Metagame SS OU Metagame Discussion Thread v7 (Usage Stats in post #3539)

[Fusion Flare]

Moltres and Buzzwole have dropped off a lot

Oh, this reminds me of a post I wanted to make, because of success with a new set.
While Moltres is largely a lost cause, I still find use for our buggy brute here!

Do you hate those ground types? Especially the ones with a neutrality to grass moves? Yeah, those ones. ESPECIALLY the offensive Sworda Dance variants? Oh, but it’s really sucky to give in with momentum killers, no?

Well, weep no more! Your combo of a defensive and offensive counter can do them in!


Buzzwole @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Beast Boost
EVs: 140 HP / 252 Atk / 116 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Close Combat
- Ice Punch
- Leech Life / Poison Jab / Earthquake
- Roost

Yes, I know, hold your applause, people. An offensive set with some defensive utility. Utilizing this pokemon, the woes of giving free momentum to your opponent are a thing of the past with this set! The speed creeps defensive Heatran, which clocks in at 222, while this is 223. This variant of buzzwole lets you keep your ability to stave off Lando-T, Chomp, Weavile, Kartana, Rillaboom, you name it! The third attack is largely of choice. Do you wanna smack the Slowking assuming you’re an offensive variant and put a considerable dent into Slowbro with Leech Life? Do you want to piss off Clefable with Poison Jab? Do you want to REALLY make sure Toxapex can go eat shit with Earthquake alongside the Future Sight that you can easily set up with a good partner in Slowking? It’s all down to you.

 

[grizord]

Pls keep this

away from OU, its bad for diversity, it turns every game in a momentum battle and make so much mons invalidate in the tier, it compress to much with almost no risk.
No, "the same cannot be said about other mons", Cinderace is so overcentralizing that reintroducing this again would shape half of the tier.
There's no reason at all to test

,enjoy what we have, if something really drastic happen in the tier then we can think about changing.

 

[afterburn]

Please don’t retest Cinderace. This piece of shit has been tested twice, banned twice in the span of less than a year. Let’s leave it at that rather than go for the “third time’s the charm!”

 

[Deleted User 464209]

Oh, this reminds me of a post I wanted to make, because of success with a new set.
While Moltres is largely a lost cause, I still find use for our buggy brute here!

Do you hate those ground types? Especially the ones with a neutrality to grass moves? Yeah, those ones. ESPECIALLY the offensive Sworda Dance variants? Oh, but it’s really sucky to give in with momentum killers, no?

Well, weep no more! Your combo of a defensive and offensive counter can do them in!


Buzzwole @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Beast Boost
EVs: 140 HP / 252 Atk / 116 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Close Combat
- Ice Punch
- Leech Life / Poison Jab / Earthquake
- Roost

Yes, I know, hold your applause, people. An offensive set with some defensive utility. Utilizing this pokemon, the woes of giving free momentum to your opponent are a thing of the past with this set! The speed creeps defensive Heatran, which clocks in at 222, while this is 223. This variant of buzzwole lets you keep your ability to stave off Lando-T, Chomp, Weavile, Kartana, Rillaboom, you name it! The third attack is largely of choice. Do you wanna smack the Slowking assuming you’re an offensive variant and put a considerable dent into Slowbro with Leech Life? Do you want to piss off Clefable with Poison Jab? Do you want to REALLY make sure Toxapex can go eat shit with Earthquake alongside the Future Sight that you can easily set up with a good partner in Slowking? It’s all down to you.

Buzzwole @ Metronome
Ability: Beast Boost
EVs: Whatever HP / 252 Atk / enough speed
Adamant Nature
- Leech Life
- Earthquake
- Poison Jab
- Roost

Offensive buzzwole is the ay, but these be the attacks you want to run. Leech blasts latios and alowbro. Metronome pjab kill celfable on switch. Metronome eq kills pex. Blasts and outspeed heatran. Fighting stab no use.

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1301369514
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1301352253
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8ou-1295533575 don't copy this team

 

[sunbhie]

Tbh I think offensive buzzwole is a threat this meta. But the problem with the above set is it's hard walled by corviknight without close combat. I feel like other than pex and MAYBE corviknight this meta just doesn't have switch ins for something like banded buzzwole. Ice punch, closed combat, leech life, earthquake...

 

[gye5]

Tbh I think offensive buzzwole is a threat this meta. But the problem with the above set is it's hard walled by corviknight without close combat. I feel like other than pex and MAYBE corviknight this meta just doesn't have switch ins for something like banded buzzwole. Ice punch, closed combat, drain punch, earthquake...

I like CB t punch to break those cores, but u can pair mag if u use less powerful sets

 

[Mediocre Ladder Player]

Well, might as well put in my 2 cents on Cinderace.

When Ace was in the Tier, I had a team full of good checks to common Ace moves; Flash Fire Heatran, Dragapult, and especially Physdef Toxapex. It still felt like my team was weak to Ace. And even if I was able to pull off one of my most fondly remembered plays on a Cinderace led team (killing a Cinderace entirely through Hi Jump Kick recoil misses on Dragapult) that doesn't change the fact that he's just too much for even his supposed checks if he has good prediction. I'm not keen on a retest.

 

[PlusC]

I support testing Zamazenta not because I think it's a balanced or interesting development, I just think it sounds fun.

 

[Finchinator]

I support testing Zamazenta not because I think it's a balanced or interesting development, I just think it sounds fun.

For what it’s worth, I’m glad you’re finding this prospect fun, but generally we need more than just “it sounds fun” to do things. In fact, the prospect of achieving a more balanced or playable metagame should be at the forefront of these discussions.

 

[Ananeemoos Jak]

Hello, I'm a relatively low-ladder player here, to voice my unqualified opinions on the survey. I'm not sure about

. On one hand, it does feel like it was cheated out of a chance to show that it was a potentially healthy mon, and it very may well could be. On the other, it feels like it has already proven itself to be unhealthy, and I would likely vote ban if I could. Now for the other mon, I am fully in support for a test of

, if only to end the "discussions". Now, if it was actually healthy, that would be great, and help with one of the few problems with this meta, knock off spam. However, it may just be too fast and strong for the meta, and a suspect test would likely prove this one way or the other.

 

[Finchinator]

To me, retesting Zama-C is foolproof. We get to see what we are dealing with and if it’s too much, then we can keep it banned. We are not hard pressed to suspect anything, so it’s not like we are wasting needed time either rn. And for people worried about disturbing the current balance, a retest does not officially drop anything into the tier unless it passes the vote, so ladder may be impacted for 2 weeks, but that’s about all there is to it.

I support the concept of a Cinderace retest because I believe the people should decide things moreso than a council unless we see more transparency from the council than just myself, but I also realize that it’s likely a waste of time and I personally would vote to ban it. I voted 3 — indifferent — because of this. In addition, I am happy my fellow councilmen acted proactively to ban thing to begin with and I don’t mind using that as an example for how to act in similar situations moving forward, so I’m fine standing firm on that decision given that I believe it helped the metagame.

 

[Ruft]

Figured I'd drop my thoughts:

It's a no from me. In terms of balance, Cinderace is the epitome of low risk, high reward. If you're using a remotely offensive team there's basically no downside in using it, and thanks to Heavy-Duty Boots and Teleport, the only common form of counterplay to the pivot set for any remotely bulky team is contact punishment, like Rocky Helmet. This way it forces teams to run a physically bulky Water- or Ground-type equipped with a Rocky Helmet, and even then Cinderace can get past them with the aid of Gunk Shot poison (which doesn't make contact) and/or Future Sight, opening a winpath with minimal associated risk.
A common complaint about the tier is that many teams are easy to use, hard to punish VoltTurn teams due to the introduction of Heavy-Duty Boots and Teleport, and this issue has always been exacerbated whenever Cinderace was legal.

I'd say quickbanning it was the right move, and there is no need to suspect test and inevitably ban it again. In fact, in DLC1, when Cinderace was "retested" (actually tested for the first time) after being quickbanned with a promise of a test down the line, I had never seen as much community pushback to a suspect test ever before, so I'd rather not see the same "mistake" (in the eyes of the community) being made.

When it comes to Zamazenta-C, I am actually completely open to the idea of a suspect test. More justification than "there's a realistic chance it's not broken" isn't even necessary if you ask me. In fact, I am in the camp that it's actually quite likely to be balanced. The lack of an actual item and a movepool devoid of status moves are bound to create problems for it.

Offensively, the lack of the ability to hold a Choice Band or Life Orb makes its base 130 Attack stat much more disappointing than it may look like, and to me it seems hard for it to make progress against common physically bulky Pokemon with reliable recovery, like Toxapex, Slowbro, Corviknight, Skarmory, or Hippowdon. It doesn't matter that it's bulky if it's extremely susceptible to both chip damage (from Wild Charge recoil, Rocky Helmet, Spikes, etc.) due to not having access to Leftovers, and PP stalling due to its main STAB moves, Close Combat and Behemoth Bash, only having 8 PP each. A burn, from Scald or Flame Body for example, renders it basically useless, too. It can't punish switch-ins with status moves like Toxic or Thunder Wave either, since it simply doesn't have access to them.

Defensively, the lack of Leftovers or recovery moves other than Rest make it a tough sell. Wish users aren't in a very good spot, so it's not particularly easy to cover it up that way either. What I think many people overlook is that it's a Steel-type that doesn't resist Psychic or Fairy, which makes it very awkward to build with, as that is one of the main appeals of bulky Steel-types in the first place. More often than not you'll need an additional bulky Steel-type that is able switch into Pokemon like Tapu Lele and Clefable, making building with it very constraining.

I'm not even sure how I'd go about building a team around it, as it doesn't seem like a particularly threatening wallbreaker nor a reliable defensive pivot. For this reason, I wouldn't be surprised if it's not broken or even not part of the upper echelons of OU. I would welcome being proven wrong and banning it, though. In either case, going through a suspect test is the right move, as that is what it's designed to do: try it in the metagame in practice and come to a conclusion based on that.

 

[shadowpea]

No I do not want to put Helmet Slowbro on all my teams again. Dumb restrictive mon that is a huge pain to account for on the builder and a even huger pain to deal with in battle if you didn't account for it in the builder already.

tl:dr, Keep Cinderace banned until at least Gliscor comes back

Gliscor is a king



Now this is a bit different. I'm actually kinda indifferent about it (not like I would get a chance to vote in the suspect or anything) because I see arguments on both sides. Basically all of my arguments for ban has been covered by ViZar so I'm not going to put it in this thread again. On the other hand, nothing changes the fact that this is way too easy to be worn down. Take something like AV Tyranitar or something: hilarious bulk but no recovery outside of Wish/Grass/etc. Zama is basically that, except it don't have nearly as much utility options and a hell lot more power. Also, like Finch said, testing Zama-C has no downsides besides two weeks of Zamac on the ladder (and since ladder is so shitty anyway no one will really care).

Slightly leaning towards suspecting it because, well, there's no real downside to it and I kinda wanna see what its place will be in this meta. But otherwise I don't really have a preferance.

Petition to bring Gliscor back

 

[SwaggySammy44]

So the survey had questions about retesting cinderace as well as testing zamazenta. I gave my opinions in a previous post, but all this talk about retests has got me thinking. This is a very hot take, so be warned.

Maybe we should consider retesting Naganadel.

Ok, hear me out. The meta in the first couple weeks after the dlc2 drop was an absolute shitshow. There was plenty of chaotic, broken stuff running around in the tier. Naganadel was banned shortly after, in the first wave of quickbans. I was honestly surprised by this for two reasons. First of all, the naganadel ban came before bans on Lando-I, Kyub and Zyagarde, all of which were noticeably more broken. And secondly, I honestly didn't find naga to be That broken. It was definitely very powerful, but it had numerous checks that are still in the meta today.

A lot of the specially defensive pokemon in the tier are able to eat an attack from naga and kill it back.

Blissey
252 SpA Life Orb Naganadel Draco Meteor vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Blissey: 208-247 (29.1 - 34.5%) -- 6.4% chance to 3HKO

Heatran
252 SpA Life Orb Naganadel Draco Meteor vs. 252 HP / 128+ SpD Heatran: 104-123 (26.9 - 31.8%) -- 39.6% chance to 4HKO after Leftovers recovery

0 SpA Heatran Earth Power vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Naganadel: 210-248 (73.1 - 86.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

Swampert
252 SpA Life Orb Naganadel Draco Meteor vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Swampert: 208-247 (51.4 - 61.1%) -- 94.1% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

0 Atk Swampert Earthquake vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Naganadel: 306-360 (106.6 - 125.4%) -- guaranteed OHKO

Tyranitar
252 SpA Life Orb Naganadel Draco Meteor vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Tyranitar in Sand: 133-156 (32.9 - 38.6%) -- 2.7% chance to 3HKO after Leftovers recovery

0 Atk Tyranitar Earthquake vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Naganadel: 240-284 (83.6 - 98.9%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after sandstorm damage

Slowking Galar
252 SpA Life Orb Naganadel Draco Meteor vs. 252 HP / 80+ SpD Assault Vest Slowking-Galar: 142-168 (36 - 42.6%) -- guaranteed 3HKO

176 SpA Slowking-Galar Psychic vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Naganadel: 318-374 (110.8 - 130.3%) -- guaranteed OHKO

All of these pokemon can eat at leat a couple of unboosted draco meteors and KO naganadel back. At +2 naga still can't OHKO glowking, ttar, heatran or blissey, although it does 2hko all of them. Granted, switching into a +2 naga is more of a challenge but the fact that draco meteor lowers SpA, and beast boost typically boosts naga's speed as opposed to SpA, it will frequently need to use NP to keep its momentum going.

I'm not necessarily saying naganadel isn't broken, or that it will be fine in the current OU meta. I do believe that we have too small a sample size from that one chaotic week, and a 2 week test in a stable meta will give a much better idea of how it does without z-moves. Like zamazenta, if it shows itself to broken, we simply send it back to ubers, no harm no foul. I'd much rather see Naganadel get retested than something like cinderace, which I think we have seen enough of.

 

[gye5]

So the survey had questions about retesting cinderace as well as testing zamazenta. I gave my opinions in a previous post, but all this talk about retests has got me thinking. This is a very hot take, so be warned.

Maybe we should consider retesting Naganadel.

Ok, hear me out. The meta in the first couple weeks after the dlc2 drop was an absolute shitshow. There was plenty of chaotic, broken stuff running around in the tier. Naganadel was banned shortly after, in the first wave of quickbans. I was honestly surprised by this for two reasons. First of all, the naganadel ban came before bans on Lando-I, Kyub and Zyagarde, all of which were noticeably more broken. And secondly, I honestly didn't find naga to be That broken. It was definitely very powerful, but it had numerous checks that are still in the meta today.

A lot of the specially defensive pokemon in the tier are able to eat an attack from naga and kill it back.

Blissey
252 SpA Life Orb Naganadel Draco Meteor vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Blissey: 208-247 (29.1 - 34.5%) -- 6.4% chance to 3HKO

Heatran
252 SpA Life Orb Naganadel Draco Meteor vs. 252 HP / 128+ SpD Heatran: 104-123 (26.9 - 31.8%) -- 39.6% chance to 4HKO after Leftovers recovery

0 SpA Heatran Earth Power vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Naganadel: 210-248 (73.1 - 86.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

Swampert
252 SpA Life Orb Naganadel Draco Meteor vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Swampert: 208-247 (51.4 - 61.1%) -- 94.1% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

0 Atk Swampert Earthquake vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Naganadel: 306-360 (106.6 - 125.4%) -- guaranteed OHKO

Tyranitar
252 SpA Life Orb Naganadel Draco Meteor vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Tyranitar in Sand: 133-156 (32.9 - 38.6%) -- 2.7% chance to 3HKO after Leftovers recovery

0 Atk Tyranitar Earthquake vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Naganadel: 240-284 (83.6 - 98.9%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after sandstorm damage

Slowbro Galar
252 SpA Life Orb Naganadel Draco Meteor vs. 252 HP / 80+ SpD Assault Vest Slowking-Galar: 142-168 (36 - 42.6%) -- guaranteed 3HKO

176 SpA Slowking-Galar Psychic vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Naganadel: 318-374 (110.8 - 130.3%) -- guaranteed OHKO

All of these pokemon can eat at leat a couple of unboosted draco meteors and KO naganadel back. At +2 naga still can't OHKO glowking, ttar, heatran or blissey, although it does 2hko all of them. Granted, switching into a +2 naga is more of a challenge but the fact that draco meteor lowers SpA, and beast boost typically boosts naga's speed as opposed to SpA, it will frequently need to use NP to keep its momentum going.

I'm not necessarily saying naganadel isn't broken, or that it will be fine in the current OU meta. I do believe that we have too small a sample size from that one chaotic week, and a 2 week test in a stable meta will give a much better idea of how it does without z-moves. Like zamazenta, if it shows itself to broken, we simply send it back to ubers, no harm no foul. I'd much rather see Naganadel get retested than something like cinderace, which I think we have seen enough of.

I think u put slowbro galar instead of slowking g

 

[Finchinator]

While I am happy to entertain most retest options, I feel strongly against giving Naganadel another chance. Of the Pokemon you list, the only true checks are AV Tyranitar and Heatran. Others cannot stomach NP boosted hits back while also taking it out. Blissey, for example, loses to Naganadel that gets an NP on the switch.

Naganadel has the strength and coverage to warp the entire metagame and already has done so when it was briefly allowed. Let’s not take a big step backwards in the profession of the metagame. I respect the intention and am glad we are being open minded, but I feel this is a tad misguided

 

[TailGlowVM]

While I am happy to entertain most retest options, I feel strongly against giving Naganadel another chance. Of the Pokemon you list, the only true checks are AV Tyranitar and Heatran. Others cannot stomach NP boosted hits back while also taking it out. Blissey, for example, loses to Naganadel that gets an NP on the switch.

Naganadel has the strength and coverage to warp the entire metagame and already has done so when it was briefly allowed. Let’s not take a big step backwards in the profession of the metagame. I respect the intention and am glad we are being open minded, but I feel this is a tad misguided

In addition to your points, Naganadel isn't quite as hopeless as it might first look against those Pokemon, as it gained Spikes this generation. Whilst this might not allow it to beat these Pokemon directly, chip goes a long way, as we saw with Ash-Greninja running Spikes to punish switches into its checks like Toxapex and Magearna in Gen 7.

So yes, please keep Naganadel far away from OU, until the next generation at least.

 

[gye5]

I want to talk about this guy it sounds crazy, but we have checks to it. Lando, chomp, hippo, draga. And this mon helps to deal with the disgusting pink blob, pex and more mons depending of the set. Some people will think is a mega-metagross with more coverage and slower, but it has even more versatility, but no move to hits grounds super effective. On paper sounds crazy, but we never know, and what do we lose testing in
it in the near future.

 

[FrozenVoltz]

I want to talk about this guy it sounds crazy, but we have checks to it. Lando, chomp, hippo, draga. And this mon helps to deal with the disgusting pink blob, pex and more mons depending of the set. Some people will think is a mega-metagross with more coverage and slower, but it has even more versatility, but no move to hits grounds super effective. On paper sounds crazy, but we never know, and what do we lose testing in
it in the near future.

That is a very small list of checks you got there,also Landorus and Garchomp have no recovery making them unable to check it in the longrun,Hippo is the only decent check out of all the ones you mentioned but even then chip damage and Knock Off can ruin its day.Solgaleo Doesn't need SE moves against grounds since its STABs already hits the vast majority of them for neutral damage,and as i mentioned earlier most grounds have no recovery.


Lastly unbanning it just because it beats Clefable,Pex and some specific pokemon(Even when most of these mons are already kept in check by the majority of the metagame) is a nonsensical reason,By using that logic we should unban Kyogre because it defeats Heatran,Landorus-T and Volcarona.

 

[gye5]

That is a very small list of checks you got there,also Landorus and Garchomp have no recovery making them unable to check it in the longrun,Hippo is the only decent check out of all the ones you mentioned but even then chip damage and Knock Off can ruin its day.Solgaleo Doesn't need SE moves against grounds since its STABs already hits the vast majority of them for neutral damage,and as i mentioned earlier most grounds have no recovery.


Lastly unbanning it just because it beats Clefable,Pex and some specific pokemon is a nonsensical reason,By using that logic we should unban Kyogre because it defeats Heatran,Landorus-T and Volcarona.

Well I dint meant that we should unban mons because it beats clef or pex, but because both the defensive and offensive utility are nice for the meta, it has some weakness that are common in OU, it is a tool for offense and defense, depending of the set, more mons or less can check it, like many versatile mons, that doesnt means its broken by default. Something like volc fire blast, draga sb can put an end to offensive sets, and more defensive ones cant hit it hard enough.

 

[Mugenman88]

I want to talk about this guy it sounds crazy, but we have checks to it. Lando, chomp, hippo, draga. And this mon helps to deal with the disgusting pink blob, pex and more mons depending of the set. Some people will think is a mega-metagross with more coverage and slower, but it has even more versatility, but no move to hits grounds super effective. On paper sounds crazy, but we never know, and what do we lose testing in
it in the near future.

I feel like you're bringing this up because of the rampant talks of Zama-C and I want to just highlight what our sun lion friend has over Zama-C because, spoiler alert, Solgaleo is WAY better than Zama-C if we're looking at the context of OU.

Solgaleo has:
An open item slot(<this is really big)
A better defensive typing
Much better coverage options (EQ, Flare Blitz, Knock, gets it's own CC, SE)
Semi-reliable recovery in Morning Sun
A pivoting move in Teleport
Intimidate-proof
A sizeable special pool with a usable Special Attack so it can also lure whatever

What Zama-C has:
Somewhat better bulk
Speed

Solgaleo in OU would warp the entire metagame around it in an instant. It can run offensive, defensive, pivot, or pretty much any other set and it would wreck face in OU.

 

[gye5]

I feel like you're bringing this up because of the rampant talks of Zama-C and I want to just highlight what our sun lion friend has over Zama-C because, spoiler alert, Solgaleo is WAY better than Zama-C if we're looking at the context of OU.

Solgaleo has:
An open item slot(<this is really big)
A better defensive typing
Much better coverage options (EQ, Flare Blitz, Knock, gets it's own CC, SE)
Semi-reliable recovery in Morning Sun
A pivoting move in Teleport
Intimidate-proof
A sizeable special pool with a usable Special Attack so it can also lure whatever

What Zama-C has:
Somewhat better bulk
Speed

Solgaleo in OU would warp the entire metagame around it in an instant. It can run offensive, defensive, pivot, or pretty much any other set and it would wreck face in OU.

I mean I cant list like every check, or what it beats, but if look closely some of the most competitive meta like gen2, gen5 have very centralizing mons, and something even better is that the top mons check solgaleo, not unusable crap

 

[Lemingue]

I know the metagames a bit slow rn but can we Not try to retest every single bad ubers out there. Neither naganadel nor solgaleo fit OU.

Life has been hard, but I have a couple weeks as a break, how have you guys been feeling on slowbro vs slowking? I've been thinking of teambuilding again, and slowking *looks* better, but I haven't had time to use both, so what do yall think?

 

[AM]

Slowking is usually better but these teams end up being weaker to things like Urshifu-R + Offensive grounds. Slowbro defensively covers these a bit better but makes you weaker to things like Tapu Lele, Heatran. Pros and Cons for each.

 

[Tapeworm]

There's been some discussion about dropping some mons from Ubers in Zama-C as well as other previously and more recently discussed options in G-Darm, Necrozma Dawn-Wings, Solgaleo, and others. Of course, with the Gen 8 OU meta being in one of the most stable states it's ever been, now is the perfect time to play nuclear warhead testing grounds with it, so I'll throw this suggestion to the list:

Zacian-Crowned would be a good complimentary option to the Zamazenta suggestion in offering a potent wallbreaker in to spice up this passive meta. Zacian-C is capable of dismantling currently common defensive cores right now, but at the same time is not difficult to keep in check with top OU picks such as Quagsire and Scarf Ditto. Viable Counterplay options such as Taunt-spam + Intimidate-spam cycling between phys-Def Lando, Inciniroar, Fini, and other combinations are all interesting strategies that limit Zacian-C's ability to set up and break; this can be coupled with ID Press Skarm as well to severely handicap its functionality throughout the match while also having viability against threats such as SD Kart and Rillaboom making them easy to fit onto an average team. Its lack of ability to run a speed boosting item limits it to its simply above-average speed allowing it to be easily revenged by mons such as Scarf Lando. Zacian-C could also pave the way for further creativity such as PhysDef Wisp-Taunt-CP Mew which is an unexplored option in the tier at the moment and could do with more experimentation. You could argue that Zacian-C's presence can be somewhat centralising, and that certainly is true, but a healthy amount of centralisation is necessary to prevent the meta from developing further into a 'match-up' meta state as it might be headed now. It certainly doesn't hurt to test, and maybe its drop could lead to other considerations for potential unbans and re-tests for mons such as Calyrex-Shadow and Kyurem-Black.

Let's just stick with Zama-C for now if anything.