★ Second Chance - Regidrago Suspect

[Felucia]

After a much requested council vote, the 1v1 council has decided to suspect test Regidrago! One look at 1v1 in the past year tells you it's an incredibly contentious presence in the metagame, with many players feeling that its unique qualities significantly warp team building. At the core of this is Drago's great defensive stats and ability Dragon's Maw, allowing it much defensive counterplay while being able to dish out immense damage. Between Choice Band, Choice Specs, and Choice Scarf, Regidrago can overpower most neutral targets with little counterplay outside of specific type immunities, and it's also able to run Assault Vest or Haban Berry to beat some of its counters. However, its extreme reliance on moves of a single type also leaves it highly vulnerable, with many Fairy and Steel types completely shutting it down. This can make previews often feel overly simplified.

This polarizing dynamic has led to two competing perspectives on Regidrago’s effect on the metagame. On one hand, its sheer offensive power forces many teams to account for it, leading to what some consider stale or restricted team building. The presence of a strong Fairy or Steel type on almost every team is often seen as mandatory because of Regidrago’s ability to brute-force matchups feeling overwhelming without them. On the other hand, Regidrago's extreme weaknesses limit its overall viability, as many other Dragon types outclass it in flexibility. Beyond just Fairy and Steel types, bulkier Pokémon like Ursaluna, Landorus-Therian, and Pecharunt, as well as many Haban Berry Dragon types and Unnerve Haxorus can answer one or more Regidrago sets effectively, allowing for more diversity in counterplay than just the most obvious type-based answers.

What do you think? Does Regidrago's overwhelming power and restrictive impact on team building make it an unhealthy presence in the metagame, or do its glaring weaknesses balance out its strengths? Post your thoughts in this thread or in the 1v1 Metagame Discussion thread!

Council votes and reasonings

bern	delemon	Felucia	lost heros	Murm	neomon	RADU
Suspect	Suspect	Suspect	Suspect	Suspect	Suspect	-

bern

it toopid.

ok but for real tho this pokemon has been on the radar on many people and it's about time we close the book on it once and for all, it has way too many options, and according to many people, it worsens the metagame to an unhealthy state.

delemon

-

Felucia

It's not my place to judge whether Regidrago would/wouldn't get banned if we held a suspect, but I think regardless of what the ratio ban vs dnb is we should just give the suspect a run and close this chapter once and for all. Regidrago's polarity makes it a frustrating mon to play against, shrinking the potential counterplay down to a very obvious subset of mons that constrains the meta even if it's not the most broken pokemon currently around. I think this is more than justified and probably way overdue.

lost heros

Regidrago is an incredibly centralizing and unhealthy force in the metagame. Although, it's easy to beat, and nearly every team will always have an answer to it, its combination of bulk and mixed raw power is highly limiting for teambuilding. And when it's in a game, it takes the worst aspects of 1v1 and pushes it to 11.

Murm

I vote to suspect Regidrago: a large chunk of the community for a long time now has been vocal about wanting a Regidrago suspect. I also personally believe that Regidrago is an unhealthy part of the tier for reasons that have been explained many times by both me and others at this point.

neomon

Suspect drago, it promotes unhealthy dynamics and influences play like very little other mons do.

RADU

Ik it doesn't matter but I'll abstain on the vote, partly cause I'm too busy partly because of my stance on the matter. I stand by what I said and what I think about drago and the discussion that happened, but I understand the disconnect between community and council, and I think this is the best solution to reach an agreement

In order to become a qualified voter, you need to achieve 2850 COIL on the 1v1 ladder.

Alt registration process

• Make any new account on PS, there's no requirements for name prefix these days.
  • You may use an existing alt, but only if it has never been used to play Gen 9 1v1 ladder games before.
• At any point, you can use the command /linksmogon and follow the instructions to link your alt to your Smogon account
• When you've reached reqs, verify that your alt is listed on the Suspect Page and let me know if you're not.
• As per usual, do not play on the alt after reaching reqs

Let me know if you have any questions about this process.

The deadline is Thursday March 13th at 09:59am UTC.

 

[Kaif]

Im voting dnb

mediocre mons dont need to be banned

^Take approved by top sv 1v1 players such as Nuxl crow crumbs (UMPL Winning Duo) and eblurb (Greatest ever sv 1v1 team tour record)

 

[LemonLime78]

I'd like to ask what drago adds to the metagame. To me, it just seems like it's a blanket check to teams that don't have a steel / fairy / certain grounds and dragons. As someone who enjoys building with shitmons, regidrago feels more like a constraint than an addition to me.

 

[Mentality]

I will be voting dnb.

It's become clearer and clearer to me over time that Regidrago is not as much of a problem as it was perceived to be earlier. I do disagree with others on it being a middling/bad mon: It's perfectly usable high tier, and I think there's still some creative sets yet to be made. Nonetheless, Drago is not particularly evil in its presence in the tier anymore. We may have lost a lot of natural counters (strong fairy and steel mons) with the shift to SV, but we gained an insane amount of powercreep, resulting in a healthy amount of checks. It is not an impossible task to make a team that beats 100% of drago sets without using fairy or steel types. The issue with a lot of pro-ban arguments is thinking you need to have a single check to it. This point was articulated much better by bo_bobson in this post, but I'll try to iterate it here as well.
Setguessing is a natural part of 1v1, and you will very rarely beat 100% of a mon in one set. Every strong mon has multiple sets that flip some matchups while losing others, and this is the exact same for the accused. Regidrago does not maintain enough matchups throughout its sets to make it broken. This is in big contrast to something like Archaludon or Hearth. These mons tech'd their checks without losing much for it, and setguessing them was an impossible job. Setguessing Drago is not even close to difficult, and figuring out a way beat its viable sets creatively is easy if you don't tunnel vision on making it a single mon.
Also yache focus energy etc etc are not real ur actively running substandard sets if you use those

TL;DR: Regidrago is fine, you can easily handle it in the builder, and there are plenty non-fairy non-steel answers that you can use on a team. s/o bobson for opening my eyes to how sv can still be interesting with his champs run.

 

[Mentality]

I'd like to ask what drago adds to the metagame. To me, it just seems like it's a blanket check to teams that don't have a steel / fairy / certain grounds and dragons. As someone who enjoys building with shitmons, regidrago feels more like a constraint than an addition to me.

Regidrago is not, in fact, a blanket check to non dfs teams. There are mons outside the categories you listed that can handle atleast a good amount of drago sets. Truth be told, I think shitmons are rather underrated with how they can be answers to drago on teams.

C- Rank

D Rank

There are quite a few mons here that can be used to combat drago. You're never beating 100% of sets outside the fairies, but as I said in my above post, I don't think doing that is necessary at all.

 

[DripLegend]

POST TO END THE TRUE PSYCHO REPLYING TO EVERY POST IN THE THREAD ECHOCHAMBER.

shitpost aside i think drago, while manageable does interact differently than most other dragons. despite being inflexible in type matchups, it is the only dragon with real set variety in sv since haban is a horrible item and drago does have a great number of options with differing counterplay. I believe that drago being banworthy is due to the facts that 1. I believe it to be a mon which overall lowers the skill ceiling of both play and building, and 2. it enables partners extremely well while also maintain its own ambiguity fairly easily.

re: point 1
drago is quite simply, one of the easier "high tiers" (in quotes because i would consider it like B tier tops but in builder i rank it highly) to check and a lot of sets do have consistent counterplay being most fairies and a few steels. in spite of this it still sees usage which some could find surprising considering most rly good sv pokemon are those ranks, due to the fact that people freak out on preview with this mon since it can be annoying to setguess. some would consider it coinflippy and while I don't often dilude 1v1 much more than I have to, regidrago does elicit this feeling more often than other pokemon outside of matching up into an opposing dfs structure since most teams simply don't use multiple checks. a lot of pokemon are able to get matchups that are great for them, but if a majority of the time on paper regidrago is able to generate 2-1 matchups regardless of set i feel it's worth considering how that looks in the metagame. obviously a pokemon getting a good matchup is luck reliable but i think having certain pokemon that will usually have them in spite of set is a bit questionable for general health of the tier and it stagnates diversity if you want to branch out from archetypes that do consistently have good matchup into it.

point 2
drago, being a dragon, naturally matches up well into a lot of the metagame bar its pretty horrid matchups into fairies and steels. while other dragons can do the same and some like bolt will fish decently into prim or corv, drago has real ambiguity while also being really bulky which benefits it a lot. fat choice sets are hella broken tbh but that points not really an argument for now. people used to use more of the drago fairy answer x2 and generate good matchup a lot of the time while still preserving the ambiguity of drago which i believe to be its strongest asset. if you are using drago to blanket a lot of non fairies/steels then it becomes way more menacing on preview. ngl i can't articulate the rest of this point rn but i'll edit with the rest of this at some later time.

overall i'm indifferent to the outcome of this suspect but i do hope my post is able to highlight why i think banning is slightly more preferable to dnb. bad mons can still have broad effects on the metagame since their design interacts with the game in ways that lead to undesirable outcomes (adv soundproof kinda vibe) and I think the tier could see benefit from regidrago being banned.

 

[MattC (Banned)]

(imagine Cubone is a ban hammer)
If I could vote on this matter, I'd personally vote BAN, but I can't. Cuz I'm terrible at mons.

Case in point, I feel like DripLegend is correct on the fact that banning Drago is better than keeping it in the tier. It's not so much a matter of if it's good or bad, but rather its impact on the meta. Like yea, sure, it's very susceptible to Fairy and Steel types in the meta. That much is obvious. But Regidrago is really difficult to truly check or counter for most mons. Counteracting this point, Mentality mentions that many a niche metagame option could beat Drago, though I don't really think many things CAN beat Drago's many variants. That being said however, most teams will have a Fairy or Steel on their team, so managing it is pretty simple.
But then there's The Preview Factor, which is just... "I have this mon but I don't bring it".

Regidrago simply being there has such an incentive to try and beat it, because more often than not, you're facing it at a 2-1 advantage. That's still good having 2 mons that check/counter Drago, but that 1 Pokemon that doesn't beat it is just... like, unbringable. You're fighting a 2v3 here. And if you only have 1 mon that beats it, then suffice to say you're tough out of luck. Preview Factoring could go the same way for mons like Valiant, Prim, Meta or Crown, but none of them really have the same impact compared to Drago, from my understanding. YES, they are better than Drago. YES, all of them beat Drago. But it's really hard to not just bring your Drago answer when you view it, because more often than not, that single Pokemon is the only thing you have to beat it. Having 2 mons that handle it is nice, because your third can be brought in safer, but it's pretty hard to bring it just because Drago is on the opposing team.

Another issue with Drago is just... it. More specifically, what it does. It has the same speed tier as Hoopa-Unbound, and possibly does more overall damage than Hoopa-Unbound for reasons mentioned previously. Everyone is aware of it having the whole Dragon Energy delete button, Draco Meteor, Outrage and stuff, but it also got Earth Power, Earthquake, Dragon Dance, Endure, Crunch, Fire Fang, and for some reason, Hammer Arm AND Reversal. Now if we just take a gander here at the impact of the [very] linear coverage of Regidrago, it may seem like its going to be handled pretty easily by Steel types. Nope.

Some obvious candidates to lose are

Magnezone Calcs

OFFENSIVE:
This thing gets fried by Earthquake. But what of Hammer Arm?
100 Atk Regidrago Hammer Arm vs. 0 HP / 4 Def Magnezone: 142-168 (50.5 - 59.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
Or if you somehow pull it off,
100 Atk Regidrago Reversal (200 BP) vs. 0 HP / 4 Def Magnezone: 282-332 (100.3 - 118.1%) -- guaranteed OHKO

DEFENSIVE:
252+ SpA Magnezone Flash Cannon vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Regidrago: 249-294 (46 - 54.3%) -- 53.1% chance to 2HKO
252+ SpA Magnezone Hyper Beam vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Regidrago: 311-367 (57.4 - 67.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

Scizor Calcs

This just gets fucking deleted by Fire Fang. No calc needed here.

DEFENSIVE:
252+ Atk Choice Band Technician Scizor Bullet Punch vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Regidrago: 280-331 (51.7 - 61.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252+ Atk Technician Scizor Bullet Punch vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Regidrago: 187-222 (34.5 - 41%) -- guaranteed 3HKO

A less obvious matchup is

Metagross Calcs

OFFENSIVE:
56+ Atk Choice Band Regidrago Earthquake vs. 252 HP / 116 Def Metagross: 182-216 (50 - 59.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
44+ Atk Regidrago Earthquake vs. 252 HP / 116 Def Metagross: 122-144 (33.5 - 39.5%) -- guaranteed 3HKO

DEFENSIVE:
252+ Atk Choice Band Metagross Bullet Punch vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Regidrago: 192-226 (35.4 - 41.7%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
252+ Atk Metagross Psychic Fangs vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Regidrago: 271-321 (50 - 59.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252+ Atk Choice Band Metagross Psychic Fangs vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Regidrago: 408-480 (75.4 - 88.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

And just because I can?

IRON CROWN CALCS

OFFENSIVE:
208+ Atk Regidrago Earthquake vs. 240 HP / 12 Def Iron Crown: 192-226 (50.3 - 59.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
0 Atk Choice Band Regidrago Earthquake vs. 240 HP / 12 Def Iron Crown: 214-252 (56.1 - 66.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
48 SpA Choice Specs Regidrago Earth Power vs. 240 HP / 4 SpD Iron Crown: 192-226 (50.3 - 59.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

DEFENSIVE:
+2 0 SpA Iron Crown Tachyon Cutter (2 hits) vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Regidrago: 440-522 (81.3 - 96.4%) -- approx. 2HKO
+2 0 SpA Iron Crown Stored Power (140 BP) vs. 0 HP / 192 SpD Regidrago: 457-538 (84.4 - 99.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
^ This isn't real whatsoever but I just wanna say, the fact that an ID and WP boosted Stored Power could even be bulked out in the first place... kinda crazy man.

There's more but the point is this: Regidrago has the potential to beat nearly every non-Balloon Steel in the metagame, as crazy as it sounds. And even some Balloon Steels just get clipped, like Air Balloon Tinkaton (who loses to certain sets depending on calls).


TLDR; there's 3 reasons I'd vote BAN on Regidrago: Preview Incentive, In-Game Set RNG, and how the former 2 make it unhealthy for the tier. It has such a stranglehold on this tier, no matter what anyone thinks. It may not be as bad as prior months would claim, but it's still nonetheless toxic for the tier. A high tier Pokemon that forces teams into bringing certain mons when seeing it in Preview is too constraining for any tier, let alone the tier where only 1 mon actually battles. Hopefully others think the same, and we could pitch in to create a healthier tier environment.
Here's to MattC trying to gain enough COIL to make their point official.

 

[LongRat]

Non DFS counters to drago include-
Donphan, Meowscarada, Lando-T, Blaziken, espathra, sneasler, dusclops, dusknoir, avalugg, swampert, etc
Non DFS counters (maybe) to drago include- gliscor,annihilape, ogerpon, ron Hands

- Donphan loses to Breaking Swipe
- Meowscarada loses to Scarf unless you're running Scarf on Meow which is otherwise terrible
- Blaziken is barely D rank. I'm all for using lower tier mons, but it's not good to bring up a D rank here. Same point applies later
- Espathra loses to AV
- Dusclops and Dusknoir are not worth discussing
- Avalugg is UR
- Swampert is D rank and relies on setguess to click Counter or Mirror Coat
- I don't know the etc pokemon
- Gliscor is UR
- Ape loses to Specs if it's not fast, but i'll give that one
- 124 SpA Dragon's Maw Regidrago Dragon Energy (150 BP) vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Ogerpon-Wellspring: 283-334 (94 - 110.9%) -- 62.5% chance to OHKO
SpDef oger doesn't even win vs Specs or Band Drago

I know you said to message on Discord if people had a problem with a pokemon in your list. But the whole list has serious flaws in that 10/14 pokemon mentioned are in some way debatable as Drago counters, mostly from being UR shitmons.

Please let me know if I have done a matchup wrong.

Edited after Aco response: Yeah I'm just gonna leave that there. Not worth a post

 

[MattC (Banned)]

Hi im an iron crown I click iron defense/calm mind

Wanna know something crazy? If Regidrago really feels like it, they could go out of their way to answer both of these things

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen91v1-2245884394-kdu9zngcrmimd1mc6jj54b8o0ayat3rpw
^ Maybe it's not "valid", but the fact that this thing even exists is just... like, mind boggling.

Hi im a metagross I have air balloon

Alright, let's say we are using Air Balloon Metagross. Let's just give it 252 HP / 116 Def, the same as the AV set.
Metagross @ Assault Vest
Ability: Clear Body
EVs: 252 HP / 108 Atk / 116 Def / 32 SpD
Adamant Nature
- Heavy Slam
- Bullet Punch
- Earthquake
- Psychic Fangs

Matter of fact, let's cheat a little bit here. OFFENSIVELY calc against a 252 Adamant Metagross using Meteor Mash + Bullet Punch. The Metagross gets all the max rolls of its life, and we get all the minimum rolls (because we suck). It loses to the following set.
Regidrago @ Sitrus Berry
Ability: Dragon's Maw
Tera Type: Dragon
EVs: 12 HP / 184 Atk / 140 Def / 72 SpD / 100 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Outrage
- Earthquake
- Fire Fang
- Dragon Dance


Time for a play by play!
Turn 1: 184+ Atk Regidrago Fire Fang vs. 252 HP / 116 Def Metagross: 90-108 (24.7 - 29.6%) -- 99.9% chance to 4HKO
This does 90 to the 364 HP the Metagross has. Metagross is now at 274 HP, and Air Balloon is popped.
252+ Atk Metagross Meteor Mash vs. 12 HP / 140 Def Regidrago: 229-271 (42 - 49.8%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
This does 271 to our 544 HP. We are now at 273 HP.

Turn 2: 184+ Atk Regidrago Earthquake vs. 252 HP / 116 Def Metagross: 138-164 (37.9 - 45%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
This does 138 to the 274 Metagross has. Metagross is at 136 HP, and dies to the next Earthquake.
252+ Atk Metagross Meteor Mash vs. 12 HP / 140 Def Regidrago: 229-271 (42 - 49.8%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
This does another 271, and leaves us at 2 HP. We heal from Sitrus Berry, and get a nice 136 HP due to it healing 1.4 of 544. We are now at 138 HP.

Turn 3, Metagross dies to another Earthquake, and we win the game. And if you say this is a bad set, it beats non Haban Raging Bolt, Scizor, Volcanion, Hoopa-Unbound, and anything else Drago naturally beats without Haban. It loses to other Dragons and doesn't exactly do well against Iron Crown, Primarina, and the such, but this is just 1 example of Drago being Drago. It COULD trade favorable matchups to win disfavorable ones because Preview doesn't tell you anything aside from the fact that the opponent has a scary Pokemon.
__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

u say regidrago is constraining when 5 of the top 6 mons beat drago. People pretend like drago checks are utterly useless and they aint.
A high tier pokemon that forces teams into bringing certain mons when seeing it in preview is just called a check?
My #1 ladder team is forced into iron hands when i see corviknight but I dont lose. No Good player is going to insta click regidrago when they see a 2-1 because thats how you lose. I understand the perspective from a 1200 peak which is that I click the mon that beats the most things but thats not how it works in the real world

Lemme redirect you to this part:

Regidrago simply being there has such an incentive to try and beat it, because more often than not, you're facing it at a 2-1 advantage. That's still good having 2 mons that check/counter Drago, but that 1 Pokemon that doesn't beat it is just... like, unbringable. You're fighting a 2v3 here. And if you only have 1 mon that beats it, then suffice to say you're tough out of luck.

You see that bolded part? That much is half true. Your opponent is kinda fighting a 2v3, but at the same time, those 2 mons are also likely Drago counters. In theory I could always have Regidrago on standby, but never use it a single time. Regidrago beats a lot of the tier, and is in my opinion, the de facto Dragon type in the tier. I wasn't specific earlier about sets but, Regidrago can run just about anything. And it can get away with it because you don't actually know if the Drago is actively "a bad set" until you face it. Then you got the set wrong and now ya lost. And not to mention that uuh... you don't HAVE TO bring it.

And as I said in my post, this goes with most of the tier as well. You can apply all of this to mons that aren't Regidrago, and to mons that ARE Regidrago. Most of 1v1 is building a good team, and the other is being able to win against most of your matchups. Regidrago's teammates can cover for it incredibly well and easily, yet most people still believe that it's not constraining. How many mons are actually good, common enough to see play? All of the VR? All of the old VR? Not really. Most of them get pushed away by mons that are, and aren't Regidrago. Like I'm sure something like Avalugg COULD be good in the metagame, but there's the partners of Regidrago and Regidrago itself that are holding it back from success. It might BEAT Regidrago, but does it ONLY beat Regidrago? Slaking is almost never going to be viable because everything COULD run Protect, but chooses not to so as to gain better matchups. Most of the Regidrago checks/counters on the VR are literally only there because of Drago, and maybe have a use outside of that SPARINGLY. You don't see that for something like Hoopa-Unbound or Primarina, and that's because Drago stands out amount them. Or maybe I'm wrong and need to look over the VR to see what mon exists there for the purpose of beating another mon.

 

[DripLegend]

So what im seeing is
Donphan loses (fair)
Meowscarada wins
Blaziken wins
Espathra loses (fair)
Dusclops and Dusknoir win
Avalugg wins
Swampert wins w setguess (set guess is apart of 1v1)
Gliscor wins
Ape wins
Ogerpon uses a set up of Spiky Shield/ Charm/ Synthesis vs band

As well as play rough vs specs dragon energy and draco meteor ( https://pokepast.es/a9637776cc2a9996 )
so 2/14 mons were flawed ok I never said it was a perfect list. u didnt refute any of my claims with calcs just unranked this unranked that
just bc a mon is unranked does not make it bad

what blaziken set are u running im curious since it should lose to cb most of the time if it's sub reversal?

avalugg does not win vs swipe av and this ogerpon is losing to any non choiced variant since u can't usually live scale shot into draco and it's a 50/50 t2 anyway assuming u spiky t1. which also is a 50/50 vs dd variants.
pert loses to any non-special variants assuming it is counter coat (not specified so idk) since drago's base hp mogs and it lives as long as it doesnt cb outrage.
for the ur guys im curious to what you run since i genuinely have not seen other people run dusclops or dusknoir (i run glis tho it's broken).

i'm not of the opinion you need to be pidgeonholed into a set vs this mon to dedicate answers depending how comfortable you are reading it. however, saying all of these mons just flat out win is just disingenuous when they do get blown up by common sets and if you clarify that then it's a way better argument. this ogerpon is just blatantly useless into any other mon which would be fine for some extended elo bandit set comp but here I don't see a reason to run it at all. also the point of a mon being unranked is that it quite literally is bad and normally is not gonna be used for some reason or another. sure theres some uncut gems in there but people being apprehensive about loading pokemon not great into the broad metagame and can just cheese a few is a natural reaction.

 

[crow crumbs]

Drago is a pretty big flop in a tour setting and I would vote dnb if i get reqs this time (jurys out on that).

I've said my piece on drago not being particularly hard to check/anti-drago sentiment being more about Bad Gameplay Vibes before and drip covered it here. Instead I just want to put forward a thought experiment: When does drago actually look like something strong to bring?

Here is a slice of the first random umpl scout I saw. There is practically always a hard counter. Two hard counters is not infrequent. Hard counters are frequently paired with mons that drago doesn't necessarily love loading into (urshifu, pecharunt, ursaluna, hoodra).

Yes, it can 3-0 avalugg/bolt/rona and it looks decent a few times but I think the chance for it being a net negative addition to your preview is actually quite high.

Going beyond one users usage and just thinking about some of the best cores in the meta, this makes sense to me.
+
+
+

At the highest level of 1v1 play, where people usually pick a core of mons that matchup well into usage+a usable 3rd, regidrago finds itself on the outs more often than not in my experience. It's not inherently great into stuff that people run and usually ends up not being fittable as a third because of it's binary matchups. Its usage in Bo7 (all mainers) vs Bo5 (lots of passed stuff, less scoutable players) last wc being 14th vs 4th supports this idea.

I think in general, theres no reason to ban strategies that get worse as strength of play increases and guaranteed neutral matchups become less preferrable. (Exceptions would be stuff like hypnosis).

edit - after receiving dms I feel the need to clarify that I am well aware “one users usage” is not a scientifically sound metric and it is not what I am basing my meta take on. I am using it to model how Regidrago, despite having an enormous volume of winning matchups, can look bad in reasonably common situations.

 

[fake tom numbers]

I genuinely cannot believe after how long of regidrago discussion we start back at square one with the argument that "regidrago is bad=why ban lmao"

+
+
+

Are we blindly ignoring how so many of these teams are structurally the same? Yes, obviously steels waters fairies dragons are always going to be good and used, but unlike every single other generation outside of DPP (and rby/gsc and maybe adv/bw), teams are literally not forced to run the same things on every team. Literally all of these teams have at least one of those types mentioned, and if you go into any competent player's builder or have scouted in WC/PL you know that everyone runs one of these types/roles on EVERY TEAM. No other competitive generation of 1v1 is this polarizing in teambuilding. SV 1v1 has been in a terrible spot for so long that we loop back around to thinking its good

It's gotten so bad that one of the main arguments against banning drago (that i've been talking to people on discord+showdown room) is that "1v1 always has 50-50 matchups and is normal" idk if im getting omega trolled or if this is actually real.

Regidrago is not, in fact, a blanket check to non dfs teams. There are mons outside the categories you listed that can handle atleast a good amount of drago sets. Truth be told, I think shitmons are rather underrated with how they can be answers to drago on teams.

As someone who has been using shitmons for tournaments (that i was somewhat trying to win like lt/wc also 4-1 wooo #Lbozo @ marshmelto) I can say for certain that this does not work UNLESS you are hard cteaming. I probably cooked up cooler stuff than mr bo biden himself and 90% of the time you either just read the other person catching them off guard with your goofy set OR just have to 50-50 anyways. Not to mention the amount of effort it takes to put into making cool teams only to have to 50-50/get a worse matchup anyways (example: https://pokepast.es/92e441fbecfb2eba this team took like 4hrs and still led to a 50-50, so why waste your time building cool/unique teams when you can run the same old water steel dragon fairy and achieve the same results).


SV 1v1 is not in a good spot currently. Many opinions have been expressed of making it better with bans for Crown, Prim, Hoopa, Pecha and encore, but clearly these options are never happening. The only simple and theoretically best solution is banning Regidrago. Drago limits teams to being formulaic and repetitive. Regidrago indirectly makes this tier a coinflip to play which makes it uncompetitive. Drago contributes nothing to this tier making it unfun. Banning Regidrago will make this tier better. Banning Regidrago will make this tier competitive. Banning Regidrago will make this tier fun.

 

[crow crumbs]

I mean if you are going to take what types get used out of context then oras is very nearly impossible to play without having a psychic.

All the top mons are where they are because they have insane toolkits. Even something like primarina, which is mainly viable because its the best available check for many threats - I would say beating drago isn't particularly more important than beating val/the grounds.

I think the argument that it warps building is a lot stronger in ss than in sv too. Regidrago requires some level of specialization (meaning specific item/evs/moves) to beat all of the following mons:
+ obv other dragons

Some of these you would never want to run as your drago counter sure but the days of it being an monster that statchecks everything execept it's counters are pretty over. A lot of these are mutually exclusive too, theres no [standard] drago that beats meow and luna or hoodra and landot. If you really wanted to then you could run teams that don't lose to drago with setguessing or run stuff like custap shifu/ss mode skill swap cress. However, that is simply not where the power lies in the metagame.

 

[fake tom numbers]

I mean if you are going to take what types get used out of context then oras is very nearly impossible to play without having a psychic.

I won't comment on oras (cuz that tier is bad) but "what types get used out of context" is actually insane. I implore you to find ANY good SV team that don't have the exact same structures as every other team out there, there is such few exceptions (volcarona hands meow or steel bolt chienpao) that I don't understand how this is considered "out of context". Literally look at sample teams:

By Neomon
By Happysh
By Neomon
By lost heroes
By RTM (put darkrai at S tier for SV)
By Neomon
By Neomon

All the top mons are where they are because they have insane toolkits. Even something like primarina, which is mainly viable because its the best available check for many threats - I would say beating drago isn't particularly more important than beating val/the grounds.

No primarinas, Crowns, Hoopas or Pechas yet all of these teams are structurally similar. (also half of them are made by neomon lol, zero clue how they'll sustain a cycle of changing sample teams every 2 months)

I think the argument that it warps building is a lot stronger in ss than in sv too.

?? No, because you have way more options to use and SS encouraging cteaming with certain mons doing well into certain archetypes (sawk doing good into dfs goodra doing good into fwg etc)

Regidrago requires some level of specialization (meaning specific item/evs/moves) to beat all of the following mons:
+ obv other dragons

For most of these it's the other way around; they have to run AV to consistently beat Specs/Scarf, and once Regidrago runs something like Band or Custap then all of these mons can just lose. (For example, main reason why many hands run fake out is for regidrago, and AV on landot is specifically for regidrago anyways (even though they can still sometimes lose))

theres no [standard] drago that beats meow and luna or hoodra and landot.

Specs can beat meow and ursa (which has been used by myself/other people in tours before) and hoodra and landot aren't good checks to drago anyways?

If you really wanted to then you could run teams that don't lose to drago with setguessing or run stuff like custap shifu/ss mode skill swap cress. However, that is simply not where the power lies in the metagame.

If your main answer to Regidrago are Custap reversal mons like okidogi gapdos sneasler tusk shifus then you're just proving my point on how restricting the meta is currently

Some of these you would never want to run as your drago counter sure but the days of it being an monster that statchecks everything execept it's counters are pretty over.

When was this? It has always been a B tier mon, so unless you're listening to aco2playsshowdown or bigchuchu (they dont read other posts) it's never been an S tier mon.



tl:dr this meta bad, best way to fix is to ban drago

 

[Aco2PlaysShowdown]

When was this? It has always been a B tier mon, so unless you're listening to aco2playsshowdown or bigchuchu (they dont read other posts) it's never been an S tier mon.



tl:dr this meta bad, best way to fix is to ban drago

Hi man thanks for the shoutout so I agree with crow crumbs in that using sample teams to dictate that the meta only has a couple usable types that every team needs is not true because 1. Some of the sample teams are outdated and 2. Some of them are not good
I personally build many a team that has at most 1 steel/water/fairy/dragon and ive reached #1 on ladder (ik ik its just ladder never forget gunk shot miss vs akeras atales) with this core so if u feel like u need 2 or more of those types to build a team thats a you problem and not a drago problem

 

[BigChuchu]

It has always been a B tier mon, so unless you're listening to aco2playsshowdown or bigchuchu (they dont read other posts) it's never been an S tier mon.

How rude! I do read other posts!

---

POST UPDATE:

Self-inflicted burn aside, I never thought Drago was S-tier. There was one time I argued it was broken but according to my own definition of "broken", not the tiering policy's.

I still very much want Drago gone. For those who argue that it can be setguessed, please do teach new players how do you guess between Band, Specs and AV (I appreciate you can guess Scarf and Haban).

I believe teambuilding is more creative and rewarding without Drago around.

 

[RTM]

im voting to ban drago

mainly because its just restrictive in teambuilding

running 2 mons that counters drago's different sets is a joke, you know damn well you can only guess if its scarf or rarely haban/av

the idea of using shitmons to beat drago is a joke, mons whose viabilty depends solely on them beating drago being usable doesn't really work in the dnb argument

it beats like 4/5 of the metagame and can tech most of its counters without too much opportunity cost like be fr

with that said it is an S tier mon in the builder but maybe an A- tier mon on preview because of the frequency of its counters, prim is not much better in that regard tbh lol.

bird brought up some good points and i agree with him but i don't like the direction the meta is headed if it continues with this unnecessary constraint

 

[Kala chasmah]

5th May, 2025
Regidrago Suspect and I don't complete?

name is trash just like me
Felucia Look I had to play 51 matches :( ..... I wish u gave any sv team

I think the argument that it warps building is a lot stronger in ss than in sv too. Regidrago requires some level of specialization (meaning specific item/evs/moves) to beat all of the following mons:
+ obv other dragons

I think ur dodging the point we all are saying that it restricts teambuilding and lots of investment is needed to counter it. Pecharunt and avalugg-h in the above list are the mons that barely wins vs regidrago i think so?

6th March, 2025

It's become clearer and clearer to me over time that Regidrago is not as much of a problem as it was perceived to be earlier. I do disagree with others on it being a middling/bad mon: It's perfectly usable high tier, and I think there's still some creative sets yet to be made.

Where are those sets? Are we just trying to wrap this thing just by saying creative sets are yet to be made? What? Its been months since this discussion is going and I haven't seen any different/great sets that are defeating regidrago's set and able to handle other mons as well in the current meta. Shaymin is the only pokemon I have seen made by bo_bobson and its actually good (still its hard to counter all sets of drago). After bo, you are telling us the same thing that people are just not being innovative, not trying to create any new set with different mons and stuff indirectly? (Words are not being filled by me, I wrote what i understood)... have u ever tried the same?

We may have lost a lot of natural counters (strong fairy and steel mons) with the shift to SV, but we gained an insane amount of powercreep, resulting in a healthy amount of checks.

Can we brief Please what u saw and we couldn't? What ''healthy amount of checks'' are you trying to tell us.

Ngl I feel horrible how metagame discussion thread is dead since i posted (25th january) and y'all need a suspect test to be started by felucia such that you can keep ur thoughts in front of everyone. I really won't mind to switch my side to ban ---> dnb but users who are trying to convince is just not able to satisfy tbh.

Hopefully I looked into everything and what I wrote was right. Looking for a great q/a's from both sides (ban and dnb). Was tired so couldn't post yesterday.

Yours Truly
Droplegend

 

[Zephyr Moonbeam]

I wanna keep Regidrago in 1v1, as it adds an element of surprise to the mind of the one who is facing it. And a fact to be noted is that, most fairies do counter Regidrago variants, but some fairies are scared of it. I feel that Regidrago is quite a fun mon to use, especially when you feel the satisfaction 2HKO-ing a corviknight with modest specs Dragon Energy. Regidrago is one of my most favourite, and I have fond memories attached to it OHKO-ing fairies back in VGC 2022 pairing it with Trick + Ring Target Grimmsnarl. Regidrago, you will be always used by me!

 

[Shivam_Z]

I guess a grass sandwich was the way to go

Soooooo.



I think this red orb is not broken , what's the worst it can do eat me?
AHHHH IT'S EATING ME NYOOoo

(anyways drago is just mid just build more seriously)-this is bs and true at the same time
The fact is I don't have used red orb for actually I don't even remember using it this year ever
THe people who say ohhh the red orb limits teams building it should be ban , why it's so strong I would like to say weak sauce couldn't be me jk jk I mean I was 19-0 just means I didn't loss any games to anything
But but you must have change teams - loveable person (free elo...)
I did this with one team!!
Which have only one red orb immunity (fairy type) and no Steel type

isn't Regidrago a spaceship hmmm

Ahh I am kinda lost what was typing for oh the suspect right
I think red orb allowed players to understand the concept of 1v1 it develops their team building ability

I am voting no ban probably not confirmed yet but I don't think it's broken and I don't think people think it is broken they just don't wanna have a mon or something that counter it for the possibility that they loss to red orb

BigChuchu pay me to vote ban :^

I will add something more if I don't have exams :(

 

[Strictsceptile]

I am thinking of voting BAN
While Regidrago isn't inherently broken(I didn't face a single one while getting reqs)it limits team building and is a negative addition to the tier and getting rid of it will be net positive for the tier.

 

[Kala chasmah]

I wanna keep Regidrago in 1v1, as it adds an element of surprise to the mind of the one who is facing it. And a fact to be noted is that, most fairies do counter Regidrago variants, but some fairies are scared of it. I feel that Regidrago is quite a fun mon to use, especially when you feel the satisfaction 2HKO-ing a corviknight with modest specs Dragon Energy. Regidrago is one of my most favourite, and I have fond memories attached to it OHKO-ing fairies back in VGC 2022 pairing it with Trick + Ring Target Grimmsnarl. Regidrago, you will be always used by me!

1. You might got lucky someday by defeating corvi with dragon energy cause regidrago's dragon energy pp can be drained by using roost 4 times.
2 Specify what fairies are scared of it?
3. I respect that Regidrago is your favourite pokemon but that doesn't justify it to stay unbanned. Also please don't talk about other tiers.

Not good reasons to say that you should let it stay unbanned. Please try to read our post if u get some time and understand the depth of why Regidrago is concerning for some and not for others. Want a more better post from your side bhai.
https://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/1v1-metagame-discussion.3710864/post-10277491

I guess a grass sandwich was the way to go
View attachment 719515

Soooooo.



I think this red orb is not broken , what's the worst it can do eat me?
AHHHH IT'S EATING ME NYOOoo

(anyways drago is just mid just build more seriously)-this is bs and true at the same time
The fact is I don't have used red orb for actually I don't even remember using it this year ever
THe people who say ohhh the red orb limits teams building it should be ban , why it's so strong I would like to say weak sauce couldn't be me jk jk I mean I was 19-0 just means I didn't loss any games to anything
But but you must have change teams - loveable person (free elo...)
I did this with one team!!
Which have only one red orb immunity (fairy type) and no Steel type

isn't Regidrago a spaceship hmmm

Ahh I am kinda lost what was typing for oh the suspect right
I think red orb allowed players to understand the concept of 1v1 it develops their team building ability

I am voting no ban probably not confirmed yet but I don't think it's broken and I don't think people think it is broken they just don't wanna have a mon or something that counter it for the possibility that they loss to red orb

BigChuchu pay me to vote ban :^

I will add something more if I don't have exams :(

Nice post but where's the reason of why it should/shouldn't be banned lol?

 

[bo_bobson27]

ban resets (sign up like ladder tour). reqs are always possible. the more ppl on ladder, the better.
If you think ladder sucks, its probably because we entered the vicious cycle:
not enough ppl on ladder -> ladder sucks -> no one wants to play ladder -> not enough ppl on ladder
Be the change you wish to see. Even having one or two more ppl on at a time makes a huge difference.
btw we already got more qualifiers than iron crown suspect!

 

[King Griffin]

1. You might got lucky someday by defeating corvi with dragon energy cause regidrago's dragon energy pp can be drained by using roost 4 times.
2 Specify what fairies are scared of it?
3. I respect that Regidrago is your favourite pokemon but that doesn't justify it to stay unbanned. Also please don't talk about other tiers.

Not good reasons to say that you should let it stay unbanned. Please try to read our post if u get some time and understand the depth of why Regidrago is concerning for some and not for others. Want a more better post from your side bhai.
https://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/1v1-metagame-discussion.3710864/post-10277491


Nice post but where's the reason of why it should/shouldn't be banned lol?

Kalas hate for regidrago is so much more real than his hate for someone saying bad about chh...

 

[Zephyr Moonbeam]

It's time to speak up...
Referring to what Kala chasmah said through his post in Sep 22, 2024 in the Metagame Discussion thread, I would like to add that-
1) Fairy in general is a superb typing and it deserves a slot in any 1v1 team.
2) We all have seen how good Iron Valiant, Weezing-Galar, Primarina, Sylveon and Azumarill have performed on ladder. They can act as brilliant Regidrago checks and also good mons in general.
3) Also, only using Steel and Fairy mons to counter Regidrago is not a compulsion. I have used Assault Vest Okidogi to counter all types of Regidrago sets out there while laddering for the suspect test.
4) The best 1v1 teams should naturally be able to counter Regidrago, like they counter all others.
5) We have seen more broken mons than Regidrago before, and it is just a bit close to all of them. But it is not TOO overpowered.
Hence, voting Do Not Ban is not a bad option at all. I will not be surprised if at the end of the voting phase, majority is received by Do Not Ban votes.