-
Check out the relaunch of our general collection, with classic designs and new ones by our very own Pissog!
-
Welcome to Smogon! Take a moment to read the Introduction to Smogon for a run-down on everything Smogon, and make sure you take some time to read the global rules.
np: UU - Rain Drops Keep Falling on my Head
- Thread starter JabbaTheGriffin
- Start date
- Status
Lonewolf said:
I don't know about that logic. The purpose of the paragraphs is to prove that you know what you're talking about, yes, but in reality every essay is potentially flawed, even the accepted ones. I think that I may have set my own bar too high because none of the suspects last test gave me the clean, consistent sweeps that Honchkrow, Gallade and Yanmega did.
the magneton analysis was written in a metagame in which torterra and roserade were popular, which makes hidden power fire or ice preferable over hidden power water or grass. hidden power fire was needed for steelix so there you go. i completely agree that in this metagame i would run hidden power water or potentially grass, but almost definitely not fire. magneton does have the unfortunate problem of raikou existing because (a) it sets up (b) it makes people prepared for special attacking electric types, but it can still perform its job of taking out steels just as well as it did before.
in a way it seems like magneton is more difficult to use than dugtrio but at the same time more rewarding. if you manage to set up on a registeel without seismic toss, you get to kill it and get a free sub and no hp loss out of the deal, while dugtrio can't switch in very safely and at best comes out of the deal with 30% and a big "setup bait" sticker.
in a way it seems like magneton is more difficult to use than dugtrio but at the same time more rewarding. if you manage to set up on a registeel without seismic toss, you get to kill it and get a free sub and no hp loss out of the deal, while dugtrio can't switch in very safely and at best comes out of the deal with 30% and a big "setup bait" sticker.
Registeel could TWave you, wait for Magnet Rise to wear off and hit you with Earthquake.
I know everyone's gonna say 'lol fail' but I've been experimenting with Calm mind/Pain Split Ninetales and it has been pretty boss so far. It can actually abuse Moltres to its own benefit and set up on it. Can also set up on Spiritomb without Calm Mind, Rotom, Weezing, and *gasp* even Milotic without Haze. I run just enough speed to outspeed max speed Moltres, then a good amount of defense Ev's and the rest in special attack. Arcanine's max attack LO Adamant Extremespeed doesn't 2HKO (without rocks, but I run a spinner) so Ninetales can even beat it if it doesn't run Flash Fire. It has been pretty fun to use actually. ^^
To all the people saying "well just run registeel/chansey on offense lol", I assume you'd be good with dropping Yanmega back down too? Because Rest Registeel and Chansey hard counter Yanmega just fine!
But of course, the rational people in the tier still voted out Yanmega unanimously because it is ridiculous to expect offensive teams to use Registeel. I don't care if people do it, I used Jynx to set up on and beat Cresselia, that didn't make Cresselia less broken and I certainly don't expect people to start putting Jynx on all their teams! I just really can't believe this is being presented as an apparently serious argument.
Anyway, regarding Magneton, I used it to great success in the Yanmega metagame, but then people started running Stoss/Shadow Claw instead of Iron Head/EQ on Registeel, which significantly hampers Magneton's effectiveness because it can no longer make unbreakable subs. Magneton is strictly better than Duggy at eliminating steel types (especially Steelix) but if you find yourself running into Stoss Registeel often you'd probably be better off just using Duggy.
Of course, if you do manage to set up on a Registeel, that might as well be game, because with Charge Beam, Magneton can amass multiple boosts easily and take out Registeel and one or two other Pokemon to boot.
Edit: Thund, did you use the Plusle set I made yet?!
But of course, the rational people in the tier still voted out Yanmega unanimously because it is ridiculous to expect offensive teams to use Registeel. I don't care if people do it, I used Jynx to set up on and beat Cresselia, that didn't make Cresselia less broken and I certainly don't expect people to start putting Jynx on all their teams! I just really can't believe this is being presented as an apparently serious argument.
Anyway, regarding Magneton, I used it to great success in the Yanmega metagame, but then people started running Stoss/Shadow Claw instead of Iron Head/EQ on Registeel, which significantly hampers Magneton's effectiveness because it can no longer make unbreakable subs. Magneton is strictly better than Duggy at eliminating steel types (especially Steelix) but if you find yourself running into Stoss Registeel often you'd probably be better off just using Duggy.
Of course, if you do manage to set up on a Registeel, that might as well be game, because with Charge Beam, Magneton can amass multiple boosts easily and take out Registeel and one or two other Pokemon to boot.
Edit: Thund, did you use the Plusle set I made yet?!
Uh no. That was your thing, Ninetales was mine. =P
No it isn't. It still seems that people still have the misconception that Offensive teams do nothing but attacking. Offensive teams greatly benefit from defensive pivots like Registeel. They don't just mindlessly attack and hope for the best, HO requires a lot of long term thinking and strategical moves. Registeel can also act as a win-condition sweeper with something like Curse/Resttalk/Iron Head or something like that as well. If Raikou is that big of a threat, perhaps HO teams can consider incorporating him as a member.
Also, the argument of "Pokemon X beats playstyle Y, therefore Pokemon X is BL/Uber" is flawed. Again, if you read the Collosoil analysis on Smog 5, it makes this point very clearly. Blissey and Latias clearly stops a vast majority of Special attackers and makes it very difficult for special attacking HO to function well. Does that mean they are Uber?? Of course not. Blissey has been debated time and time again and has always been deemed OU (It hasn't even had the privilege of a Suspect vote), and while Latias has been voted Uber in Stage 3-4, it is certainly not in the Defensive Characteristic (Specs Latias is what was found to be broken). Yes, you can say Gallade and Yanmega was voted BL because they screwed up an entire playstyle, but has it occurred to "Raikou is BL" advocates that it is simply because they fitted the Offensive Characteristic and can "Sweep a large proportion of the metagame with little to no support"?? The fact that they screwed up an entire playstyle is merely a consequence of them fitting the Offensive Characteristic.
That's about the same thing as saying "it is ridiculous to expect offensive teams to use walls" which is...completely untrue. Primarily offensive teams would really love hazard support and easy switch-ins for when they're forced out by something they can't beat, which is exactly why Registeel is on most of my teams, regardless of the focus. If you are using nothing but bulky sweepers and relying on defensive type coverage, you are playing a risky game no matter what, especially in a metagame where switching in and out safely is fairly difficult due to the prevalence of Spikes.
What is ridiculous, however, is expecting every team to rely on Chansey and Registeel to beat something that otherwise tramples any and everything else on your team. That much I'd agree with.
No, actually, it is. We voted out Gallade because it is ridiculous to expect stall to run offensive Pokemon just to check it; offense had absolutely no problem with Gallade, due to its terrible base SPE, but it was still voted out because it broke stall wide open. Stall had to run shit like Swellow and LOtres just to survive with it in the tier, due to Spiritomb, Weezing, and every other physical wall of note all being ohko'd by Gallade's boosted attacks.
I wasn't around a lot during the Crobat meta, but I understand that it was voted out for similar reasons.
So yes, there is plenty of precedence for voting out Pokemon because they "break" stall or "break" offense, because such styles constitute a "significant portion of the metagame"; if large parts of the metagame are no longer viable due to a Pokemon, then clearly, the metagame is unbalanced and something must be done about it.
Edit: SJCrew, I'm not saying offensive teams should or shouldn't run walls (disregrading the whole discussion about team templates). But when the entire purpose of your pivot is to ensure that you aren't utterly decimated by a certain Pokemon, and when you have to use one of a select pool of Pokemon in order for your playstyle to even remain viable, I'd argue that there is an imbalance in the metagame.
And neither one of you answered my question. Why was Yanmega banned if your arguments hold ground, and would you be okay with it coming back?
I wasn't around a lot during the Crobat meta, but I understand that it was voted out for similar reasons.
So yes, there is plenty of precedence for voting out Pokemon because they "break" stall or "break" offense, because such styles constitute a "significant portion of the metagame"; if large parts of the metagame are no longer viable due to a Pokemon, then clearly, the metagame is unbalanced and something must be done about it.
Edit: SJCrew, I'm not saying offensive teams should or shouldn't run walls (disregrading the whole discussion about team templates). But when the entire purpose of your pivot is to ensure that you aren't utterly decimated by a certain Pokemon, and when you have to use one of a select pool of Pokemon in order for your playstyle to even remain viable, I'd argue that there is an imbalance in the metagame.
And neither one of you answered my question. Why was Yanmega banned if your arguments hold ground, and would you be okay with it coming back?
He raises an extremely valid point. When talk about the metagame, we deal with ALL of UU. Stall, Balance and Offense.'
(Interesting that Gallade wrecked stall)
Crobat was banned for breaking pretty much every style of play since it checked or countered so many pokemon (it actually was a very strong member of stall).
I didn't know that. I wish I'd played UU more often back then, it seems really fun. Instead I was being trolled by Garchomps >_>
My point was that saying "If Raikou is so broken, why did we not vote it BL". I'm simply saying that those results don't affect the validity of either argument; rather they show which is a more convincing argument.
I never said anything about the process being messed up. I'm just saying that people vote, not robots.
I addressed this earlier. Yanmega absolutely forces you to run Registeel and Chansey or your team WILL get run over. That's not metagame development, that's just an extremely specific, non-negotiable stipulation for countering an otherwise broken Pokemon.
Honestly, Raikou doesn't seem all that dissimilar to me. Sure, certain Pokemon counter it based on what HP it's carrying, but it's absolutely no comfort to me that I counter ~60% of Raikou out there with Torterra if one with HP Ice kills it and proceeds to wreck the rest of my team. The only non-movepool/set specific counters in the entire tier are Registeel and Chansey...much like with Yanmega. Sure, it can be revenge killed by the likes of Swellow and Sceptile...but so could Yanmega! That's really the point I'm trying to make.
Registeel's a bit of a shaky counter. Seismic Toss will 4HKO, but so will Thunderbolt, and Raikou is faster, and Regi has to switch in if we're talking about counter as in something that switches in and shuts it down. It does have Thunderwave, which is a plus, but an unboosted Iron Head doesn't even break Raikou's subs if it lacks Seismic Toss. Chansey and Dugtrio are really the only hard counters (except not Duggy if Raikou's behind a sub).
Registeel gets Earthquake...it's definitely not a shaky counter if it has that, which most do.
Don't forget that Yanmega has Speed Boost, so revenge killing isn't really an option. Anyway, Yanmega was banned because it met the Offensive Characteristic, ie He could sweep a large portion of teams in the metagame with little to no support. The fact that he "destroyed" offense is an effect, not a cause. "Pokemon X making playstyle Y difficult" does not warrant to Pokemon X being broken. I made the Latias/Blissey example before, but let's make another one. Heracross pretty much makes every OU Stall team crap their pants, because he easily OHKO or 2HKO pretty much every Pokemon on the stall team if he happens to switch into Toxic Spikes (Which a lot of Stall teams run). Although Hera is rare in OU (Which means people can be a bit more lax about their team building), any stall team should still be prepared to face it if it ever comes into play. Does that mean Heracross is Uber because he forces EVERY stall team to run Gliscor (Which Heracross can beat if he catches him Roosting), Weezing or something like that??
@ Narulyg: Registeel can run EQ for Raikou, and Dugtrio is not a counter because he can't switch in on anything apart from Thunderbolt.
Duggy can survive an unboosted HP with some SpDef investment, so it does hard counter SubCM Raikou, if there arent 2+ layers of spikes I think.
Dangit, I think there's a certain tiredness level where I shouldn't be allowed to make judgments off of movesets.
The offensive characteristic says that a pokemon needs virtually no support to sweep effectively, which of Raikou does not meet this requirment. You can't just send him in early game and expect him too sweep. You need team support to help with troublesome walls/revenge killers. That's why Moltres isn't BL at this moment, he needs a lot of team support in order to be effective eg. SR removal and spike support.
Back to Raikou: If he is causing you problems, you have to learn to adapt. If the old offense is not working, try something that works. Don't just ban random crap because it owns your team from two metagames ago. The metagame evolves and forces players to evolve with it. If you choose not to you will probably be left in the dust. Of course some things are just too powerful for the metagame and will make it unhealthy eg. Cressilia since it had very limited counters.
Right now I think RP Torterra is more dangerous than Raikou since basically only a Scarfed Ice attack stops it. :/
Back to Raikou: If he is causing you problems, you have to learn to adapt. If the old offense is not working, try something that works. Don't just ban random crap because it owns your team from two metagames ago. The metagame evolves and forces players to evolve with it. If you choose not to you will probably be left in the dust. Of course some things are just too powerful for the metagame and will make it unhealthy eg. Cressilia since it had very limited counters.
Right now I think RP Torterra is more dangerous than Raikou since basically only a Scarfed Ice attack stops it. :/
People dismiss this, but I'll still say it for whatever reason.
With a mere 8 Atk EVs and a neutral nature, Lanturn's Aqua Tail will always break 4/0 Raikou's substitutes, making it the hardest counter possible to non HP Grass / Ground Raikou. On a less... endearing note, it takes 124 EVs for that same Aqua Tail to break a 252 HP sub, but I have no idea how common 252 HP Sub Raikou is (probably not very), so take that with a grain of salt.
People say "i would lol if a lanturn aqua tailed me" but then that makes me lol as Lanturn mercilessly rapes the SubCM Raikou that they previously thought was safe. Aqua Tail / Discharge / Heal Bell / (move, probably Rest) Lanturn can be decently legit, though it loses its ability to put the hurt on Rhyperior... but it's not hard for Rhyperior to outrun Lanturn anyway, so w/e. Pair it up with Wish Leafeon and you'll find that it's easy to get Lanturn in on the Ice and Fire attacks coming at Leafeon while Ground and Grass attacks are covered by Leafeon.
As for RP Torterra, it's got the same hilarious checks that it's always had. Leafeon and Torterra are essentially impossible for it to break, it can be beaten through pivot switching between something like Hitmontop to intimidate it and Altaria to take the STABs, it's hard to set up without taking damage, it's got a crippling ice weakness, and in order to do its best damage to crucial foes it has to take a fuckton of recoil. I love RP Torterra to death, but it's no automatic rampage machine.
With a mere 8 Atk EVs and a neutral nature, Lanturn's Aqua Tail will always break 4/0 Raikou's substitutes, making it the hardest counter possible to non HP Grass / Ground Raikou. On a less... endearing note, it takes 124 EVs for that same Aqua Tail to break a 252 HP sub, but I have no idea how common 252 HP Sub Raikou is (probably not very), so take that with a grain of salt.
People say "i would lol if a lanturn aqua tailed me" but then that makes me lol as Lanturn mercilessly rapes the SubCM Raikou that they previously thought was safe. Aqua Tail / Discharge / Heal Bell / (move, probably Rest) Lanturn can be decently legit, though it loses its ability to put the hurt on Rhyperior... but it's not hard for Rhyperior to outrun Lanturn anyway, so w/e. Pair it up with Wish Leafeon and you'll find that it's easy to get Lanturn in on the Ice and Fire attacks coming at Leafeon while Ground and Grass attacks are covered by Leafeon.
As for RP Torterra, it's got the same hilarious checks that it's always had. Leafeon and Torterra are essentially impossible for it to break, it can be beaten through pivot switching between something like Hitmontop to intimidate it and Altaria to take the STABs, it's hard to set up without taking damage, it's got a crippling ice weakness, and in order to do its best damage to crucial foes it has to take a fuckton of recoil. I love RP Torterra to death, but it's no automatic rampage machine.
- Status