I wanted to write a post actually discussing anti-ban arguments that have repeatedly come up in this thread. I obviously don't agree with them, and I want to explain why I think these arguments are flawed by actually engaging with them. By and large, the main anti-ban arguments have been: 1) focusing on volc's benefits for the meta and theorymonning problems without it, 2) arguing that every mon can use tera like volc can, 3) contesting lack of counterplay. I'll be citing some posts here that reference these arguments.
1) Volc's benefits to the meta: Has come up repeatedly.
-Volcarona has a good match-up into most of the problematic/controversial Pokemon in the metagame:
With the exception of Ogerpon-Wellspring, Volcarona´s match-ups and capacity to limit Kingambit, Kyurem, Gholdengo, Iron Valiant, and even Dragapult to some extent is a valuable contribution towards a balanced state of the metagame. While it could be argued that Iron Valiant is no longer a problematic presence in the metagame, the same could be argued prior to Volcarona´s quickban earlier in the generation. What we saw after that was a dramatic increase in Iron Valiant usage and complaints about how uncompetitive it was. Regarding Dragapult, Volcarona only has a good capacity to limit the Wisp + U-turn set, getting obliterated by CB and not being a big enjoyer of Specs Shadow Ball either, but at least, it can punish U-turns from the Pivot Set withouth much risk.
It’s barely centralising when you compare Volcarona to the real brokens.
people are arguing that Volcarona has too many sets and they don’t want to use a 2-check or more combo to bypass its bypass.
Meanwhile, no questions asked, the meta is centralising on things like rocky helmet landorus + momentum partners as one of the few consistent ways to check the dearth of physical threats that are actually impacting the meta in an over centralising way.
If Volcarona was over centralising we would see significantly higher usage of checks like clodsire, heatran and skeledirge. The reality is crickets..
it’s very obvious just how volatile and mediocre Volcarona actually is, when it’s reality is compared to the perception its performance and popularity. Similar to what we saw with zamazenta during its suspect, the usage isn’t supporting the perceived OPness. People are using it for its defensive profile, with offensive upside when it’s MU is good.
Removing Volcarona would also remove a check for Zamazenta, Kingambit, Gholdengo, and I don't think the council will ever take action on these Pokémon, so I prefer to avoid the risk and leave everything as it is. However, I can see the common denominator among all recent suspects: all these Pokémon are great Tera abusers, and that shouldn't be something new.
Volcarona isn't the only problematic Tera Blast abuser rn imo, I would argue CB Pult runs away with a ton of games due to surprise factor as well. Also, even if we take banning tera blast out of the list of options, I don't think we will arrive at a more balanced metagame for banning volc. Like I said earlier, the problem isnt just jf Tera Blast is what makes Volc broken or not, it's that if we simply ban Volc it gets replaced with Iron Moth or something of similar nature.
Also, your Iron Valiant argument doesnt make sense. Problematic is not the same as broken.
There are a few issues with these arguments. First is Finch's repeated assertion that tiering isn't pros and cons: A mon can have benefits for the tier and be broken, these two things are not contradictory at all. Archaludon was a bulky steel in a tier without a ton of good ones, Gliscor in dlc1 provided a ton of defensive utility. These positives fundamentally don't matter because we should be judging a mon as broken based on its negatives for the tier; is it overcentralizing, uncompetitive, unhealthy, etc.? The positives fundamentally don't matter. HOWEVER, I do feel as if just saying this may risk not engaging with legitimate arguments for why people will vote DNB, so I want to engage these points directly, on their own merits, even if I think that this isn't how tiering should be done.
To get it out of the way, Volc does provide the tier with defensive utility. It resists ice, fairy and steel, so great. However, I will be questioning this argument on the implicit assumption that volc is as sturdy a check to these mons as people claim, and that it leaving will make these mons get out of hand. Volc is repeatedly mentioned to check mainly Val/Enam, Kyurem, and then ghold, kg and zam by some. Fine. The issue is that it's ability to check some of these mons is circumspect. Val beats it with its best set, SD, so I don't think its as good of a check or dissuasion as people claim to Val. It actually loses to a lot of kyurem sets; specs kyurem with draco almost one shots even bulkier volcs, and boots sets can easily slide on rock slide over draco if volcarona is a problem. It's mu into KG is shaky because of how hard KG hits on the physical side, but it can threaten burn procs, and it does beat ghold and zam without tera, sure. But this fundamentally doesnt matter unless these mons are actively problematic or broken. I view KG and Ghold as potentially problematic in the future, but not right now. I think Kyurem is ACTIVELY problematic, but volc is kind of a fake check to it anyways. Valiant, enamorus and Zamazenta i'm not concerned about at all.
This argument, however, essentially hinges on Volc being what keeps these mons from being problematic, and that once it's gone, these mons will become a problem. The issue is that it's theorymonning. All of these mons have checks other then Volc, even the one I think is actively broken. Furthermore, it assumes that the tier will guaranteed go into chaos or whatever if Volc leaves, which is frankly unlikely, and even MORESO, it assumes that if it does, that action will not be taken, when even action against mons like Gouging Fire, which isn't broken, WAS taken. These are a LOT of really groundless assumptions more based on people pretending to see the future then actual reasons related to Volc's brokenness; we DON'T KNOW if the tier will descend into chaos if Volc leaves, and LIKELY, it won't. Compare this to the present and what we know about Volc: We KNOW Volc is a great abuser of Tera, WE KNOW Volc has been extremely dominant as a wincon whenever its been legal this gen, AND WE KNOW Volc can snowball much easier then other mons. Volc being broken or problematic is ACTUALLY known, unlike theorymonning of whether certain mons will be broken if Volc leaves.
2) Every mon uses Tera like Volc can
The main flaw I see with this argument, is that it is not an argument against Volcarona, but one against Tera Blast. Withouth Tera Blast, Volcarona can not beat Heatran, Clodsire, Skeledirge, Gouging Fire etc. Banning Tera Blast is preferable to banning Volcarona, not only because there are multiple other Pokemon that are only deemed broken because of Tera Blast, like Regieleki but also because something will take Volcarona´s role after it gets banned, Tera Blast Ground Iron Moth seems like a plausible candidate. This argument is also flawed from the perspective that even with Tera Blast being allowed, some counters still exist, like Cm Blissey or defensive Teras on Unaware Pokemon to beat Tera Ground.
This is a new paradigm Tera meta.
This isn't true for a few reasons. I go through most of the reasons in my earlier post, but Volc can DEFINITELY use tera much better then other mons, because its a much easier snowballer. It gets access to the best setup move in the game, flame body and fiery dance, and all three of these tools allow it to snowball easily. QD boosts defenses, offenses and speed all in one, making it harder to both revenge kill, but also making it more powerful. Flame body makes it harder to revenge kill by burning the opponent, essentially multiplying its physical bulk, especially if its procced it on a physical threat earlier on in the game, while simultaneously dissuading physical threats from hitting it if they're needed later on. Fiery dance is a free click and can both hit hard and boost its offenses even more (50%!!!). I've mentioned before, but by turn 2 of volc being out, it could have burned a mon that may have been needed to revenge kill it (like Pult), gotten a quiver dance AND a fiery dance boost, meaning its that much closer to blowing a hole through the enemy team. These are tools that are UNIQUE to Volcarona; no other mon or setup sweeper can abuse snowball like it, so no other mon abuses tera like it. It runs QD virtually always, it runs tera blast way more often then not, and often forgoes flamethrower for fiery dance, despite the power drop (note that on very high ladder, flamethrower is run more, however fiery dance is still run a significant portion of the time). It also obviously mostly runs flame body. It also runs tera blast over half the time AT LEAST, which is concerning because, as many people have pointed out, Tera Blast is often a dead moveslot if you do not tera. Most mons actually don't run it unless there is a significant chance they end up teraing over the course of the match; Volc running a dead moveslot more then half the time means, by definition that it is a much better tera abuser then other mons, so it is unique. HighVoltage brings up Tera blast being the issue, and I don't agree, because virtually every OU viable mon barely uses it. Yes, other mons have been banned for it, like Espathra, but this is actually harming his argument; Espathra was also another mon NOTORIOUS for being able to snowball thanks to speedboost with CM and stored power! Tera blast is in fact barely used on mons that are not able to snowball like this (serp is fake), and the fact that Volc uses it this much and is as good with this dead moveslot as it is should be proof of this.
Ctann claimed that Volc is mostly used for its defensive utility over offensive utility, but why would a defensive mon never drop QD and almost always run tera blast if it mostly planned on being used for its defensive capabilities? These are snowball tools! HighVoltage's only other example of tera blast being problematic is CB Pult, which is a good set, but nowhere near its most common. It's clear Volc is able to use this tool much better then virtually any other mon, and you would not be putting tera blast this frequently on a mon if you didn't think you'd be tera-ing it for a sweep or to win the game, given that the move is functionally worthless if you DON'T tera. So, what we know is that Volc has more snowballing tools then other mons, no matter its defensive capabilities, and its movesets reflect this by the use of an extremely high-commitment option in its moveslot that it wouldn't use if it wasn't going to blow a hole open in the enemy team.
3) Contesting lack of counterplay: there's been a lot of thought here that Volc does in fact have counterplay, and to the insistence that it's not that much, some posters have just suggested stacking multiple forms of volc counterplay onto a team. I've gone into Volc's counterplay and the vast majorities issues with one of its sets, so I'm not going to beat that dead horse, but I want to point out that "just stack counterplay" is a bad argument because there are a TON of threats in the builder I already need to account for. YES, me and any good player will do their best to not lose to Volc, but given the threat saturation right now, saying that you just need to stack your counterplay fails to take into account that I'm not just building a team to beat Volc, I'm building a team to beat the entire metagame, and that being forced to stack counterplay against Volc can mean I'm weaker into some of the many other threats right now. Furthermore, because of its unpredictability, I can end up sending in the WRONG form of counterplay into Volcarona at first, meaning that the other defensive counterplay (because Volc is hard to revenge kill) is now much more susceptible to getting overwhelmed. If I have Skeledirge and Gking on my team for Volc, I might send in Dirge at first, but if it's tera ground, my Dirge can get 2shot, and now my Dirge is gone and my team is much weaker. Or, if I send in my GKing at first and it turns out to be sub/tera ground or something, I give it even more opportunities to boost on my Gking as it attempts to break sub. Similarly with other forms of counterplay like Garganacl; I can have multiple forms of counterplay, but if the Volcarona beats what I send in first and sets up on it, my other counterplay might be screwed. Similarly, not all counterplay can fit on all teams; Blissey and Clod are obvious examples, but Dirge is often not splashable at all. GKing is, but it needs to devote psyshock and toxic to reliably stop it, when it's already torn for moveslots and is checking half the metagame for your team anyways. Rilla and Weavile can smack tera ground variants with priority, but they might not fit on that team, for example.
Saying "just stack threats" is close to admitting the huge pressure Volc puts on the builder. And furthermore, you can do this and just lose. Look at
FayaWizard's replay:
Mimikyu Stardust vs Beraldinhoo
Berald brings Dragapult, Ting Lu, and Heatran, but Mimikyu manages to pick off the former two throughout the course of the game, and brings in Volcarona as their last mon in the lategame, surviving a Headlong Rush from Great Tusk to pick up a Quiver Dance, before killing Tusk with Giga Drain, then revealing Tera Ground Tera Blast and smashing Heatran to clutch the game.
This team has a lot of Volc counterplay in theory, but in practice Volc has other teammates, and once those get worn down, Volc can go for the kill. Importantly, you probably don't know Volc's tera type or set until its boosted on you and is in position. Is this a good matchup for Volc? Yes, and it could've been worse, but you often don't know what tera or set it rocks until its in position to snowball; there's a shitty guessing game here, where if you play wrong or get the set wrong, you lose because it can snowball.
TLDR Overall, i think a lot of these arguments forget that there's evidence that Volc is a great snowballer and tera abuser, which we know, and often use arguments based on uncertainties, or claiming that because the meta might be worse after Volc gos, it should stay, without actually knowing and ignoring the issues that Volc clearly presents in the builder right now.
