Reflections on the current state of DPP OU

Hello everybody ! I dediced to open this thread because there a few thoughts about DPP OU that I would like to share and I would like to spark some discussion around them.

Current State of DPP OU


DPP OU is pretty much a flawed metagame at the moment. This is obviously my subjective opinion but, having discussed with many good and experienced DPP players, I know I'm not alone in this. So, what exactly is wrong with DPP ? I would say there are two major issues:

  1. Pace: DPP OU is a very fast paced metagame. This caused by the obvious power creep, compared to the first three iterations of the game. Why is this a problem ? Well, unlike the generations that followed, there is no team-preview in DPP. This often makes games decided by a wrong guess of the opponent's last pokemon, which to be fair happens in every game without team-preview. The problem in DPP's case is that, most times, you simply can't make up for your mistake. Team guessing is indeed a skill in generations with no team-preview and I believe it should be rewarded but, on the other side, it's neither the only skill nor the most important one. Furthermore, DPP games tend to be much more linear compared to other generations and I personally believe that this leads to less-competitive games, often decided by guessing your opponent's team correctly or not.

  2. Over-centralization: DPP OU is definitely an over-centralized metagame. This is not inherently bad, as there are perfectly fine centralized metagames. For example, I consider RBY OU to be one of them (despite people still being preoccupied against it). The main reason I think this is a problem is because the pokemon, around which the metagame is centralized, are largely contributing to the aforementioned problem of pace. Being more specific, I think the most problematic core of our metagame is Tyranitar + Breloom. In my opinion, this core is very unhealthy for the metagame. It is so consistently good against defensive builds, that it simply downgrades their viability and thus, contributes to the problematic fast-paced metagame. It is also very, very restrictive in teambuilding and makes several -otherwise perfectly viable- defensive pokemon pretty much unviable. Tyranitar in particular not only deals with most Breloom checks/counters, but it can also trap (or threaten to trap) every single spinblocker of the tier and the only really viable spinner of tier, making the hazard game very difficult and risky to play, often forcing 50/50s.

Suggestions

My suggestion is to start a suspect process, in an attempt to make DPP a bit more balanced and less random. I believe this will only be achieved if we manage to slow the metagame down, so my personal suggestion would be suspecting Tyranitar. If Tyranitar is not banned, then I'm certainly in favor of bringing Latias back to OU. That's all I had to say guys. I hope this thread can reignite discussion around DPP and I'm really looking forward to reading your thoughts, as long as you behave yourselves.
 
I have never played a game of DPP, but I have read enough threads and articles to realize that Tyranitar is an integral part of the game, used for several different things. If banning Tyranitar is not the way to go, would banning the use of Tyranitar and Breloom on the same team be an idea, or is that proposal bad?

Again, my experience with DPP OU is literally nothing, so feel free to disregard, ridicule or mock my comment. I'm just working from the assumption that Serpico's statements are at the very least close to the truth.
 
Meriksn : I don't think it's possible to ban the use of the core, especially since the core is not clearly "broken". However, even if it was possible, I think I'd still prefer to suspect Tyranitar itself for its overall impact on the metagame.

pasy_g : "Settle for less and keep a brave face on it !". Thanks, but I prefer to use my voice when I deem it's necessary.
 
I honestly strongly disagree with these "issues". I happen to feel that DPP has stabilized to a healthy point, where innovation and team diversity are strongly rewarded, and that despite the "fast pace" (which, in my opinion, distinguishes DPP from the other metas in a unique way) the games are usually very competitive.

I don't think that DPP's "fast pace" and "lack of team preview" are issues at all in this meta because I think you have more options on almost all viable teams even if, for example, your scarfer is gone. Also, I think it can be a key component of strategy to hide a sweeper, save it for last, and then use that to win. I think that if somehow this "problem" of the game were solved, it would actually take away a dimension of strategy that DPP is able to support (I don't think without a scarfer a +1 sweeper will always just destroy the team. There are certainly multiple options DPP gives you that would enable you to shut down a +1 DD sweeper). For example, mons like Gliscor, Suicune (offensive), Skarmory, Milotic, Hippowdon, etc. all can handle DD sweepers when they are at +1 given that they are healthy enough to do so. I overall just disagree with the power creep being significant enough to warrant a necessity for team preview. If you disagree with this, it's fine, but I've never found this an issue in my almost 9 years of playing this meta.

"it's neither the only skill nor the most important one"
I think that this is very largely opinion based, and I don't think because it's not the most important skill, it shouldn't have presence. I don't think a very high number of battles are decided on this "skill" being used effectively or not.

Regarding "over-centralization", this is where things become even more subjective than they were. But I don't understand how DPP can be considered to be "over-centralized" when DPP has probably more diversity in team choice than most of the other gens (can't speak for 6 and 7 as much). There are many viable teams without tyranitar, without jirachi, etc. If you look at my scouter, or my builder for example, there are a shocking number of tyranitar-less teams that are used. I don't also feel that loom + tar is broken and definitely not an autowin vs defensive builds. Because of the skarm + nido core -- yes, defensive builds are naturally weak to loom -- technically one can absorb the sleep and the other can handle. Loom + Tar core (assuming bandtar) does not break Skarmory, an essential pokemon in the defensive core. Stall has other options to tackle this, like adding rest talk rotom to the mix with reflect/WoW (which also, even bandtar has a ton of difficulty reliably trapping). So I think in this post you are underrating extremely the capabilities and viability of defensive builds.

"It is also very, very restrictive in teambuilding and makes several -otherwise perfectly viable- defensive pokemon pretty much unviable."
I think this also adds to taking Loom + Tar way out of proportion. Yes, it is an amazing core, but not to this degree. If your team has a breloom weakness, you can use things like sleep talk CB nite, sleep talk Gengar, sleep talk Specs Kingdra, a mon that resists both stabs, a team so offensive that loom doesn't have many chances, etc. I just don't feel at all like loomtar is heavily restrictive on teambuilding, nor does it decrease the viability of defensive pokemon in the grand scheme. Full stall is one of the most viable playstyles in DPP because full stall builds are the most conventionally sound and check way more threats than offensive builds do (DD sweepers in particular have a very rough time breaking stall, which I mention because you alluded to DD sweepers being an issue with lack of team preview).

"Tyranitar in particular not only deals with most Breloom checks/counters, but it can also trap (or threaten to trap) every single spinblocker of the tier and the only really viable spinner of tier, making the hazard game very difficult and risky to play, often forcing 50/50s."
I disagree with this comment mostly for reasons stated above (skarm + nido are not checked by tyranitar, in fact many times the opposite, choiced and 3 attack sleep talkers also can often annihilate tar, Zapdos is not reliably trapped by bandtar, etc.) but also because of forcing 50/50s, which I believe the hazard game is much more than just a "50/50". Starmie has tools like reflect, colbur berry, etc. What if Tyranitar is not passho and it comes in on a powerful hydro? What if you have spikes up as well? Yes, there can be 50/50s in this situation, but doesn't that also reward the player who can predict the 50/50 right? I don't think 50/50s imply entirely random choice, anyway.

I think that suspecting Tyranitar in DPP is taking things way out of proportion as well, especially for a meta that has been extremely stable over the past 8 years. In every meta, there are going to be one or two mons that are centralizing, that is how metagames, and even healthy ones, work. Tyranitar is a monster but nowhere near broken and a staple on so many teams that have been used for several years now. Also, I feel that Starmie would become extremely difficult to deal with if Tyranitar is not in the mix. Even with Tyranitar keeping Starmie in check, Starmie still is probably the #4 best mon in the tier (behind Jirachi (#1), Tar (#2), and Heatran (#3) in my opinion). Passho Tyranitar + Pursuit + Crunch is pretty much a mandate as well if you want to very reliably deal with Starmie, which comes with its drawbacks as well for Tyranitar's destructive capability and coverage. I could go on and on about all the things that would go wrong if Tyranitar were taken out of the meta (ie. Rain Dance Kingdra being unstoppable, Rotom also having nothing to balance it out (and by extension other electrics, especially Zapdos), Blissey and other defensive builds becoming dominating and extremely difficult to deal with, etc.) but I won't go too into detail about this now. The effects of taking Tyranitar out of the meta would be so extreme and tremendous that it really should not be considered at this point with the meta having been stabilized for so long, especially since the mon is not broken whatsoever.

"If Tyranitar is not banned, then I'm certainly in favor of bringing Latias back to OU."
If you state that over-centralization is a huge issue right now in DPP, then why would you be in favor of bringing back Latias, a mon that would be tremendously more overcentralizing than Tyranitar, to the meta? I won't go too into this because I have a lot to say about my strong opposition to bringing Latias back into the meta, but I'll say this: if you don't like pursuit wars in DPP with Tyranitar and Starmie, they will multiply a hundred fold if Latias is introduced back into the game. I could see a huge resurgence of scarf scizor as well, running double pursuit to deal with the extra nuisance that has no drawback outside of being weak to pursuit, which would be extremely restrictive on team building and invalidate many of the teams people on ladder and in tournament use today.

That's all I can think of about this matter right now, I just want to say that I don't want to come off on this post as attacking or anything like that. Also, since I wrote this pretty quickly, please encourage me to elaborate on any point I made in more detail if need be. I just wanted to get all my thoughts out there quickly in case I forgot something. I just think DPP should stay as is because it is in a healthy state that promotes creativity, a diverse set of viable builds, and in my opinion, a tolerable centralization. I might be some crazy DPP conservationist, but I'd really prefer if DPP is left alone, and I play the tier more nowadays than almost everybody. That can be attested to :P

Edit #1: De-bolded sentences for ease of reading
Edit #2: Added mention of Blissey and other electrics like Zapdos, which is extremely important when thinking about suspecting tar
 
Last edited:
Yesterday, we had a pretty lengthy conversation with excal on discord about this thread. We have a quite different opinion on current dpp and we both of us failed to convince each other. Although, (this doesn't only refer to excal) you have to keep in mind that my proposal was not banning Tyranitar, but testing a metagame without it. In fact, I can't be adamant that the Tyranitar-less metagame will be better because it is a metagame that has never been played in the past. I believe that it will be better (explained my thought-process in the OP), but we won't really get to see unless we test it. At this point, I have to say I am getting very frustrated with the people complaining about suspecting pokemon/strategies in old gens. What makes it frustrating is that, in most cases, these are the very same people who mindlessly spam "gen X is untier" on discord/forums etc. You have to understand that tiers were not formed by deities and if something is wrong, we can try to change it. Then, there is the argument that we should not disrupt the stabilized (stagnated in my opinion) metagame and that we shouldn't waste our time and energy on projects like this. My answer to these arguments perfectly summarized by the epic quote of eden's embrace : "you are not running some multinational company, you clown". I think I made myself pretty clear on this topic and this is one of the very few things I am adamant about. I'm perfectly fine with people not agreeing with my proposal by the way, I know it's controversial and I had doubts whether or not I should create the thread in the first place. However, the controversy lies in suspecting Tyranitar ; not in the general idea of suspecting in old gens. If you can't understand this, you can make yourself a favor and stop wasting your time with this thread. Anyway, rant over.
I will now proceed to present my counter-arguments to what excal said.

- Regarding the pace of the metagame, power creep, the influence of MU and guessing:
Nobody can deny that DPP is very fast paced metagame. This indeed makes DPP unique, but being different isn't any good if the metagame isn't actually good. In fact, most non-dpp players I've talked with (that's a lot of people, believe me) think it is one of the worst, most random and MU based ou metagames at the moment. You may say that this is opinion based and it is, but this doesn't mean it is an unreasonable claim. My personal opinion is that the pace of the metagame and the power creep makes it significantly less competitive than it could be and much more random than it should be. The existence of the power creep really obvious in my eyes. The fact that set up sweepers can't outspeed and OHKO the whole tier at +1 is not really a valid argument against the power creep. Compared to the previous generations, the power levels are insane. Mixed Sweepers like Dragonite, Infernape and even Flygon have almost no counters and even their checks will get destroyed, when hit by the appropriate move. Then, there are also lots of physical/special dedicated hard hitters who don't even need to set up because of the improvement of choice items. Choice items are significantly better in DPP, not only because of the introduction of choice specs, but because the coverage of the pokemon using them is significantly better after the physical/special split of moves regardless of their type. This has led to neutral effective hits getting OHKOs on pokemon, which makes the metagame very prediction based. Prediction (a glorified word for guessing) has always been a significant factor in competitive pokemon. However, I can't think of any other ou metagame that is as prediction-based as DPP. Furthermore, DPP OU is by far the metagame with the most games decided by guessing the unrevealed part of your opponent's team correctly or not. Why ? Because DPP teams usually don't last long enough. So, if you guess wrong, something important may faint and chances are you're paying the price. You also claimed that I extremely underrate the viability of defensive builds, but I don't think this is the case. Defensive builds are definitely viable, but the truth is not that they're not as good as you make them appear. There are many people out there who don't know how to beat stall and this is the main reasons defensive archetypes have been getting their fair share of success in tournaments. The tools to break stall exist, are easy to fit on most bulky offensive teams and a good player will know how to apply pressure to stall builds until they crumble. If anything, I think you underrate the wall-breaking capabilities of DPP pokemon and the power levels of the tier in general.

-Regarding overcentralization:
"Innovation and team diversity are strongly rewarded". This is partly true, because it is a very generic comment. Innovation isn't only about the pokemon used, but also the sets of the pokemon. Their movesets, their ev spreads and even their partnerships. Regarding team diversity, I disagree. DPP OU has ~45 OU pokemon, yet in SPL 9 only ~30 pokemon would make the OU cut-off. People just tend to recycle their old standard teams at the moment or use the BKC DPP "starter pack", which is the main resource of teams for a large part of the DPP OU playerbase. You're one of the few people around who really tries to innovate, so this maybe the reason you don't agree with that.

-Regarding the impact of potential suspects:
As I wrote earlier, I can't be adamant about something I haven't tried yet. I think my arguments about the metagame's pace and its impact are backed up, so I'd expect to at least consider them seriously. If banning a Tyranitar-less metagame proves to be worse, I will be the first one to say that we shouldn't ban it. What I'm asking with this thread is to consider it seriously and try it (even unofficially). Regarding your assumption that a whole bunch of pokemon will become bordeline-broken once Tyranitar is gone, you contradicted yourself. If Tyranitar-less teams are so open to so many standard pokemon like Starmie, Zapdos, Kingdra and Gengar, then I don't understand how you managed to build so many solid Tyranitar-less teams since these pokemon are omnipresent in DPP OU. Chances are that the metagame will adapt to a slower pace, with bulkier builds and will therefore become much less random and much more competitive. It will also never become as slow or fat as GSC/ADV because of the aforementioned power creep that exists regardless of Tyranitar.
I also don't really mind Latias getting back to OU, because I don't believe the metagame will be much worse than it is now and therefore, I find its ban unnecessary unless we want to change DPP drastically. I mean, if you have fun playing this overcentralized metagame, you will also have fun playing the Latias metagame once you get used to it and adopt to it. I personally doubt I'll have fun playing either version in the future and thus made my proposal.

That's all I had to say, thanks for posting in the first place. It gave me the chance to elaborate a little bit more on my thoughts and healthy discussion is always welcome.
 
Last edited:
I think the (completely justified) complaints of games coming down to matchup advantages and revealed last mons are somewhat inherent to the most power creeped metagame without team preview.

Slowing down the pace of the metagame could definitely address the pitfalls of a game without team preview. I'm suspicious how much removing Tyranitar would contribute to slowing the metagame, especially with the boosts its removal would provide to Rain Based Offense. I think that one of the biggest culprits of DPP's fast pace are the overpowered Explosions/SelfDestructs.

I also disagree that Tyranitar + Breloom cores are the biggest problems for defensive builds, especially with Nidoqueen being a centerpiece in the current stall meta. I would argue (Tbh I hardly think its arguable) that Clefable is a much bigger problem for stall/hazards based teams. LO MixGon and DNite also come to mind as potential bigger threats to stall than Tar + Loom.

There are so few reliable answers to electric types in the current metagame, so I think that removing one of the greatest would lead to a metagame more centralized around them, and their remaining checks.

Since Tyranitar is also one of only 3 autoweather inducers, I think that banning it could lead to a metagame more centralized around the remaining 2, as weather inducers are strongly desired to deal with Rain Offense.

However, if people are interested in seeing what the metagame looks like without Tyranitar, I would certainly be willing to partcipate in testing, and play friendly matches without it, to see how enjoyable the resulting game is.
 

panamaxis

how many seconds in eternity?
is a Forum Moderator Alumnusis a Tiering Contributor Alumnusis a Contributor Alumnusis a Battle Simulator Moderator Alumnusis a Two-Time Past SPL Championis a Three-Time Past WCoP Champion
Wcop 2018

Qualifying
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-375381 - defense wins
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-375760 - defense wins
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-377660 - defense wins
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-378994 - balanced wins vs offense

Round 1
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-380177 - defense wins
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-380439 - defense wins
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-383907 - defense wins vs balance
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-382742 - defense wins
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-381040 - offense wins vs offense
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-381232 - balance wins vs tyranitar + breloom core

I stopped at this point. If you scroll through the replays list, these are the first 10 games that appear so it's not like I've cherry picked them. I'm sure offense would win a lot more if I went through all of them. I'll preface this by saying that I'm going by my definition of "defense" and if someone disagrees with that classification in those replays, fair enough. In these games we see things like Nidoqueen, Crobat, Aerial Ace Gliscor, Ice Fang Gliscor. All metagame adaptations to give more insurance against tyranitar/breloom. We see teams with swampert - arguably a defensive pokemon that breloom would make "unviable" - succeeding. We see teams with dugtrio, who can beat both breloom and tyranitar. The evidence seems to suggest that defense is completely viable.

Team guessing is indeed a skill in generations with no team-preview and I believe it should be rewarded
I agree with you.

I personally believe that this leads to less-competitive games, often decided by guessing your opponent's team correctly or not.
You said this is a skill that should be rewarded, so why does that mean games aren't competitive if this is a 'skill' that is deciding games? If we were talking about, say, BW without team preview, I could totally see what you mean as it's not really possible to prepare for all threats. And while it probably isn't 100% possible in DPP either, it's a lot easier, and you should usually be able to build your teams well enough and play well enough to get to a point where you can make reasonable assumptions about what is safe to sacrifice and what isn't. I guess what i'm saying is that I don't think the power creep is big enough in DPP that you have to make a guess about what to sacrifice in the very early game only to later realise, woops, I sacced the wrong thing, guess I lose now.

Tyranitar in particular not only deals with most Breloom checks/counters
I don't think this is true at all, and it's backed up by the replays I've posted where we see breloom checks/counters that have ways around tyranitar - nidoqueen / gliscor with a coverage move / dugtrio / skarmory. Stuff like celebi and bronzong can also situationally work. Now, i'm not saying these pokemon are going to beat breloom/ttar every time, particularly as ttar can run heaps of viable sets, but my experience is that tyranitar does not really deal with most breloom checks & counters on a consistent basis.

My suggestion is to start a suspect process, in an attempt to make DPP a bit more balanced and less random. I believe this will only be achieved if we manage to slow the metagame down
DPP has a number of pokemon at the top that centralise the metagame, no doubt. Jirachi, tyranitar, starmie, heatran etc. But we see that in a lot of metagames. RBY has tauros / lax / eggy / chansey. GSC has lax / cloyster / raikou / zapdos. What, to you, makes DPP unbalanced? How is DPP 'random'? And how will 'slowing the metagame down' fix either of these problems?

I suggest you check out replays from players such as BKC, ToF, DracoMalfory, august, 6A9 Ace Matador, Heist etc to see examples of players who have had consistent success with defensive teams across many years. I also suggest you check out replays from players such as Philip7086 to see examples of players who lose due to time in winning positions. Defensive builds are as viable as ever and they are in no way invalidated by tyranitar and breloom.

I am not convinced DPP is random, and I am also not convinced that tyranitar and/or breloom downgrades the viability of defensive builds. I do think that DPP is skewed towards 4 or 5 top threats that dominate the meta, but I think that's completely normal and not really an issue.

I want to echo the quote by Excal, as I think Excal made a great post and summed up my thoughts neatly:
I honestly strongly disagree with these "issues". I happen to feel that DPP has stabilized to a healthy point, where innovation and team diversity are strongly rewarded, and that despite the "fast pace" (which, in my opinion, distinguishes DPP from the other metas in a unique way) the games are usually very competitive.
Even though I disagree with the OP, always nice to see some discussion about DPP.
 
I actually said that overcentralization isn't inherently bad in the OP. I only think it's bad for DPP because I believe it leads to a more fast-paced metagame and combined with the power creep it makes games much more random in my opinion, since you can't scout as effectively as you can do in previous gens. Mixed sweepers are the prime example of pokemon that are difficult to scout, especially pokemon such as MixNite. When you get a prediction wrong vs these pokemon, it often means something is getting OHKO'd. Not knowing the rest of your opponent's team also makes predicting the sets of his revealed pokemon a bit more difficult. This is what I mostly mean by random ; I guess MU too, but not much more than it does in other gens (especially later gens). Agreeing or not with this argument of mine obviously comes down to one's opinion about the power creep (since this also affects the magnitude of correct team guessing), so it's only natural to disagree if you believe the power creep is not big enough.

As for the impact of Tyranitar, I believe the biggest issue is not its partnership with Breloom, but its role in the hazard game (trapping both spinblockers + spinners). I only mentioned its partnership with Breloom because of the pressure it applies on defensive teams. Getting something slept essentially means you play with a pokemon less, meaning a wall less for defensive builds. Tyranitar + Breloom doesn't beat stall teams singlehandedly, but it consistently gives some very good momentum to the user of the core. From that point on, the game is on the hands of the player attacking rather than the player reacting. If the stall player plays better, he can still win of course. In that sense, it is not an auto-win indeed. The thing is that I never said it is, maybe my wording was bad. By saying "downgrading their viability", I didn't meant that stall is unviable. I meant that the playstyle isn't dominant enough to be considered the go-to DPP playstyle. This is backed up by the usage stats of every tournament, which show that Bulky Offense/Offense is the most dominant playstyle. I believe that a metagame with these usage stats balanced, or even reversed would be much healthier. In fact, my main problem with current DPP isn't the stall vs (bulky) offense MUs, but the (bulky) offense vs (bulky) offense MUs which are also much more common.

P.S: A couple of unofficial tournaments with Tyranitar banned would be really cool, to actually see how the meta would adapt.
 
Before I get into my final response, I just want to say that I agree with pretty much everything panamaxis has said thus far. Beyond this, since I've expressed almost all my thoughts already on certain parts of your response, I'm only going to address and even add a few things. Writing a post that's as well-done and eloquent as panamaxis' post is going to be tough, but that said, here's my response:

"Regarding the pace of the metagame, power creep, the influence of MU and guessing:"

"My personal opinion is that the pace of the metagame and the power creep makes it significantly less competitive than it could be and much more random than it should be. The existence of the power creep really obvious in my eyes. The fact that set up sweepers can't outspeed and OHKO the whole tier at +1 is not really a valid argument against the power creep."
I don't see this opinion of yours changing at all, so you are certainly entitled to this opinion, but I just want to add here that in addition to this, you have other options like resist berries (shuca Jirachi and shuca Metagross have been really nice alternatives for handling DD sweepers), and what you said, "prediction". DPP is a prediction-heavy metagame, but more on this later.

"Defensive builds are definitely viable, but the truth is not that they're not as good as you make them appear. There are many people out there who don't know how to beat stall and this is the main reasons defensive archetypes have been getting their fair share of success in tournaments. The tools to break stall exist, are easy to fit on most bulky offensive teams and a good player will know how to apply pressure to stall builds until they crumble. If anything, I think you underrate the wall-breaking capabilities of DPP pokemon and the power levels of the tier in general."
Panamaxis touches on this comment really well, but I just want to state again that I strongly disagree with this. You are basically implying here that if someone is good enough of a player, stall should never be an issue for them to overcome. Also, regarding my "[underrating] the wall-breaking capabilities...", I didn't say anything about how I felt about the wall-breaking capabilities of DPP pokemon. I said that I don't believe the power creep is large enough to warrant a necessity for team preview, and I still don't think so. All I said is that I don't think LoomTar is nearly as problematic for defensive builds because several of the claims you used to support this are false (however LoomTar is still great vs defensive builds, but that's the natural order of things in DPP), and I added specific examples of ways stall can overcome this. This comment about my underrating seems a bit out of hand for this reason: I am responding to some of your claims about why stall is bad, not saying at all that offense isn't a great playstyle. In fact, I actually believe at the highest level, offense is a superior playstyle, but the room for error is significantly smaller. And since offensive builds are not as conventionally sound as full stall builds, the combinations you choose won't always have a clear cut advantage over the opposing team. If you want my opinion on MixNite and MixFlygon (I'll leave ape out of this for now), I think they are absolutely insane, and very terrifying offensive threats. It's funny with the context to this post, because the counters to these mons (bulky waters like Milotic, some Suicune, Hippowdon, etc.) are usually found on stall builds and defensive teams, and not offensive teams. Flygon mixed I'd say is countered pretty hard by Blissey fairly often, and even Clefable (with protect). I think MixNite is just ridiculously powerful, and nite can run many sets. I think MixGon benefits tremendously from being assumed that it will always be scarf. These are staples of DPP offense, and because of the ability to predict/double switch, these pokemon can't just sweep an entire team on a consistent basis.

"Regarding overcentralization:"

"Regarding team diversity, I disagree. DPP OU has ~45 OU pokemon, yet in SPL 9 only ~30 pokemon would make the OU cut-off. People just tend to recycle their old standard teams at the moment or use the BKC DPP "starter pack", which is the main resource of teams for a large part of the DPP OU playerbase."
Maybe I've missed out somehow on this "BKC starter pack" but just as an example, if I remember correctly, Jimmy Turtwig, who won the DPP cup this year, mentioned that almost all of his builds he created himself. From my experience in tournaments, I tend to build around my opponent in many cases. I don't think that at the more competitive levels of play people are just mindlessly recycling BKC teams in tournaments. I would be very interested in some sort of evidence that this is entirely the case, because I'm really not buying this. Also, regarding the "OU pokemon" in DPP, the fact that "OU" pokemon like Dusknoir, Electivire, Smeargle, NINJASK, etc are not used in SPL to me does not correlate with team diversity. You make a good point that I innovate regularly in this tier, but hey we disagree on this.

"Regarding the impact of potential suspects:"

"What I'm asking with this thread is to consider it seriously and try it (even unofficially)."
I am down to try this unofficially, perhaps through the RoA room would be a good medium through which to try this. But for reasons I stated in my post I do not want to seriously consider this in terms of rehashing the current tier.

"Regarding your assumption that a whole bunch of pokemon will become bordeline-broken once Tyranitar is gone, you contradicted yourself. If Tyranitar-less teams are so open to so many standard pokemon like Starmie, Zapdos, Kingdra and Gengar, then I don't understand how you managed to build so many solid Tyranitar-less teams since these pokemon are omnipresent in DPP OU."
I understand here why it seems like I have contradicted myself, but I don't think I quite have. Very often teams with no Tyranitar will be open to those standard pokemon. I think that my teams with no ttar are pretty "open" to those pokemon for the most part as well. But because Tyranitar is in the metagame, electrics won't be used "all the time", as I'll phrase it. Take Tyranitar out of the equation, and many of my Tyranitar-less builds start to face fundamental issues: electrics are spammed much more often, kingdra is everywhere, and if I don't have Blissey (which you mentioned as the example of a mon that combats electrics and the pokemon you listed), I will have huge issues. So what is my response here, and what will other players likely do? Start using Blissey. This last comment on this quote is going to be extremely opinion-based and radical, but I'd rather have the game centralized around Latias, a mon which I've shown strong opposition to, than Blissey. But I guess this comment is not necessary. Last thing I will say on this is that Seven Thunders brings up some other important points to consider about a Tyranitar-less metagame, so definitely consider those definitions of overcentralization as well.

"I also don't really mind Latias getting back to OU, because I don't believe the metagame will be much worse than it is now and therefore, I find its ban unnecessary unless we want to change DPP drastically. I mean, if you have fun playing this overcentralized metagame, you will also have fun playing the Latias metagame once you get used to it and adopt to it. I personally doubt I'll have fun playing either version in the future and thus made my proposal."
This comment overall really confuses me, and hints at a few blatant contradictions you've made in your posts thus far. Your opinion on wanting Latias back, I can respect, but I simply don't understand it when you have mentioned numerous times that DPP is already overcentralized. I won't go too far into this as I already have in a previous post. It's just weird to me because your wanting Latias back completely contradicts many "issues" that you've addressed with Tyranitar (the trapping wars, "overcentralization", etc.) Regarding this quote "if you have fun playing this overcentralized metagame, you will also have fun playing the Latias metagame once you get used to it and adopt to it," I just don't really understand this stab at my preferences. My argument is that I don't think DPP is overcentralized whatsoever, and I claimed in my post that I do not want Latias coming back because it will in my opinion overcentralize the metagame. So what is this comment for? You're an extremely articulate guy, but this comment just belittles my claims that I have supported and adds nothing to your claim/argument. I think DPP will always be a prediction-heavy metagame, and I will reiterate that I think this distinguishes the tier in a unique way. I just don't see how being prediction-based makes the tier more "random" and "less balanced". I am overall not convinced DPP is random nor that the prediction-based meta devalues competitive play.

Thanks for the response. I just want to say as well that I have a deep respect for both your opinions on the game and also for your effort and work you've put in to these posts. Stimulating this kind of DPP discussion I think is really valuable at this time, and it's also very nice to get a new thread on DPP. Like I said earlier, this is my last post here, but if anybody has any questions on things I've said or anything about DPP in general, feel free to send me a private message or contact me on discord. To those who took the time to read my two posts, I thank you as well.
 
Last edited:
Reading your post, it seems you only responded to the post that was my response to yours. You can find parts of what would be my full response to your post in my response to panamaxis, where I elaborate on my statements a bit more. Anyway, let's elaborate even more:

The overcentralization of the DPP metagame is not an opinion,something that is up to debate, it is a fact.
Since the OU cut-off argument wasn't enough (to be fair many those pokemon are indeed shit, but my point still stands because ~40 > 30), I'd like you to have a look at DPP SPL's usage stats,. You'll notice that DPP was one of the three tiers with 3 pokemon (Tyranitar, Jirachi and Heatran) having usage > 40%. The other two were GSC and RBY, but those are tiers with half or less the pokemon available in DPP. I mean, if DPP is not an overcentralized tier, I guess there are no overcentralized tiers at all. Having said that, since you tend to ignore this part of my argument, I guess have to repeat for the third time that I don't believe that being overcentralized is inherently bad. I believe it is bad in this case only because it speeds the tier up and, thus makes the tier much more random. Why ? Because, as you said, the checks&counters of some of the most overpowered dpp pokemon are usually found on defensive teams. Resist berries can only save you once and while they are useful, it's not something you really want to rely on when you're building teams. What I want is defensive teams to become good enough to be the dominant playstyle of DPP, so that we're not constantly in 2HKO/OHKO range if we get one prediction wrong. Why aren't stall teams the most dominant playstyle ? Because it is much more difficult to play the hazards game and because of the power creep that makes it much easier to apply pressure to defensive builds. I'm not sure banning Tyranitar would make stall the dominant force of DPP, but it will be a step towards that direction and that's exactly why I want to try it so much (unofficially at first). Is there a reason not to ? Not really.

Regarding the impact of potential suspects (again). You've stated my "contradiction" about the Latias part so many times, it's getting exhausting at this point because I'm very clear about it and it's not even the main discussion point. I'm basically saying that while I won't be happy unbanning it (because this isn't the direction I'd like the tier to go), I'm not opposed to it either as it has been proved by the tournaments hosted that it doesn't make the meta any more unhealthy than it is now. The implication that the metagame will either become a Blissey-fest or the teams will be falling down to electrics and Kingdra may seem valid in a first glance, but I don't think it is. Why ? Because you're talking as if the metagame will never adjust to the changes, meaning pokemon rising in usage and new sets of already dominant pokemon becoming more popular. For example, specially defensive Celebi would be much more viable than it is now (thanks to Tyranitar being omnipresent) and it would serve as a check/counter (depending on the set) of both Kingdra and electrics. Specially defensive grounds such as Hippowdon are (already used) alternatives to checking electrics and if rain proves to be such a gigantic issue, water absorb users such as Vaporeon and Quagsire could also rise in usage. Plus, some pokemon can be dealt by a defensive core instead of a single pokemon. For instance, a core of Swampert and Flygon is used in ADV to cover Zapdos efficiently. New metagame would mean new trends and thus, it is wrong to simply say that X thing becomes borderline-broken once we remove Y pokemon.

P.S.1: Just a clarification, regarding the "BKC starter pack". Experienced DPP mains also create their own builds but players not that seasoned in DPP tend to use several variations of his teams, if not his exact teams. The Zapdos/Jirachi/Heatran/Starmie/Breloom/TTar teams are the prime example of what I meant. People use these teams because they're easy to use and perform consistently. There are other excellent builders like osgoode as well, whose teams are widely popular in tournament play nowadays. Innovation is always appreciated, but as time goes by the tier gets closer to getting solved and therefore it's much more difficult to innovate at the moment.

P.S.2: This was also the final response of mine to you regarding this topic. I think we've both analyzed our points quite extensively and we'll start sounding like broken records if we keep on going about the same things (I think we already did to an extent). I hope I don't appear to be offensive at any point of my posts btw, this is not my intention. We can't always agree and I didn't expect much support for the Tyranitar suspect anyway, as it something controversial and people in general tend to stick with what they already have. Last but not least, I strongly believe that the bad vibes around DPP exist and are reasonable, regardless of people's opinion on my proposal and I hope we can do something about it at some point instead of just moaning on the various chats.
 
That was my last formal post, but I just want to say very quickly: this quote "What I want is defensive teams to become good enough to be the dominant playstyle of DPP, so that we're not constantly in 2HKO/OHKO range if we get one prediction wrong." makes a lot more sense regarding your goals for this meta and is the most compelling way that you've supported your claims thus far.

That said, I really would not like that for that to happen. Going quickly back to my distinction between stall and offense, the right stall will completely invalidate a decent size subset of offenses, but it's about bringing the right offense for your opponent that will capitalize on their preferences. I want to provide this WCoP game with DeepBlueC vs Void as an example, where Void brings a full stall and DBC seems to completely lose at matchup:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-381153

I think the way stall and offense works right now is really great, and I would not like for stall to be even more potent than it already is (stall is really, really good and I still think you are underrating it, but like you said this is beginning to sound like a broken record).

And a quick thing on "overcentralization", it is absolutely not a fact. The metagame being centralized is a fact, but when you connote it by adding the prefix "over", it becomes an opinion. I know I said Latias would be overcentralizing if it were added to the meta like it was a fact, but that is technically an opinion too. It is a fact, however, that it would be more centralizing than Tyranitar based on the statistics from years ago. Saying the DPP meta today is overcentralized is different, so I just wanted to touch on that too.

I know I said it was my final post before so I apologize again for another post. This one is much shorter, so this is really my last post on here. And no worries at all, you're not offensive in your posts whatsoever. I hope the same for mine. Thankfully we already sorted this out earlier :)
 
Last edited:
Wcop 2018

Qualifying
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-375381 - defense wins
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-375760 - defense wins
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-377660 - defense wins
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-378994 - balanced wins vs offense

Round 1
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-380177 - defense wins
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-380439 - defense wins
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-383907 - defense wins vs balance
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-382742 - defense wins
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-381040 - offense wins vs offense
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-381232 - balance wins vs tyranitar + breloom core

I stopped at this point. If you scroll through the replays list, these are the first 10 games that appear so it's not like I've cherry picked them. I'm sure offense would win a lot more if I went through all of them. I'll preface this by saying that I'm going by my definition of "defense" and if someone disagrees with that classification in those replays, fair enough. In these games we see things like Nidoqueen, Crobat, Aerial Ace Gliscor, Ice Fang Gliscor. All metagame adaptations to give more insurance against tyranitar/breloom. We see teams with swampert - arguably a defensive pokemon that breloom would make "unviable" - succeeding. We see teams with dugtrio, who can beat both breloom and tyranitar. The evidence seems to suggest that defense is completely viable.


I agree with you.


You said this is a skill that should be rewarded, so why does that mean games aren't competitive if this is a 'skill' that is deciding games? If we were talking about, say, BW without team preview, I could totally see what you mean as it's not really possible to prepare for all threats. And while it probably isn't 100% possible in DPP either, it's a lot easier, and you should usually be able to build your teams well enough and play well enough to get to a point where you can make reasonable assumptions about what is safe to sacrifice and what isn't. I guess what i'm saying is that I don't think the power creep is big enough in DPP that you have to make a guess about what to sacrifice in the very early game only to later realise, woops, I sacced the wrong thing, guess I lose now.


I don't think this is true at all, and it's backed up by the replays I've posted where we see breloom checks/counters that have ways around tyranitar - nidoqueen / gliscor with a coverage move / dugtrio / skarmory. Stuff like celebi and bronzong can also situationally work. Now, i'm not saying these pokemon are going to beat breloom/ttar every time, particularly as ttar can run heaps of viable sets, but my experience is that tyranitar does not really deal with most breloom checks & counters on a consistent basis.


DPP has a number of pokemon at the top that centralise the metagame, no doubt. Jirachi, tyranitar, starmie, heatran etc. But we see that in a lot of metagames. RBY has tauros / lax / eggy / chansey. GSC has lax / cloyster / raikou / zapdos. What, to you, makes DPP unbalanced? How is DPP 'random'? And how will 'slowing the metagame down' fix either of these problems?

I suggest you check out replays from players such as BKC, ToF, DracoMalfory, august, 6A9 Ace Matador, Heist etc to see examples of players who have had consistent success with defensive teams across many years. I also suggest you check out replays from players such as Philip7086 to see examples of players who lose due to time in winning positions. Defensive builds are as viable as ever and they are in no way invalidated by tyranitar and breloom.

I am not convinced DPP is random, and I am also not convinced that tyranitar and/or breloom downgrades the viability of defensive builds. I do think that DPP is skewed towards 4 or 5 top threats that dominate the meta, but I think that's completely normal and not really an issue.

I want to echo the quote by Excal, as I think Excal made a great post and summed up my thoughts neatly:


Even though I disagree with the OP, always nice to see some discussion about DPP.
>is excited to see panamaxis tagged him
>is sad to see it's to reference a loss
 
Just here to revisit this thread and offer my own two cents:

I don't think Tyranitar is broken in DPP OU. Nor do I think that a Breloom/Tyranitar core is too powerful to be deemed uncompetitive. Tyranitar has numerous concrete counters; it also is very easy to revenge kill thanks to its low speed and weakness to common priority moves such as Bullet/Mach Punch. There is rarely a time in a match when I don't have a solid switch in for Tyranitar. Also of note is that he completely vunerable to SR, Spikes, and TS.

As for pairing him with Breloom, I also don't see how the two are broken. For example, recently, I ran a bulky offense team that utilized pokes that could take a hard hit and then hit hard back. These pokes played off each other's synergy to hold momentum throughout a match. I will use this team as an example of how T-Tar/Loom can be dealt with. My main answer to Breloom was a defensive Dragonite with Dragon Claw, Fire Blast, Roar, and Roost as its moves. I will admit that I would usually sack another Poke to sleep before sending in D-Nite for Loom, but still, it was a full stop to Breloom, especially since pretty much none of them run Stone Edge. If my opponent then decided to switch in Tyranitar, I would switch out to either my Machamp or Jirachi, which could easily scare the Tyranitar back out. This is just one example of team synergy that can easily deal with the Tyranitar/Loom combo and there are many others.

What Tyranitar brings to the table is that he is the best Pursuit trapper in OU. Honestly if he was banned, I think his niche with Pursuit will be sorely missed. Tyranitar forces stall to prepare for their spinblocker to be dismantled easily (Stall has evolved Colbur, Reflect techniques), among other things. Tyranitar also offers a more offensive option to defending against special attackers than having to stick a Blissey on one's team. Tyranitar adds a bit of unique diversity to the OU tier rather than taking away from it. He forces healthy adaptation, which is good for any metagame.

As for my thoughts on what is broken in OU, I believe it is Jirachi. In my opinion, Jirachi is the best Steel type in OU in regards to overall diversity and ability to destroy another's team. Other Steels have their perks, but they are not as hard to handle as Jirachi is primarily due to two factors: Jirachi's ability to run many different, effective sets and Jirachi's secondary ability: Serene Grace.

I'm going to right out and say it: Jirachi has no complete counters, and even those "counters" can be defeated through Serene Grace. Jirachi can be physical, special, or even mixed and all work well. He also can be purely defensive and be an extremely effective Pokemon. Want to switch in your Heatran to your opponents Jirachi? Be prepared to eat a T-Wave and have your pokemon virtually ruined and now suspect to unfair RNG factors.

To make things worse and push Jirachi into the Uber realm, in my opinion, is Serene Grace and let me expand upon that. If we are trying to make a competitive, fair metagame that rewards player's skill rather than luck, we need to look more closely at Serene Grace. How many wins or losses have been decided by flinch hax for you? Too many to count, probably.

People have continually been complaining about DPPOU being infected with T-Wave Flinch haxxers. I think the answer to this would be banning Jirachi. Too many times have I outplayed an opponent for the entirety of a match before being haxxed into a loss. As a competitive player who enjoys the strategy that DPPOU allows me play with, I am tired of flinch hax.

My proposal is that we either ban Iron Head or ban Jirachi completely.
 
Last edited:

Users Who Are Viewing This Thread (Users: 1, Guests: 0)

Top