OU RBY OU Ladder / "Jank" Discussion Thread

[XionGaTaosenai]

So a few weeks ago, I made the bold claim that if Gallade was in RBY - even if it was a Gallade with only 65 special and no EQ or Rock Slide coverage - it would still be a more viable psychic type in OU than Mr. Mime. But after I said that, I got to thinking - is that, like, true?

I can't find any information at all about Mr. Mime in OU. On the one hand, I completely understand why no one's chomping at the bit to cover Mr. Mime, but on the other hand, thanks to Ortheore, I literally have more resources on hand regarding Kadabra's utility in OU than I do Mr. Mime's. I found Ortheore's extended viability rankings earlier in the thread and saw Mr. Mime placed in E6, but no words on why it's there.

So if you were somehow forced to use Mr. Mime on the RBY OU ladder, what would you do with it?

 

[Eeveeto]

So a few weeks ago, I made the bold claim that if Gallade was in RBY - even if it was a Gallade with only 65 special and no EQ or Rock Slide coverage - it would still be a more viable psychic type in OU than Mr. Mime. But after I said that, I got to thinking - is that, like, true?

I can't find any information at all about Mr. Mime in OU. On the one hand, I completely understand why no one's chomping at the bit to cover Mr. Mime, but on the other hand, thanks to Ortheore, I literally have more resources on hand regarding Kadabra's utility in OU than I do Mr. Mime's. I found Ortheore's extended viability rankings earlier in the thread and saw Mr. Mime placed in E6, but no words on why it's there.

So if you were somehow forced to use Mr. Mime on the RBY OU ladder, what would you do with it?

Psychic, Tbolt, Counter, Submission.

Psychic is STAB.
Tbolt is the ONLY thing that Mime has over Zam.
Counter because its frail as fuck and opposing Normal guys sometimes will use Normal moves. Also, if someone explodes and kills some of your other Mon, you send Mime and they send a Poison type, you predict switch and Counter previous Explosion.
Submission because otherwise you have almost 0 chance to kill Chansey. Zam (who has more Attack btw, lol) doesnt need it because he has 32 PP Recover and in long games will end up winning vs Chansey with the drops, Mime doesnt have that luxury. An underrated advantage of Submission is that if you kill yourself with it, even if Chansey stays alive, it wont be able to heal that turn.

Stoss and Twave are other options, but then you are just much better using Zam.

The only good thing I can say about Mr. Mime, is that unlike many other los tier Mons it at least isnt walled by Gengar, the fun killer. Otherwise, its a terrible Mon, worse than Kadabra and almost worse than Abra, lol.

 

[Ortheore]

Yeah I didn't give a reason for where I ranked Mime bc I haven't tested it at all, and I'd be pretty open to moving it if anyone wanted to argue.

Mime's probably not terrible to use, given that it's mostly a watered down Zam without Recover. It's just that justifying its use is really fkn difficult when there are so many better psychic types. I think Eeveeto's comment that Kadabra is better than it is probably accurate tbh

I haven't seriously tried finding a niche for Mime yet, but it probably follows similar logic to Kadabra in that you're stacking it w Zam, Tbolt isn't enough to distinguish it otherwise. However, beyond that I suspect it plays completely differently. Mime's lack of recovery makes it less useful early game, whereas its better physical bulk when compared to Kadabra means that at least it isn't OHKO'd by Taur, so it's likely geared more towards lategame. That said, this is still fairly superficial theorymon

 

[Enigami]

Literally the only thing Mime has going for it is Thunderbolt to hit Starmie, Cloyster and Slowbro, threatening a 3HKO / 2HKO / 3HKO respectively. It is not "almost worse than Abra", Mr. Mime has superior bulk + Thunderbolt with Abra's only advantage being 5 more Special. It's basically an upgraded Abra, which of course means it's nowhere near good enough in OU. Kadabra alone is certainly superior to it, and Hypno is right there if you want a non-OU slow recoverless Psychic-type. Even if Mr. Mime had over 300 HP and Recover, it would be hard to justify it over Starmie is another Psychic-type with Thunderbolt that has superior speed, bulk and movepool. Even the lack of Electric weakness isn't very meaningful when it still loses to Zapdos easily in a 1v1. Perhaps if its type was Psychic/Electric, then its Thunderbolt would be something worthwhile and would stand out as a Psychic-type that isn't Zapdos-weak.

Edit: I think if there were a niche for Mr. Mime, it'd be used alongside TBolt Starmie as a Mie/Cloy/Bro + Don counter team. While Mr. Mime is bad in a vacuum, I can imagine end game scenarios where the combined threat of Psychic + Thunderbolt + Thunder Wave could be tricky for those teams to navigate, and could let you play more aggressively with Starmie earlier on. I think for this purpose the ideal set would have Barrier as 4th move, as that changes the Rhydon matchup in a way that makes Mr. Mime favored in a 1v1 instead of losing it (also handy for gaining speed advantage in a paralyzed Mr. Mime vs. paralyzed Starmie situation):
Mr. Mime Psychic vs. Rhydon: 154-181 (37.2 - 43.8%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
Rhydon Earthquake vs. Mr. Mime: 169-199 (59.7 - 70.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
Rhydon Earthquake vs. +2 Mr. Mime: 85-100 (30 - 35.3%) -- 21.6% chance to 3HKO

Victreebel and Venusaur serve a similar purpose and should do it better most of the time, but STAB Psychic and the lack of Ice/Psychic/Flying weaknesses can help in certain situations, such as against Gengar and unparalyzed Zam/Mie. Mime is also problematic for wrappers, STAB Psychic + Thunder Wave + >80 Speed is always a problem for them.

 

[Leader of the Rockets]

I've had success against many good players with a variation of the 4-starters team (Charizard, Venusaur, Blastoise, Raichu, Lapras, and Chansey), which very much surprised me. The issue, of course, is that this team, as it stands, could never obtain an impressive gxe. I was wondering if any professional shitty team users here could recommend any changes to boost the consistency. The fact that I can perform well with this team suggests to me that there is potential here.

 

[Kaz]

https://pokepast.es/0d6b47ee5069488f tauros is pretty good at the video game
https://pokepast.es/eee1cd57b9e4324f maybe

 

[Leader of the Rockets]

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen1ou-2293809638-gyt63p86plpg5puo13rwgjkfg8l42iqpw

For a while I experimented with Moltres. This game is a pretty good display of its power. Some people talk about the accuracy of fire spin holding it back. But that doesn't matter. Fire spin is just icing on the cake. What I really remember disliking is fire blast when it missed. But I never found a better combination of moves than the standard set. Zapdos has historically been seen as the dominant bird, leaving the others in its shadow. But honestly, Moltres and Articuno are really great, and I have never felt held back when using them.

Completely unrelated question: has anyone ever figured out how to use Raichu in any viable way? I have always loved Raichu but have never figured out how to optimize a team that would allow him to shine. He doesn't feel synergistic with anything I've tried.

Edit: What I'm more focused on is synergy and less on viability. A team that makes Raichu MAKE SENSE. I play with Onix quite a bit, and yeah, he sucks, but he MAKES SENSE on the team I use him on, which uses paralysis and toxic support to take advantage of bind.

 

[Amaranth]

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen1ou-2293809638-gyt63p86plpg5puo13rwgjkfg8l42iqpw

For a while I experimented with Moltres. This game is a pretty good display of its power. Some people talk about the accuracy of fire spin holding it back. But that doesn't matter. Fire spin is just icing on the cake. What I really remember disliking is fire blast when it missed. But I never found a better combination of moves than the standard set. Zapdos has historically been seen as the dominant bird, leaving the others in its shadow. But honestly, Moltres and Articuno are really great, and I have never felt held back when using them.

Completely unrelated question: has anyone ever figured out how to use Raichu in any viable way? I have always loved Raichu but have never figured out how to optimize a team that would allow him to shine. He doesn't feel synergistic with anything I've tried.

Last and only time I remember a Raichu in any form of high level tournament was Kenix messing around with it 4 years ago:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen1ou-594774
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen1ou-586250

The fact that I can only pull 2 replays from the memory banks probably speaks quite poorly about Raichu's overall viability, and it's a different meta now so I doubt replicating that team 1 to 1 is especially good. But maybe it can be a starting point for something at least decent

 

[Eeveeto]

With Raichu, instead of dedicating the 5 other Mons to destroy Rhydon (like Jolteon and Zapdos need), you need to dedicate them to kill Exeggutor. Which on top of being harder (Exeggutor is much harder to switch into than Rhydon), isnt even enough, cause after Egg, you still have to deal with Tauros (and Persian) outspeeding you, Alakazam and Gengar still checking you hard, Chansey forcing you to suicide with Submission ( which is actually a good trade) and Snorlax taking your hits fairly well.
You don,t have the Speed + crit rate of Jolteon. Or the bulk. In fact, Jolteon too is physically AND specially bulkier than Raichu.
You don,t have the Ground immunity of Zapdos. Or the offensive power, for that matter.
You are killed by Para. Jolteon and Zapdos don,t like it either, but are viable Rest users and also are capable of doing damage when paralyzed (remember Jolteon's crit rate? It doesn,t go away).

The 2 things going for Raichu are Surf and Submission, meaning its the Electric that does most damage to both Rhydon and Chansey (at the expense of probably dying in the process of doing it, though if it happens and Chansey lives, it won,t be using Softboiled that turn).
With this in mind, probably some kind of special spam is the best idea. Gengar, Zam, Slowbro (Blizzard + no Twave) are probably good ideas. Tauros might afford not running Blizzard and use EQ + Tbolt (for Cloyster) instead.

Honestly, I think building a decent team with Electrode is easier than with Raichu, its like Jolteon or Zapdos, but explodes vs Rhydon, preventing Sub and allowing some big threat (Tauros, for example) in.

 

[Soda_Eesti]

Completely unrelated question: has anyone ever figured out how to use Raichu in any viable way? I have always loved Raichu but have never figured out how to optimize a team that would allow him to shine. He doesn't feel synergistic with anything I've tried.

Lead him. I think multiple people have played around with him but sadly tarvold is the only name that comes to mind.

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen1ou-794409
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen1ou-794428

 

[Leader of the Rockets]

Lead him. I think multiple people have played around with him but sadly tarvold is the only name that comes to mind.

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen1ou-794409
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen1ou-794428

Oh yeah, these teams are better than Kenix's. The back Raichu on those teams just seems very arbitrary. It doesn't necessarily have a clear specific purpose for being there. But, on Tarvold's teams, the lead Raichu actually has a niche all of his own. It plays a similar role as Jolteon, with the niche being that Rhydon can't hard wall it, and it scares Chansey a bit more than Jolteon. Despite whatever one has to say of the quality of lead Raichu's opening game, it is at least unique and one can work with it. So far, this is the best use of Raichu I have seen.

 

[Tarvold]

Yeah I do value it as a dedicated turn 1 t-waver lead that can't be Don-blocked like Zap and Jolt.
Obviously has it's issues. Has problems with 4 move slot syndrome and lacks the sheer destructive elements of the aforementioned (*Jolt if crits and pin-missile accuracy play ball).
In other cases Zam is usually the best t1-waver, but Raichu allows you the option to have Zam in the back.
Being a dedicated waver slower than Jynx, for me is not a very viable option. Being faster than Gar doesn't matter as much since it can often just shoot itself in the foot missing hypnosis, however being faster than Jynx is important to reduce it's freeze odds.
So the other non-Zam, non Don-blocked options are Mie and Kad, which both are going to have issues with t-waving a t1 Chansey switch, allowing opponent a comfortable sleep or to freeze fish with impunity.
For Raichu Zam-less I think you consider it mainly for the soft Zap check and electric lead check principles.
Plus probably more than any other lead it invokes an early opponent switch to Egg, so you can construct that to your advantage. A sleeper that can bust through Egg easily makes sense, think back Jynx, Lap etc.

 

[Leader of the Rockets]

Many people have used Venusaur with success in the highest level of this game. Why has this not been done with Blastoise, or at least Charizard? For a pokemon so loved and so cool as Charizard, I'm so surprised that the only person who acts as if he exists is our dear Doydos. Charizard can't be that worse than Venusaur right? Has anyone made any teams that show any potential promise with either of these pokemon?

 

[Eeveeto]

Many people have used Venusaur with success in the highest level of this game. Why has this not been done with Blastoise, or at least Charizard? For a pokemon so loved and so cool as Charizard, I'm so surprised that the only person who acts as if he exists is our dear Doydos. Charizard can't be that worse than Venusaur right? Has anyone made any teams that show any potential promise with either of these pokemon?

Tried. Not terrible, not good. As all Fire Mons, suffers from having to use non Accurate moves constantly. Physically weak before SD, has 4 weaknesses and becomes useless if paralyzed. At +2, still can,t break Rhydon. 4 slot syndrome. Moltres competition (who is also pretty bad, but the Fire Blast hits much harder).
Best RBY Fire is Flareon and only because its Body Slams, Hyper Beams and Quick Attacks are comparable in power to Normal Mons, while the Fire Blast is stronger than anyone except Moltres. It still has problems (pretty slow, physically frail, has to choose between Body Slam, Hyper Beam, Quick Attack and Fire Spin), but its the easiest one to support (just needs para and maybe Starmie sleeping or paralyzed + damaged) and pairs well with common Mons.

Blastoise has 1 niche. Its a pure Water that learns Counter and Earthquake. Often not enough to distinguish itself from better Waters (Starmie and Cloyster are obvious ones, but also Gyarados, Omastar, Poliwrath, Slowbro, Lapras, Dewgong and Kabutops are clearly better than it).

Here is a team with all the starters. Its not good, but since it has a Sleep lead, a Chansey and a Tauros, it can get some wins: https://pokepast.es/c1588eea5fa64a49

 

[Leader of the Rockets]

Tried. Not terrible, not good. As all Fire Mons, suffers from having to use non Accurate moves constantly. Physically weak before SD, has 4 weaknesses and becomes useless if paralyzed. At +2, still can,t break Rhydon. 4 slot syndrome. Moltres competition (who is also pretty bad, but the Fire Blast hits much harder).
Best RBY Fire is Flareon and only because its Body Slams, Hyper Beams and Quick Attacks are comparable in power to Normal Mons, while the Fire Blast is stronger than anyone except Moltres. It still has problems (pretty slow, physically frail, has to choose between Body Slam, Hyper Beam, Quick Attack and Fire Spin), but its the easiest one to support (just needs para and maybe Starmie sleeping or paralyzed + damaged) and pairs well with common Mons.

Blastoise has 1 niche. Its a pure Water that learns Counter and Earthquake. Often not enough to distinguish itself from better Waters (Starmie and Cloyster are obvious ones, but also Gyarados, Omastar, Poliwrath, Slowbro, Lapras, Dewgong and Kabutops are clearly better than it).

Here is a team with all the starters. Its not good, but since it has a Sleep lead, a Chansey and a Tauros, it can get some wins: https://pokepast.es/c1588eea5fa64a49

First of all, Moltres is good (when fire blast doesn’t miss), how dare you. If fire blast had 90% accuracy like Blizzard instead of 85%, I would love Moltres.
BTW, small tangent, why in the world is Fire Blast 85%??? Blizzard in the og versions has a freeze chance of 30% and its accuracy is 90% ????? Fire blast is a worst move and they decided to give it less accuracy??? Why?????

But unfortunately, yeah, it does seem you are right about Charizard. My boy is terrible. I’ve been experimenting, and I just cannot make him even kind of be satisfying to use. I can only hope someone figures something out that I can’t in the team builder one day and makes him at least semi-viable. I actually like Blastoise better, even though he doesn’t do anything special, he somehow doesn’t disappoint me as much.

Flareon seems interesting.

 

[Believer of GXE]

May I pose a question?
If the big 4 are definitely exactly the following: "Tauros,Chansey,Exeggutor, and Snorlax"... and that they are put vs Cloyster....why is it that even if cloyster wins vs each of them, or very close to it? that cloyster finds its usage rate at significantly lower when relative to them?

If I start with the 4 most commonly used things and put them vs 1 exact thing...why do I find cloyster is the best vs these 4 things...and then why is it that underused?
Cloyster absolutely obliterates Snorlax with clamp alone. Without clamp, it still wins, by a lot.
Cloyster wins vs the 90% of Tauros that don't have T-bolt....by a lot
Cloyster wins vs exeggutor if that something on my own team is already asleep, and still holds 49% equity against exeggutor if something isn't yet asleep...I did the math for that....
Cloyster Blizzard vs exeggutor crits 15%. +freeze of 9%+exeggutor misses sleep power of 25%.
Cloyster vs Chansey is very complex, but it always has 1to1 equity with explosion, it also holds equity otherwise in a multitude of ways. With clamp Chansey is hard to calculate, but it obviously isn't too terrible for either side, and if chansey is swapping into blizzards also, it implies that even that scenario isn't bad.
Shouldn't cloyster be universal if I knew my opp always has 3 or 4 of these? Nearly always.
The big 4 are all used at usage rates that are very consistent over decades.

It's cloyster vs any of them.....Why not?

I predict Cloysters usage rates will go up over time, is anyone willing to risk against this?
Or do you disagree that cloyster wont climb in usage rates.
Answer yes if you agree cloyster will climb in time or if you think cloyster won't, and why or why not? I'm genuinely interested.

I'll set a time capsule from Oct 2025 and compare in Oct 2026. Comparing the usage rates of cloyster then vs now.

 

[Ortheore]

"Big 4" is a really outdated grouping that specifically ignores Cloyster's worst matchup, which is a bit disingenuous when Starmie is arguably as good or better than Chansey/Egg (opinions on the exact order of those 3 seem to vary). As for its flaws, it loses to practically every special attacker, its limited coverage means that it's easily walled, and without status it doesn't support the team much aside from tanking physical attacks (which also exposes it to paraSlam, which worsens an array of matchups).

It's a good pokemon, but cherry picking certain 1v1s that favour it isn't a compelling argument for it to rise, when teams pretty consistently run other pokemon that beat it and mons isn't a 1v1 exercise anyway. Tbh all you need to make equivalent arguments is a pokemon with good physical bulk and a powerful super effective STAB into Egg. This means you can almost copy/paste those arguments for Moltres and Lapras and they'll still be valid- do you also think they're due for a rise?

Also Clamp is a terrible option vs Lax, Blizzard is way better

 

[Believer of GXE]

How is it cherry picking if I pick anything that's used over 70% of the time and pit any 1 thing against that? It's used over 70% by definition, which means I will nearly guarantee i will face it often.
I will always nearly guarantee I'm vs those.
I would rather guarantee my cloyster is vs a Tauros 95% of the time
I would rather guarantee my cloyster is vs a Snorlax 92% of the time
I would rather guarantee my cloyster is vs a Chansey 85% of the time
I would rather guarantee my cloyster is vs a exeggutor 72% of the time
In fact based off that I will guarantee I will have a cloyster 100% of the time until anything changes.
.....And if that makes starmie more common, it already has, because exeggutor dropped for starmie because of cloyster.

 

[Soda_Eesti]

It's used over 70% by definition

again, big 4 is a very outdated term not represenative of our current metagame at all, and fails to recognize the fact starmie (In some cases used more than egg or chans) just farms cloy.

Also brjnging anything but tauros 100% is just asking for cteams. LOL.

I suggest you in general reread the entire post instead of cherry picking and fixating on a specific line. Because your reply reeks of having not read it.

 

[Believer of GXE]

again, big 4 is a very outdated term not represenative of our current metagame at all, and fails to recognize the fact starmie (In some cases used more than egg or chans) just farms cloy.

Also brjnging anything but tauros 100% is just asking for cteams. LOL.

I suggest you in general reread the entire post instead of cherry picking and fixating on a specific line. Because your reply reeks of having not read it.

Latest usage stats for 1760+
| 1 | Tauros | 95.21702%
| 2 | Snorlax | 81.43979%
| 3 | Exeggutor | 79.11347%
| 4 | Chansey | 64.63277%
| 5 | Starmie | 47.64186%

If I know for certain that I will face this range with this frequency I would want which things to counter this?

 

[Ortheore]

Latest usage stats for 1760+
| 1 | Tauros | 95.21702%
| 2 | Snorlax | 81.43979%
| 3 | Exeggutor | 79.11347%
| 4 | Chansey | 64.63277%
| 5 | Starmie | 47.64186%

If I know for certain that I will face this range with this frequency I would want which things to counter this?

Cloyster only counters (or strongly checks) 2 of those pokemon btw, it generally can't switch in on Chans/Egg/Star. Ultimately if you think that Cloyster is underrated and has anti-meta potential that's totally fine, I don't want to flat out dump your reasoning because it's still a notable point. It's just saying that it wins a bunch of 1v1 matchups isn't as strong of an argument as it might seem and not really a bulletproof case, because the game simply isn't played like that (especially when you consider more than 5 pokemon)

PS: RBYPL is running atm and gives much clearer picture of high level play than ladder. Starmie has 65.68% usage (#5 I think, just an estimate) across the 2 weeks for which we have usage stats