Resource SS OU DLC2 Viability Ranking Thread [SEE: Page 105, Post 2618]

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Thunder Pwoell

Banned deucer.
C+ Rank

Glastrier
I know Glastrier is at LEAST b rank and I'm nominating this mon for B+ rank in the OU VR. Now, why such a jump? I know for a fact most of you do not use this mon and it is extremely underutilized, overlooked, and undervalued. The value add this mon brings is almost invaluable depending on your teams. It is so bulky, so powerful that you can just shrug off most mons super effective attacks that will hit you. I am not afraid of ttar, bisharp, kartana and sometimes heatran actually, since you can kill all of these mons from full and most of the time they will not kill u: god knows trash ass kart has no shot. Why is that? it's because your natural bulk is so astronomically high.

For those that need visual, this mons stats are 100 Hp/ 145 Attack / 130 Defense / 110 Special Defense/ 30 Speed. An incredible bulky pokemon with VERY high attack and the phenomical boosting moveset and ability. Once this starts stacking, there is Very little to do it stop it. You can shrug off bitchmade attacks from a attempting to stall kyurem, as well as outspeeding and killing toxapexes that are running around. Very few physical attacks will kill you, while you can oko or 2hko (oko with swords dance and no life orb) most things. I personally have a set that uses swords dance nad leftovers which takes advantage of said bitchmade mons and sets,which really cant hit. you at all and u can just setup on them withvery little issue. Because your defense is so high and speed so low, many mons who would body press you or gyro ball you are pretty much setup bait to a fault, you still need to hit them. Lastly, I believe a huge issue that people have with this is that they see the speed and auto think trick room. No.you can shit on weavile,kill the the torn and slow twins, shit on the balance squads and disrupt offense since it;s so frail. you don't need trick room at al. I have never used it on there and it's done a phenomenal job for me. Good day yall.. and remember, it get cold at night.



IIght so my next nom is for braviary. Braviary should definitely be B tier.
1631770038173.png

This mon is actually incredible. It has 3 really good abilities, with 2 being the main ones: sheer force and defiant. It has a good typing, really powerful moves, mad decent bulky, good hp, and great attack. It gets some cool moves such as rock slide, shadow claw, iron head, bulk up and uturn to supplement it as well. And with it's sky high attack it can nab REALLY nice scarf or banded okos. I prefer defiant and will refer to that ability through the rest of this post.

Now for the white elephant in the room, what sets this apart from Galarian Zapdos?
This can easily be boiled down into a few points:
  1. Since braviary's speed tier is different, It can afford to be adamant.
    • braviary lived lele's psychic and okos at +0 with scarf and obvs with anything else
    • it lives lando stone edge and if you're defiant it okos back easily.
  2. Because it's normal type, it is actually effectively much bulkier than galarian zapdos.
    • not being weak to moonblast nor brave bird is super vital.
    • being immune to ghost and forcing a draco is amazing
    • being able to not just shit on clef and fini, but to get a boost from them is outright fucking hilarious.
    • people think their landos can live
    • even joey thought he could live a banded brave bird with his galarian slowing since it can live a banded zapdos brave brid but forgot that the murica bird is adamant lmao and it's VERY noticeably stronger and loses less hp to brave birds.
  3. It's effectively stronger in most situations
    • unless you are trying to take out like a corv or whatever with scarf close combat, in most situations u either oko anyway or you hit MUCH harder than gzapdos bc u are going to be adamant. it's great.
    • You also can run different sets than gzapdos because of ur different move set. Other than band I like the moveset of: adrenaline orb, bulk up, brave bird, roost, close combat and it is FIRE.
    • having rock slide is fucking great. fuck the fucking birds up. fuck em up fuck em up.
    • People underestimate it because they some gargling groupthinkers
  4. It's Omari P™ certified
    • bitches
Now how does it mesh well with other teams? You can easily have this replace gzapdos in most situations but id suggest taking advantage of the ghost immunity and setting up on dracos.

Now for the replays, I got up to damn near 2000 with this great American bird, which is far better than the dirty trash staraptor wannabe galarian zapdos, mon just needs to wade.

Replays:
go bird go: https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1393590548-l1gyhh1jcxfhdrztx3tu1ooapq6ddg2pw
yeehaw: https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1391191943-q6j6gsrcafkjnmrovrqmf6s9uwi6ujipw
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1397652374
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1393551771
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1395396235-71h29hd4fcot2z7hcobfl17qstfp2nwpw
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1394531896-9wn59qvgvjt8euwz15357baglir24hjpw
lol


Let me know what u think. don't be ignorant
 
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Baloor

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im not going to bother arguing too hard because i know its gonna be like talking to a brick wall but i do have some small comments

i agree glastier should rise but b+ is super extreme. it doesnt really do anything uber notable to be in the same rank as mons like blacephalon, tyranitar, bulu and victini. its mostly just strong mon hit hard durr type of shit that has good coverage to hit common defensive cores rn. its pretty easily out pressured like blaziken & moltres-galar by mons that are simply better, b- is fine for glastier at the moment. considering its super pressured by corviknight thats enough to keep it out of anything above b.

braviery is a weird one. i actually dont think the mon is garbage, as defiant + sball switch in that hits hard is a ok niche in ou. it could probably be ranked low on the vr and i wouldnt be upset at it at all. but the b nom is pretty insane. this thing def shouldnt be close to zapdos-galar on the vr (which is b- for some reason?) let alone above. zapdos-galar is simply just better in the current landscape of ou, which i know is a opinion you dont really care for so i wont elaborate. i wouldnt mind rising brav out of UR since i think its better than shit like xatu and charizard but it doesnt have a good enough niche to justify this insane jump to b at all, frankly the niche is barely strong enough for c- and for some people its just not strong enough at all. the vr doesnt work like that. no mon rises that many subranks (let alone out of UR) unless it has some huge meta changing effect like the recent hail rise. though i do appreciate you posting replays unlike some of the other UR -> Ranked posts. but you need to understand that the vr takes baby steps when rising and dropping mons unless there is some insane shift.

this post has made me realize than some of these lower ranks do need a bit of a clean up though and hopefully there is some discussion to help that
 
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Thunder Pwoell always a fan of the heat, but I don't think braviary is it. P sure this is a case of you being a good player, and not so much the pokemon. Can you see the OU lemmings using this effectively? I can't.

Braviary has roost, ghost immune, and hitting OG zapdos over Zapdos-g, otherwise it's straight worse. Why couldnt you also go adamant on Zapdos too? I don't get that point. The difference in close combat power is huge. Banded Zapdos kills melmetal and ferrothorn, whereas braviary does not. Also disagree on braviary being bulkier...you take a quarter from stealth rock unless boots, and then you do no damage.

Anyway, I've tried braviary a bunch and I agree it's not bad, but the stuff that differentiates from Zapdos G would put it more in C something for me. :Thumbs up:

(Granted, I think g zap is the truth)

Most Ferrothorn are 252/252+ at high ranks.

252 Atk Choice Band Zapdos-Galar Close Combat vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Ferrothorn: 338-402 (96 - 114.2%) -- 75% chance to OHKO

252+ Atk Choice Band Braviary Close Combat vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Ferrothorn: 248-292 (70.4 - 82.9%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

Against the less common 252/80:
252+ Atk Choice Band Braviary Close Combat vs. 252 HP / 80 Def Ferrothorn: 308-364 (87.5 - 103.4%) -- 25% chance to OHKO

252+ Atk Choice Band Braviary Close Combat vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Melmetal: 304-358 (73.9 - 87.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

Neither kills if based defensive melmetal
 
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Thunder Pwoell

Banned deucer.
Braviary has roost, ghost immune, and hitting OG zapdos over Zapdos-g, otherwise it's straight worse. Why couldnt you also go adamant on Zapdos too? I don't get that point. The difference in close combat power is huge. Banded Zapdos kills melmetal and ferrothorn, whereas braviary does not. Also disagree on braviary being bulkier...you take a quarter from stealth rock unless boots, and then you do no damage.
that's a good question, my bad for not elaborating on that further. Because of their speed tiers and typings, both of them are weak to different mons. Galarian Zapdos unfortunately is in a tier where stuff that is faster than it can kill it if it's not +speed such as fini or more notably Lele, as well as a few other base 100s. However braviary doesn't have that issue whatsoever and lives all of the those attacks that would kill the orange bird. A close combat kill on ferro is very very likely with banded braviary, I think you should recheck ur calcs or play more games with it. melmetal is broken and a joke, however all u need is a small amount of chip to kill it with braviary.

As far as braviary being bulkier, it effectively is. Takes far less from Brave bird, not weak to all of said moves, and takes less from common attacks. Now as far as rocks go, I keep rocks off the field so that point is mute to me. they arent relevant to me anyway.

Lastly, thank you for actually trying it out and not just going off of it the groupthink; I appreciate that.
 
Move up Rotom-Wash
Rotom-Wash seems like it's extremely capable of moving up. It currently checks/walls and beats a large number of the mons is A- rank or higher such as Heatran, Lando, Garchomp, Corviknight, Torn, Scizor, Buzzwole, Fini and Dragonite (the last 2 can setup against Wash only if you are scarfed but don't enjoy Vswitch or status). It has 2 main item choices which are both effective being Scarf and Leftovers however they both have drawbacks but are still effective in the majority of matchups. It's very safe and threatening against a large number of common threats similar to Heatran. Heatran and Wash both have similar strengths and weaknesses having amazing typings, great offensive and defensive utility, being amazing pivots and a lack of self-regeneration. It has strengths in the majority of matchups, doesn't need too much support, is very portable. It doesn't require a certain team to be useful on, isn't destroyed absurdly hard by top threats like other mons in its tier or have one detrimental weakness holding back. Its offensive utility compared to other bulky waters above it give a clear advantage to those mons in that aspect. Wash has so much utility that no matter the matchup it's usually putting in work. It's very hard to switch in against Wash.

General Strengths
In general, a large number of the best/most common hazard removers either can't switch into Wash, lose to it, get crippled by status and or hate seeing volt switch (the exception defensive Koko). It might be the best anti-rocks mon due to beating nearly every common stealth rocks user and the ones it doesn't that can live hydro pump hate getting status or having its item switched to a scarf (exception being Mew and clefable). In terms of either keeping hazards from coming on or off the field, few mons are as effective as Rotom-Wash (maybe Mew). Due to its insane typing of only being weak to grass and nature bulk, it can switch into a large number of common threats safely without worrying about getting predicted and dying outright to random coverage moves. It's insane pivoting and switchability make it amazing at gaining tempo/momentum. It's extremely strong in the early game when your opponent doesn't know what set it's running and while hazards aren't up. Due to being such a safe threatening option against so many common leads, it can quickly make games snowball since switching in the wrong mon against Rotom-Wash can cripple that mons effectiveness with a status or create momentum by switching into a counter. Compared to the other topwater pivot Toxapex, Wash isn't forced to switch out against the common rocks setters and can do more aggressive plays like Vswitch to keep the momentum going (however Toxapex ability to shut down momentum is hard for any Mon in the tier to match). It's so commonly used as a lead that players will intentionally pick mons that lose to Wash's team's rock user. The majority of mons that want to switch in on Wash either hate getting status(Toxapex, Grass-types, Lele, Slowking-G, Koko and Dragapolt), Vswitch since it allows more tempo for Wash's team and or Hydro (Zera, Rotom-Heat and other switch-ins).

General Weaknesses
Wash has issues with rocks chipping, knock off, and toxic. In general, Rotom relies on its item more than top defensive pivots like Lando, Corv and Heatran. Rotom can have issues surviving if it isn't running pain split and leftovers. For the amount of offensive momentum, Wash can give you it has trouble sweeping and may need additional electric coverage for it to be effective at cleaning up. Although most Mons don't like switching in against Rotom-Wash if a Mon can get in safely like after another mon died or with U-turn common threats like Dragapult, Zera, Rilla, Lele and Urshifu can usually threaten the KO on it without fearing it or a Mon can set up against the scarf variant. Don't have to worry about Wash setting up. Wash loses to certain leads like Alola Ninetails or Mew, gets destroyed by Grass-types, can't touch Clefeable or Reuniclus and requires good reads to handle certain mons like Dragapult, Lati twins, Zera, Blissy and Slowking-G. Compared to Fini it isn't as good at setting up and compared to Toxapex it isn't able to survive as long.

Leftovers Set
Leftovers allow Wash to utilize and maximize its defensive strengths. Its ability to wall and check a large number of the tiers threats whilst also allowing it to snowball arguably more easily than the scarf set due, to making switch-ins riskier for mons that resist its stab since a status can ruin its effectiveness makes it the most common set used in OU. It can survive longer than the scarf set since it has leftovers recovery and pain split recovery. Rocks are far less detrimental to the leftovers set since the damage is healed every turn and Wash is able to be more liberal with its switches. Deciding which status condition seems obvious in the current meta due to the rampant amount of steels/poisons making Wisp a phenomenal choice since it affects almost everyone in the tier whilst being one of the only reliable sources of chip against Toxapex, Slowking-G, Corv, whilst actively. T-wave is viable since it hampers special sweepers and wall breakers like Tapu Fini, Lati twins and Dragapolt. Hard for offensive mons to switch into it fearing the status or tempo being taken away with Vswitch.

Scarf Set
Scarf makes Wash far more of a threat immediately than its defensive counterpart. Scarf allows it to be a far more effective revenge killer and sweeper than the Leftovers set. A scarf can be far more valuable in certain matchups since using Trick to give to a Mon like Blissy, Toxapex or an Assualtvest user can destroy a team defensive core more than a burn could. The extra speed plus and its natural bulk mean that it is still a counter to a lot of Mons like Heatran, Lando, Corv etc however it's far more of a threat. Wash has to be warier of Rocks damage and status than the Leftovers set meaning you can't be as liberal with your switches as the leftovers set. The last move in the set can either go to Discharge for bigger use of Wash's stab, or status to have more utility and harder to switch into (on the initial turn) at the cost of offensive power. The lack of Pain spilt means Wash's doesn't have any sort of recovery done by itself. It's extremely threatening when it's first sent out, however, it's far easier to play around after the initial turn like all choice Mons. Hard for defensive mons to switch into it fearing the trick or tempo being taken away with Vswitch..

Niche Move choices and Sets
Rotom has other niche options to fill out its moveset however these are typically like Ghost coverage (only really useful to 2 hit ko Lele and Dragpult which usually can switch in safely against Wash), Defog (which can work due to beating hazard setters one on one but, other mons are much better at filling this role since Rotom can't heal itself as efficiently as other prominent hazard removers) and nasty plot (too slow to really work)

This kinda just became a complete Rotom Wash Guide lol.
TL;DR is
- Beats most Hazard removers and setters in the meta
- Amazing defensive utility
- Amazing at keeping the momentum going and starting it
- Has clear Advantages over other water types in the tier
- Doesn't require much support to effective
- Doesn't have to be used on one type of team to be effective
- Threatens and beats many of the mons ahead in tiers above it
- Doesn't have to be used one way to be effective.
- Hard to switch in against due to status o


Thank you for listening to my Ted Talk
 
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this post has made me realize than some of these lower ranks do need a bit of a clean up though and hopefully there is some discussion to help that
:ss/Shedinja: C- to B

This thing is criminally underrated. Shedinja is a great option for stall because it checks or outright counters most sets of the following: Excadrill, Garchomp, Kyurem, Magnezone, Melmetal, Tapu Fini, Tapu Koko, Tapu Lele, Urshifu, and Arctozolt. Safety Goggles enables Shedinja to shit all over Hail in particular.

Shedinja @ Safety Goggles
Ability: Wonder Guard
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 HP / 0 Atk / 0 Def / 0 SpD
- Hex
- Toxic
- Will-O-Wisp
- Protect

I've been using this set, which I got from airfare's team here. Double status is excellent for all the switches that Shedinja forces and Hex allows Shedinja to deal meaningful chip damage against statused targets. Shadow Ball has more PP but that's rarely relevant. Poltergeist is bad on Shedinja since it only has 8 PP and is useless against Knock'd opponents.

Here's another Shedinja stall team, this time by me. It's not quite as robust as Airfare's but it has a better Heatran matchup. Notice that both teams have multiple hazard control options, as Shedinja obviously cannot function without tons of support.

Although I believe Shedinja is one of the best options for stall currently, I think B is appropriate because stall is generally not a great playstyle this gen. Seriously. Knock Off + Magnezone, Heatran, and the god-awful stall vs stall matchup have plagued every stall team for years, and the absence of Gliscor and Pursuit are the last nails in the coffin. We'll see if that changes if BDSP brings back Pursuit in November ;) Anyway, if you like to matchup fish and/or bully low-to-mid level players, then Shedinja will be a valuable asset.
 
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I agree Shedinja should be moved up since its niche is better than what C- would suggest, but I think B is too massive of a jump. As you said yourself, stall isn’t that great a playstyle this gen, and I don’t think any Pokémon whose niche is relegated almost entirely to stall teams should be anywhere in the B ranks atm. I can definitely see C rank or maybe even C+ though!
 
I agree Shedinja should be moved up since its niche is better than what C- would suggest, but I think B is too massive of a jump. As you said yourself, stall isn’t that great a playstyle this gen, and I don’t think any Pokémon whose niche is relegated almost entirely to stall teams should be anywhere in the B ranks atm. I can definitely see C rank or maybe even C+ though!
That's reasonable. My logic is that Shedinja is extremely valuable for stall, to the extent that most stall teams should use it currently. As such, Shedinja's viability ranking should correlate to the viability of stall. This is similar to how weather-related mons tend to be ranked, such as Pelipper and Venusaur; they can only be as good as their playstyle is because they're not on any other teams. Shedinja should be a little lower than wherever stall is considered because not all stall teams require Shedinja whereas Pelipper, for example, is mandatory on rain. I think C+ should be its rank at minimum, but I would not consider anything higher than B.
 
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Alright time for some quickfire noms

:hydreigon: to B+
I get the appeal of this mon, but it runs into some major 4mss when choosing between nasty plot, roost, draco meteor, earth power, dark pulse, flash cannon, flamethrower, defog, and uturn. A lot of these moves have major oppurtunity cost for not using them, with roost 3 atks lacking breaking power and nasty plot roost severely lacking coverage for fairies. Overall :hydreigon: simply does not command the same respect in the builder nor have the role compression of fellow setup sweepers :dragonite: :volcarona: :rillaboom: I should also mention it’s awkward defensive typing in a meta without ash-greninja, leaving it unable to switch into dragapult or weavile despite its dark typing.

:ferrothorn: to A+
I already made this nom before the last vr update and others have made it as well. Insane role compression and excellent blanket check to a lot of the threats in this meta like hail, koko, fini, weavile, and lando.

:blaziken: to B+
Imma keep nomming this up till people catch on to the fact that the meta is super weak to it and that protect sets are viable.

:uxie: to UR
Uxie’s supposed niche is a tr setter, except its no longer a legit option on tr. Cress, p2, and hatterene are all excellent tr setters that outclass uxie by virtue of lunar dance+massive bulk, pult check+teleport, and magic bounce respectively.

:Reuniclus: to B-/C+
I haven’t seen this seriously used over cm wincons like clef and fini in ages, I respect the fact that it still has a niche by virtue of stored power+excellent bulk, but weavile and bisharp are everywhere atm and make it difficult to set up reliably.
 

Thunder Pwoell

Banned deucer.
:uxie: to UR
Uxie’s supposed niche is a tr setter, except its no longer a legit option on tr. Cress, p2, and hatterene are all excellent tr setters that outclass uxie by virtue of lunar dance+massive bulk, pult check+teleport, and magic bounce respectively.
you can use uxie for many things other than trick room and it's fine as such. It;s a solid mon, saying it's UR is weird
 
you can use uxie for many things other than trick room and it's fine as such. It;s a solid mon, saying it's UR is weird
What does it do that mew can't do? Mew has higher speed, bulk, offenses, and a better movepool, whereas uxie has checks notes memento. The slightly lower speed could be useful for trick room, but as others have mentioned its basically never used on trick room.
 

Thunder Pwoell

Banned deucer.
What does it do that mew can't do? Mew has higher speed, bulk, offenses, and a better movepool, whereas uxie has checks notes memento. The slightly lower speed could be useful for trick room, but as others have mentioned its basically never used on trick room.
I would like you to say more stuff about it, as uxie is just outclassed defensively by other psychic's like slowking-g, slowbro, slowking, or mew. It has nothing going for it besides memento +trick room shenanigans.
What else is it used for? Every other role I can think of is fully outclassed by a much better mon higher on the vr
lol jesus chirst. ok it depends on your team. You can have a slower mew-like bulky mon that can use momento instead of exploding. as well as having this be a slower, bulkier rocker (bc mew is not bulkier just FYI). it depends on your usage. You can even use wonder room man idk I’m just saying that it has uses.
 
lol jesus chirst. ok it depends on your team. You can have a slower mew-like bulky mon that can use momento instead of exploding. as well as having this be a slower, bulkier rocker (bc mew is not bulkier just FYI). it depends on your usage. You can even use wonder room man idk I’m just saying that it has uses.
You can make a niche for any pokemon out there, but the real question would be in what scenarios would your team prefer to have uxie over any other psychic
 
lol jesus chirst. ok it depends on your team. You can have a slower mew-like bulky mon that can use momento instead of exploding. as well as having this be a slower, bulkier rocker (bc mew is not bulkier just FYI). it depends on your usage. You can even use wonder room man idk I’m just saying that it has uses.
Mew is actually bulkier, unlike mew, uxie has no recovery which means it struggles to check things that mew would such as tapu lele, koko, kyurem, garchomp. Can spread status via will-o-wisp, can remove useful items such as tapu lele's specs, boots and leftovers, and set up spikes.

252 Atk Garchomp Scale Shot (3 hits) vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Mew: 126-147 (31.1 - 36.3%) -- approx. 59.3% chance to 3HKO
252 Atk Garchomp Scale Shot (3 hits) vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Uxie: 99-120 (27.9 - 33.8%) -- approx. 0.1% chance to 3HKO

Uxie is actually not that much bulkier, as shown in this calc it is taking 3% more, with no reliable recovery it will get worn down. Memento on trick room teams is its only niche as it does nothing more than that. Levitate sure can be useful but solely for that? nah, im not buying it
 

ausma

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We are treading into really nitpicky territory for a Pokemon that's already undeniably very niche, and the conversation doesn't really seem to be conducive or going anywhere productive. Let's try to reduce further discussion on Uxie going forward so it doesn't have to be blacklisted.
 
Alright, I'll nom a much less niche Psychic instead:

:ss/(Tapu Lele): A ---> A+

This mon deserves A+ in my eyes. Specs sets need absolutely no introduction, and running a Modest nature gives Lele the interesting ability to bypass most prediction-reliant situations that don't involve a Dark-type, so specifically situations with Steels such as Corviknight and Heatran. This mon's damage output is so insane, it can achieve the following:

• 252+ SpA Choice Specs Tapu Lele Psychic vs. 248 HP / 92 SpD Corviknight in Psychic Terrain: 162-191 (40.6 - 47.8%) -- 5.5% chance to 2HKO after Stealth Rock and Leftovers recovery
• 252+ SpA Choice Specs Tapu Lele Psyshock vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Heatran in Psychic Terrain: 133-157 (34.4 - 40.6%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Stealth Rock and Leftovers recovery


The above calcs mean that Corv only needs to be brought down to 87% until it can no longer switch in on Psychic after rocks (and Corv, a defogger, will very frequently switch into rocks) and Tran only needs to go down to 75% until it can't take Psyshock with rocks involved. Getting that little chip on both of those pokemon is extremely easy to achieve, and it means that the Lele user can seriously just turn off their brain and click in the midgame once those Steels have been weakened sufficiently. And that's not accounting for coverage options such as Thunderbolt and Focus Blast, as well as untimely SpD drops against the likes of Ferrothorn, but the point is that the Lele user legitimately has the choice to disregard those moves and still be rewarded for clicking STABs every time Lele is brought in against a slower mon during the midgame. There's also the infamous LeleZone core which reduces these situations to dust and allows for completely free STABs vs any slower target in OU (Especially since dropping Focus Blast gives you room for Shadow Ball to invalidate the occasional Shedinja), and allows Lele to click Moonblast much more frequently which dissuades Dark-types from ever trying to pull off a risky switch-in. Still, this mon's ability to muscle through its supposed checks after so little chip is incredible.

There's also the Scarf set that has been picking up in popularity, serving as an excellent revenge killer and late-game wincon with its solid damage output thanks to PsyTerrain and immunity to priority. Focusing more on the revenge killing aspect, here's a list of popular threats that Timid Scarf Lele can reliably revenge (or at least force out):

• SD :(Weavile): (Psyterrain ignores Ice Shard)
• Modest Scarf :(Blacephalon):
• Hail-boosted :(Arctozolt): (Mild chip needed, usually inflicted by Zolt's own Sub)
• Boosted :(Zeraora): (72.2 - 85.4% with Psychic, some chip required)
• SD :(Kartana): (Near-guaranteed Psychic KO after LO recoil)
• Faster Choiced wallbreakers (:(Dragapult):,:(Urshifu): etc)
• NP :(Hydreigon): (Less common but it's still a threat that outspeeds non-scarf Lele so it counts)

And the Specs set is no slouch in the revenge department either, finding safe entry opportunities against priority-reliant attackers such as SD Rillaboom and Bisharp which it can easily OHKO. And I figure I might as well mention CM Lele, which can be extremely potent vs fatter styles but is highly susceptible to status which can occasionally make it falter in the stallbreaking department. But overall, this pokemon's double-sided potential as a wallbreaker that can inflict extremely heavy damage in the midgame and as a scarfer that can reliably revenge kill several notable offensive threats and sweep end-game makes it worthy of moving up to A+ to me, especially considering its capacity to overwhelm supposed checks with minimal effort and its lack of a Stealth Rock weakness compared to fellow A-tier Specs user Kyurem which makes it easier to maneuver onto the field to fire off its downright scary STABs. If A+ wallbreaker Urshifu is un-wallable with FS support, this thing is near un-wallable on its own and becomes even more terrifying with Magnezone support. And it can RK most things to boot.

Other noms I agree with:
:(Ferrothorn): A --> A+
:(Arctozolt):/:(Ninetales-Alola): A --> A-
:(Shedinja): C- --> C+
:(Scizor): A --> A-
 
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:Zeraora: from A+ to A: Zeraora is still a late-game warrior with impressive survivability thanks to Heavy-Duty-Boots and Volt Switch, but the ability for Zeraora to break is getting worse with time. Alongside the abundance of common Ground types we also find some Grass types that bode well against Zeraora. This coupled with a wider array of fast-paced competition to Zeraora thanks to the uptick in Scarf Tapu Fini, Weavile, Tapu Koko, and Tornadus-Therian makes for a tougher landscape for Zeraora.
I don't think
deserved a drop and should be lifted back into A+ rank. It's still one of, if not the best speed control options in the metagame, and has many good reasons to be slotted to a team. A lot of people use how amazing
is as a reason to have Zeraora be in A rank. However, i don't see much reason that the speedy electrics cannot coexist. They are both excellent mons; one is a great pivot, while the other is an excellent late game win condition that makes and stops progress simultaneously. Also, many of the fast options prevalent in the metagame are beneficial for Zeraora due to it outspeeding those common forms of speed control. It forces out
, since it is faster and revenge kills it with Close Combat. Choice Scarf
gets mauled by Plasma Fists (252 Atk Zeraora Plasma Fists vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Tapu Fini: 264-312 (93.9 - 111%) -- 62.5% chance to OHKO), and if you are able to bait the Trick, you're suddenly in a fantastic position.
also takes huge damage from Zeraora (252 Atk Zeraora Plasma Fists vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Tornadus-Therian: 354-416 (97.7 - 114.9%) -- 81.3% chance to OHKO). And while the grounds(
,
,
) in the tier are hard to directly break down, they all shake in their boots at the thought of Toxic.
 
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Gomi

yep
is a Community Contributor Alumnusis a Smogon Discord Contributor Alumnus
:hydreigon: to B+
I get the appeal of this mon, but it runs into some major 4mss when choosing between nasty plot, roost, draco meteor, earth power, dark pulse, flash cannon, flamethrower, defog, and uturn. A lot of these moves have major oppurtunity cost for not using them, with roost 3 atks lacking breaking power and nasty plot roost severely lacking coverage for fairies. Overall :hydreigon: simply does not command the same respect in the builder nor have the role compression of fellow setup sweepers :dragonite: :volcarona: :rillaboom: I should also mention it’s awkward defensive typing in a meta without ash-greninja, leaving it unable to switch into dragapult or weavile despite its dark typing.
disagree with the dreigon drop, people spamming steel heavy cores due to Hail and other things like Lele encourages more team structures that Hydrei can break apart with ease (Heatran Ferro Lando being a huge one). Fat Drei and regular NP drei are entirely different sets, so to class their clashing movesets as 4mss is really weird. 3 atks Drei is also fine and usually doesn't really lack the power needed to break the shit people spam rn, Draco+Dpulse+EP coverage is really hard to switch into with how many turns Dreigon generates for itself. Fairies like Fini and Clef usually end up getting forced to switch into Dreigon if they have them anyways, which you can abuse with decent doubling, especially in the case of fini due to its lack of instant recovery. Any comparison to Volc or Dnite is pretty null since its far more of a breaker than those two, and doesn't function similarly if you're referring to their purely offensive sets, given its a balance/BO breaker rather than a sweeper. Rillaboom doesn't command any respect in the builder rn given its counterplay overlaps with Kart/Weav heavily so idk where ur getting that one from.

Specifically though I think your statement that Dreigon's typing isn't that useful currently is really blatantly wrong. any regen scout can allow Hydrei to very easily abuse its dark typing for sball and psychic stab absorbsion and its one of the best singular Heatran switchins in the tier, given it doesnt have to mess around with any taunt mindgames, can easily dispatch it if need be, abuses it for setup, and doesn't keel over to Magma spam.

If anything, I would argue the current state of the metagame is fantastic for Hydreigon. The main fairies can't switch into it safely or are Fini and reasonable to overwhelm, its hard checks (Blissey and Clef) are on the low, and people rely alot on things like Toxapex and steels to blanket check other Dragons, which just does not fly vs Hydreigon.
 
disagree with the dreigon drop, people spamming steel heavy cores due to Hail and other things like Lele encourages more team structures that Hydrei can break apart with ease (Heatran Ferro Lando being a huge one). Fat Drei and regular NP drei are entirely different sets, so to class their clashing movesets as 4mss is really weird. 3 atks Drei is also fine and usually doesn't really lack the power needed to break the shit people spam rn, Draco+Dpulse+EP coverage is really hard to switch into with how many turns Dreigon generates for itself. Fairies like Fini and Clef usually end up getting forced to switch into Dreigon if they have them anyways, which you can abuse with decent doubling, especially in the case of fini due to its lack of instant recovery. Any comparison to Volc or Dnite is pretty null since its far more of a breaker than those two, and doesn't function similarly if you're referring to their purely offensive sets, given its a balance/BO breaker rather than a sweeper. Rillaboom doesn't command any respect in the builder rn given its counterplay overlaps with Kart/Weav heavily so idk where ur getting that one from.

Specifically though I think your statement that Dreigon's typing isn't that useful currently is really blatantly wrong. any regen scout can allow Hydrei to very easily abuse its dark typing for sball and psychic stab absorbsion and its one of the best singular Heatran switchins in the tier, given it doesnt have to mess around with any taunt mindgames, can easily dispatch it if need be, abuses it for setup, and doesn't keel over to Magma spam.

If anything, I would argue the current state of the metagame is fantastic for Hydreigon. The main fairies can't switch into it safely or are Fini and reasonable to overwhelm, its hard checks (Blissey and Clef) are on the low, and people rely alot on things like Toxapex and steels to blanket check other Dragons, which just does not fly vs Hydreigon.
I second all of this.

I like reaching for Hydreigon on most non-rain squads as it really takes advantage of Heatran, Pex, and Slowking(bro). Other than UU Kommo-O it is the only mon hat can check Heatran, Blace, and Bisharp in one spot. There aren’t many good Shadow Ball sponges with recovery right now and Hydreigon is the least passive of the lot.

Futhermore, Life Orb Draco with its speed tier just deletes shit like Urshifu-R, Rillaboom, and Kyurem which is really nifty in a pinch. Most slow balanced structures completely fold to ‘Gon if their Fairy gets chipped and with Roost for longevity it’s not difficult to do that.
 
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disagree with the dreigon drop, people spamming steel heavy cores due to Hail and other things like Lele encourages more team structures that Hydrei can break apart with ease (Heatran Ferro Lando being a huge one). Fat Drei and regular NP drei are entirely different sets, so to class their clashing movesets as 4mss is really weird. 3 atks Drei is also fine and usually doesn't really lack the power needed to break the shit people spam rn, Draco+Dpulse+EP coverage is really hard to switch into with how many turns Dreigon generates for itself. Fairies like Fini and Clef usually end up getting forced to switch into Dreigon if they have them anyways, which you can abuse with decent doubling, especially in the case of fini due to its lack of instant recovery. Any comparison to Volc or Dnite is pretty null since its far more of a breaker than those two, and doesn't function similarly if you're referring to their purely offensive sets, given its a balance/BO breaker rather than a sweeper. Rillaboom doesn't command any respect in the builder rn given its counterplay overlaps with Kart/Weav heavily so idk where ur getting that one from.

Specifically though I think your statement that Dreigon's typing isn't that useful currently is really blatantly wrong. any regen scout can allow Hydrei to very easily abuse its dark typing for sball and psychic stab absorbsion and its one of the best singular Heatran switchins in the tier, given it doesnt have to mess around with any taunt mindgames, can easily dispatch it if need be, abuses it for setup, and doesn't keel over to Magma spam.

If anything, I would argue the current state of the metagame is fantastic for Hydreigon. The main fairies can't switch into it safely or are Fini and reasonable to overwhelm, its hard checks (Blissey and Clef) are on the low, and people rely alot on things like Toxapex and steels to blanket check other Dragons, which just does not fly vs Hydreigon.
Ok I was waiting for this tbh, I expected pushback against that nom, but I stand by it. Like I said, I get the appeal of Hydreigon's useful speed tier and strong boosted attacks, however, I still feel like its a very on paper mon, that tends to struggle in practice more than the other A- mons. For starters, the extremely common hail is a terrible mu for hydreigon, as it essentially grants free entry to alolatales which can force it out and set aurora veil. I'll admit the mons I used in my example weren't the best, but there isn't much to compare it to in A-. I think its important to note that hydreigon lacks splashability, and you're often forced to build around it, since its utility outside of being a tran/blace switchin is somewhat lacking. Think of bulky qd volc being able to soft-check kyu, melm, rilla, kart, and weavile as well as threatening burns with flame body. Rilla provides invaluable terrain support as well as an amazing rkilling tool, and dnite beats grass spam along with an excellent rain mu. Hydreigon can also find it difficult to find entry vs voltturn spamming cores, since it takes significant damage from even weaker uturns without defensive investment. You do make a good point about its useful speed tier, but if its running dark ground coverage it cant revenge the mons below it, like shifu, lele, and kyu (you've referred to its np set mostly in your post so I'm using it in my example). All this is not to say hydreigon is a bad mon, or that its not difficult to switch into, rather to say that it fits better in B+ alongside threatening, but flawed, offensive mons like Nidoking, Tapu Bulu, and Bisharp.
 
:tapu lele:A>A+
This thing is so strong it's not even funny.Specs hits like a fully loaded cargo ship and just rips apart slower teams.Scarf is great for speed control and still hits like a truck.It also has some other sets it can run such as CM or FS which are also very good.Overall,I think Tapu Lele is very deserving of a rise to A+.
 
Ok I was waiting for this tbh, I expected pushback against that nom, but I stand by it. Like I said, I get the appeal of Hydreigon's useful speed tier and strong boosted attacks, however, I still feel like its a very on paper mon, that tends to struggle in practice more than the other A- mons. For starters, the extremely common hail is a terrible mu for hydreigon, as it essentially grants free entry to alolatales which can force it out and set aurora veil. I'll admit the mons I used in my example weren't the best, but there isn't much to compare it to in A-. I think its important to note that hydreigon lacks splashability, and you're often forced to build around it, since its utility outside of being a tran/blace switchin is somewhat lacking. Think of bulky qd volc being able to soft-check kyu, melm, rilla, kart, and weavile as well as threatening burns with flame body. Rilla provides invaluable terrain support as well as an amazing rkilling tool, and dnite beats grass spam along with an excellent rain mu. Hydreigon can also find it difficult to find entry vs voltturn spamming cores, since it takes significant damage from even weaker uturns without defensive investment. You do make a good point about its useful speed tier, but if its running dark ground coverage it cant revenge the mons below it, like shifu, lele, and kyu (you've referred to its np set mostly in your post so I'm using it in my example). All this is not to say hydreigon is a bad mon, or that its not difficult to switch into, rather to say that it fits better in B+ alongside threatening, but flawed, offensive mons like Nidoking, Tapu Bulu, and Bisharp.
Hydreigon is better than those 3 because it is not exclusively an offensive mon. Tbh, I don’t even think of Hydreigon as an offense first mon as more often than not you are choosing it to plug holes defensively. I disagree about splashability; every team could appreciate an answer to Heatran, Blace, and Bisharp.
 
Hydreigon is better than those 3 because it is not exclusively an offensive mon. Tbh, I don’t even think of Hydreigon as an offense first mon as more often than not you are choosing it to plug holes defensively. I disagree about splashability; every team could appreciate an answer to Heatran, Blace, and Bisharp.
Fyi tapu bulu is definitely not exclusively an offensive mon, it would just be bad rilla if it was. Anyway, i personally find hydrei to be a terrible defensive gap filler cause of its truckload of weaknesses to common attacking moves(cc, moonblast, uturn, etc.) but that’s just my opinion tbh. Ima get off the hydrei discussion cause it seems my nom was unpopular.

Hopping on the lele bandwagon aswell, it’s an amazing offensive mon that can break literally anything with the right move, and it doesn’t pack a rocks weakness like kyurem. Onto another surely controversial nom imao.

:corviknight: to S-
I know this seems like crowding the S ranks, but I feel like this is a mainstay on a ridiculous amount of builds. Corv’s unparalleled ability to blanket check nearly all of the physical attackers of the meta, AND soft-check lele as well as slow-pivot to bring in breakers, defog on all rockers bar heatran, and being the seemingly only riskless swap in to toxic lando make it worthy of S- in my eyes. Not gonna bother replying to the inevitable pushback this time.
 
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