ORAS In-game Tier List - Read Post #324

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Celever

i am town
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But for Kyogre, you still have to fight the 8th gym. The rain makes you battle quite a lot of annoying Swift Swim Pokes, including Swift Swim Horn Drill Seaking, Swift Swim Lovely Kiss Luvdisc, and Swift Swim Ludicolo. Not that they are horribly difficult but Groudon makes it a lot easier than Kyogre.

After that, Groudon plows through the E4, especially Glacia and Steven. Glacia's team wastes turn using Hail and is destroyed by Eruption. For Steven, 5 of 6 Pokes of his are weak to Groudon's STABs AND his trump card, MegaGross can do zero to Groudon.

Groudon makes everything after its capture very easy, a lot easier than Kyogre's. I think it deserves S-rank.
It's simply too late to be considered S-Rank. They dominate very late game, yeah, and that's why they are A, but they aren't the best of the best because they aren't a part of enough fights...
 
But for Kyogre, you still have to fight the 8th gym. The rain makes you battle quite a lot of annoying Swift Swim Pokes, including Swift Swim Horn Drill Seaking, Swift Swim Lovely Kiss Luvdisc, and Swift Swim Ludicolo. Not that they are horribly difficult but Groudon makes it a lot easier than Kyogre.

After that, Groudon plows through the E4, especially Glacia and Steven. Glacia's team wastes turn using Hail and is destroyed by Eruption. For Steven, 5 of 6 Pokes of his are weak to Groudon's STABs AND his trump card, MegaGross can do zero to Groudon.

Groudon makes everything after its capture very easy, a lot easier than Kyogre's. I think it deserves S-rank.
Groudon comes incredibly late as far as the tier list is concerned. And Kyogre gets to learn a sure-shot Thunder to demolish any Water type not named Whiscash, for which Origin Pulse will deal tremendous damage to. Luvdisc croaks to any kind of meaningful hit, it's so bad. Celever and the others have already decided that the two are not around early enough to be in the highest tier. I wouldn't know exactly how badly Groudon smashes Wallace/E4/Steven because I fainted it in order to have a shot at soft resetting the behemoth in peace, without stupid, excessively long cut-scenes every time I catch it before checking.
 

Colonel M

I COULD BE BORED!
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Well probably should continue "stirring the pot".
I personally do not agree with factoring in X-Items into the tier list because the average joe would not even use or care about using X-Items and the possible skewing factor of them similar to Exp. Share (though the average joe would use Exp. Share but let's not go there) but I am not attached to the issue.
I want to use this quote not to smash it into your face, but I want to discuss something that is relative to the efficiency discussion and the "average joe".

First off, I want people to realistically think what they mean by the average player / joe. The reason I state this is because I don't want the tier list to fall into another slippery slope that seems to be the current trend of things. I want to point out to a rather... experimental tier list created years ago that IOS was kind enough to point out to me:

http://serenesforest.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=19819

I want everyone to ignore the majority of the strawman I put to bblade (at the time we were at clash of heads but we've gotten along since) and point to a quote by dondon:
Is warp skipping allowed? Or is the player not proficient enough to do that?
This actually is critical to understand. In FE11 H5 the game was easily trivialized by the methods of warpskipping. The average joe might decide "let's not warpskip because that seems cheap" and proceed with the game as normal. Now this may seem harmless in theory, but the problem is that it takes characters like Zagaro (Sedgar) / Wolf and completely skewers their usefulness in an efficiency runthrough. This also applies to Wendell, Merric, and Boah. In H5 mode Sedgar and Wolf start rather awful; however, due to their base growths they can become rather stellar units in about 5-10 levels. They surpass the majority of Marth's army in offense and durability barring minor circumstances (weapon levels) which can be fixed if done properly. If the player does a Warpskip strategy Zagaro and Wolf become almost useless - with Wolf almost surpassing Zagaro just due to having slightly better base stats (Speed in particular). Though in combat Merric will eventually surpass Wendell (even though OHKOing Dracoknights with Excalibur = OHKOing Dracoknights with Excalibur) Wendell (and Boah) are able to use a Warp Staff to bypass the majority of the game - thus making them easily Top / High Tier units (Boah is maybe a little lower at worst).

Now how does this apply to Pokemon? It's very simple - the average joe might not use X Items; however, that does not entail that average joe is being efficient because of it. Now if the ground rule was placed that X Items aren't allowed (and barring RBY I think it would be a rather stupid rule)* then it is possible that average joe is actually being efficient. On the contrary, though, we also noted that average joe, given the spectrum of the entire world for comparison, is likely using EXP Share and DexNav and isn't even attempting to play by any efficient means.

In a tier list we want to assume that our player is competent. He / she is not some average joe we found on the street and told to play Pokemon. If we wanted to assume the average joe we should just allow DexNav and Exp Share regardless of how "skewered" it makes the competition.

The tl;dr version - don't assume average joe in a tier list. Ever.
I'm sorry but I assume you didn't watch the entirety of the run in question. Nor did I watch the whole 4-hour long thing of course, but I found all the places I found important to investigate.

Times when the player uses X-Attack (just one, but Swellow has no natural means of boosting attack outside of Guts otherwise):

Flannery - X attack to KO Torkoal
Norman - X attack to KO Slakings
Winona - X attack to KO Altaria, Pelipper, and hit Skarmory harder
Wallace - X attack to KO Milotic, Whiscash, possibly more

X Attack on Swellow is not used against Roxanne (player uses Mudkip), Brawley (level advantage + SE STAB Wing Attack), Wattson (player uses Marshtomp) and Tate & Liza (player uses Latias with multiple X Special bots).

In other words, Swellow is used only in 5 gym battles out of 8, out of which it's overlevelled for one gym and an X Attack is required for the other four. And then Swellow is dropped for Kyogre.

Facade+Guts is powerful, no doubt about it. But there is simply no way this performance will be replicated in an efficiency run the kind of which we are discussing in the present thread.
Since we mentioned that Tailow was only overleveled for one fight in particular I believe it is fairly safe to assume that the performance with Tailow / Swellow can be replicated if done properly. I am even willing to use Tailow in my next runthrough because I know a 1,000 To Get Poisoned<tm> other than Grimer (you know Tentacool with Old Rod exists with Poison Sting right?) Realistically it probably won't always be poisoned; however, it could remain poisoned in important fights (Brawly for example should be crushed by Poisoned Tailow without breaking a sweat).
Ever since we started the in-game tiering process as a serious community effort under Mekkah's supervision with RBY X items have not been taken into account, and the reasons weren't questioned much until the speedrunning duo - you and Colonel M I mean - intruded with an alternative vision of why certain Pokemon should be tiered differently.
Tier lists do not stay stagnant to a point where they cannot be improved upon. Tier lists can evolve as what has been done throughout the years through Fire Emblem's efficiency tier lists. Remember when everyone ragged on FE6 and FE7 Marcus because they didn't cap stats or that they jeopardized the Experience category for the "rankings" that were largely ignored after, say, 2008? Or when units like Sedgar and Wolf were praised as Gods Among Men<tm> in FE11 - only to be dethroned by actual bad asses like Caeda (Shiida)? It is precisely what I mean. We didn't ban forges, which could be compared to X Items, when we created those tier lists either (like X Items Forges have an opportunity cost and can be used by everyone; however, there are superior methods for forging and X Items).

Though I was not completely around when Mekkah created the soft-ban for X Items I believe I can somewhat relate to a reason being on how buggy RBY was with mechanics - even with X Items. One proper example is that a Pokemon that is leveled above the opposing Pokemon and given an X Accuracy will proceed to always OHKO with Fissure / Horn Drill - this made Pokemon like Nidoking even more of a god before its stellar learning movepool, good typing, and stats. Another example is Dire Hit which divided the critical hit rate by 4 (thus making it useless). The ban on X Items is likely different with Mekkah and others; however, even people like Mekkah have gone with changes of tier philosophy over the years and has adapted and renewed various subjects in question.
Held items don't homogenise Pokemon at all considering they differ greatly in availability (you often get Miracle Seed before all others, some are never easily available in some of the games) and actual application. X items achieve just that, though we can still agree that Swampert and Luvdisc require a considerably different number of said items to ensure a sweep. However, for efficiency purposes, not every battle is preferred to be a sweep; far from it.
Actually in most cases you would prefer a battle to be a sweep - again, time is a part of efficiency. If you're able to sweep without the need of setting on Shift during important fights you create a time save at the end of the day. Let's not jeopardize the definition of efficiency simply for the sake of something that you don't necessarily agree with.
It is at no risk because you're using an X Attack item to ensure a sweep with a 140 BP STAB move with additional 50% attack from Guts; otherwise, it does not last. And it is no longer such a great option against Brawley if it's not soloing the game after being caught at a whopping level of 18, because the neutral attacks it's taking in return are very difficult to survive. Zubat is a better option for Brawley because of its resistances, but most players will probably use their second tier starter or a well-trained Ralts/Marill.
Hint - no one in their right goddamned mind should ever use their second tier starter against Brawly. It's a recipe for disaster - some Pokemon like Combusken target on Defense while some like Treecko will never be able to overpower both Makuhita and Machop at the same time with STAB Mega Drain (maybe -one- tops). I also find it very funny how you twisted your own words that you stated long ago about how "Speed puts full control of the battle" to twist against Tailow because it could take "neutral attacks that are very difficult to survive". What exactly is so different here when Pokemon like Treecko can take a rather hefty neutral attack and have itself KOed - this is especially true if we consider the "average joe" argument of a tier list player.

But funny enough - if a Tailow is always OHKOing its opposition and is outspeeding it - then it isn't taking neutral hits from anything. So... what's the point of your statement otherwise?

(Oh and spoiler alert - you can't catch Marill before Brawly. It's impossible).
You have to really build your entire playstyle around keeping Swellow poisoned, which is the sole reason why it's doing so well against generic mooks (the other being its high speed, a pro we should by no means ignore since we're likely going to measure Taillow outside of its speedrun prominence sometime later on).
Though it requires minor tweaks to a playstyle it is still a valid playstyle that the player can adapt to easily. Again - poisoning a Tailow is very easy with the Old Rod. Yes it may take a little time; however, if we're dawdling time to obtain things like various TMs and Pokemon like Mawile then I don't really think that it's that much more drastic.

(Nevermind if Tailow wasn't sweeping - it would only have to be Poisoned under various circumstances like important fights to sweep - Archie / Maxie as one example which can be done before the fight).
They are only common against Team Aqua grunts, because the Magma ones (including Maxie himself) use Koffing / Weezing instead.
Yet hilariously enough, both Koffing and Weezing are Poison-types that learn Poison Gas and Sludge - both moves which... have a chance to Poison?

He merely used Grimer as the example as the player in question who used Swellow used it against Grimers - which is on AS. The same logic still applies in OR. Koffing and Weezing will always have a move with a chance to Poison (Poison Gas, Smog, Sludge, Sludge Bomb). The only problem really is that Koffing and Weeezing may have Self-Destruct or Explosion in their repertoire - but I highly doubt they use it immediately on turn 1.
I think you are being manipulative and provocative with that wording - "slower, less efficient playstyle" is exactly what we understand by efficiency here, as opposed to speedrunning which you (and Colonel M to a certain extent, but he's arguing that Golem should be in the second tier so I doubt he'll go with you until the very end logically) propose as the new basis for efficiency instead of what we have been comfortably been doing here all the time for what seems like many years now.
Golem may be a slower Pokemon; however, it is still doing its job - it is sweeping important fights and only few Pokemon can realistically match up to its time taken. Most have to either have rather steep opportunity costs (buying PuP / Low Sweep TMs) or replicate with X Items. Allow me to demonstrate - the only Pokemon that came close to KOing Flannery in 4 turns was Azumarill - and that is ignoring the possibility of Curse / Sunny Day (mine was Adamant so it did KO through Curse). Nevermind if we want to get technical Bulldoze Golem 4 turns Flannery provided that Torkoal does not use Curse.

Ignoring that statement, the end result is an efficient playthrough. "Speed running" often requires manipulation of things outside of the game (be it constant soft resets or forcing stats upon level up among other forced mechanics). Being comfortable with your definition of "efficiency", if you can even call it that at this point, is irrelevant to the end goal of actually being efficient. If something is naturally more efficient without the use of things like glitches and such then obviously it must be considered.
I'm not Celever running the topic, or IAR/Colonel M/DHR who appear to be authoritative figures when decisions are to be made, but it seems these arguments have been generally met with reluctance so I'll go over these myself.
1) X-items have not been allowed, which has mostly been an unstated rule all agreed upon (most users debating have been aware of their existence and application, no doubt). Their usage can be compared to temporary Exp Share in erasing the peculiarities of the Pokemon used.
X-items have never been discussed mainly because, outside of the RBY saga, have never really been discussed in full detail. Though I participated in tier lists even I've found different methods of the evolution of efficiency in Pokemon throughout the years. EXP Share is a much different case than X-Items - we'll discuss this later.
2) By "efficient", you mean "used to achieve the highest score in a speedrun". We are not discussing speedrunning however, even if specific aspects of speedrunning can be applicable to efficiency tiering, but many are not.
That is absolute nonsense. Nevermind in a speedrun most people aren't even attempting to achieve a high score. The exception is maybe time - but that is exactly what an efficient player is trying to do. An efficient player only has few differences here and there from speedrunners.
When Mekkah and atsync were running the RBY tier lists, testing was done with a team of six Pokemon. While this makes the difficulty of otherwise laughably easy games quite real, Pokemon like Farfetch'd still found themselves high up on the list because the requirements to be a good Pokemon were low enough in those games.
This is precisely what I mean by "tier lists and efficiency have evolved over time." Most adaptations of teams never have a full team of 6 - most usually consist of 3-4 usable Pokemon and 1-2 HM slaves. Besides, the difficulty of RBY was not abusing many of its hordes of glitches barring what could not be controlled (Razor Leaf always scoring a critical hit for example). Farfetch'd was also one of these cases because Swords Dance + Slash always critting made it a viable Pokemon - nevermind HM slaving it.
Let me take a second and replace "X Items" with "Exp Share" in that statement.

Exp Share and X Items are remarkably similar in that both can be used to turn a Pokemon with a detrimental typing, weak stats and poor movesets into an unkillable OHKO machine. "Neutral coverage" becomes the keyword to decide a Pokemon's worth instead of multiple other factors, and this way Wigglytuff becomes better than Venusaur, Furfrou becomes better Roserade, and Stoutland is suddenly better than Magnezone.
...This is it? This is how you're going to replace "X Items" with "Exp Share"? With these weak examples?

Alright. I'll bite.

Let's take a moment and evaluate your statement. Let's see... let's use Furfrou with Roserade because both are available in a game with EXP Share and X-Items (the other have major disparities in availability). Coincidentally Furfrou and Roselia come roughly at the same time as well. For now we'll ignore normal battles and we'll focus on important fights.

- Furfrou would have to spam X Attacks and Rock Smash to even attempt to get through the second gym. Overleveling Roselia will probably be the only thing really necessary to do in order to crush Grant - or simply having the EXP Share on helps that.
- Roselia would naturally have the advantage against Korrina barring Hawlucha - a match that Furfrou would still likely lose. If the player wanted to they could spam X Defenses on Roselia and deter the power from Hawlucha's Flying Press (it does neutral damage). Since Furfrou is simply using Fake Out turn 1 it's pretty safe to do. You could also spam X Specials if you were afraid of missing KOes with Mega / Giga Drain.
- Roselia would still have the advantage here against Ramos barring the Jumpluff who probably isn't going to hurt an overleveled Roselia too much. Probably don't even need much for this one - Toxic + Venoshock kind of bones Gogoat and Weepingbell isn't doing shit.
- Celmont is probably the first "notable" victory against Roselia only because it can handle Magneton and maybe Emolga better; however, Eviolite Roselia probably could leg up that match-up if its overleveled. Roserade probably could take a hit if overleveled too.
- Roserade with Grass Knot should 2HKO Mawile and the other two are taken care of through an X Attack Poison Jab and holding a Poison Barb (this is assuming roughly Level 43). Furfrou always 2HKOes Mawile even with an X Attack (unless it is grossly higher leveled at this point). Oh and Mawile has Iron Defense. Lol.
- Sigilyph here actually has Reflect and Light Screen. Though Furfrou can eventually get through once Reflect is down with STAB Return / Crunch it's still probably going to take X Attacks to do so. Though Roserade may want to opt out against Sigilyph STAB Petal Dance should murder both Slowking and Meowstic.
- Sludge Bomb murders Abomasnow and Petal Dance should knock out Avalugg as well if Roserade had some training and a Miracle Seed (needs to be about Level 60). Furfrou at +6 will fail to OHKO Avalugg while Furfrou would risk being froze in the process (to answer the question to reliably 2HKO with Silk Scarf you need +3 X Attacks).

And the E4:

- Malva requires Furfrou to set up a couple X Attacks to really KO through everything (I believe Torkoal could withstand a +1 Bulldoze). Level 65 Roserade with Rain Dance + Weather Ball should OHKO everything in here without much trouble (-maybe- Talonflame at worst).
- Aegislash-Shield is 2HKOed by Sunny Day Weather Ball while Klefki / Scizor are OHKOed. Probopass takes a huge dent from Grass Knot / Giga Drain at the least. Furfrou can only Bulldoze 3 Pokemon and has nothing SE against Scizor.
- Water in favor of Roserade. No contest.
- Dragon E4 member has some grip against Roserade so I will just conclude a win for Furfrou here.
- Diantha neither can waste time to X up. Hawlucha is quite the threat with STAB Flying Press and Roserade doesnt have much better of a time. Roserade has a leg up against most of Diantha's Pokemon.

Despite Furfrou's neutral coverage it barely makes an impact in the game without spamming X Items to death. Meanwhile Roselia (Roserade) makes enough of an impact with only small detours at worst and Heart Scale / TM use. So with Furfrou under the bus we can look at Gen 1 Bulbasaur / Wigglytuff.

Bulbasaur already starts off with an impressive lead against Jigglypuff with an advantage against Brock. When Jigglypuff arrives it brags Sing and Growl while needing levels (off the top of my head to 9) to get STAB Pound. Meanwhile Bulbasaur is rocking STAB Vine Whip and Leech Seed. Against Misty Bulbasaur has a clear cut win here as Ivysaur should have 0 issues. Bulbasaur is also superior to Jigglypuff against Surge because of its typing advantage.

Erika is where Wigglytuff could in theory climb ahead but it has steep opportunity costs. Psychic is a very valuable TM in this game as it goes well with Abra line, Drowzee line, Mr Mime, Clefable, Gastly line, and Staryu line. Ignoring the Moon Stone's opportunity cost Wigglytuff will have to fight very hard to get Psychic. In fact the majority of Jigglypuff's movepool is very reliant on TMs and HMs - which I may remind you are limited in supply in this game. Though Bulbasaur would love TMs like Body Slam it can live without them. Bulbasaur event reaches a point of mediocrity after Lt Surge up until it learns Razor Leaf - but this is still a minor issue because many Gym Leaders Bulbasaur has to face next arent in his favor until Giovanni - where Bulbasaur will pull back in the lead and will be a trump card against Lorelei, Bruno, and chunks of Lance / Blue. Now this may seem like an advantage for Wigglytuff but, again, Wigglytuff has to fight very hard for its use (it is an inferior Clefable with 50 SpA vs Clefable's 85) and needs TMs to compete with the big boys.

I mean really you chose Furfrou and Jigglypuff? Come on man those were horrid examples. I question if you are even trying at this point.
The only difference is that X items have to be used in battles, whereas Exp Share only needs to be turned off when you're soloing the game in your speedrun anyway - no logical reason to do it because it is, as you say, "contributing to efficiency" in a very crucial way. But since the tier list is made with, as one rude, snarky poster put, 'arbitrary restrictions', both X Items and Exp Share are things that make discussion pointless and uninteresting. I mean, banning Kangaskhan and 6 or so others in competitive is also an 'arbitrary decision' but done quite deliberately to preserve the fun in a certain activity; here it's the fun in playing the game with "Pokemon as they are" (naturally).
Though I agree somewhat with Exp Share (for reasons much different than you outlined but closer to IARs) X Items still bring new strategies and discussions to strategically beating important fights at a much safer and efficient pace. I outlined how X Items can help you in crucial fights while still retaining to a strategy that is efficient. I do not understand the 'arbitrary restriction' that is needed for X Items. It promotes positive discussion and opens up new opportunities and possibilities to beat the game in an efficient pace. You make it sound like we set up 20 X items during each fight - that is certainly not the case. Though Pokemon like Swellow may lack set up attacks it is wrong to deny the possibility that Swellow can do with X Attack against certain Pokemon. It's like sandbagging a Pokemon from using TMs - notice I never brought up the opportunity costs of buying those TMs against Geodude's case (and trust me - it can be justified) when I could give Grovyle a Cheri Berry and probably 2HKO Magneton with a +1 Low Sweep once PuP is used on Magnemite. I figured I would keep that strategy a secret since people seemed hellbent on using items it seems.
Azumarill is another Pokemon unto whom different unpleasant things can be done because it's a slowmon (albeit a fabulous one). It should do just fine against said enemy even without X item use (poison-type attacks are quite bad though), but I wouldn't count that Swagger is always used on you whenever you want and prepare a Persim Berry just in case (you could use one from your bag next turn and leave your attack-boosting item on instead since that one is active during all relevant turns).
That is a horrible idea. Remember the strawman on being confused and hitting yourself five times in a row? Even if you cure said confusion by using the item youre still too slow and could be Swaggered that same turn again. Then the exact same scenario you cried about could happen again. Stop trying to beat around the bush and listen, please.
90% accuracy becomes a big problem when you attempt to set up with Rollout (one of the multitude of gimmicks you've been advertising because one really has to transcend logic to place Golem in the second tier); it's not so bad per se because the attack missing can be worked around, and is just one of the many things that can go wrong in-game without a fatal consequence to the player (i.e. you losing to another player in a competitive match). Powerful moves are often inaccurate; their power still makes them worth using if it's not something like Focus Blast.
So le me get this straight.

Setting up Rollout, a move that can be fixed with an X Accuracy if youre so qq about the use of said Rollout, is somehow less reliable than hitting with a 70% accuracy move? Can we think logically for a second when 4 turns of Rollout, as you mentuoned before, has 2 less accuracy than your -one- use of Focus Blast. Nevermind that you could easily just Bulldoze through everything Golem faces in Flannery's gym for the same results and same accuracy. Again - the key difference is missing that KO on Torkoal. But as we also mentioned with Azumarill - you could easily miss the 2HKO on Torkoal too (and I didnt even include accuracy like you did before!)

If you think Rollout is the only bag of tricks I had with Golem - sorry, but youre wrong. Like mentioned with Flannery you can Bulldoze through everything. Numel and Slugma are OHKOed while Torkoal is 2HKOed assuming no Curse. With Norman you can set up Power-up Punch to your heart's content since Slaking isn't doing shit to Golem and proceed to clean. With Winona you can Stealth Rock, KO with Rock Tomb, then come back in to nail the deal against Skarmory with Smack Down + Bulldoze or have a special Electric / Fire-type finish the job (Golem's Stealth Rock contributes to bypassing Sturdy). Etc, etc. Rollout is by no means necessary; however, people like Stellar even used it back in HGSS with his Graveler (or Golem) to success. Then as I mentioned before Golem can help against Team Magma and Aqua with its movepool - Koffing and Weezing still fall prey to Smack Down and Ground moves. And then there's stupid fucks like Muk that can actually tank a Gardevoir Psychic and OHKO it back with STAB Gunk Shot. Anyway, moving on.
And indeed, please do test your Golem properly if you're too lazy to theorycraft to see why this thing is as mediocre as it is (and has been since about the dawn of the series; in-game wise that is). I don't know how you can seriously argue it's a good switch-in against anything during the champion battle unless, as I previously suspected, you noticed me reacting negatively to Golem's placement so high up and are just making fun of me with this discussion.
Actually a good 80% of it is mockery as far as Golem in A (Electrike over Golem? Worth a good laugh) and mainly because it is easy to argue that Kyogre / Groudon cruise control makes endgame negligible. Golem is about the most solid of Bs you got. Thats about what I would also rank Electrike after more thought. Again, as a constant reminder - you can avoid the majority of Water-types because many of them are Fisherman. Those with Steel moves is usually Skarmory and Aggron - both are more prone to Golem than vice versa. The most common of Ground-types are Numels and Camerupts - both prone to STAB Ground. Golem is a B. It is a good Pokemon. It may fall off somewhat lategame but it can contribute lategame.
And they are also superior to most other tactics, like using Growth, Power-up Punch, many others, and not taking up a moveslot when there are quite a few moves most decent mons would enjoy running (I estimate 6-8 moves on a set would be just enough for most). They are a setup option for any mon lacking a setup option, too, such as the Swellow recently brought up and many others (Swampert to an extent, though he does have PuP and Rain Dance).
Moves like PuP still have an advantage over X-Items. X-Items cannot break Sturdy. X-Items still take more time to use than PuP. Should be common knowledge by now.
And that scary ultimatum in bold should probably be developed into a full-fledged idea to convince the participants of this enterprise that we should do a 180 and start tiering according to speedrunning criteria and not the efficiency criteria we have grown so accustomed to and which have proved to be so fruitful for all the 12+ games we've ranked so far. I haven't seen around in most discussions, but if you're one of the authoritative persons to decide what should happen on the tier list, I think it couldn't hurt if you were a little more respectful of the traditions of tiering that we have agreed on and stuck to for all this time and that, should you find them unsatisfactory, you convince people you're right instead of saying 'well, I want things my way'.

I'm quite serious by the way; the proposed change in tiering criteria and the kind of playstyle that it demands is nothing but drastic. It undermines the way we have previously tested, played the games and tiered everything, and it requires a sharp re-direction from where we are looking right now.
I dont understand how something done for over 12 years but still falls short on he definition of efficiency by a long mile suddenly makes it the right and only choice. If we stuck to the logic presented by yourself we wouldnt have moved to computers because we've used typewriters for years. Remember when Pokemon was purely singles? Didnt stop Gamefreak from a sweeping change either.

Discussion like this is critical because it is the difference of relevant efficiency information being applied and thrown out of the window for the shallow argument's sake of "what we have always been doing." Speedrunning is not the ultimatum goal; however, a middle ground between this "efficiency" and "speedrunning" needs to be analyzed seriously. IOS and myself gave strategies that should soundly work in any efficiency run and help the player progress faster. There is no 180. There is barely a 45° angle.
Ignoring the categorical statement at the end, the Mega Glalie in question should still do a very respectable job against Drake due to high offensive stats (speed also) and a type advantage against everyone, Kingdra included, and yes, this is definitely something that can be discussed in an efficiency setting.
Should, but easily improved upon. Mega Glalie can fall slower to Flygons, Mence. That leaves vulnerability to taking more damage, critical hits, everything that you loathed about slow Pokemon and faster Pokemon have.
feel you are twisting the way things are yet again. The performance of Lati@s in the E4 is highly solid, from penetrating targets with diverse coverage moves off absurd base special attack in Mega form, to employing hit-and-run strats against some of the toughest opponents around with Draco Meteor. There is never a time when Mega Lati@s is not used to great effect in the Elite Four. The surface knowledge that it's weak to dark, ghost, ice and dragon (coincidentally, all types of the E4 members) doesn't change the fact that it still performs very well in all these fights.
Wut? I tried using Mega Lati@s in the E4 and it blew chunks. All it could do is OHKO a Pokemon with Draco Meteor... at the cost of a Mega. Thats horrid.
 
I don't actually play the game (although I don't rank anything or similar) but I know how this types of items works.

X-Items are fine in in-game tiers. Basically they are stat boosters that at best they are raising an stat one stage. The thing that makes those items good to use is that it isn't actually a Pokemon move and that X-item have priority +6.

The list of X-Items are:
X Attack: Raises Attack by 1 stage.
X Defense: Raises Defense by 1 stage.
X Sp.Atk (in Gen V or before, X Special): Raises Special Attack by 1 Stage.
X Sp Def: Raises Special Defense by 1 Stage.
X Speed: Raises Speed by 1 Stage.
X Accuracy: Raises Accuracy by 1 Stage.
Dire Hit: Raises Critical hit ratio y 1 level. Don't stack with Focus Energy. (the latter is still true?)
Guard Spec: Prevents stat reduction made for the opponents (no Leaf Storm, Draco Meteor, etc) for 5 turns to all the user team.

I don't see the problem using those items. They give an advantage, but this is a legit use, are eliminated (except Guard Spec) when the user is switched out (except Baton Pass), and doesn't completely replace the effects of the best stat boosting moves (Swords Dance, Dragon Dance, Calm Mind, Bulk Up, Nasty Plot, Agility, Rock Polish...), takes a turn to use like those stat boosters.

In RBY X-Items were possibly banned because the effects of some items are really overpowered.
-In Gen I, X Special raises tghe Special by one stage, which is huge. Since Gen II X Special only raises Sp. Attack. And the X Sp Def item wasn't released until.... Diamond and Pearl!!! (yes, until 2006/2007 there wasn't an iten to raise Special Defense).
-X Accuracy allowed all moves (even OHKO moves) to never miss. That effect lasted during Gen I and Gen II.
-Guard Spec. halaved the damage taken from all special attacks, like a Light Screen.

Apart of that, using Dire Hit was actually detrimental. Because that item actually lowered to one/quarter the chance of a critical hit. If the item were actually being implemented on Stadium, it would have done the intended effect: quadruple the chance of a critical hit.

I don't see enough reason why this item shouldn't be allowedin in-game tiers.

About Exp. Share, it's not that the item is inneficient (actually it has the contrary effect). Exp- Share was banned in X/Y because if you use during all the X/Y game and defeat the majority of trainers your team will have insane levels. In X/Y it was actually boring to watch videos of the Elite 4 because the Exp. Share made the Diantha battle (the CHAMPION battle) a piece of cake.
 
I'd like to express disagreement with IAR's statement that the tier list is for the average joe and that this would be the main argument against the inclusion of X items in the efficiency runs (of course, Colonel M couldn't have found a more perfectly useful counterargument for his aims than that). You switch a Pokemon against another it can take at least two hits from (one hit is enough should you need only one X item use) and you can apply +6 to any given stat as long as you're sufficiently patient. This turns impossible matchups (as a whole) and very poor ones into winning matchups, just the number of turns varies. It's quite simple, and managing one single Pokemon to function in this way against an important opponent is a lot less demanding for a player than managing an entire team that is imperfect, limited without X items around and eventually quite underlevelled to stand up for itself on stats alone, forcing the player to use everything at their disposal (one of the reasons Yawn, Counter and physical bulk were brought up when I was discussing my experience with Slaking in the endgame for example).

To make my point short, X items, besides erasing the unique qualities of Pokemon (or tying them almost completely to the application of X items) and trivialising difficulty, their inclusion detrimentally affects gameplay by also simplifying the strategising aspects of it to finding a weak link to set up on (often the leading mon).

By keeping the X items out as an option available to the player, we continue to promote in-depth, varied and, in my eyes, quite profound strategy-making, all within the context of efficiency (which I do not treat as a synonym for speedrunning, which places too many restraints to allow a tier list discussion that is of any interest).

Colonel M finally had the decency to acknowledge that his Golem defence is largely mockery (presumably of just myself and my attitude, but I certainly wouldn't have said a word if his position in A-rank hadn't been so firmly cemented in the tier list and left without any opposition), but I'm still left questioning which parts of his latest opus is to be treated as serious points requiring addressing and which parts are more trolling (I have a feeling these are inextricably intertwined, making this question rhetorical). I don't doubt for a second you'd find something less time-consuming if you simply wanted to satiate an urge to troll, but I'm hesitant to continue exchanging 5+ page long posts on everything on-topic if it's only a game you engage in out of sheer boredom as well as mockery to punish me for disagreeing with you or whatever else it is.

But for Kyogre, you still have to fight the 8th gym. The rain makes you battle quite a lot of annoying Swift Swim Pokes, including Swift Swim Horn Drill Seaking, Swift Swim Lovely Kiss Luvdisc, and Swift Swim Ludicolo. Not that they are horribly difficult but Groudon makes it a lot easier than Kyogre.

After that, Groudon plows through the E4, especially Glacia and Steven. Glacia's team wastes turn using Hail and is destroyed by Eruption. For Steven, 5 of 6 Pokes of his are weak to Groudon's STABs AND his trump card, MegaGross can do zero to Groudon.

Groudon makes everything after its capture very easy, a lot easier than Kyogre's. I think it deserves S-rank.
I'd like to point out that Wallace is as easy for Kyogre as any other of its matchups. Some of the information is wrong, namely he doesn't run Ludicolo in the remakes, Seaking isn't a high enough level to connect a Horn Drill and Luvdisc cannot infatuate Kyogre due to it being genderless. You can just give it a Persim Berry in place of the Blue Orb if you're so paranoid about confusion (as funny as it may be, it's the worst thing that can happen to Kyogre in this gym battle by far) or just cure it from the menu should the worst happen.

I'd argue that Kyogre is better than Groudon overall, because his STAB receives a boost from rain whereas Groudon's doesn't (from intense sun). He also deals with Drake's dragons more reliably. They're mostly comparable however.
 

Colonel M

I COULD BE BORED!
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Colonel M finally had the decency to acknowledge that his Golem defence is largely mockery (presumably of just myself and my attitude, but I certainly wouldn't have said a word if his position in A-rank hadn't been so firmly cemented in the tier list and left without any opposition), but I'm still left questioning which parts of his latest opus is to be treated as serious points requiring addressing and which parts are more trolling (I have a feeling these are inextricably intertwined, making this question rhetorical). I don't doubt for a second you'd find something less time-consuming if you simply wanted to satiate an urge to troll, but I'm hesitant to continue exchanging 5+ page long posts on everything on-topic if it's only a game you engage in out of sheer boredom as well as mockery to punish me for disagreeing with you or whatever else it is.
Every once in a while if a person seems really out of line for stating something I may go off into satire mode.

But I am serious about Golem's B rank. I feel that it isn't very detrimental until around various parts of Tate / Liza and then Wallace on down. Lategame Golem is probably better off benched (likely for Kyogre / Groudon) once you're up to Wallace, but he does have a few tricks up the sleeve if you're willing to use him (Stealth Rock against Aggron is pretty nice if only to secure OHKOing it with other Pokemon with Earthquake). I have heard sometimes Steven does troll on that part and will swap to Claydol so I don't want to get too greedy on Golem's possible utility against Steven. You probably could drop it on Glacia too (provided you have Sturdy) since it makes KOing Walrein a lot easier with someone else. It's not quite a C Tier Pokemon based on its performance throughout Midgame is pretty substantial and it still can paddle along lategame (some of the trainers in Victory Road have Pokemon Golem excels against). Like I said though - I'm using it very seriously in this playthrough and have evaluated scenarios with and without Rollout.

- Wattson is a practical guarantee with Geodude if you set up with Power-up Punch (Rock Polish helps but it can be ignored - bear in mind Geodude takes nothing from Magnemite). I don't think anyone can do it faster (some like Marshstomp can tie though). PuP Turn 1, Bulldoze Turn 2, Bulldoze vs Magneton, Bulldoze vs Voltorb. Magneton with Supersonic could be annoying but it can be for Marshstomp too (just safer for Marshstomp). I think with Combusken you should still Bulk Up Turn 1 to guarantee KOing Magneton (I believe Double Kick can miss the 2HKO). Grovyle can somewhat muscle through it but it is kind of so-so for him (PuP + Low Sweep does fail to 2HKO Magnemite at lowest damage rolls so it's close - Protein and some Attack EVs should come close enough to close the game most of the time though).
- Flannery can be KOed with Graveler and Golem in 4 turns with Rollout 68% of the time. Though that is quite the game I want to point out that you don't want to fuck with Torkoal for too long - nothing clears Attract if you're Male and Curse can really fuck things up. This also can be said somewhat for Pokemon like Marshstomp who only has Bulldoze / Dig / Mud Bomb (Mud Bomb working off its lower SpA) and Combusken CAN get through it but it takes some setting up of Rock Tomb - nevermind these Pokemon need to KO Torkoal or they risk Attract. It is possible to 4HKO with Golem spamming Bulldoze; however, if it's male it has a 50% chance of failing and I'm sure if it's female Torkoal would just set up Curse.

I want to also point out that not a lot of Pokemon can OHKO that Torkoal either. That's the only reason I mentioned Golem here.

- Side note with Magma / Aqua Grunts - Geodude line should do fine most of the time. Carvanha Ice Fang is mild to worry about (Aqua Jet less so), Sharpedo stings a bit more but it is a 3HKO about equal in levels, Numel is scrapped once you have Golem, and Camerupt is only annoying with Solid Rock (and it can still be OHKOed by Dig if Golem has Attack EVs / matches Camerupt roughly in levels). Archie and Maxie Golem is best suited versus Golbat if only because it takes the least from Confusion / Golbat shenanigans.
- For Norman Golem is very solid (no pun intended) against Slaking. Since it resists STAB Retaliate, takes so-so damage from Feint Attack, and Slaking only moves every other turn Golem can take advantage with PuPing through. Rock Polish kind of helps but isn't necessary. For the most part only Fighting-types really dominate Norman and they're minimal in supply (Combusken, Breloom, Machoke, and Hariyama to give ideas). Most Pokemon aside from Lairon and Golem take quite a bit from STAB Retaliate too... so...

Again. These are serious (as were the X Items comments but those are being shoveled elsewhere). And a really funny note though I'm sure someone may disagree - Treecko and Geodude are a cool pair. They cover just about everything they need to nicely with only minor issues (Grass-types are the only bane of existence really and sort of Ice-types).
 
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I just want to know, how is Roselia still viable if you can't get Roserade pre-game unless you do Super Training?
(I actually have both OR and AS as of today and I'm picking Torchic on OR (I'm starting a seperate playthrough on OR as I finished AS) with Marill as my Water-type and I'm planning for Roselia to be my Grass-type, but the lack of being able to evolve Roselia is kind of worrysome to me)
 
Roselia can evolve right after the 6th gym assuming you still have Cut somewhere. That's the earliest Shiny Stone you can get reliably.

Golem in B is definitely acceptable; not sure about Graveler as his stats might be too low for the second half of the game with his typing not granting him the same benefits he received in the first two generations.

tbqh I have a lot of trouble reading your last mammoth of a post without detecting non-obvious bits of raging trollishness every other sentence and then some more between the lines. From little nuances like recommending to use Grass Knot against Mawile (Base Power of 40 and NVE) to generally confusing things forming unexpectedly grandiose but logically impossible counterarguments to things I never really implied or even said, I'm at a loss about handling it in any sensible way. The one thing I learnt from the post is that Marill does not have the same availability as it had in Emerald (the only version in original gen 3 where I ever used it), meaning it's absent for the first two gyms. This is both bad (can't Bubble those Geodudes and switch into Brawley's fighting-types resisting all their moves) and good (instant PuP to add to Bubblebeam and Rollout (ha!)), and I'm not sure how it affects its ranking on the list. You've used it here so you might have a better idea.

I think you said something about not wanting to see Mega Manectric in A as well? Would you like to talk about that next? Leaving the "satire" out preferably.
 

Colonel M

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Sure. (Actually I forgot Mawile was light - was thinking Petal Dance for some reason).

(Also Graveler would be C).

Manectric was something that we discussed a little bit before we delved into X Items. So let's go over Electrike in its earliest available area and go from there. Electrike is available right before Wattson. unfortunately, and perhaps fortunate in some ways, it arrives once you are facing some Electric-types within the trainers on the same route. Coincidentally if you catch it before facing Team Aqua / Magma it actually can help out against the Zubats that the Grunts have (I believe both have a Zubat) and, in Aqua's case, against the Carvanha. Numel is a little scary for Electrike since it has Magnitude. Aside from that, Electrike does face problems such as not being very effective against your rival's Marshstomp (for obvious reasons), though if you start with Mudkip or Treecko Electrike gains the upper hand against Wailmer who takes a while to kill with anything anyway. IMO Spark is really a temporary move until you get Charge Beam and Volt Switch. Charge Beam at least has STAB and, over time, will let Electrike overpower some trainer Pokemon (even the occasional Grass-type) while Volt Switch is an immediate special Electric-type attack. Volt Switch is about so-so (in Set style it is beneficial while in Shift it can cause complications). One notable strategy you could do with Electrike is to force Magnemite to use Thunder Wave or Volt Switch in Wattson's Gym to obtain a free Special Attack boost. From there keep spamming Charge Beam and you should eventually be able to clear Wattson. A minor advantage to Electrike vs Wattson is that, much like in Geodude's case, Electrike isn't taking much from Magnets and Voltorb. Tackle is the only threatening move Magnemite has and Voltorb only has Rollout. Magneton could cause a headache I guess but that's about the worst of it. One con to Electrike is that your starters (even Grovyle) can likely clean up a little easier than Electrike can in this gym.

Moving further into the quest Electrike can gain a leg up on Water-type Pokemon and some of the Flying-types (or both... in Wingull's case). Unfortunately it is rather reliant on Charge Beam to really go through trainers as Volt Switch will likely miss the OHKO on neutral Pokemon while forcing a switch. This can leave to some headaches if Electrike fails to OHKO with Volt Switch as it means a Pokemon will take an attack / stat drop / status effect / etc. It can be worked around to Electrike's favor, though, so there is also that to consider. In a case like Koffing you could lead with Electrike in hopes to lure Poison Gas / Sludge and Volt Switch to Swellow to bank on Poison. This is really minor though.

Eventually we reach Team Aqua and Magma again. Once again Electrike will evolve into Manectric and does alright against these guys, though the Grimers are a major headache with their SpD and access to Minimize (seriously - Dig sucks against these Grimers) and Numel is a big cockblock to Electrike. Against Archie Electrike can be used against Golbat and Sharpedo while Maxie it likely is only used against Golbat. Still, minor contributions could add up.

When we hit Flannery we reach a dilemma - some of the Fire-types in this gym are Numels. And this speaks true with Flannery. Slugma is hard for someone like Electrike to set up on as not only is Overheat going to do massive damage (especially if Sunny Day is set up), but Light Screen and then Numel will really harm your chances of making it much further. One notable thing after Flannery is that Manectric will have access to Overheat - something nice to bypass Grass-types (aside from Lombre lol).

When we hit Norman we probably won't have Discharge. Kind of irrelevant anyway since Manectric will only be able to do small things like beating up some of the trainers maybe. Slaking hits way too fucking hard for Manectric to try and set up (without some help with like Intimidate and X Defenses).

This is partially why I argue that catching Electrike after Norman may yield to a slightly lesser headache. Once Electrike is past Norman it starts to get a little better. Notably it is about 6 levels away from Discharge and very close to evolution. Since there are Bug Maniacs and Bird Keepers you could try to hold Electrike back if you really want Discharge a bit earlier. Once you have Discharge Manectric gets rolling nicely - notably it can shitstomp Winona with its Mega and setting up Charge Beams to bypass Altaria's neutrality. Only Skarmory will likely live a hit other than possibly Altaria.

Manectric eventually does well within later routes but Iit comes with rocky moments. For Aqua Grimer sucks to face but Carvanhas and Sharpedos are easy to pick off. For Team Magma Numel and Camerupt are difficult to bypass; however, Koffing and Weezing are a little easier for it. Manectric does well provided it hits neutrally and assuredly against Water-types (not Marshstomp / Swampert / Whiscash though. Oh and Chinchou). I probably would opt to use something else against Tate and Liza. Manectric is a huge win against Wallace (barring Whiscash). In the Elite 4 you could do a couple things like use it against Sydney and Glacia at this point since Flamethrower is accessible and Charge Beam / Discharge / Flamethrower should run through Sydney and Glacia without too much hassle. From there it has situational matchups like Steven's Skarmory but honestly that's about it - setting up on Skarmory is a bad idea too because you don't really have anything great to hit Claydol with and Aggron can always survive and follow up with Earthquake. Cradily also could take a boosted Flamethrower I bet.

So why B? Much like Golem Manectric has some really rocky moments - though in Manectric's case it is slightly reversed. This can be both beneficial and detrimental to the player. For example Golem has a strong hold against multiple gym leaders while Manectric really only has a strong hold against two (Winona and Wallace). If opted to catch the later Electrike Pokemon like Geodude have a higher availability than it with more sweeping advantages. If opted to catch the earlier Electrike you have to deal with awkward moments like relying on Charge Beam to really get through Pokemon (which is okay - but not exactly the most efficient means) or Volt Switch which can be a catch 22 in efficiency.

It's a strong Pokemon but it has some lackluster qualities. Also note that Overheat can have its base power halved in routes that you could really use it on (mainly towards Fortree City and somewhat towards Lilycove). I think overall the earlier Electrike is probably a bother, but the one after Norman is pretty worthwhile with the bonus of having the Mega in only two levels. I guess overall it really depends on how much you value lategame and midgame points since Golem is a Pokemon that is a little rockier lategame but Manectric is a Pokemon rockier in the earlier portions of the game.
 
Oh hello, just wanted to dump some of my resources in this thread. Could be useful for checking stuff, planning runs, discussion, making comparisons and analysing, theorymonning etc. if embedded into the OP.

Littleroot Town: Treecko / Torchic / Mudkip
Route 101: Poochyena, Wurmple, Zigzagoon
Route 102: Lotad (AS) / Seedot (OR), Ralts, Surskit
Route 104: Taillow, Wingull
Petalburg Woods: Cascoon, Silcoon, Shroomish, Slakoth
Rustboro City: Makuhita (trade)
Route 116: Nincada, Skitty, Whismur
----------GYM 1----------
Route 106: Magikarp (Old Rod), Tentacool (Old Rod)
Granite Cave: Abra, Geodude, Zubat
----------GYM 2----------
Slateport City: Pikachu (gift)
Route 110: Electrike, Gulpin, Minun, Plusle, Oddish, Voltorb, Magnemite
Route 117: Illumise, Volbeat, Marill, Roselia, Goldeen (Old Rod)
Granite Cave (Mach Bike): Aron, Sableye (AS) / Mawile (OR)
----------GYM 3----------
Granite Cave (Rock Smash): Nosepass
Route 112: Machop, Numel
Fiery Path: Grimer, Koffing, Slugma, Torkoal
Route 113: Sandshrew, Spinda, Skarmory
Route 114: Lombre (AS) / Nuzleaf (OR), Seviper (AS) / Zangoose (OR), Swablu
Meteor Falls: Lunatone (AS) / Solrock (OR)
Route 115: Jigglypuff
Jagged Pass: Spoink
Lavaridge Town: Wynaut (egg)
----------GYM 4----------
Route 111 (Go-Goggles): Baltoy, Cacnea, Trapinch
Rustboro City: Lileep / Anorith (fossil)
----------GYM 5----------
Route 118: Kecleon, Linoone, Pelipper (Surf), Carvanha (Good Rod)
Route 117: Corphish (Good Rod)
Route 111/114: Barboach (Good Rod)
Route 110/115/many others: Wailmer (Good Rod)
Route 102/111/114/others: Azumarill (Surf), Masquerain (Surf)
Southern Island: Latias (AS) / Latios (OR)
Route 119: Gloom, Kecleon, Tropius, Feebas (Old/Good Rod)
Weather Institute: Castform (gift)
Route 120: Absol
Scorched Slab: Golbat
----------GYM 6----------
Route 121: Shuppet
Safari Zone: Psyduck, Doduo, Rhyhorn, Girafarig, Pinsir, Heracross, Xatu, Donphan, Wobbuffet, Seaking (Good Rod)
Mt Pyre: Duskull, Meditite, Vulpix, Chimecho
Lilicove City: Staryu (Good Rod)
Team Hideout: Electrode
Shoal Cave: Sealeo, Spheal, Snorunt
----------GYM 7----------
Desert Ruins: Regirock
Island Cave: Regice
Ancient Tomb: Registeel
Route 124 (Dive): Chinchou, Clamperl, Lanturn, Relicanth
Route 128: Corsola (Dive, Super Rod), Luvdisc (Good/Super Rod)
Sootopolis City: Gyarados (Super Rod)
Cave of Origin: Kyogre (AS) / Groudon (OR)
----------GYM 8----------
Meteor Falls: Whiscash (Super Rod), Bagon
Route 130: Horsea (Super Rod), Seadra (Super Rod)
Victory Road: Hariyama, Lairon, Medicham, Loudred

Route 104: Echoed Voice
Rustboro City: False Swipe, Cut
- Gym 1: Rock Tomb
- Gym 2: Bulk Up
Granite Cave: Flash, Steel Wing
Slateport City: Torment, Thief, Hone Claws, Thunder Wave, Struggle Bug, Confide
Mauville City: Sky Drop, Round, Rock Smash, Venoshock, Aerial Ace, Facade, Low Sweep, Charge Beam, Bulldoze, Dragon Tail, Power-Up Punch
Verdanturf Town: Attract
Granite Cave (Mach Bike): Shadow Claw
- Gym 3: Volt Switch
Route 111: Secret Power
Route 112: Strength
Route 113: Double Team
Route 114: Dig, Roar
Meteor Falls: Smack Down
Mt. Chimney: Incinerate
Jagged Pass: Flame Charge (Acro Bike), Rock Polish
Lavaridge Town: Swords Dance
- Gym 4: Overheat
Route 111 (Go-Goggles): Sandstorm
Fiery Path: Nature Power, Toxic
- Gym 5: Retaliate
Petalburg: Surf
Dewford Town: Sludge Bomb
Sea Mauville (Surf): Rain Dance
Route 123: Dazzling Gleam
Route 119: Fly
Fortree City: Hidden Power, Grass Knot
Scorched Slab: Sunny Day
- Gym 6: Roost
Safari Zone: Dream Eater, Wild Charge, Solar Beam, Energy Ball
Mt Pyre: Shadow Ball, Will-O-Wisp
Lilycove City: Rest, Sleep Talk, Fire Blast, Thunder, Blizzard, Focus Blast, Stone Edge, Hyper Beam, Giga Impact, Protect, Safeguard, Reflect, Light Screen
Team Hideout: Dark Pulse
Shoal Cave: Frost Breath, Hail
- Gym 7: Calm Mind
Mossdeep: Quash, Dive
Seafloor Cavern: Earthquake, Scald
Sootopolis: Brick Break
Mirage spots: Payback, Gyro Ball, Poison Jab, Substitute, Flash Cannon, Snarl
Mauville (revisited): U-Turn, Thunderbolt
Sea Mauville: Ice Beam
- Gym 8: Waterfall
Route 119 (Waterfall): Acrobatics
Meteor Falls (Waterfall): Dragon Claw
Pacifidlog: Fling, Psyshock, Return, Frustration
Route 134: Rock Slide
Route 133: Psych Up
Route 132: Sludge Wave
Victory Road: Psychic, Flamethrower, X-Scissor
Sky Pillar: Explosion
S. S. Tidal: Embargo
Battle Resort: Swagger

----------GYM 1----------
----------GYM 2----------
Deep Sea Tooth (OR Mauville, Clamperl), Deep Sea Scale (AS Mauville, Clamperl).
----------GYM 3----------
Moon Stone (Meteor Falls, Skitty/Jigglypuff).
----------GYM 4----------
Fire Stone (Fiery Path, Strength, Vulpix).
----------GYM 5----------
Leaf Stone (Route 119, Surf, Nuzleaf/Gloom), Level-Up (New Mauville, Surf, Rare Candy, Magneton/Nosepass).
----------GYM 6----------
Shiny Stone (Route 121, Cut, Roselia/Togetic), Sun Stone (Mossdeep, Gloom).
----------GYM 7----------
Thunderstone (Yellow Shard, Dive, Pikachu), Water Stone (Blue Shard, Dive, Lombre/Staryu), Dragon Scale (Steal from Horsea, Seadra).
----------GYM 8----------
Dawn Stone (Victory Road, Kirlia/Snorunt).
----------Postgame----------
Protector (Battle Resort, Rhydon), Reaper Cloth (Battle Resort, Dusclops).

----------GYM 1----------
----------GYM 2----------
----------GYM 3----------
----------GYM 4----------
----------GYM 5----------
Latias / Latios (Southern Island), Alakazam (Slateport, trade), Mawile (Verdanturf), Manectric (Route 110), Aggron (Rusturf Tunnel, lv. 42), Sceptile / Blaziken / Swampert (Route 120, lv. 36).
----------GYM 6----------
Gyarados (Route 123), Absol (Safari Zone), Altaria (Lilycove, lv. 35), Banette (Mt Pyre, lv. 37), Medicham (Mt Pyre, lv. 37), Glalie (Shoal Cave, lv. 42).
----------GYM 7----------
Pinsir (Route 124), Heracross (Route 127), Gardevoir (Verdanturf), Sableye (Sootopolis), Groudon / Kyogre (Cave of Origin).
----------GYM 8----------


I'd appreciate if somebody could check these for accuracy.
 
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Its Reaper Cloth that evolves Dusclops not Dusk Stone. (I believe Misdreavus, Murkrow, Doublade and Lampent evolve from it, though the only one that's obtainable in any part of the game is Murkrow IIRC)
 
Whoops, brain fart. Added Reaper Cloth into the postgame section and removed Dusk Stone from the list entirely (since Murkrow is one of the post-National Dex mons).
 

Colonel M

I COULD BE BORED!
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A really big question is how substantial are penalties for backtracking / sidequesting for something? Ignoring Mawile for a moment - Tentacool has Sludge Bomb and Ice Beam - two great TMs that has a rather awkward backtrack. Sludge Bomb is easy with Fly but takes longer witg Surf. On the other hand Ice Beam requires Dive, thus after Tate and Liza, and a rather annoying mini sidequest that takes a while (probably a good 10-30 min).
 

Celever

i am town
is a Community Contributor
A really big question is how substantial are penalties for backtracking / sidequesting for something? Ignoring Mawile for a moment - Tentacool has Sludge Bomb and Ice Beam - two great TMs that has a rather awkward backtrack. Sludge Bomb is easy with Fly but takes longer witg Surf. On the other hand Ice Beam requires Dive, thus after Tate and Liza, and a rather annoying mini sidequest that takes a while (probably a good 10-30 min).
It's all risk vs reward, per se. If the reward is that after the 2nd badge you can easily sweep the rest of the game, but the sidequest/backtrack w/e takes half an hour, you're pretty safe...

Obviously it will have to be handled on a case by case basis, since there are so many mechanics in Pokémon -- even in-game.

So, exactly how important are those TMs to Tentacruel? What do they beat, how do they help it? That's what you have to ask yourself. Then you have to decide on how much time it would take the average player to go and get those TMs. Then just decide on how much you think it is actually worth going and getting the TMs and you have your answer. I'm not going to put down a deadline like "any sidequests over 20 minutes are not counted for the list" because you could spend 20 minutes on a sidequest and reap the rewards for the rest of the game.

However, diversions will definitely be frowned upon unless there is a good reason why that Pokémon should partake in said diversion.
 
Tentacruel gets Poison Jab at L32, which is a worthy replacement for Sludge Bomb considering you can power it up with Swords Dance. However, if you don't plan to run SD, you can just Fly to Dewford the moment you get the HM.

Ice Beam can only be replaced with Blizzard, which has better availability, but isn't really a good bargain - +20 BP for -5 PP (-8 factoring in PP Up/Max) and -30% accuracy. I can at least see Stone Edge replacing Rock Slide since it's a whopping +25 BP for just -10% accuracy, and with some crit added unto it to compensate for the low PP, but Blizzard is there only for the people who don't want to do the Sea Mauville sidequest.

If nothing else, you can use Dazzling Gleam against Drake's dragons (it's SE against Kingdra too) but with 80 sp. atk. it probably won't do much, and I'd rather use Blizzard there personally.
 

DHR-107

Robot from the Future
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Orange Islands
Okay so I am using a Slakoth/Zubat/Torchic in my current game (as well as three traded over mons so they dont count).

So far neither Zubat or Slakoth have "earned their stripes" as it were. I pretty much fucked up and caught Zubat after Brawly's gym which was dumb as hell I know... But it's getting better as it nears evolution. Already have the Soothe Bell equipped too, so hopefully I'll get crobat shortly after. I taught mine Steel Wing, and I was hoping for Sludge Bomb too, but apparently that does not spawn until later.

Slakoth is hard work to get to Level 18 but once it does it's a force to be reckoned with. Vigoroth is really strong. I taught mine Rock Tomb which has been really good against some of the annoying flying types like Doduo which randomly pop up every now and then.

Torchic... Well it's just Torchic. It's so ridiculously strong as Combusken. I'm pretty confident I am going to flatten Wattson with just Combusken, even though i haven't used it much because of levelling Slakoth/Zubat.
 
Lucchini, did you forget the Pikachu Cosplay ? Or we don't rank it ? I think with Light Ball + 3 perfect IV + Icicle Crash from Belle, it could be useful ... but GREAT list :D
 
It's all risk vs reward, per se. If the reward is that after the 2nd badge you can easily sweep the rest of the game, but the sidequest/backtrack w/e takes half an hour, you're pretty safe...

Obviously it will have to be handled on a case by case basis, since there are so many mechanics in Pokémon -- even in-game.

So, exactly how important are those TMs to Tentacruel? What do they beat, how do they help it? That's what you have to ask yourself. Then you have to decide on how much time it would take the average player to go and get those TMs. Then just decide on how much you think it is actually worth going and getting the TMs and you have your answer. I'm not going to put down a deadline like "any sidequests over 20 minutes are not counted for the list" because you could spend 20 minutes on a sidequest and reap the rewards for the rest of the game.

However, diversions will definitely be frowned upon unless there is a good reason why that Pokémon should partake in said diversion.
Even still, if (all hypothetically) Tentacruel is in B tier, and requires a 30 minute diversion to sufficiently compete with the other Pokemon in B tier, then it really should be reflected by a tier gap. The other Pokemon in B tier would be able to accomplish what Tentacruel does without requiring the player to go out of their way for 30 minutes. That 30 minutes is a sizable chunk of the game. What time are we assuming for completion anyways? 5-6 hours seems like a good balance between speedrun and leisurely pace IMO.
 
6 hours ? WOW. That's rushing the game ! The speedrunners did it in 3 hours ++. And Sludge Bomb is just a "Fly" go and back, that's not 30 min. Ice Beam is less mandatory (just useful :)). You have a lot of Fairy type (Gardevoir, Azumarill, Mega Altaria, Wigglytuff) and some Ice type (Glalie, Walrein) or fast Dragon (Lati@s, Salamence, Kingdra, Flygon, Altaria)
 
It would be nice if Celever showed some initiative by laying out clear guidelines for the tier list, rather than passive aggressively "liking" posts that disagree with me.

The most prominent Pokemon speedrunner out there right now (Werster) beat the game with a 4:48 on his first playthrough, going in with no prerequisite knowledge of the game other than his experience with the originals. If we assume that the tier list player a) has beat the game at least once and b) has a very solid understanding of the game, I think anything above 6 hours is really stretching the definition of efficiency. We in fact run into the same problems that inevitably would arise if we allowed EXP share. Pokemon levels will be inflated, and significant advantages and disadvantages that Pokemon possess become muddled. What exactly would a player be doing that would result in a longer playtime?

Also, if a Pokemon requires say...a 15 minute diversion to be used optimally, we need to assume that every other Pokemon also has 15 minutes to improve their usefulness. Theoretically, if we allow one Pokemon to participate in a 15 minute sidequest, every Pokemon should have 15 minutes of Dex Navving, grinding, participating in contests or any other time waster at their disposal. We cannot allow some Pokemon to reap the benefits of time wasters and not others.

So really, in addition to setting a time limit for completing the game, there does need to be a definitive time limit set for time wasters so that we can apply it to every Pokemon in the game. Although my preference would be no time wasters unless they contribute to real time being saved.
 
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Be nice and give Celever some credit, the last three or more in-game tier lists were from very linear games without much skippable content so "diversions" were so minimal that it could be ignored in tier construction. And the last time we visited Hoenn was when Smogon was in it's infancy (and it was the first in-game tier list to be constructed I believe, so of course it has some holes and cobwebs). Plus it is the holidays, people have jobs and lives to live.

Yes, ORAS has a great deal of skippable content if the goal is JUST to beat the Elite Four ASAP. Like, at least four whole routes and several "mini-dungeons" for lack of a better word. Yes, it's a bit too much to ignore this time in terms of rankings.

Also, Whismur for A tier and I've already said why.
 

Its_A_Random

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Lucchini, did you forget the Pikachu Cosplay ? Or we don't rank it ? I think with Light Ball + 3 perfect IV + Icicle Crash from Belle, it could be useful ... but GREAT list :D
Cosplay Pikachu is currently ranked in B though idk if he wants to drop it to C or not.

Even still, if (all hypothetically) Tentacruel is in B tier, and requires a 30 minute diversion to sufficiently compete with the other Pokemon in B tier, then it really should be reflected by a tier gap. The other Pokemon in B tier would be able to accomplish what Tentacruel does without requiring the player to go out of their way for 30 minutes. That 30 minutes is a sizable chunk of the game. What time are we assuming for completion anyways? 5-6 hours seems like a good balance between speedrun and leisurely pace IMO.
Different Tier lists have different managers. Different managers have different ideas on how things should be done. To be fair I did penalise Sylveon and Espeon in XY because of 10-30 minute opportunity costs in evolving Eevee. The former relying on a tool that is inefficient to begin with and the latter because you needed to make a crapton of steps in order to get the +150 Happiness required to evolve Eevee into Espeon at level 20 in order to give it Psybeam; a move pretty much required on it at that point of the game.

However this is not my tier list and it is up to Celever to do what he feels best. As long as he is consistent amongst all Pokémon affected by it, then yeah. Though however he should actually listen and respond and whatnot or at least explain his decisions, yes.
 

Celever

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It would be nice if Celever showed some initiative by laying out clear guidelines for the tier list, rather than passive aggressively "liking" posts that disagree with me.
Oh right, I forgot to address this. If I like your content and/or I strongly agree with what you are saying in this thread, I'll like it. Hopefully this means that the users who are contributing to this project heavily will get some credit, and maybe people will look into posts which I like a little more? That's the idea, anyway.

The fact that a number of posts which disagree with your posts may mean something, then. I honestly hadn't noticed and I didn't mean any of this to be done "passive-aggressively" since I'm really not a passive-aggressive person, it just turns out that quite a bit of what you were posting was, for need of a better word, wrong, and I will explain why in this post.

IOS said:
So really, in addition to setting a time limit for completing the game, there does need to be a definitive time limit set for time wasters so that we can apply it to every Pokemon in the game. Although my preference would be no time wasters unless they contribute to real time being saved.
No, there does not. Also, while there isn't going to be a set time set for a player to complete the game in, I honestly find your proposed time of 6 hours absolutely preposterous. I think I was at 4 and a half before my 3DS broke (which was just before Wattson). I like to actually experience the games, try out all of the features and for the most part talk to all of the NPCs. There is so much to do in a Pokémon game that adding on an hour and a bit to a speed run is idiotic anyway.

Everyone must look at this below section:
Efficiency =/= speed. If I meant speed I would have said quickly. Efficiently means effortlessly, consistently, satisfactory, and of course quickly. It's not JUST speed.

For example, whoever brought up the speedrunning tactic of poisoning a Swellow on Grimer with Guts after finding one at a high level with DexNav and buying things like Super Potions and Elixirs as opposed to just healing at a Pokémon Centre and hitting everything with Facade is not efficient. It's fast. That requires a hell of a lot of effort to go through, and isn't something that the average player would care about doing in the slightest, however fast it may be.

Another example is when the 10 page discussion about Treecko was happening (which really should have stopped because I made it clear that Treecko wasn't going to move and didn't include it on my "more discussion needed" lists...) and people were arguing that it should be S-Rank because it has a chance, however high it may be, to KO various aces on gym leaders' teams. The calcs were false, but the point still stands that if it were true, it would not be efficient because it's not consistent. I don't care if Grovyle OHKOs a Pokémon 80% of the time because there's 20% of the time where it could screw over the player. That isn't efficient to me.

Carrying a Dustox through the game for the Norman fight is neither effortless nor satisfactory, so it is ranked low on the tier list.

Aside from a few discussions and a few users (who should know who they are because I have been liking a plethora of their posts! n_n) this tier list has turned a bit shit, though I hate to admit it since it is my thread, but the problems this project has faced haven't been in any other in-game tier list discussions... Hoenn is a region with a lot of stuff to do like stage7_4 said above, and the average player isn't going to skip over all of it. I don't want to see any more any discussion over time benchmarks, I don't want to see any more discussion over complex tactics which theoretically could make a Pokémon which can also make any other Pokémon in the game better, and I definitely don't want to see another word said about speedrunning. This is a simple process, and for reasons unbeknownst to me this process isn't working for this game. Furthermore, no one has even taken notice of this list because they've been too wrapped up in their own intimidating tl;dr posting discussions:

More Discussion Needed:
Tentacool B --> A
Zubat B --> A
Oddish (Vileplume) C --> B
Swablu C --> B
Feebas C --> D
Electrike A --> S (THIS needs discussion right now, and I will post thoughts on it tomorrow)
Rhyhorn C --> B
Horsea (Trade) B --> C
Magikarp A --> S
Slakoth (Slaking) E --> D
Slakoth (Vigoroth) Untested --> C
Castform E --> D
Mawile C --> B/A
Magnemite S --> A (IAR is using it in a run and will keep us updated as he plays through the game. I think S right now.
I'm going to make some decisions here though, because a lot of these Pokémon have been on there for a long time.
Changes Made:
Feebas C --> D
Horsea (Trade) B --> D
Magikarp A --> S (This is also a good time to point the risk vs reward aspect of this tier list. Leveling Magikarp up those 5 levels is pretty much a sidequest in and of itself, but the reward in this game is worth pushing it into S-Rank IMO)
Slakoth E --> C (Subject to rising to B, but I want discussion on it)
Slakoth (Vigoroth) removed from Untested.
Castform E --> D
Mawile C --> A (possibly S. Discussion is needed on that)
Magnemite S --> A
Whismur B --> A (stage7_4 made some good points and no one disagrees with him, what can I say? :p)

As such, the current list for discussion needed is:
More Discussion Needed:
Tentacool B --> A
Zubat B --> A
Oddish (Vileplume) C --> B
Swablu C --> B
Electrike A --> S

As always, there is a chance that I missed a nomination somewhere (especially given the amount of tl;dr in this thread) so if a Pokémon you have nominated is in neither of the above two lists, just VM me and I'll add them on!

Furthermore, I am going to go through the OP and will bold Pokémon who are not subject to change tiers. Realistically I don't want to do this to a large number of Pokémon, but I feel it is necessary. I will post a list of the bolded Pokémon once it is done.

If you have any further questions for the tier list, please ask me directly, tagging me in the post if possible or even VM'ing or PM'ing me. I will be free from January 2nd and on since I've had to deal with some shit irl recently, but I'll get to all questions ASAP. Oh, and on that note, one last thing:
X Items Will Be Allowed - DHR, Deinosaur and Colonel_M convinced me that X Items are actually safe to use for this tier list. The reason for this is that they are expensive, which means that it is an inefficient tactic anyway, and if a Pokémon actually needs an X Item to perform well it's probably shit anyway.

Anyway, now that that long post is over, I'd like to take this chance to thank Lucchini for compiling that huge list of information and posting it here! Everyone go like that post :p
 
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Colonel M

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Discrediting that Salamence was even mentioned...

The reason I ask is because Sludge Bomb has an awkward availability. Though it is available after defeating Norman it is more convenient to grab after you defeat Winona. It's minor, but I just wanted to be sure on what's going on.

Anyway, the reason I asked a bit was because of Tentacool. Its position is rather awkward because, in theory, it seems decent for A Tier but things just hold it back. It starts rather rough with only Poison Sting and comes at Level 5 when your team has 5-10 levels on it and doesn't really get anything good until Level 10 (Acid) and 16 (Water Pulse). Once 16 it's holding its own, but then we hit Tentacruel and while Surf is great it likes Ice Beam for Golbat / Drake. Dazzling Gleam helps it out a lot, though, and having STAB Sludge Bomb usually takes care of the Grass-types in the game.

This kind of applies with Crobat too. Actually Crobat is pretty strong but outside of field presence it only has one gym advantage. This also applies to Tentacool (Tate and Liza are to a point).

I think a good idea at this point is to clearly define an A tier Pokemon (aside from Treecko) and maybe do side-by-side comparisons on them.
 
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