Metagame SS Monotype Metagame Discussion [Crown Tundra]

Top 5 Worst Types in SS Monotype
5th place: Bug

The addition of Heavy-Duty Boots means Sticky Web teams are much less consistent now. Bug also lost its main powerhouses in Mega Pinsir and Mega Heracross, so Bug teams don't dish out that much damage. The type itself is bad offensively and defensively, they're stuck low speed and mediocre bulk. While Bug has no problem setting hazards, getting rid of them can be a big problem: your options are more or less limited to Armaldo. It's also just straight up outclassed: Fire, Water and Electric all do the all-out offensive type better. While you could do worse than Bug (see below) you could also do a lot better.

4th place: Fighting

If you're laddering with a Fighting team, get ready to be stopped cold by Toxapex, swept easily by Psychic and Fairy, and dread seeing Flying (arguably the best type) in the team preview. You also need to get ready for never having enough slots on your team, and thus deciding what you want to lose to. Bring Toxacroak to check Rain HO Water, but then you'll struggle with balance Poison. Bring Scarf Buzzwole or Heracross to check Psychic, but then you'll struggle more with Fairy and Flying. Hazard control is another serious problem for Fighting teams. Cobalion is the only good Stealth Rock setter, and unless you want to run Rapid Spin Hitmonlee or Defog Hawlucha (you don't, Hitmonlee sucks and Hawlucha has better things to do) once your opponent gets the hazards up, they're staying there. Stealth Rock is a minor inconvenience, but God help you if they have Sticky Web since you're so reliant on Scarf users. It doesn't even reliably beat Steel, since the Aegislash + Celesteela/Corviknight/Skarmory core shuts down most Fighting types.

3rd place: Grass

When it comes to bad matchups, Grass arguably has more than any other type. Bug, Flying, Ice, Fire, Poison, Dragon, Steel, all of them eat Grass teams for breakfast without even stopping to chew. While the Grass type does have some nice resistances, it ties with Rock for the most weaknesses, meaning almost every type has Pokemon Grass types fear - Dark has Goltres, Fairy has Togekiss, Electric has Zapdos. It's also very weak offensively, being resisted by 7 types. Almost everything on a Grass team is weak to Fire, so against any team that has them, you're in trouble. Cradily offers a neutrality, but it's very passive. Grass teams in general tend to be quite passive, and unlike Poison don't have a Regenerator core to fall back on (I mean technically you could run Amoongus + Tangrowth, but why would you?).

2nd place: Rock

Now, take the lacking Speed of the Bug type, 5 common weaknesses of the Grass type, and add a general layer of suckiness on top, and you have the Rock type. Good luck finding a team of any type that has no Water, Grass, Ground, Fighting or Steel types. Even the types it should do well against like Bug, Fire and Flying all have Pokemon that can sweep Rock teams: Swords Dance Scizor, Bulk Up Cinderace and offensive Landorus-T, respectively. Hell even Normal can bring Bewear which gives Rock a lot of trouble. Hazard removal's a pain too, unless you want to bring Armaldo or Defog Aerodactyl. The only type Rock can reliably beat is Ice, and even then, it still doesn't like dealing with the likes of Galarian Darmanitan.

1st place: Normal

What could be worse than a slow type with lots of weaknesses, low speed, bad hazard control and very few good matchups? A slow type with no resistances, bad hazard control, a small pool of viable Pokemon, a propensity to get worn down quickly and not one reliable match up. Ghost is the closest it has, and even then Ghost teams can wear Normal teams down quickly with entry hazards and status. The Chansey + Porygon2 walling core is nowhere near as good as it might appear on paper, as both are reliant on Eviolite and thus have to be very careful of Knock Off and are very susceptible to passive damage. It also doesn't have any good sweepers apart from Snorlax, which isn't too difficult to stop if you don't let it get multiple Curses off. Gen 8 just gutted Normal - it lost its main hazard setter in Smeargle, its main sweeper with the loss of Z Moves, its anti-offense option with Mega Lopunny and its Fighting check with Mega Pidgeot.
I’d argue the list could be:

5. Grass
4. Fighting
3. Bug
2. Normal
1. Rock

Grass, I believe, is the best of the worst. You could argue for Fighting to be above it, but I put it at a close second. Grass has a solid defensive core to support the offense and utility it has. Rillaboom hitting hard with its STAB and coverage, Whimsicott disrupting setup sweepers and walls, Rotom-Mow either being speed control or a status inflicter, Zarude being speed control or a setup sweeper, same with Celebi.

Fighting, on paper, has great mons. Gapdos, Urshifu-S, Hawlucha, Terrakion, etc. But like you said, it has 6 slot syndrome. Also, without a reliable core, it’s tough to support these heavy hitters efficiently which is why I put it below Grass. On the flip side, I put it above the other 3 because it has arguably the best mons out of these 5 types.

Bug has been terrible since gen 7 and it only got worse in Gen 8. The webs are still good because while HDB exists, not everything runs them so webs still achieves the same utility for Bug. In addition to HDB’s existence, most Bug teams opt out of hazard removal. Putting boots on the ones that need it (Volcarona, Araquanid, Ribombee) and using other items on the ones that don’t need boots (Scizor, Heracross, Buzzwole). I see Bug as a worse Fighting offensive-wise.

Normal is thereciprocal of Fighting. Great defensive core, bad offensive core. Smeargle was HO Normal’s main hazard setter, balance Normal’s main hazard setter was Chansey. The defensive core is still good, swapping Eviolite Chansey for HDB Blissey. It’s just not able to crank out as much immediate damage outside of Diggersby (maybe Indeedee too). It still has good matchups against decent types like Dragon and Dark. Just not as oppressive as it used to be when it had megas and Staraptor.

Rock is BY FAR the worst type. The loss of megas probably hurt Normal the most proportionally, but the pain Rock feels from losing its megas are almost up there. Losing Rockium Z hurt a lot too because now it’s harder for Stakataka to snowball. The offense is okay, the speed is whatever without webs, defensive core is severely lacking. You are setting Monotype to the highest difficulty setting by playing Rock.
 
To add to my point, here’s a tier list I made!

View attachment 456588

While this may not seem like such a bad matchup chart, keep in mind that it loses to 2 of the top types in the metagame, while being quite hard to make work against another few top-5 types. Its advantages (besides Dark, Ice and maybe Normal) aren’t super useful.

Unwinnable:

Fairy:
Not much explanation in my eyes. Fairy is only threatened by Terrakion or the rare Toxicroak, whom the ever-present Klefki can stop with Thunder Wave or screens. In return, you die to everything: Bulu soft checks Terrakion, Scarf Lele sweeps, you get the point.

Psychic: Less unwinnable, as adaptations have emerged such as Pangoro. However, it just doesn’t win even with it, as Tapu Lele rips through the team with semi-decent play.

Significant Disadvantage:

Electric: Alolan Raichu can beat teams lacking priority, while the Rotom forms can blank a lot of dangerous attacks.

Mobile is a little glitchy, so I’ll get back to you all on laptop.
I have a few issues with this tier list.

STEEL: First of all, steel is actually a neutral, and even possibly, a winning MU for steel. The main reason that most fighting pokemon can't go through aegislash and those who can get walled by the steel birds. Now specs keldeo is an exception(so is kommo-o) to this rule as specs hydro goes even though spdef aegis and spdef corv/celes. However, most steel teams, if not all of them run at least one of specs jirachi, AV melm, and ferrothorn which are all very big problems. Although some argue that sub ID kommo-o is a huge counter, keep in mind that jirachi moonblast can be very threatening and and many celesteela's actually run air slash specifically for this purpose. Therefore since the likelihood of encountering these two especially specs rachi which has become more and more common, I would say that for fighting teams. The MU is at most even. Steel has more than enough tools to deal with fighting who does not have the luxury ground has with gravity to turn the MU on its head.

DARK: I think the dark MU is also neutral however I can't argue for the case it's winning. First, galarian moltres has no switch once set up outside of cobalion which takes 50% minimum at +1 if running air slash. If running hurricane, assuming it hits, it does 75% min and at +2 it ohkos. Therefore, the goal of the fighting user will be to kill moltres, however, it's not as easy as it sounds, if moltres user runs sub and subs on coba using t wave, the fighting user is basically screwed. Second, priority through things like mach punch and vaccum wave won't help much because of A. goltres' bulk B. The dark player can just switch out. However, the most important aspect of this is that dark often sets up screens with grimsnarl which has access to fairy moves and most importantly: thunder wave. This by itself cripples a lot of fighitng types as it's not very bulky meaning this will ruin them. These 2 by themselves make the MU much harder than expected. Although one can argue that fighting can overwhelm with offense, it does help with the fact that some teams run will o wisp intimidate parting shot incineroar and some run dark ghost types with will-o-wisp which really makes this MU harder for fighting.

BUG: Then we have bug which I would argue is a winning MU.The only thing threatening to bug is galarian zapdos. Most other things loses to araquanid(except kommo-o which you have to catch with a toxic using araq) and if they are running lead sash ribombee(often carrying qd) you're screwed. back to zapdos. if zapdos is band, galvantula threatens it out and in return either sets up webs or threaten to KO/do huge damage with thunder(you don't have good switch outside kommo-o which hates the para). This is on top of the fact that late game, once volcarona is setup, you basically have to hope that it doesn't psychic which volcarona often has.

GRASS: I don't have much to say for grass because of my lack of experience with it in gen 8 but I feel that with the combination of pokemon like whimsicott, tapu bulu, and celebi(you don't have to use all 3, but most teams run two of those) which are backed by ferrothorn and late game sweeps with rillaboom, I would argue this MU is actually even.
*note: this is the one I'm least confident on, therefore I may be very wrong, so please correct nicely.

Finally here is my list of the top 5 worst types:
5.Bug
4.Normal
3.Grass
2.Rock
1.Fighting

Rock and Fighting are honestly interchangeable because they suffer from the same problem. Even match ups that they should be winning like fighting against steel and dark and rock with flying. They actually kinda don't.
 

Dead by Daylight

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I have a few issues with this tier list.

STEEL: First of all, steel is actually a neutral, and even possibly, a winning MU for steel. The main reason that most fighting pokemon can't go through aegislash and those who can get walled by the steel birds. Now specs keldeo is an exception(so is kommo-o) to this rule as specs hydro goes even though spdef aegis and spdef corv/celes. However, most steel teams, if not all of them run at least one of specs jirachi, AV melm, and ferrothorn which are all very big problems. Although some argue that sub ID kommo-o is a huge counter, keep in mind that jirachi moonblast can be very threatening and and many celesteela's actually run air slash specifically for this purpose. Therefore since the likelihood of encountering these two especially specs rachi which has become more and more common, I would say that for fighting teams. The MU is at most even. Steel has more than enough tools to deal with fighting who does not have the luxury ground has with gravity to turn the MU on its head.

DARK: I think the dark MU is also neutral however I can't argue for the case it's winning. First, galarian moltres has no switch once set up outside of cobalion which takes 50% minimum at +1 if running air slash. If running hurricane, assuming it hits, it does 75% min and at +2 it ohkos. Therefore, the goal of the fighting user will be to kill moltres, however, it's not as easy as it sounds, if moltres user runs sub and subs on coba using t wave, the fighting user is basically screwed. Second, priority through things like mach punch and vaccum wave won't help much because of A. goltres' bulk B. The dark player can just switch out. However, the most important aspect of this is that dark often sets up screens with grimsnarl which has access to fairy moves and most importantly: thunder wave. This by itself cripples a lot of fighitng types as it's not very bulky meaning this will ruin them. These 2 by themselves make the MU much harder than expected. Although one can argue that fighting can overwhelm with offense, it does help with the fact that some teams run will o wisp intimidate parting shot incineroar and some run dark ghost types with will-o-wisp which really makes this MU harder for fighting.

BUG: Then we have bug which I would argue is a winning MU.The only thing threatening to bug is galarian zapdos. Most other things loses to araquanid(except kommo-o which you have to catch with a toxic using araq) and if they are running lead sash ribombee(often carrying qd) you're screwed. back to zapdos. if zapdos is band, galvantula threatens it out and in return either sets up webs or threaten to KO/do huge damage with thunder(you don't have good switch outside kommo-o which hates the para). This is on top of the fact that late game, once volcarona is setup, you basically have to hope that it doesn't psychic which volcarona often has.

GRASS: I don't have much to say for grass because of my lack of experience with it in gen 8 but I feel that with the combination of pokemon like whimsicott, tapu bulu, and celebi(you don't have to use all 3, but most teams run two of those) which are backed by ferrothorn and late game sweeps with rillaboom, I would argue this MU is actually even.
*note: this is the one I'm least confident on, therefore I may be very wrong, so please correct nicely.

Finally here is my list of the top 5 worst types:
5.Bug
4.Normal
3.Grass
2.Rock
1.Fighting

Rock and Fighting are honestly interchangeable because they suffer from the same problem. Even match ups that they should be winning like fighting against steel and dark and rock with flying. They actually kinda don't.
I agree with most of your points on the MUs besides Grass and Bug. Grass’s defensive core of Amoonguss + Ferrothorn + Cradily can’t stand GZapdos, as Brave Bird hits incredibly hard. Additionally, Bulu is actually outsped and Celebi is speed tied with max speed Zapdos-G. The one issue is Whimsicott; however, it simply dies to Scarf Terrakion. The rare Heracross also bodies Grass.

Bug is handled by Galarian Zapdos in conjunction with Scarf Terrakion, which can rip through the team with ease. Most Bug teams use one of Ribombee and Galvantula, meaning that it’s simpler to deal with both. Araquanid can’t do much of anything to Kommo-o, either. Now that I think about it, this may be an advantage.
 
Just want to clarify something about my top 5 list. Before I made it, I created new alts and played 40 games with a team of each type. The 5 types I listed were the ones I had the worst experiences laddering with. After hearing other's views, and reflecting a little more myself, I have reordered my list.

5: Bug
4: Grass (wrecking Water and Ground is a good USP)
3: Normal
2: Fighting (I got lucky laddering, it is a really bad type)
1: Rock

Normal is counting the days until it can use Wyrdeer and Hisuian Zoroak.
 

maroon

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RMT & Mono Leader
It seems the discussion around Kyurem, Galarian Moltres, and Aegislash has stopped but I wanted to make a post anyway prefacing that the Monotype council overall views the metagame as balanced and we do not plan to hold any more suspects this generation. All of these Pokemon are fantastic, but not unhealthy or broken in the current metagame. Will give my personal thoughts on three pokemon as well.

:ss/kyurem:

The biggest thing Kyurem gained from this generation was Freeze Dry, which absolutely made it viable. Many people say it directly beats types that Ice is strong against such as Flying and Water due to how Freeze Dry works. However, all of these listed types have solid counterplay to Kyurem. Water teams have Urshifu-R to force out Kyurem, then can use Pokemon such as Calm Mind Tapu Fini to setup against Dragon. Sure Dragon has checks to Calm Mind Tapu Fini like SpD Gunk Shot so its not a cut and dry answer but it is a playable match at its core. If you take some rather fringe approach to building such as using Walrein to check Kyurem, of course its going to feel like a big deal. However without sacrificing slots on the team Water you can reliably check Kyurem, both offensively and defensively. As for Flying it can quite easily even wall kyurem with specially defensive corviknight or has adapted to run dual Steel stab Celesteela, which can both offensively and defensively check Kyurem. This is true with most types, sure Kyurem is a powerful wallbreaker or an annoying Pokemon to take down behind Substitute, but that does mean its broken or unhealthy. If you still arent convinced lets take a look through Monotype's usage in official tournaments such as MPL, where Kyurem won less than half of the games it was brought in, there is enough evidence to warrant the metagame has adapted to it.

:ss/moltres-galar:
Galarian Moltres has to main roles, on most teams it plays the role of setup sweeper+stallbreaker. However on hyper offensive teams, it usually drops its ability to better matchup against fatter pokemon for agility, allowing it to better take on other offensive teams. This alongside its good natural bulk and solid defensive typing makes it quite a force to be reckoned with, that is where it stops though. Here is a quick run-through of different types matchups against Galarian Moltres, made by roxie.
Dark: Tyranitar / Weavile / Grimmsnarl / Bisharp
Dragon: Kyurem / Hydreigon (Fiery Wrath exclusive sets) / Choice Scarf Dragapult
Fairy / Electric / Ice: Shouldn't have issues.
Fire: Incineroar / Cinderace in Sun / Getting +2 Spa +2 Spe is hard overall considering how offensive/direct Fire is
Ghost: Mimikyu / Choice Specs Blacephalon (Difficult MU in general)
Grass: Cradily / Whimsicott + Virizion + Bulu (Fiery Wrath exclusive)
Ground: Roar Hippowdon & Clear Smog Gastrodon makes it have low setup opportunities + Offensive Pokemon
Normal: Chansey / Snorlax
Poison: Nihilego (Nihilego + Core alone beats Ice, Flying, Fire, and Bug pretty well), Galarian Weezing+WW Drapion (Fiery Wrath exclusive) / Galarian Slowking to an extent
Psychic: Hatterne / Tapu Lele / Alakazam / Galarian Slowking to an extent
Steel: Heatran / Melmetal / Bisharp / Celesteela
Water: Tapu Fini / Swift Swim Water / Urshifu+Crawdaunt (Fiery Wrath exclusive) / Roar Swampert
Similarly to Kyurem, Flying and Dark teams didn't have an overbearing presence in MPL, respectively having a 50% or less winrate. Sure just like a handful of other setup sweepers if you dont play carefully around it, it can clean through teams. But it has a hard time getting every boost it needs to do this in different matchups. Overall the metagame has adapted to Galarian Moltres quite nicely.

:ss/aegislash:
This is perhaps the only Pokemon I really thought was suspect worthy/bannable at a point in the metagame. Aegislash finishes the unholy trinity of Steel's immunity trio with a flying type like corvknight/celesteela, and heatran. This Pokemon is the final piece of the puzzle that made Steel teams so hard to break, between its fantastic defenses, its special ability stance change allows it to have actual damage output. It can also act as a late-game cleaner for Steel teams with hazard stack as it sweeps the opposing team with Shadow Sneak. However, even with all these amazing qualities the metagame is very naturally anti-Steel regardless of Aegislash's presence. Pokemon such as Substitute+Nasty Plot Hydreigon exist which picks apart Steel very easily, or any number of strong attackers with neutral coverage and setup can keep Steel teams at bay such Galarian Moltres with Nasty Plot. There are more common examples such as Clefable and Azumarill on Fairy, Nidoking on Poison, Landorus-T/Zapdos/Galarian Moltres on Flying, etc. Overall, while Aegislash is the perfect addition to round out Steel teams defensive core the metagame doesn't have problems breaking through Steel teams defensive cores as evident by tours such as MPL with the linked sheet above.

SS Monotype is one of the healthiest Monotype metagames, with most type diversity, and types not having an overwhelming win-percentage. The metagame has pretty healthily grown to adapt to these Pokemon, leaving no reason to suspect these 'controversial' Pokemon.
 
Just want to clarify something about my top 5 list. Before I made it, I created new alts and played 40 games with a team of each type. The 5 types I listed were the ones I had the worst experiences laddering with. After hearing other's views, and reflecting a little more myself, I have reordered my list.

5: Bug
4: Grass (wrecking Water and Ground is a good USP)
3: Normal
2: Fighting (I got lucky laddering, it is a really bad type)
1: Rock

Normal is counting the days until it can use Wyrdeer and Hisuian Zoroak.
I don't know how this top 5 worst types thing started but anyone who says fighting is not worst is fooling themselves. Even just laddering 16-1800 you can get a good grasp of this, though rare, rock is used far more than fighting at high ladder. For reference you can see stats here of overall usage, where fighting is the least used type at 1500, 1630, and 1760, and even it's 1500 usage is lower than any other type has for an elo listed, with even normal at 1760 having more usage than fighting at 1500. https://www.smogon.com/stats/2022-09/monotype/metagame/

Anyhow I'm putting it like this:
5. Bug
4. Grass
3. Rock
2. Normal
1. Fighting

The rest idrc what order they're in on your list, this is how I see them. Grass has a pretty high skill ceiling, and I honestly see as better than poison if we're being real. Bug also has a decent skill ceiling but with real annoying 6 teamslot syndrome. Grass is defs better than bug this gen with more potential imo, but it's not a type I'm as familiar with. Normal is more viable than rock/bug this meta but idc I'm putting it #2 because of how much I hate using it, you can literally feel how much better the type would be with just Staraptor added and that pain lingers.You mentioned H Zoroark and Wyrdeer, nah fool it just needs Staraptor. Rock is more fun than normal and I'd be more likely to use, just cause I think it's good mus are more important than normal's. I think every rock user has a dababy revenge arc when they first get to 1300s or wherever tf that bot is. Using rock tells a story, one of overcoming your demons and dababybot, and for that it's #3.
 

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