In the pre-home metagame, the tier was in a fantastic state by the end of it. There was a high variety of playstyles, a variety of top tiers such as Hydreigon, Breloom, Amoonguss, Toxapex, and even Hisuian Zoroark. It was a true utopia, where skill and variety dominated and almost anything could work.
Then Home happened. Following the bans of the initial drops like Chien Pao and Regieleki, we saw an evil core rise up to destroy the metagame:
This core ravanged the metagame, where "skillful play" was determined by which player got the game winning paralysis dice rolls the most in their favor. The once beloved and cherished SV OU metagame turned into a series of 50/50 dicerolls, where game outcomes were out of the player's control, and in the hands of the RNG gods, deciding which player got the game winning paralysis. Interactions like clicking rapid spin with great tusk became a liability, as tusk would merely get paralyzed and be cheesed while Ting-Lu and Samurott-H destroyed the tier with their Spikes. Thankfully, we had Baxcalibur in this time to save the metagame and not make
completely riskless, but it nonetheless dominated the tournament scene and the ladder.
In DLC1, following the ban of Baxcalibur, Gliscor rose to the top of the metagame, being a virtually riskless pick that completely dominated matches with its ability to effortlessly set up Spikes, knock off Boots, and all around outlive every other threat in the metagame. Many of the best teams during this time needed to either be Grassy Terrain, or they would be overwhelmed by Gliscor's peerless longevity and progress making capabilities. The best counter to these gliscor teams was often your own SD Gliscor. In many ways, this metagame was refreshing compared to the paralysis spam 50/50s of the previous post-Home metagame. But here, there was a debate as to whether the cure to the problem was worse than the problem itself. Following Gliscor's ban however, the answer was evidently no.
returned with a full vengence, and without its best counter, Baxcalibur, the metagame became more focused around para dice rolls than ever before. It was pure madness, and the victims - the playerbase -realized their mistake far too late.
After seeing the dark ages of the Home and DLC1 metagames, the playerbase has had enough. We have seen the alternative to a Kyurem metagame already and WE WON"T GO BACK. Kyurem keeps many of the playstyles that dominated the past 2 formats like Gliscor balance and ZapKingLu in check. Unlike Baxcalibur, Kyurem is no where near as dominant as a Ice-type, having to rely on either mixed sets or a forced Terastalization for coverage on its DD sets, while also being vulnerable to entry hazards (due to running Loaded Dice) in a metagame where entry hazards are more difficult to remove than ever. Its special sets are quite strong especially SubTect which has been making the rounds as of late. Nonetheless, we have already began to see new counterplay emerge, whether it be Iron Crown, Psychic Noise Tera Steel Latios, Scizor, and AV Hoopa Unbound, all of which utility in checking other common Pokemon such as Hatterene, Gliscor, Roaring moon, and general strong special threats like Raging Bolt respectively, in addition to players being more proactive in setting and maintaining entry hazards, which can pressure Subtect Kyurem over the course of a game. New options like Fezandipti have also began to see usage which players are using to check Pokemon other than Kyurem, like Iron Valiant, Darkrai, and Raging Bolt.
Speaking of entry hazards, this gets me onto my next point - the support Kyurem requires. Compared to many other top tiers gamers complain about like Darkrai and Gliscor, Kyurem actually requires a lot of support to get going. Hazard removal in a gen where hazards are nearly impossible to remove, pivots to bring it in safely against the Pokemon that it supposedly farms for free, like Gliscor (where Knock + Toxic destroy its threat level), etc. For a Pokemon that's supposedly quickban worthy, a significantly higher skill ceiling & level of support is required to use Kyurem and even then, its consistency and performance still can be lesser than many of its compatriots due to teams packing many of the Pokemon that it will naturally struggle against, such as Balloon Kingambit, Balloon Gholdengo, Zamazenta, Iron Valiant, etc. Speaking from experience, there is a massive amount of fluctuation in Kyurem's usefulness in a match - Gliscor and Darkrai are generally more splashable picks and arguably have higher upside as well due to Gliscor's better defensive profile, and Darkrai's better speed tier. Kyurem's defensive utility is quite poor in general next to many of OU's best Pokemon such as Kingambit, Primarina, Gliscor, Dragapult, and Gholdengo, which have significantly more utility checking threats while also being more effective general attackers due to their inherent traits, such as Kingambit's priority, Primarina's ability to block healing & act as a psuedo special wall on HO, or Gliscor's ability to ignore passive damage. Compared to these Pokemon, Kyurem needs to select its spots more carefully, and even then, it's structures can be prone to falling up short due to their inherent limitations, typically having a general vulnerability to key threats like Gholdengo, Darkrai, Zamazenta, and Iron Valiant.
There have been claims that Kyurem is limiting many balanced staples like Corviknight, Slowking-Galar, and Alomomola. However, I find this claim to be some cap. If anything, all of these balanced staples love Kyurem's presence as a queen piece that can make the most mileage out of their pivoting talents. Slowking-Galar's Chilly Reception boost Kyurem's bulk to let it better handle threats like Ogerpon-W, while it also lures in some threats Kyurem can take advantage of, like Samurott-H and Ting-Lu. Corviknight can safely bring Kyurem in against many of the threats its suppose to check like Gliscor and help Kyurem get rid of the hazards that so devastatingly limit it. Alomomola can help Kyurem regain its health that its likely to lose from entry hazards and appreciates Kyurem's (somewhat inconsistent) defensive utility against Ogerpon-W. The fact is, many balance staples are retaining a job because of Kyurem role as a partner to them. and this is reflected by many of the best Kyurem teams having one of Corviknight, Slowking-G, Alomomola, or another defensive pivot like Moltres paired with it. How can Kyurem be limiting the usage of the very Pokemon its commonly paired up with? It doesn't make sense.
The popular mechanic of the generation, Terastalization, has done wonders to help contain Kyurem, with many commonly used Pokemon like Raging Bolt, Kingambit, Gholdengo, and Garganacl running Tera Fairy and typically smoking most sets, with Garganacl mainly struggling against sub protect. Other Pokemon like AV Hoopa can make use of Tera Steel to grant enhanced safety against sets like Mixed Kyurem. Even Tera Fairy Ting-Lu is annoying for Kyurem to face, with it Whirlwinding Sub Kyurem away and forcing it to take increased entry hazard chip damage. Other common options such as Tinkaton have also begun seeing usage as well, which is in no way niche due to its utility against other common Pokemon like Darkrai and Raging Bolt with Encore. Despite complaints about it, the metagame has adapted itself to Kyurem quite well and will continue adapting to new sets like SubProtect, where options like Tera Steel Psychic Noise Latios, alluring voice users, and old favorites like Skeledirge are being explored to curb its impact, which have many other application use cases as well.
While I appreciate the OU Council's swiftness in taking action against threats the playerbase deems to be a problem, the fact of the matter is that this suspect is far too soon after the Gouging Fire suspect. While I generally don't feel that Gouging Fire's ban affected the metagame too drastically, it noticably buffed all of Kyurem's main checks and counters like Galarian Slowking, Iron Crown, Scizor, Tinkaton, Gholdengo, and more. I feel Kyurem was one of the few Pokemon notably hurt by Gouging Fire's ban because of this and I feel more time was needed before we proceeded with this suspect to see if the rise in these Pokemon would help curb its impact.
The closest set to being broken in my eyes is the mixed DD set, which is OP vs stall specifically. To my stall friends who may consider voting ban on Kyurem due to its mixed dd set being frustrating to fight, understand they will target Gliscor next which will destroy stall (& balance) as a whole. They will be citing a "lack of Ice-type attackers" as the thing that pushes scor over the edge. We saw stall get utterly destroyed following Gliscor's ban in the last DLC. We won't make the same mistake again, and Kyurem's presence does a great job in helping Gliscor stay in the tier. Stall has tools to deal with Kyurem, like Tera Steel Cresselia (which has an amazing general defensive profile might I add) but it does not have the tools to deal with losing its best defensive piece and Knock Off absorber.
I will vote Do not ban on Kyurem.