np: USUM UU Stage 8.1 - Garden (Mega Venusaur banned)

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Hogg

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The much-anticipated tier shifts brought quite a few significant changes to UU, but none so significant as the two powerhouse megas that dropped down from OU: Mega Diancie and Mega Venusaur. Both of these proved to be absolute top threats in the tier. While the council was near-unanimous in agreeing to quickban Mega Diancie thanks to its Speed, typing and top-notch wallbreaking potential, on the question of Mega Venusaur they presented a much less united front, splitting 6-5 against quickbanning. Therefore, we are bringing the question the public: should Mega Venusaur remain UU?


Mega Venusaur is a defensive behemoth on par with previously suspected threats such as Mega Slowbro and Mega Latias. With an excellent defensive typing (especially when backed by its ability, Thick Fat) and stunning 80/123/120 defenses, there isn't much that Mega Venusaur can't withstand. On top of all of this, MVenu sports a very respectable 122 Special Attack, ensuring that this prehistoric beast is anything but passive. However, it's not all garden parties for Mega Venusaur: with no recovery outside of the unreliable Synthesis, Mega Venusaur's great bulk is prone to getting chipped away by hazards, sand and Scald burns. And while its Special Attack means its Sludge Bombs and Giga Drains pack a punch, Poison and Grass have less than ideal coverage in UU.

Now, this suspect is going to be handled a little differently from previous suspects. Most importantly, there will be no suspect ladder. Instead, the standard UU ladder will remain open. Those who wish to participate in this suspect test will instead use a fresh, suspect-specific alt. The actual requirements will be the same that they have been in previous suspects: at least 40 games, with a GXE of 80 or higher.

Here are the requirements in detail:
  • All games must be played on the Pokemon Showdown! UU ladder on a fresh alt with the following format: "UUVS (Nick)." For example, I might register the alt UUVS Hogg to ladder with. You must meet the listed format in order to qualify.
  • To qualify for voting, your alt must play a minimum of 40 games, and
  • You must have a minimum GXE of 80.
That's it! You have until Saturday, August 4 at 11:59 PM GMT -4 to meet voting requirements. Feel free to post if you have any questions about the current suspect format. Happy laddering!


 
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justdrew

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I got reqs in 40 games, on the regular ladder reqs are much easier to get. S/o to PinkDragonTamer for the team, I don't know if he wants me sharing it so I won't link it. If PDT gives me permission I will paste team.


My thoughts on Mvenu are this. It is such a centralizing Pokemon to the meta. It can fit on every team type, its versatility and viability are unmatched in UU (Scizor being a close 2nd). Mvenu is fat, it is hard to break and it can threaten every single one of its checks with Sludge Bomb poisons, Leech Seed, or Sleep Powder. Swords Dance and Growth also pose huge offensive threats. Mvenu took Gliscors place as UU's crutch Pokemon. By crutch Pokemon I mean a Pokemon that can fit on every team and is very easy to use and keep alive. Every team has to have a hard counter to Mvenu which to me makes it broken. I am voting ban.
 
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Freeroamer

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I really don’t understand the logic of using the regular ladder at the same GXE value. Drew has what I’d consider a good above average record, he wins 5+ for every game he loses yet he hasn’t even broken 1600, coming in just outside the top 200 on ladder which I don’t think is really a great way of determining if someone is competent enough to vote in this test. Drew could probably have lost at least another 3 or 4 games before his GXE would’ve been in much peril which likely only just puts himself above 1500 if not below it which definitely can’t be seen as competence in the current tier surely. I’m not expecting people to have to go and challenge pif at the very peak of the ladder but this seems a touch on the easy side to me. Outside of the first few days where you might play other people going for reqs using the regular ladder is going to give you much easier games for a longer spell as virtually anything can make its way into the 1400-1500 bracket provided the player using it has at least some familiarity with the game, which doesn’t really bode well for users showing they’ve earnt the right to vote.
 

Hogg

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We discussed possibly raising the GXE requirement, since this would likely make laddering easier, but did not want to do so for this trial run of the new suspect system. After all, easier reqs in theory does not necessarily mean easier reqs in practice. We decided it was safer to keep reqs the same for this run, so that we could later compare its results to previous suspects.

As the suspect goes on and more people try for reqs, I'll be very interested to hear feedback on how it went and if we should adjust the game minimum or GXE requirements for future tests.
 
I really don’t understand the logic of using the regular ladder at the same GXE value. Drew has what I’d consider a good above average record, he wins 5+ for every game he loses yet he hasn’t even broken 1600, coming in just outside the top 200 on ladder which I don’t think is really a great way of determining if someone is competent enough to vote in this test. Drew could probably have lost at least another 3 or 4 games before his GXE would’ve been in much peril which likely only just puts himself above 1500 if not below it which definitely can’t be seen as competence in the current tier surely. I’m not expecting people to have to go and challenge pif at the very peak of the ladder but this seems a touch on the easy side to me. Outside of the first few days where you might play other people going for reqs using the regular ladder is going to give you much easier games for a longer spell as virtually anything can make its way into the 1400-1500 bracket provided the player using it has at least some familiarity with the game, which doesn’t really bode well for users showing they’ve earnt the right to vote.
If you want to increase the effect of a loss, you could also gate the reqs to be the top "x number" of UUVS alts on the ladder that also meet the GXE and game count requirement. It increases the effect of a loss by not only pitting the player against the game, but also against another player through rankings.
 

Hogg

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I'm sorry if I'm not understanding, but how does raising the GXE make laddering easier?
It doesn’t. Holding the suspect on the regular ladder makes getting reqs easier. The discussion was whether or not we should raise the GXE or minimum game requirements to account for that (ie to balance it out, and keep the approximate difficulty the same).
 

pdt

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I think in terms of either raising GXE or minimum game requirements, I would have to say raising minimum games seems more effective. If the GXE was raised, players could just make new accounts and start over until the reach the requirement, but with more games they would play at a higher level on average assuming with more games maintaining an 80 GXE, they would be at a higher ELO on ladder, which would help them formulate better opinions while playing against users who have better knowledge of the tier.
 

Lilymoding

formerly Kyosuru Jets
If you want to increase the effect of a loss, you could also gate the reqs to be the top "x number" of UUVS alts on the ladder that also meet the GXE and game count requirement. It increases the effect of a loss by not only pitting the player against the game, but also against another player through rankings.
I dont think artificially limiting the amount of people that can give their opinion is a good idea when judging how a mon fits in a tier, and deciding whether or not it should be banned. I can't really comment on the system that's up now, but anybody with competency should be able to contribute, not just the most competent.
 

justdrew

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Freeroamer I was 33-2 with an 84.6% gxe at 1626 and then I started playing bad. Of course the ladder is going to be easier. Getting gxe on the suspect ladder is like picking up individual grains of sand with your eye balls. The amount of gxe you gain is dependent on your opponent and if you’re playing people who just started laddering of course you’re going to gain less and in turn have to play more games to get 80%. 80% gxe is not a walk in the park for “Charizardlover4000” as Kink puts it. This was a test run of a suspect test do let’s see how it goes. There can be speculation but we will be able to see the quantity and quality of the voters at the end of the suspect. And once we see the voters the council can decide if this suspect is a good option for the future. I think keeping reqs the same will be fine. 80% is a respectable gxe and more voters will mean more conversation and attention to the tier.
 
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dingbat

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Gonna quickly find a prior post of mine and then edit it in here since it largely pertains to this one as well.
One thing I'd like to add myself is that the GXE/game requirement could be adjusted depending on the timing of suspect tests, but I think 82 GXE/50 games is as high as requirements should go. Most good or well known players could probably still break the 82 GXE mark by a huge margin (won't include myself because I've had suspects where I broke 85 GXE as well as suspects where I couldn't break 75), but we're looking at GXE values that are excessively subjective since one can only have so many good matchups before he/she run into inevitable losses that have varying degrees of impact on GXE.

Basically less of timing, more of subjectivity here
 
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Hey guys! It's been a long time since I played singles, but I recently came back and joined the UU metagame as a player, even if I've always been specting matches since the release of SM.

I'm confirming as UUVS Popplio and I'd like to say something about Mega Venu. I think it absolutely deserves the S rank, because you can put it in every kind of team and it'll surely do something useful despite of the specific set: leech seeding, poisoning with Sludge Bombs, simply damaging or force switching and also boosting with Growth/Swords Dance or Curse/Amnesia. Can come in a lot of times - despite hazards/Scald burns/getting chipped - thanks to Synthesis and Leech Seed and much more if paired with a Wish passer. In my opinion, its most important weapon is the bulkyness:

252+ Atk Tough Claws Aerodactyl-Mega Wing Attack vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Venusaur-Mega: 242-288 (80.3 - 95.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 Atk Crobat Brave Bird vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Venusaur-Mega: 254-302 (84.3 - 100.3%) -- 6.3% chance to OHKO
252 SpA Latias Psychic vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Venusaur-Mega: 224-266 (74.4 - 88.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 Atk Strong Jaw Sharpedo-Mega Psychic Fangs vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Venusaur-Mega: 246-290 (81.7 - 96.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 SpA Life Orb Starmie Psyshock vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Venusaur-Mega: 242-283 (80.3 - 94%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 SpA Life Orb Starmie Psychic vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Venusaur-Mega: 273-322 (90.6 - 106.9%) -- 43.8% chance to OHKO [but 252 SpA Life Orb Starmie Psychic vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Venusaur-Mega: 273-322 (75 - 88.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO]
252 SpA Moltres Hurricane vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Venusaur-Mega: 300-354 (99.6 - 117.6%) -- 93.8% chance to OHKO [but 252 SpA Moltres Hurricane vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Venusaur-Mega: 300-354 (82.4 - 97.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO]
252 SpA Pidgeot-Mega Hurricane vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Venusaur-Mega: 318-374 (87.3 - 102.7%) -- 18.8% chance to OHKO
252+ SpA Choice Specs Primarina Psychic vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Venusaur-Mega: 272-320 (90.3 - 106.3%) -- 37.5% chance to OHKO


These calcs mean that there is no Pokemon able to 100% kill MVenu even with a supereffective STAB move, without a boosting item or a Z-move.
In the end, I think MVenu pressures really much teambuilding and also the games, because you can't Toxic so, if you lose the only members of your team able to hit it hard, you automatically lose. Yeah, you can try to burn and chip it, but in the meantime you have to switch it simply does what he wants and seeds/poisons/sleep powders/damages your team. For these several reasons, I think the UU metagame would be better without it and I'm voting Ban.
 

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Hogg

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Hey, folks, while I appreciate the discussion, there’s no need to post your reqs here (unless you want to). There will still be a voting ID thread going up later in the suspect, and you’ll still be required to ID there even if you’ve already done so here.
 
Hey guys! It's been a long time since I played singles, but I recently came back and joined the UU metagame as a player, even if I've always been specting matches since the release of SM.

I'm confirming as UUVS Popplio and I'd like to say something about Mega Venu. I think it absolutely deserves the S rank, because you can put it in every kind of team and it'll surely do something useful despite of the specific set: leech seeding, poisoning with Sludge Bombs, simply damaging or force switching and also boosting with Growth/Swords Dance or Curse/Amnesia. Can come in a lot of times - despite hazards/Scald burns/getting chipped - thanks to Synthesis and Leech Seed and much more if paired with a Wish passer. In my opinion, its most important weapon is the bulkyness:

252+ Atk Tough Claws Aerodactyl-Mega Wing Attack vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Venusaur-Mega: 242-288 (80.3 - 95.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 Atk Crobat Brave Bird vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Venusaur-Mega: 254-302 (84.3 - 100.3%) -- 6.3% chance to OHKO
252 SpA Latias Psychic vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Venusaur-Mega: 224-266 (74.4 - 88.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 Atk Strong Jaw Sharpedo-Mega Psychic Fangs vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Venusaur-Mega: 246-290 (81.7 - 96.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 SpA Life Orb Starmie Psyshock vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Venusaur-Mega: 242-283 (80.3 - 94%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 SpA Life Orb Starmie Psychic vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Venusaur-Mega: 273-322 (90.6 - 106.9%) -- 43.8% chance to OHKO [but 252 SpA Life Orb Starmie Psychic vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Venusaur-Mega: 273-322 (75 - 88.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO]
252 SpA Moltres Hurricane vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Venusaur-Mega: 300-354 (99.6 - 117.6%) -- 93.8% chance to OHKO [but 252 SpA Moltres Hurricane vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Venusaur-Mega: 300-354 (82.4 - 97.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO]
252 SpA Pidgeot-Mega Hurricane vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Venusaur-Mega: 318-374 (87.3 - 102.7%) -- 18.8% chance to OHKO
252+ SpA Choice Specs Primarina Psychic vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Venusaur-Mega: 272-320 (90.3 - 106.3%) -- 37.5% chance to OHKO


These calcs mean that there is no Pokemon able to 100% kill MVenu even with a supereffective STAB move, without a boosting item or a Z-move.
In the end, I think MVenu pressures really much teambuilding and also the games, because you can't Toxic so, if you lose the only members of your team able to hit it hard, you automatically lose. Yeah, you can try to burn and chip it, but in the meantime you have to switch it simply does what he wants and seeds/poisons/sleep powders/damages your team. For these several reasons, I think the UU metagame would be better without it and I'm voting Ban.
Try Azelf.
 

Freeroamer

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Just finished my reqs, not the most successful evening I've ever had laddering special shoutout to the dude who crit me 12 times in 32 turns for achieving a real statistical impossibility but w/e anyway

I think Venusaur is a little bit too much for this metagame at present. It's ability to single handedly dominate the offensive metagame in terms of what's viable and what's not while still proving a legitimate offensive threat in it's own right give it a tremendous presence, and one that's hard to justify keeping. One of the biggest issues I have in responding to Mega Venusaur is that the vast majority of it's checks are SR weak, which forces building to become increasingly repetitive as users look to the same tried and tested cores of Venu answer+removal+hazards+answers to everything else within the metagame. Honestly the amount of teams I played against in this suspect where the teams were virtually identical other than a slight shift to accommodate a different offensive venu check and the tradeoffs with that was absolutely ridiculous. Venu is absolutely too much for the tier right now, and if it stays long term building in this tier is going to become extremely stale and unenjoyable.
 

ausma

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this mon is something else
i just got around to laddering, so i'm far from reaching that voting par, but ya know. here are my thoughts because discussion is cool
mega venu was a really cool addition to the tier (as well as one i didn't expect), but so far it's done some huge work. it's an amazing damage soaker and has a lot of sustain options that make it one hell of a wall that can pack a punch too. kinda like what someone said earlier mega venu has always been a sorta crutch mon to me. it's got a juicy defensive typing with all arounder tools to support its team with, which is why i loved using the thing in ou. now that it's in a metagame full of mons that struggle to hit grass/poison types it's become way better at walling and easily centralizing. the main thing i noticed as i started to ladder up is that it is really, really good at being a general pivot. thick fat, good defensive stats/typing in the tier, and respectable sustain options make it really good at being both a wall and a pivot which honestly is an asset that can go onto any team.

do i think this makes it ban worthy, though? honestly, no. main reason i say that is because even though i stand by what i said about it being an amazing all arounder pivot and wall, i can compare this thing's likeness to gliscor. it's an incredibly good asset to have on your team that's versatile and just generally is a good way to round off a team, but it's far from invincible, especially now that we got stuff like moltres in the tier that wreaks havoc with STAB base 125 hurricanes. in fact the calcs below just show that there is a lot that hurts the hell outta this mon.

252+ Atk Tough Claws Aerodactyl-Mega Wing Attack vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Venusaur-Mega: 242-288 (80.3 - 95.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 Atk Crobat Brave Bird vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Venusaur-Mega: 254-302 (84.3 - 100.3%) -- 6.3% chance to OHKO
252 SpA Latias Psychic vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Venusaur-Mega: 224-266 (74.4 - 88.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 Atk Strong Jaw Sharpedo-Mega Psychic Fangs vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Venusaur-Mega: 246-290 (81.7 - 96.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 SpA Life Orb Starmie Psyshock vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Venusaur-Mega: 242-283 (80.3 - 94%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 SpA Life Orb Starmie Psychic vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Venusaur-Mega: 273-322 (90.6 - 106.9%) -- 43.8% chance to OHKO [but 252 SpA Life Orb Starmie Psychic vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Venusaur-Mega: 273-322 (75 - 88.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO]
252 SpA Moltres Hurricane vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Venusaur-Mega: 300-354 (99.6 - 117.6%) -- 93.8% chance to OHKO [but 252 SpA Moltres Hurricane vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Venusaur-Mega: 300-354 (82.4 - 97.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO]
252 SpA Pidgeot-Mega Hurricane vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Venusaur-Mega: 318-374 (87.3 - 102.7%) -- 18.8% chance to OHKO
252+ SpA Choice Specs Primarina Psychic vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Venusaur-Mega: 272-320 (90.3 - 106.3%) -- 37.5% chance to OHKO


These calcs mean that there is no Pokemon able to 100% kill MVenu even with a supereffective STAB move, without a boosting item or a Z-move.
In the end, I think MVenu pressures really much teambuilding and also the games, because you can't Toxic so, if you lose the only members of your team able to hit it hard, you automatically lose. Yeah, you can try to burn and chip it, but in the meantime you have to switch it simply does what he wants and seeds/poisons/sleep powders/damages your team. For these several reasons, I think the UU metagame would be better without it and I'm voting Ban.
these calcs are pretty cool and all, but the fact they don't safely ohko venu is honestly far from making it too bulky for the tier to handle. while they don't necessarily hit that ideal benchmark the fallicy in using these as a way to support a claim of it being way too bulky for the tier is that this thing is meant to eat all kinds of hits. a lot of these moves safely ohko after rocks, and even then a good chunk of them are damage rolls. another thing is mega venu is so rarely at that high of a hp percentage that honestly the fact they don't ohko isn't even that big of a concern. the fact is, this thing eats all sorts of hits and these ones used in the calcs are not a good way to gauge the "overpowered" bulkiness of mega venu due to how it's usually rocking mid to midhigh hp percentages and needs valuable turns of synthesis to theoretically live the hits (which can make a huge difference, but this would take prediction and solid reads which, honestly, with any bulky mon is just the nature of competitive pokemon as a whole and far from a broken trait).

so tl;dr this thing is basically the new gliscor. but the fact it is that new gliscor does not make it inherently broken. while this thing is a phenomenal pivot, wall, and all around versatile damage dealer, the fact is that it takes too much punishment (extent drastically varying) to be considered invincible or broken. centralizing? yes. but as long as you have some sort of wallbreaker on your team this thing can drop no problem. you do not need a specific mon or strategy to blow it away as long as you keep offensive pressure.
 
One thing I will say is it is extremely powerful and there's a lot of pokemon to pair with it like alomolola for phys attackers with super effective damage or blissey for psychic or hurricane users. Mega venucan be succeptable to set up but there's pairing options for it. And psychic types can easily be trapped by alolomuk. I do think it's too much for the tier although I haven't seen it being used too tremendously more counter teaming options. One thing I've been testing is salazzle and so long as they don't have a mon with heal bell or aromatherapy you 1v1 it easily
 
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