tempo tries to stiff the arghonaut's circle throw by building towards a last-mon situation with chuggalong, but OLK does a good job at denying it, successfully crippling chugg with thunder wave as it sets up. chugg faints to end the game soon after

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9cap-2217115521-j5z97oezweozhy6skhhcefwumc7ajy4pw galarian blades vs one last kiss; summer ssnl finals (chugg L)
very interesting game here between screens HO and normal looking balance; chugg quickly sets up behind screens, reveals not to be throat spray, and gets phazed by arghonaut just as fast. (if this were throat spray tera psychic, i think the game was over, but of course it was not). arghonaut refuses to do anything but click circle throw for a while, eventually going down to a darkrai, paving the way for chuggalong to set up again on necturna. salt cured and at 6%, chugg reveals resto chesto and misclicks stored power (i assume last move was surf) vs blades's hemo, consequently dying to explosion. if surf was clicked instead, i dont think it was a guaranteed win, especially given that the libra ran protect when blades used this team before. regardless, chugg dropped the ball

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9cap-2217122878-9s4ld7v96adi3la8s1s9alkq0j8xvsdpw galarian blades vs one last kiss; summer ssnl finals (chugg L)
blades has wasted his opponent's tera and killed the arghonaut by turn 10, things look good so far. chugg ends up picking off a 13% hydrapple and futilely attempting to set up on OLK's libra before dying to earth power. decisive loss, though also maybe a choke

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9cap-2217129265-nifghj7aesm74w8molmabw6s711tnzcpw galarian blades vs one last kiss; summer ssnl finals (chugg L)
OLK pops an early tera dark on his arghonaut in order to nip the bud on a turn 5 cawm setup. chugg is dragged out by circle throw and attempts to inadvisably set up in arghonaut's face, even using its own tera in the process, ultimately wasting 6 recovers and leaving argh at half health before dying. the game is very difficult for OLK to lose from here, and so he lands the plane with a confident 5-0

general observations:

• out of 16 appearances, chugg won 3 out of 8 times in all of CAPLT's playoffs (not including the mirror), and 2 out of 7 times in the final three summer ssnl rounds. 3 out of 5 of these wins, it did not hit the field.
• nearly half of these games (7), chugg revealed to not be throat spray. in fact, if we only look at the games where chuggalong hit the field, throat spray sets did not win once.
• there's a non-neglible amount of random mons like empoleon, hisuian goodra, and wo-chein being used to contain chuggalong. this can be attributed to chuggalong having a warping nature, or to the nature of ladder tour (the one tour every year where players are guaranteed to bring psycho stuff), or to individual player tendencies (e.g. OLK has a history of bringing very niche picks). hard to say. this is a neutral observation at best, and a negative one at worst.

(it is late at night, hopefully i counted these numbers correctly). overall these replays are a mixed bag. many weren't very quality games or between serious teams, but i think the point is clear that chuggalong just isn't performing at the level of your typical nerf-worthy CAP. it's certainly a mon you beat more in-game than in the builder. that said, i think consistent builder responses are inexcusably low, which is why we're conducting this nerf in the first place.

after thinking more and going through these replays, my opinion has settled close to dex's. remove flamethrower, encore, and taunt. cutting flamethrower limits the versatility of traditional throay spray sets, but also nerfs choiced sets much harder, which we are seeing a lot of for some reason. stored power is a practical but ostensibly balanced option that encourages throat spray use. taunt and encore both exist mostly to cheese mons like argh, cresceidon, gking, ting lu, blissey, and so on. chuggalong still has tech options for 4th slot (destiny bond / substitute / tera blast) with these gone, but loses a good deal of its BS potential. this is a minimal but effective nerf.

 

[Joeshh]

I've rarely made a big post on stuff like this but I feel like I have enough thoughts on the moveset of this guy.

For the record, initially I was against nerfing Chugg again based on a couple of things. One was that Chugg had a notable decline in performance especially during the ladder tour as shown from Spoo's post (even though like he said a lot of those games weren't that high quality or were teams that people were testing or just playing with) but the other reason was that it didn't really feel like there was significant time to really see the impact of the most recent nerfs as I think that the nerf actually only got implemented during the second round of the playoffs in the ladder tour. However the set versatility and the fact that there isn't a super reliable way to deal with Chugg especially because it can run a plethora of things makes it super annoying especially in the builder. Even though it's not as bad as it used to be in CAPPL when it had draining kiss, there are times were it can be warping in the builder to make a team worse to make sure you don't just lose to a train, although I do think that this issue is more of a problem for offense now over balance teams.

With all this being said I do think that the only moves that need to be removed here are flamethrower and encore. Agreeing with everyone in saying that the train shouldn't have a reliable way to deal with steel types. Just removing flamethrower opens up a lot more options to be able to check Chugg such as Gambit, Iron Crown, Kit, Corv, Gholdengo, walled by a boat etc. Not only that but it also lets random tera steels be fine last ditch options incase things go wrong as a means of dealing with Chugg which I think is only a good thing. I do think that encore enables it to be a lot more of a problem than taunt does though. With encore you can end up in a situation where chugg is free to set up and the game is over on the spot where as taunt has a lot more counterplay as chugg still needs to set up and not let you hit it. Also without flamethrower I feel like the cost of an extra moveslot for taunt definitely comes with a lot more drawbacks than it used to, and as Dex mentioned in his post I think it can be a beneficial thing for an offensive mon to have tech options as long as there's noticable drawbacks to using it.

Last thing I want to mention is that I'm heavily against reversing the speed nerf and bringing it back. Like I mentioned earlier there has really not been a lot of time since the nerf has actually been implemented to feel the effects of the nerf properly but I do think that the speed nerfs were really substantial overall. The biggest issue I thought Chugg had before was how it was very polarising for offense teams as there wasn't many good options for offense teams to deal with a train outside of an opposing Chugg or forcing a random pokemon to run a niche item like mirror herb that only ever benefitted it in the case that a Chugg was on the other side. This was especially apparent because revenge killing this thing is a nightmare especially because of it's ability but also because of it's original speed tier. The speed nerf not only makes it so that this mon is a lot easier to revenge kill if it does get the oppurtunity to set up with something like moth or wake but it also makes it so that there's more ways to make it harder for chugg to set up infront of certain other pokemon like a moth without a speed boost and wellspring. It also opens up other weird niche options of trying to deal with it as well such as scarf latios or if you're a psychopath going hard ogerpon on a clang and encoring it. Overall I do think that the speed nerf was only a beneficial thing for the tier overall.

 

[earthflax]

but empirically speaking, chugg is not running rampant in the tier.

while there's a huge BS "hope it's not the set that owns my team" element to the mon that i think needs to be tuned down, chuggalong is failing way more in practice than it's succeeding. the rest of this post is replay analysis from CAPLT + a few rounds of summer ssnl.

I generally agree with your take on the mon itself but I'd like to disagree with this characterization. To say that Chuggalong as it is meant to be played has performed poorly in the current meta might be a fair statement, but it is one that ignores some context that is otherwise important to consider. This is especially true when discussing the prevalence or lack thereof of Throat Spray Chuggalong.

I'd like to say that I'm a primary source on this because I built or helped to build every single Specs Chugg team that you mention in your replay analysis and in my eyes the whole point of it was to capitalize off of shock factor and the expectation of Throat Spray; this was initially pre-2.0 and there are actually earlier rounds of ssnl where you can see it in action pre- and post-PPL (sorry shsp that shit went kinda crazy). I don't pretend to know what Buns' intentions were with the Scarf builds, but I can't imagine the surprise factor did not play into this builder choice a little. Point here is, in my experience and perception at least, choiced Chugg was not necessarily seeing use in these tours because it was particularly good (not that I believe you, spoo, are claiming it is better or anything like that; using this as an example more than anything), but instead because it completely precludes the lines that people often, sometimes lazily, play for against a Chuggalong. This definitely shouldn't be interpreted as empirical proof that Throat Spray Chugg is floundering right now, but instead should show that some tour players are capitalizing off of the building and gameplay patterns that people are falling into in the face of TSpray Chugg, which needs focused prep in the builder as is. If anything, the frequency of these choiced sets should be very obvious proof as to how omnipresent and warping Chugg is in the current meta.

With regards to the usage of specific or niche counterplay, once more, I can't speak on OLK's brings, but as the Hoodra bringer, I'll say that that team, and Hoodra's inclusion especially, was built *specifically* to beat Chugg in any instance. I was trying to qual for LT at the time and every team had a Chugg it felt like so I'd say that was significant overprep from my part and plays more into the idea that these brings are because of Chugg and not mons that are good otherwise and also are good into Chugg. Other earlier brings in ssnl carry very similar energy - substandard tera types (though this is silly and subjective anyways so I don't mind throwing this one out), SpDef Navi I think made an appearance once???, etc.

Generally, I think I would be happy with the nerfs proposed in your post (+ joesh's below), but I don't think that Chugg's current "meta state" based off of recent tour play is really reflective of how good it is.

also no one has brought this up yet but winrates don't mean anything, this is my last yap post i promise xx

 

[shnowshner]

Counterplay to Chugg should be more standardized and force players to build around its tough MUs in teamslots instead of dancing around them with huge set variety. If it generally loses to Steels and Tera Steel, it's about as balanced as the strong do-or-die sweeper we envisioned can be. We can't eliminate Tera Fire without eliminating Tera as a whole, but if your gameplan is based around needing Tera Fire to make progress then you're going to end up in awful defensive positions. Tera is the biggest thing to keep in mind while playing and dependence on it to circumvent one of best typings in the game is not ideal.

I think Chugg brings a lot of good to the meta in reducing the power of Priority, which has already taken OU by storm and CAP only adds more abusers to work with. The issue is Chugg is also one of the biggest headaches for people to build around: I saw this firsthand during CAPPL and the mon was so volatile some teams just stopped using it out of fear that they'd get turbo-tech'd into oblivion. Linearization of Chugg's gameplan eases the builder headache without removing its useful defensive properties for frailer Offense teams.

Cut the annoying moves and Flame from its movepool and don't touch it further. CAPCL is right around the corner and should provide more than enough experience to see if it's in a good spot.

 

[Spammernoob]

(Some thoughts so this isn't a one-liner shitpost) Removing Flamethrower is probably fine. I'm not sure if anything else is even necessary since Clangorous Soul + 2 moves + utility is very hard to run without Flamethrower, but if you really hate Dbond or Encore I guess it's fine to cut.

This is peak.

 

[quziel]

The council has voted and Flamethrower is being removed. There will be no other changes at this time, however we will continue to monitor the state of the meta and of Chuggalong and take further actions if necessary.