So it begins.
Let me start it simple fact: Aegislash is the best pokemon in the metagame. Period. If there was an S+ rank, Aegislash would be the first, and probably the only mon to deserve it. It's even better than the recently banned deoxys formes, although those were in my opinion more unhealthy to the meta. It is just amazing at everything it does. It can wall, sweep, pivot, wallbreak, revenge kill, and be good at any of those depending on what set you use. It counters a high number of common threats, being able to easily switch into many things with its high number of resistances and good bulk, and its high offensive power. It easily becomes the MVP is any team it's in, being the one pokemon that will deal the hugest blow to the team if it goes down, because of the sheer match-up advantage it brings.
Even more, it is centralizing as fuck. There is just no way around it, Aegislash is the king of gen 6, the one pokemon that defines it and dictates its rules. The name of Gen 6 OU is Aegislash. Being countered by Aegislash is usually grounds for keeping a pokemon with low usage, or even outside OU. Things such as Medicham and Gardevoir are prevented from ruling the tier because of it, while others such as Starmie are barely viable. In a game ruled by Aegislash, how well a pokemon fares against it is a major criterium to choose it. Heck, Aegislash was probably the reason the Deos took so long to be banned, since it was the only thing preventing them from being blatantly gamebreaking. Using a pokemon that is countered by Aegislash means every time it comes in, it will give a free switch to something with a 150 attack stat and a spammable Shadow Ball. The only reason Aegislash isn't a bigger concern in teambuilding is that almost everything it can easily beat has been kicked down to the lower tiers long ago.
That said, being "the best" and "the most centralizing" doesn't necessarily mean it should be banned. While it's true there isn't anything that counters every single of its sets, that also goes for many of the pokemon in OU. And a game where everything had easy counters would be a boring game, with long battles and lots of double switches. Besides, Aegislash still has a high number of checks. Things that can't always switch, but beat every set if they are given a free switch. Such as Mega Charizard Y, Landorus, Amoongus, Excadrill, Garchomp, Mega Gyarados... anything with decent speed, and a super-effective, contact-less STAB wins against it. And there are quite a few pokemon who can do that because Aegislash is still a slow pokemon, with 4 weaknesses (3 common ones). And once you discover its set, the number of checks (and counters) rises even more. So Aegislash, despite being amazing, is not excessively hard to beat. Every team has something that beats it, and it's often without sacrificing a lot of effectiveness against other pokemon.
I also don't agree with the 50/50 argument. There is a reason we play this game against players, instead of sticking to NPCs like the Battle Maison. It's because it leads to mind games, where the best option isn't simple the one with the highest probability of success, but where being able to manipulate or predict your opponent is also a skill. This is why, for example, we use lures: we are sacrificing an objective probability of victory to induce a desired behavior in our opponent. A game where every move was dictated by the highest probability of winning wouldn't be a game, it would be a math problem. Aegislash, in that sense, it's a pokemon higly dependant on mind games: the player who manages to manipulate the opponent the best tends to win the match-ups involving it. For example, a few months ago, I was using a SUbstitute Kyurem-B. After many matches, I learned that the best way of defeating opposing Aegislashes with my Kyu-B was by picking moves in this order: Sub-Sub-Earth Power-Earth Power, because more often than not, it would induce my opponent into doing what I wanted. Similarly, if I'm using an Aegislash and have a good reason to think I'm facing a Belly Drum Azumarill, I may try to use Shadow Ball even though I'm already in Blade Forme, since the Azumarill is likely going to attempt to set up on me. That is a kind skill that goes beyond the simple X-Y% probabilities that people are talking about in this thread, and I think the game is more interesting with it.
In the end, what it should boil down to, is: being Aegislash a metagame centralizing entity, is it centralizing the meta into a more fun and competitive one? If it is not, then it should be banned. Personally, I'm not feeling it. I'm glad they did this suspect test because this is a discussion that really needs to be done, but for now, I don't think it should be banned. It simply isn't unhealthy for the meta. It might even be making the meta more healthy, since it keeps a lot of potentially broken offensive threats in check, like it did with the Deos. I might change my mind after playing the suspect ladder. After all, a gen 6 OU game without Aegislash might be completely different from anything we have played before. Let's just see how good it is.
Let me start it simple fact: Aegislash is the best pokemon in the metagame. Period. If there was an S+ rank, Aegislash would be the first, and probably the only mon to deserve it. It's even better than the recently banned deoxys formes, although those were in my opinion more unhealthy to the meta. It is just amazing at everything it does. It can wall, sweep, pivot, wallbreak, revenge kill, and be good at any of those depending on what set you use. It counters a high number of common threats, being able to easily switch into many things with its high number of resistances and good bulk, and its high offensive power. It easily becomes the MVP is any team it's in, being the one pokemon that will deal the hugest blow to the team if it goes down, because of the sheer match-up advantage it brings.
Even more, it is centralizing as fuck. There is just no way around it, Aegislash is the king of gen 6, the one pokemon that defines it and dictates its rules. The name of Gen 6 OU is Aegislash. Being countered by Aegislash is usually grounds for keeping a pokemon with low usage, or even outside OU. Things such as Medicham and Gardevoir are prevented from ruling the tier because of it, while others such as Starmie are barely viable. In a game ruled by Aegislash, how well a pokemon fares against it is a major criterium to choose it. Heck, Aegislash was probably the reason the Deos took so long to be banned, since it was the only thing preventing them from being blatantly gamebreaking. Using a pokemon that is countered by Aegislash means every time it comes in, it will give a free switch to something with a 150 attack stat and a spammable Shadow Ball. The only reason Aegislash isn't a bigger concern in teambuilding is that almost everything it can easily beat has been kicked down to the lower tiers long ago.
That said, being "the best" and "the most centralizing" doesn't necessarily mean it should be banned. While it's true there isn't anything that counters every single of its sets, that also goes for many of the pokemon in OU. And a game where everything had easy counters would be a boring game, with long battles and lots of double switches. Besides, Aegislash still has a high number of checks. Things that can't always switch, but beat every set if they are given a free switch. Such as Mega Charizard Y, Landorus, Amoongus, Excadrill, Garchomp, Mega Gyarados... anything with decent speed, and a super-effective, contact-less STAB wins against it. And there are quite a few pokemon who can do that because Aegislash is still a slow pokemon, with 4 weaknesses (3 common ones). And once you discover its set, the number of checks (and counters) rises even more. So Aegislash, despite being amazing, is not excessively hard to beat. Every team has something that beats it, and it's often without sacrificing a lot of effectiveness against other pokemon.
I also don't agree with the 50/50 argument. There is a reason we play this game against players, instead of sticking to NPCs like the Battle Maison. It's because it leads to mind games, where the best option isn't simple the one with the highest probability of success, but where being able to manipulate or predict your opponent is also a skill. This is why, for example, we use lures: we are sacrificing an objective probability of victory to induce a desired behavior in our opponent. A game where every move was dictated by the highest probability of winning wouldn't be a game, it would be a math problem. Aegislash, in that sense, it's a pokemon higly dependant on mind games: the player who manages to manipulate the opponent the best tends to win the match-ups involving it. For example, a few months ago, I was using a SUbstitute Kyurem-B. After many matches, I learned that the best way of defeating opposing Aegislashes with my Kyu-B was by picking moves in this order: Sub-Sub-Earth Power-Earth Power, because more often than not, it would induce my opponent into doing what I wanted. Similarly, if I'm using an Aegislash and have a good reason to think I'm facing a Belly Drum Azumarill, I may try to use Shadow Ball even though I'm already in Blade Forme, since the Azumarill is likely going to attempt to set up on me. That is a kind skill that goes beyond the simple X-Y% probabilities that people are talking about in this thread, and I think the game is more interesting with it.
In the end, what it should boil down to, is: being Aegislash a metagame centralizing entity, is it centralizing the meta into a more fun and competitive one? If it is not, then it should be banned. Personally, I'm not feeling it. I'm glad they did this suspect test because this is a discussion that really needs to be done, but for now, I don't think it should be banned. It simply isn't unhealthy for the meta. It might even be making the meta more healthy, since it keeps a lot of potentially broken offensive threats in check, like it did with the Deos. I might change my mind after playing the suspect ladder. After all, a gen 6 OU game without Aegislash might be completely different from anything we have played before. Let's just see how good it is.
Last edited:
