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Monotype is a really simple concept; you build a team of six Pokemon sharing one common type and fight against teams with the same restriction. You are allowed to use Pokemon with dual-typing on a team represented by either type, but every other Pokemon must share at least one type with the dual-typed Pokemon. For example, you can use Grimmsnarl, a Dark- / Fairy-type Pokemon, on a Dark or Fairy team. If you choose Grimmsnarl, you can also use Roaring Moon (Past Paradox Salamence), a Dragon- / Dark-type Pokemon, and create a Dark team with the two of them, but you cannot use Noivern, a Flying / Dragon type Pokemon, on that team because it does not share a type with Grimmsnarl and Roaring Moon.
Using six Pokemon of the same type can lead to some interesting team archetypes, and it challenges teambuilders to make sure the common weaknesses a certain type of Pokemon share are covered as best as possible. This metagame allows for all kinds of Pokemon to be viable against top threats, so be imaginative. As you play, you'll find many unique threats that aren't common in the usage based tiers.
The Monotype metagame features builds from all playstyles—Offense, Balance, and Stall. The playstyle will often reflect the Pokemon available on that type. For instance, there are many strong offensive Fighting types, but the type lacks reliable defensive Pokemon. As such, a Stall Fighting-type team is hard to make, while Offensive Fighting is more likely to be viable. The best Monotype players build and play a wide variety of types, using teams that capitalize on the strengths of an individual type. Forcing your favorite type into an archetype that it will struggle to pull off is a good way to lose matches and get frustrated!
Tiering and Discussion
Monotype has its own tiering, which is based on the tiering philosophy. The metagame is led by a 9-man council, each with an equal say in tiering decisions.
You may find the current banlist in the Monotype entry on the Smogdex.
This thread is meant for discussion—not just requesting bans! That said, if you feel anything not on these banlists is too overpowered for the meta, this is the place to discuss it. All tiering discussion should be framed within the context of the Monotype Tiering Philosophy, which you can find below. Additionally, if you want to recommend a Pokemon for suspect testing, include some evidence and reasoning why you think said Pokemon is broken. Just saying something like, "I think Kyurem-Black should be banned because it has base 170 Attack." is a post that will get deleted, and it won't get you taken seriously. Back up your claim with replays showing how the Pokemon is overpowered in practice. Tell us how it interacts against other types/playstyles, what checks and counters it, its role on the team type(s) where it's played (going back to the Kyurem-Black example, how does it play on Mono-Ice vs. Mono-Dragon?), and so on. If you need any advice or have any questions on things you think are broken but are unsure what the best way to post is, contact a member of the Monotype Council either through message or on Showdown in the Monotype room.
As a final thought, before you post, think about what you're saying and whether it adds anything to the conversation or sparks discussion. If not, add to it until it does. Let's make an effort to have fun while keeping a certain level of mature conversation!
Special note: This thread is for metagame discussion, not tiering philosophy discussion. If you would like to propose a policy change then please start a private message with the members of the NatDex Monotype council. If the council would like to field general discussion on the tiering philosophy then it will make a post requesting input from the community.In this thread, we encourage people to share their thoughts on elements that they think could be potentially unhealthy in order to help balance out the metagame.
Hi! (I'm better known as Bka Onon) As we all know, NatDex Monotype is in utter chaos right now with all these crazy unbanned pokemon going crazy, but this is what early gen fun is right? So after observing and using a lot of types in NDM, I've made a Type Rankings for Week 1
Here it is (Left=Higher):
I'll explain some stuff in brief:
The elephant in the room is
(actually the elephant mons are Ground type :p) This generation has added a lot of new good mons, some examples are Added to these are the current unbanned threats of and and Screens Dark has become even better because has recieved Parting Shot. All of these great new additions and unbans make Dark a destructive type which has the tools to counter almost all other big threats.
Right behind is
In NDM, Fairy hasn't lost its Tapus, and to add to them, they have gained , a Pokemon which single handedly makes the Fairy Vs Steel matchup a lot more easier, and gained , the single most broken Paradox Form, great speed, great offenses and coupled with Screens from or Webs from it can wreck havoc.
Next up is
Now Ghost was the single worst type in Gen 8 National Dex Monotype, however it has now risen to the top. The reasoning behind this is quite same as Dark, in amazing new additions of (ofc) and the unbanned threats of and Some old mons even gained buffs like Spectrier getting Draining Kiss to deal with Dark Types and a niche pick of which now has Quiver Dance!
A type that has always been great is
In the current state of the metagame, Water has been really good mostly due to unbanned threats of and and the amazing new additions of and Fun Fact: Rainless HO with webs is currently better than Rain HO! Mostly due to these amazing new immediate offense threats. (Oh and has Swords Dance now :>)
252+ Atk Choice Band Strong Jaw Water Tera Type Dracovish Fishious Rend (Doubled) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Toxapex in Rain: 283-334 (93 - 109.8%) -- 56.3% chance to OHKO be...careful...
A mid and mostly anti-meta type in Gen 8 NDM is now much much better thanks to the entire mechanics of Hail, now Snow, being reworked, giving Ice types a 25% boost to defense when it is snowing. Of course we have great new additions of and which are all a menace to deal. They abuse Snow and Aurora Veil for longevity and setup. has become an even greater answer to Steel thanks to its defense being even higher. And the currently unbanned also abuses new Snow and Veil to be a deadly sweeper.
is in a similar situation to Water in having access to a lot of unbanned threats and some great new additions of and some already good pokemon that have been buffed in Spikes even Stealth Rock and a bit more indirectly Tera
has risen to A tier due to good new Setup Sweepers that can use Sun and Screens, these being and The unbanned have also been going nuts. Other additions of and Chlorophyll are great too. One sad thing about Fire is that is no longer as good due to the Protean/Libero Nerf, but it is still usable.
The typing that annoyed everyone
has gone a completely different route in Gen 9 with most teams resorting to Offensive Steel because of the amount of new good offensive Steels and unbanned threats. These include But the classic immunity core of One of and (Now too) on a bulky or semi stall is still great.
RIP , will definetely not miss you.
has few new good mons in but the reason it is good lies in the sheer amount of strength of unbanned threats, those being which grant Fighting the ability to have more offensive presence and more defensive options due to these pokemon's secondary typings.
hasn't gained a lot of new good mons or unbanned threats but the ones it has are more than enough, those being and With how offensive bug is, these threats combined with or webs have insane momentum and damage output.
CLOSE COMBAT IS REAL
An interesting case is
Yes it has good new mons in but the sauce lies in the new buffs, Nasty Plot Sandsear Storm and , Spikes and , Stealth Rock + Spikes and also the unbanned The classic Sand Ground is at its peak, however with the prevalence of types like Fairy, Water, and Ice, Ground has it a bit tough, still good nonetheless though!
is a weird typing here, one can run Gen 8 Normal and be mostly fine, but Normal Teams are going offensive with Hazards. The unbanning of is great for normal and and (who made Population Bomb) are great pokemon, and Normal may be the best type to Tera with, however, the other types such as Fighting, Ground, Water, Steel are simply consistent at either stopping or overpowering Normal.
Oh how the mighty have fallen, the ruler of Gen 8 NDM, the single best type
finds it on the verge of being C tier, the reasoning behind this is the fact that Flying has barely gotten anything new, and is a classic victim of Power Creep which is insane this gen. Now yes, flying has some good stuff in the unbanned and but that's it, is the one new Flying mon one would use but it is outclassed by Moltres-Galar. With how much the other types like Ice, Ghost, Dark and others have gotten better, Flying finds it difficult to fly high...
There is a problem with
and that is the fact that Stall, is no longer as good as it used to be, don't get me wrong, it still is pretty darn good and annoying, but nowhere on the level it was in Gen 8, and that really hurts poison. So Poison tries to go Hyper Offensive with its unbanned threats of and newcomer alongside pokemon like but there is just one problem, HO Poison. sucks. This is because unlike Bug which also goes HO and abandons defense, Poison isn't a great offensive typing, Bug has more targets and a better hazard, nor does Poison have the insane momentum of Bug, so Poison has definitely taken a hit in Gen 9, I believe it has potential of being a good anti-meta type though.
faces the same issue as Flying in being a victim of Power Creep, it hasn't gained a lot of new good mons, the only ones are (outclassed by Victini anyway) and and the unbanned mons of and not being the best in this environment. But the biggest reason Psychic is so low is the sole fact that the best types in the metagame all destroy Psychic.
While Flying and Psychic had some new things,
gets literally nothing. nothing new. So it has too fallen in the hands of Power Creep. and are slow and don't fit Electric's Face Paced Offensive Nature, is outclassed by The only one that can be considered is but it has no good physical Electric STAB and would still be better. And with types like Ground being good and Dark and Fairy have more offensive presence, Electric finds it difficult to survive. But again, classic Terrain Rising Voltage may be good anti-meta.
was always a low tier type, even in Gen 8 NDM, and the trend continues into Gen 9, The best new things it has are Unbanned and Gunk Shot but Grass struggles to match the power of the other new insane threats in this current meta. The Darks, Ghosts, Ices, Fires, Steels and so much more are so threating to Grass that it is a pain to use.
The Crown of being currently the worst type however goes to
, Rock was the 2nd worst typing in Gen 8 NDM, now it's the worst (Grats), the problem with Rock, lies in the typing, Rock is a bad Offensive and Defensive Typing, and may seem like fun new good additions but they're just more targets for the many many dangerous threats, and for one last time, I will reiterate that yes, Dark, Fairy, Ghost, Water, the best types utterly devastate Rock, and not just these most of the other types do too. If there's ever a Gen where Rock is good, I would love to see it.
Alright, that was a lot of typing so I hope you enjoyed reading it, Of course feel free to correct me if you feel I'm wrong somewhere, or if you just want to add on stuff, you're good to do that, I just want to spark some conversation and thought this was a good way to do it, I might do this again once tier settles, but for now, let's enjoy the brokenness that is Gen 9 National Dex Monotype :DD
Shame no one has been posting too much since the gen has started for NDM. This early meta is still very hectic and brokens are everywhere but it's a nice change of pace from current gen Monotype, where teams feel quite repetitive due to lack of mons and some types literally just run the same 6 each time. I'm just going to share some thoughts on some typings I've used and explain them. (click on sprites for pastes)
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So I wanted to use Psychic considering the fact that Mega Medicham has access to CC now so no more are the days of missing or landing into a ghost type and losing 50% hp. Mega Metagross is legal (and probably should be banned) so I might as well use these seeing how they are some psychic's best mons at this current time. I was using Celebi on the first team since I didn't want to like lose into defensive water teams with Dondozo, which I've been caught lacking with in SV Monotype. The commonness between these 2 teams are that I have Tapu Lele, Alakazam and Jirachi on both teams, and a Deo forme if you wanna count those. Scarf Lele is honestly psychic's best combatant vs dark teams and the Tera Psychic, Psychic Terrain Psychic Lele actually just nukes everything in sight. Alakazam is what I call a "get out of jail free card" and will save you from being swept by everything not named DD Kyurem Black or anything with multi hit moves. And Z happy hour Jirachi has always been one of my favourite sets on the mon.
Ice in NDM is a lot more versatile I feel and I prefer running it here than in SV. Reason being that I just don't like hail setting Abomasnow and that's our only option in current gen. I appreciate Ninetales' speed and the quite consistent Hypnosis kek. The MVP of this team has to be Kyurem-Black. Kyurem-Black was already a mon that may not have the best defensive typing but it has a high hp stat with decent defence, now with snow's defence boost to ice types, Kyu-B has a much easier setting up and Loaded Dice + Icicle Spear is kinda ridiculous all things considered. Cetitan under snow + veil is also quite a menacing wincon and Ice Shard can just kill things after snow is finished.
Ghost is strong in SV Monotype, it's even stronger in NDM, thanks to Mega Gengar and Flutter Mane. Mega Gengar is without a doubt getting banned, we just gotta wait but this mon is just so unfair with trapping, trapping is uncompetitive lmao. Flutter Mane is quick, hits hard, somewhat bulky on the special side and has a multitude of sets to run from Booster Energy with Calm Mind or Sub to Specs or Scarf. Mimikyu is always a staple on ghost teams, Disguise is also a "get out of jail free" card and handles the dark mu well. Ghostium Dragapult was sent to Ubers in gen 8 and it's still as scary as it was before, in addition to having Ghost Tera Blast as an alternative over the Z, I don't know if Pult stays in the tier in the long run. Ghost is also a lot more expansive than my current team with bulky mons like Mega Sableye, Skeledirge and somewhat Spiritomb while the offensive side has stuff like Spectrier, Houndstone, Gholdengo and Blacephalon. Very strong type rn.
Overall, I can say I've been having a positive experience so far with Gen 9 NatDexMono. Obviously, bans will need to take place so the tier becomes more competitive but once the tier settles, we're all gonna have a good time. Hope to see more people posting their experiences and thoughts on the meta in the near future and for now, good luck to all on the ladder!
Reached top 50 on the ladder last night using a team partially inspired in ASKid679's bug team and a hail team of my own:
Going to post some thoughts on the meta as to not make this not only a team dump.
Terastalization: For the love of everything almighty please just ban this mechanic. This is arguably the worst aspect of the metagame as there is nothing about it that you can use to justify it in this meta, especially since it just makes unfavourable matches be even more of a stomp as types with the type advantage just become stupid strong and prevent any chances to turn the game around. It has to go, it just doesn't do any good in the meta and just helps excacerbate the biggest problems with it.
Monotype ranking in this meta:
Water: Just ban the entire typing from use bruh. It has just so much stuff to abuse its downright ridiculous, but out stuff like , and probably the biggest issue surprisingly actually relies in . Thanks to Jet Punch, under rain just gets to crush the large mayority of teams in the meta who run very offensive teams, turning the water matchup into the stuff of nightmares for pretty much every typing without the type advantage. This is in no way dismissing rainless water which is also nuts, nor the aformentioned threats which are nearly just as bad.
Dark: Haven't played against it much but as mentioned before the type got a lot of additions that while not making it as broken as water, it does make it very versatile. Most problematic mons are probably , , and maybe and ? Regardless i can see this typing remaining good even after a lot of stuff gets axed.
Ghost: Broken as hell thanks to the unbans, I expect an eventual ban on and , although there is a chance ghost keeps the funny and maybe even but even then its likely to see a huge drop in viability after bans.
Fairy: Goofy stupid thanks to and . It might keep valiant but otherwise its likely it that the playstyle remains the same after the banwave clears away.
Ice: This typing is going to get gutted thanks to bans on other typings but at least it will have the honor of getting banned as behind veil and snow this mon is bulky enough to setup on pretty much anything. Chien Pao deletes walls and Iron Bundle its the best revenkiller this mono ever wanted. I do think ice will remain strong tho, options like , and are probably going to be great, especially with Veil support. There is a chance even could get a niche this gen.
Dragon: Its just HO land with broken unbans and to enable them. Only reason it isn't top mono of the meta is that it actually has a losing matchup against the current top threats thanks to the presence of mons like and which sort of eviserate it. A lot of old mons did get interesting tools however, so post-ban dragon might be very interesting.
Bug: This is a very hot take but i genuinely find bug to be amongst the top 10 of the meta. With the mayority of teams becoming extremely offensive in nature, Bug HO feels the best it has ever been in its history. in particular is an very good mon for it and is the most fun revenge killer of any meta to exist. I think it will rise to dominance this gen considering just how little mons of it can be elegible for a ban.
Steel: Has gotten some pretty heavy stuff in the form of unremoveable hazards thanks to :and very nasty unbanned mons, although the meta is a bit hostile to it at the moment. Once things settle its likely to rise up to the top.
Fire: +2 252 SpA Inferno Overdrive (185 BP) vs. 252 HP / 0+ SpD in Sun: 654-771 (91.5 - 107.9%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock. Jokes aside this typing just kept on getting better but it has to watch up for the fact that sun powers up top threats in the and .
Fight: Has all the crazy unbanned stuff that its heart may desire but unlike stuff like fairy, dragon or bug it lacks stuff to actually enable said threats to come into the field like screens or webs. In the end after rebanning stuff it might at least keep stuff like or .
Ground: Mostly seems to be the same except it now has Zygarde, two new great spinners and a couple of move buffs, nothing too outlandish besides that.
Grass: Mostly just viable cause is the closest monotype that can beat mono water consistently, it has very little use other than that than that.
Normal: It might just be that i have encountered the most brainless normal type players but Normal just isn't able to keep with power creep, and at most can only use very unconventional strategies with terastalizing
Rock: Is unfortunately subject to powercreep once again, with very actual options it can use.
Haven't encountered Poison, Flying, Electric nor Psychic so I can't really comment on them.
TLDR: Meta is fun, but seriously needs stability sooner or later. Also ban teralizing.
In response to the new quick bans today, I both want to say nicely done and question some things.
I was adamant about banning Mane and Iron Bundle. However, I am cautiously optimistic that with the banning of booster energy, these new mons can still be used but not be op. Though, it seems like you could just slap scarf or specs on them. I guess time will tell.
I'm a little disappointed that Palafin was banned quickly or at all. As someone who plays the ladder and room tours consistently, I don't believe it deserved to be banned. It has never raised the ban question in my mind as many other mons have.
Could the council's opinions on this mon been formed outside of the context of our particular room? It's possible for a mon to be op in other formats but not ours since we have access to more total mons. Idk. This decision is sus at best to me and I'd like clarification. #freeflipper
I don't personally care or use Mega Kang, but it hasn't seemed like an issue in this meta.
I'm sad for grass that Kart was banned, but it IS an understandable ban.
Let's talk terastalization - To me, this was used in NDM as more of a defensive tactic. For example, you have Ferro on a grass team and you're predicting your opponent to use CC. You tera to grass type to get rid of your steel typing and survive the hit. I think since you're tera-ing to the same type as your team, this should stay. The other use is getting a 2x stab instead of a 1.5x. I can understand people figuring out ways to abuse that. However, our ndm room and meta have to evolve with the new gens.
To me, this is akin to banning z-moves. We let those stay, so why not tera? It's limited to 1 mon per team per match, same as z-moves.
I would add that population bomb might need to be looked at.
Ultimately, it's the council's decision but I hope they take the players opinions into consideration.
Thanks for reading. Lmk what y'all think!
PSA - As long as we're cherry picking game mechanics, can we bring back old protean and libero?
I'm a little disappointed that Palafin was banned quickly or at all. As someone who plays the ladder and room tours consistently, I don't believe it deserved to be banned. It has never raised the ban question in my mind as many other mons have.
Banded Jet Punch in rain is juuust too much, but maybe I've only seen it with a tera boost, but its extremely oppressive if you dont have a water immune (its worse than Vish). The Taunt-BU set I havent seen as much, but if you can simply boost your way through walls [which arent even that much used in NDM], but also get punished for getting breakers in because +1 Jet Punch is actually lethal, what do ;w;
Terastalization made bad matchups much worse. For example if you're mono dark vs mono fight, breloom's mach punch is already scary, but no worries, Chien Pao's Ice shard can revenge kill it after SR and your random chople berry user can eat a mach punch too..
Breloom terastals to Fighting. Now it isnt weak to Ice Shard and the chople berry user now folds to terastal-boosted mach punch.
Furthermore, it makes Barraskewda more brainded, just smacking and 2HKOing everything that isnt a quad resist or a water immunity with Rain-boosted Choice Band Liquidation. Other examples include: Tera Dark Sucker Punch Kingambit [who you even asked the room awhile ago on what counters it in Water; with Tera it even murders Dark resists so yes.], Tera Grass Rillaboom [2HKO'es Pex now], Tera Electric Regieleki [now OHKOing/2HKO'ing everything, even that M.Latias which was built to counter it last gen], Tera Dark Roaring Moon [which doesnt get OHKO'ed by Moonblast now], and the list goes on....
National Dex Rationale uses the most up to date mechanics, so it wont happen. Nat Dex uses the most recent gen's mechanics and just adds in all the previous mons. If Aegislash' Gen 8 nerf was applied in NatDex, then it follows that Libero/Prot nerf also happens here.
Banded Jet Punch in rain is juuust too much, but maybe I've only seen it with a tera boost, but its extremely oppressive if you dont have a water immune (its worse than Vish). The Taunt-BU set I havent seen as much, but if you can simply boost your way through walls [which arent even that much used in NDM], but also get punished for getting breakers in because +1 Jet Punch is actually lethal, what do ;w;
Terastalization made bad matchups much worse. For example if you're mono dark vs mono fight, breloom's mach punch is already scary, but no worries, Chien Pao's Ice shard can revenge kill it after SR and your random chople berry user can eat a mach punch too..
Breloom terastals to Fighting. Now it isnt weak to Ice Shard and the chople berry user now folds to terastal-boosted mach punch.
Furthermore, it makes Barraskewda more brainded, just smacking and 2HKOing everything that isnt a quad resist or a water immunity with Rain-boosted Choice Band Liquidation. Other examples include: Tera Dark Sucker Punch Kingambit [who you even asked the room awhile ago on what counters it in Water; with Tera it even murders Dark resists so yes.], Tera Grass Rillaboom [2HKO'es Pex now], Tera Electric Regieleki [now OHKOing/2HKO'ing everything, even that M.Latias which was built to counter it last gen], Tera Dark Roaring Moon [which doesnt get OHKO'ed by Moonblast now], and the list goes on....
National Dex Rationale uses the most up to date mechanics, so it wont happen. Nat Dex uses the most recent gen's mechanics and just adds in all the previous mons. If Aegislash' Gen 8 nerf was applied in NatDex, then it follows that Libero/Prot nerf also happens here.
Yep. All good points, Neko. The tera thing is definitely 2 sides of the coin. You listed offensive consequences and I listed defensive consequences.
Btw, the Kingambit question revolved around a sd sucker punch.
Hello People, It is I, Onon, to give some takes on the current situation :D
First of all, let's talk about the banwave so far shall we?
Terastallisation
Now, personally, I loved how terastallisation worked in Monotype Tiers and it was really fun, but I do also agree it did push some Pokemon a bit too over the edge like and more I'm missing. I do think though that the banning of Tera should have been a Suspect rather than a Quick Ban since it is a generational gimmick. I do hope that when the DLC for ScVi comes out Tera might get a change again (with suspect of course).
Booster Energy
Understandable ban, this is the reason why the Paradox Pokemon were as good as they were, even with the discovery that it only boosted stats by 1.3x (except speed which was 1.5x) it was still a bit too much, something like or coming in and instantly getting a life orb boost to their attacks or or coming in to get a free scarf boost was pretty overpowered.
Banned Ubers
I don't think I really need to explain too much here, these were the ones causing chaos in NDM, and it's healthy for the tier that they are gone, and this does lower the overall power levels of many types, like Fighting losing both of its Fairy Counters in Mega Lucario and Zamazenta-Crowned. And Rainless Water becoming a bit worse due to losing Palafin, Mega Blastoise and Dracovish. I do however agree with all of these bans.
Okay next up lets talk about how these bans (and potential future ones) affect some Types
(For Reference I'll be using my Week 1 Type Rankings, scroll up to see)
hasn't lost much, yes losing hurts but Dark already had a 6 slot problem in this meta, you can just replace it with the other amazing options that dark has, so I still firmly believe it is still the best type.
has lost a lot of big threats in which does lower its power level a bit but in this meta Water has THE faster pokemon being under rain which outruns any and everything, and water still has the amazing and newcomer but water still firmly sits in S tier
has also lost a lot, a lot more than water which are huge blows, especially that also doesnt have Booster Energy anymore. Dragon will fall a bit to Low A tier but overall its still fine with threats like
is uhh sad now. Mega Lucario and Zamazenta provided Fighting with something it only dreamed of, Ultimate Fairy Counters, Mega Lucario was probably the single best Flutter Mane Counter, but those are gone. also insane hitters are also gone, this make Fighting drop by a lot, it's decent but nowhere as good as it was, it probably falls to C tier now.
lost the one thing that kept it semi alive LOL was the only good unbanned threat for flying but even that is gone, I can't help but just laugh at Flying this gen like. RIP Bozo Flying lmfaoo idk but this is like low D tier now I just feel bad for flying kekw.
is still fine, it only lost which well yes is a blow, but Bug still has a lot of good mons like and whatnot, and if you are crazy enough Revival Blessing is live now, so uh yes have fun :)
has lost its OP offensive threats of and which make it so that poison has to go back to its roots of being a defensive stally type but stall isn't as good anymore, so it's probably worse than before.
of course lost but it can make up for it since its other threats of are still alive so its still pretty functional and still is an S tier type.
That's all the types I'm explaining for now since the others are more or less the same even after bans, but I will soon post an updated Type Rankings with more briefs. Yea basically I just wanted to explain some shit and give my takes, so uh that's all for today folks, hf reading :)
Good series of bans by the council, Terastal in particular being banned is phenomenal for the metagame as monotypes with the type advantage no longer just click the win button.
My current reordering of the viability list looks like this:
Dark
Ghost
Fairy
Ice - These are the monos I consider to be the absolute top of the meta, the top 3 are obvious but I am adding ice since it has a really good matchup against the top threats of the metagame.
Steel
Water
Bug
Fire
Ground - These would be the A tiers as of right now. Water down in A is a huge hot take from my side but I do genuinely believe the type loses hard to the top dogs of the meta with the disappearance of its biggest threats. Steel lost a lot of its offensive threats but it still has a solid defensive backbone. Bug, fire and ground all become better thanks to the nerf on water.
Dragon
Electric
Psychic
Normal - These are the B tiers, I personally believe Electric and especially Iron Hands are overhated, Mon is good and a big pivot that makes a lot of matchups with top types easier. Dragon dropped as hell and Psychic and Normal are mostly meh.
Flying
Fighting
Poison - Flying without MENCE it's just sad. Fighting was carried hard by unbanned threat and naturally fell of. Poison hates the current nature of the meta.
Grass
Rock -- No Kartana and water not being the top threat means Grass viability falls down harder. Rock is still mid.
Ice - These are the monos I consider to be the absolute top of the meta, the top 3 are obvious but I am adding ice since it has a really good matchup against the top threats of the metagame.
I'd like to help
As I have become an Ice main this gen,
VS Fairy
Fairy is a great type this gen, even better than it already was (I was-am a Fairy main too xp), and Ice Vs Fairy I'd say is equally balanced. Ice has not one, but two pokemon capable of outspeeding and killing in and Hell if Chien Pao is successfully able to set up, its hard for fairy to stop it withs excellent speed, STABs, and priority. Iron Bundle can outspeed any and everything on Fairy and also abuse the terrain set up by Fairy's own Koko. and are hard to set up, but if executed right, with the support of Snow and Veil from they become insane sweepers, lastly Slush Rush is a great addition if one wants to use Extended Snow Ice, since its very easy to pull off Belly Drum with and even has priority Ice Shard if Snow runs out.
VS Ghost
I don't need to explain a lot here, Ghost is weak to Dark. Ice has Chien Pao. And I guarantee you, Ghost can barely stop an unboosted Chien Pao, let alone a boosted one, and it's pretty easy to setup Chien Pao Vs Ghost. Of course the other mons mentioned above also do a lot but Chien Pao has the power to single handedly destroy Ghost which has some of the most insane threats in all of which crumble to the Sabretooth's Ruinous Swords.
VS Dark
This one is pretty hard for Ice admittedly, and many times Dark does win, that reason being Dark having and so Ice Vs Dark is a bit more inclined towards Dark. But Ice does have the capability to kill some of Dark's most insane threats in and opposing but Chi-Yu is the one it falls to.
VS Water
use Freeze Dry! It's super effective! and the game is over gg. This is 90% of Ice Vs Water no exaggeration. the other 10% is used Dragon Dance! used Fusion Bolt! It's Super Effective and the game is over gg.
Bka Onon is here people. With another Type Rankings, How y'all doin, hope y'all are doin well, here it is
Also I'm not writing a fricking 3 page thesis like I did for the old one, because I want to keep my sanity, but I'll try to explain all doubts you have, feel free to ask/oppose
Just as a reminded, rankings have been made after 2 weeks of playing and understanding the general tier and with community opinions even, so don't think I'm looking at stuff in a vacuum, like for example on paper Dark shouldn't beat Fairy, but in practice, if played right, Dark has the potential to beat any and every type, and against Fairy its not just a fluke-chance, it's a good possibility just because how insane Dark is, hope you guys understand (I will also not reply to preposterous claims so do come with a good idea of the tier please, thank you <3)
Interesting set of bans, gonna be quick on how they affect each mono since I'm in mobile: Water: This mono really catching hands lately. Both the loss of Urshifu-Rapid and the loss of hit this real hard, but I guess it still has enough tools to make it good enough as an a tier type. Dark: Okay so apparently it was who got banned, not , Whoops. A huge hit for mono dark but not really something that takes it down from the title of Best type of the gen. Ghost: This is personally a decision I think was really weird since I mostly saw stuff like and as the main terrors of this mono, but considering was a huge matchup fish good riddance. Said it before and will say it again but this mono doesn't have much sustainability once more bans roll around. Ice: :icy rock: removal stings, but otherwise ice is probably fine, still an S tier type. Slush Rushers like and suffer a huge hit but it's main breadwinners in (is okay running light clay anyways), and still remain untouched. ain't no but it's pretty damn good as a replacement, not to mention regular probably remains as menacing. Dragon: Oh no, dragon lost another ddancer, boo hoo. In actuality, while was just sorta replaceable, wasn't, since steel types now stomp this typing between it's flyings and the fairies. Ground: ban would have devastating on prior gens where flying reigned supreme but now its kinda whatever. Real stinger comes at the ban which nerfs what was already the arguably worse weather in this gen. Fighting: Idk if this did anything of substance but the typing is also in hot water thanks to ban radar. Rock: Ouch.
Nothing much to add other than not being banned or on the radar being a slight oversight by the council in my opinion but otherwise the rest of decisions were fair.
Water: This mono really catching hands lately. Both the loss of and the loss of hit this real hard, but I guess it still has enough tools to make it good enough as an a tier type.
While yes, it is true that there are more sun abusers, from a new chlorophyll abuser in scovillain to the paradox mons that have the protosynthesis ability, the main reason why heat rock isn't banned, is due to the difficulties in being able to abuse the use of sun. This main limitation is due to how monotype works.
If we look at the automatic sun setters, you only really have torkoal, ninetales and charizard y, all of which are on fire. Yes, charizard y is also on mono flying but there isn't any viable sun abuser there or one that would actively abuse it, so that doesn't really work. The most sun does for a fire team is to boost their fire stab, and reduce damage from water moves. We can go into further detail for how an automatic sun setter can be useful in weather wars vs opposing rain, sand or hail teams but I digress. There is a chlorophyll pokemon on fire this generation in the form of scovillain as mentioned earlier (nice grass typing as well), but it hasn't proven to be anywhere near a threat yet where 8 turns of chlorophyll use is too much or a problem.
Now what about the sun abusers on other types? Mainly those protosynthesis mons. Some of them don't even have a sun setter to begin with, and for those that do, it's unreliable. Take roaring moon for example. The pokemon that could learn sunny day, it isn't worth fitting a moveslot just for the move to make another mon work, and assuming it would use the move, it would use up an item slot in heat rock, which would be a waste of the potential of said mon. For example, using say garchomp that learns the move, is a waste of the mon, when it could be running an offensive sd set, with items like focus sash or life orb, or a bulky stealth rock set with rocky helmet or leftovers (also worth mentioning in this case, none of the mons that could use sunny day on dragon could get it up as reliably). Roaring moon is also a dark type, so what about there. Well, the same thing applies. Now one could argue that prankster sableye with heat rock to set up sun might be a bit more reliable (and there are some more specific sun abusers there, for example, shiftry, mega houndoom), but that type of team would be more gimmicky overall and less reliable and consistent then say, using mega sableye on a balance team for support. You can test this out and see for the other protosynthesis pokemon and they have this issue as well, to the point where their ability is virtually an afterthought (and yes, booster energy is already banned so you can't use the ability that way).
Overall, the use of sun hasn't created so many issues where 8 turns of sun is a problem. I could even talk about how torkoal isn't even used on every sun team despite its role compression in drought, rapid spin, yawn, stealth rock, but I digress. This is contrasted to damp rock, where water teams have an easy rain setter and a variety of swift swim mons, so that 8 turns of rain is a problem, or smooth rock, where trying to contest excadrill for 8 turns is an issue (the lack of good sand abusers being the reason smooth rock is actually legal in sv monotype). Icy rock is now considered banworthy this generation due to the new slush rush abusers and the buff/change to snow where it boosts the physical defense of an ice type (which combined with aurora veil set up creates scenarios that make it hard to stop some of these mons during the 8 turns that hail is up).
I hope that answers your question (even though the response is long, so sorry if that is a problem).
Would also like to add that drought sun this gen is actually good at enabling OPPOSING types with their protosynthesis mons, which in turn makes sun easier to check.
Is the clearest example. Found in the already good types of Dragon and Dark, Roaring moon needs a singular good turn to switch in, which is often enabled by choice mons locked into a move, and then the combination of its good typing alongside either a speed boost that outspeeds even Scovillain or the attack boost make it a very scary threat for fire to face, with the most relevant switch in being probably only intimidate fire Paldean Tauros.
Is another good example. A speed boost on this thing often means outspeeding the large mayority of the typing especially after a spin, which then leads to either earthquake spam or headlong rush spam, both very deadly.
Less effective than the other two, but Flutter being able to hit marginally harder or outspeed the opponent's scarfers and Scovillain often means the mon gets able to revenge kills a substantial amount of stuff.
Ok this one is way more niche since the moth is often outclassed by Buzzwole as a scarfer but if the scrimblo gets the boost it probably hits disgusting hard with its stone edges / earthquakes.
Guys, I don't think it makes much logical sense to cut so many top tier mons right before a big tour. Now people have to redo teams they've spent time making for this tour. It also nerfs fighting pretty heavily - which has had a chance to be relevant for the 1st time in a while. Hate to be the contrarian, but the timing is not ideal.
The bans are very interesting. Fighting lost some critical Pokémon that ultimately set it back considerably. Ghost lost it's undoubtably best mon it's received this generation. Like pr1nce said before me, I think that these bans should occur after the tournament considering that this does impact teambuilding considerably.
All 4 bans hit each of their monos extremely hard, and it is honestly ridiculous that neither Mawile nor Mane didn't get banned, with that fairy rises as the top mono of the meta by far.
Dark losing this meant losing one of its biggest tools against fairy, it is still top tier but Chi-yu was a really good mon for the typing. The ban hits fire harder however, since sun made mono fire the best type to abuse the fish to tore holes in opposing teams.
This one hurts me personally, bundle was extremely key in ice as one of its biggest revenge killers, especially since without it Ice is once again nearly completely stomped by scizor. No longer s tier imo. Mono water loses its biggest threat against itself, but in turn also loses one of its strongest mons.
While I wouldn't call Annihilape the best mon of the ghost mono, losing it makes once again very weak towards dark types. Not to mention just how catastrofic mono fighting has been left.
This contributes to what was mentioned before with fighting being left in a terrible position, while also leaving psychic just slightly worse since it still has meta.
Edit: Nvm I forgot meta and zam are banned lol.
Hi, I just wanted to remind everyone that this is the metagame discussion thread. This is not the place to talk about when the council decides to take action. This thread is solely for voicing your opinions on the current metagame, whether what types are dominant, if you think a pokemon is suspect/ban worthy and why, or anything along those lines. It is standard practice to tier before a tour starts to see how a metagame will play out at a high level with the needed changes, testing out and helping figure out what the metagame will look like, and if there are new banworthy elements. Will post my thoughts on the metagame sometime within the first few weeks of the welcome tour.
I, for one was quite happy with these wave of bans before the tour started. Chi-Yu, as much as I liked using it, was too strong. Specs, Z move, Fire Scarf, it was just too much for most teams to handle defensively. I also wasn't a huge fan of Bundle, way too fast and even in Natdex where the pool of mons is pretty much doubled compared to SV, still had few defensive answers on most types.
Due to these bans, I again have to build some more heat for the tournament. In terms of my actual thoughts on the meta, it's always fun when I play it, I just need to build more
Hi, I just wanted to remind everyone that this is the metagame discussion thread. This is not the place to talk about when the council decides to take action. This thread is solely for voicing your opinions on the current metagame, whether what types are dominant, if you think a pokemon is suspect/ban worthy and why, or anything along those lines. It is standard practice to tier before a tour starts to see how a metagame will play out at a high level with the needed changes, testing out and helping figure out what the metagame will look like, and if there are new banworthy elements. Will post my thoughts on the metagame sometime within the first few weeks of the welcome tour.
This is the option y'all gave people to voice their opinions on the bans. "Feel free to discuss the newest wave of bans in the discussion thread"
If you don't like that, then open the ban thread up to comments.
This is the option y'all gave people to voice their opinions on the bans. "Feel free to discuss the newest wave of bans in the discussion thread"
If you don't like that, then open the ban thread up to comments.
Yes, talk about the impact it has on the metagame, not a tournament. I don't really want to see anymore comments like this about why a ban happened right before a tour, thanks!