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I haven't seen a single post about Darkrai suggesting any positive role it may have in the meta. Nothing about actual concrete and consistent offensive and or defensive counterclaim. Zamazenta supporters had a lot to say about its positives, both theoretical or practical. Even Bax was touted to have good positive additions to the tier, which until DzLC1 was able to somewhat justify its existence sgainst its negstive traits. The only arguments I've seen are "Iron Valiant" and "No Dark Void". Can someone please bring forward an actual reason why this Pokémon deserves a retest, and why it does more so than say, Urshifu (either form) for example, just to throw a mon out there.
It's less a positive role, more people think it's balanced enough for OU. It took a nerf to Dark Void back in gen 7 (Thanks VGC 16), and really just became a fast Nasty Plot Mon or quick Specs Mon. People thought the council were nuts for dropping Blaziken in CT, but that dropped to UU BL. With it looking weaker than it's been in the past, it should deserve some time for testing. Either unban next DLC, or retest it.
The downside I have to it is it's coverage. Last gen, I could potentially see it drop, but now, it got Psyshock, so traditional special walls could struggle, and it has fighting and poison coverage to blow through the special resists. It even gets Ice Beam for the likes of great tusk. And we can't forget our good friend Tera, which it could use to break traditional dark threats. 135 Spa/125 Spe is very good on it, and we have few special comparisons outside of Dragapult, but that's restricted a lot.
I do think a test is possible, but I don't think this DLC.
It's less a positive role, more people think it's balanced enough for OU. It took a nerf to Dark Void back in gen 7 (Thanks VGC 16), and really just became a fast Nasty Plot Mon or quick Specs Mon. People thought the council were nuts for dropping Blaziken in CT, but that dropped to UU BL. With it looking weaker than it's been in the past, it should deserve some time for testing. Either unban next DLC, or retest it.
The downside I have to it is it's coverage. Last gen, I could potentially see it drop, but now, it got Psyshock, so traditional special walls could struggle, and it has fighting and poison coverage to blow through the special resists. It even gets Ice Beam for the likes of great tusk. And we can't forget our good friend Tera, which it could use to break traditional dark threats. 135 Spa/125 Spe is very good on it, and we have few special comparisons outside of Dragapult, but that's restricted a lot.
I do think a test is possible, but I don't think this DLC.
I don't see the need to waste time with introducing Darkrai to the tier. Dragapult isn't a good comparator, but the hilariously broken Flutter Mane is. Darkrai only needed Dark Void to function in Ubers. It can generate plenty of free turns without sleep in OU with its offensive toolkit and Speed. You haven't listed really anything that holds it back in OU. It's just another mundane overpowered special sweeper.
For Darkrai, it's more out of curiosity that I want it to be tried for at least 2 days. This Pokémon has never been tried in a gen with a Dark Void at 50% accuracy (I also add that it lost Thunderbolt so it no longer has access to BoltBeam without Thunder). However, we are never safe from small surprises, such as Blaziken in Gen 8 which everyone expected to see banned, and which ended up falling from the OU in the first month.
Maybe he'll get his chance in DLC 2.
Shaymin Sky has been basically unchanged since Gen 5.
For Darkrai, it's more out of curiosity that I want it to be tried for at least 2 days. This Pokémon has never been tried in a gen with a Dark Void at 50% accuracy (I also add that it lost Thunderbolt so it no longer has access to BoltBeam without Thunder). However, we are never safe from small surprises, such as Blaziken in Gen 8 which everyone expected to see banned, and which ended up falling from the OU in the first month.
Maybe he'll get his chance in DLC 2.
Shaymin Sky has been basically unchanged since Gen 5.
skymin has lost hidden power and gained terra, so anything I think the flying reindeer hedehog dog has gotten only considering it's self,stronger. However it's defences are just poor by todays standards, there is alot more faster mons that can crush it, bulky mons that can terra to wall it ect. However the prosapect of a terra water shaymin with just flare, air slash, Earth power/leech seed/ect. and substitute haxing the living daylights out of the meta is just a terrafying prospect.
I don't see the need to waste time with introducing Darkrai to the tier. Dragapult isn't a good comparator, but the hilariously broken Flutter Mane is. Darkrai only needed Dark Void to function in Ubers. It can generate plenty of free turns without sleep in OU with its offensive toolkit and Speed. You haven't listed really anything that holds it back in OU. It's just another mundane overpowered special sweeper.
That's was the point of the post. I put some options out there, but it's not really a Mon I think that should be OU this time. It's a strong special sweeper, that could work in OU. Dragapult is the closest I could go for in OU. Otherwise, the better comparison would be Weavile/Sneasler, due to the high speed with solid offensive stats. Flutter is a worse example with the better typing, ability and speed tier, but yeah.
However, when we saw Blaziken dropped in CT, people were expecting it to go in a matter of days, but it was balanced out by being unable to handle both Fini and Pex.
I doubt it would be feasible to test it now, but next DLC, could see it drop to OU at the start. The worst that can happen is it gets sent back to Ubers.
I've heard that Dozo with tera dragon can kind of deal with it, but again, if it has one wall that requires a tera to only kind of deal with it, that's a problem.
OgerponH is very scary, but I've noticed that the moves it chooses kind of determine what counters it can beat.
No Play Rough? Bulky dragons can take it's stab.
No Zen Headbutt? Niche, but Tera Poison Heatproof/Thick Fat Mon are your friend.
No Swords Dance? Yet to encounter one that doesn't run this, but I imagine you can tank it more easily.
What are people using to check her? Tera Poison Sinistcha is a niche one I've used, but even with Tera Blast it can only 3HKO Oger without rocks.
OgerponH is very scary, but I've noticed that the moves it chooses kind of determine what counters it can beat.
No Play Rough? Bulky dragons can take it's stab.
No Zen Headbutt? Niche, but Tera Poison Heatproof/Thick Fat Mon are your friend.
No Swords Dance? Yet to encounter one that doesn't run this, but I imagine you can tank it more easily.
What are people using to check her? Tera Poison Sinistcha is a niche one I've used, but even with Tera Blast it can only 3HKO Oger without rocks.
i considered tera poison thick fat maxdef snorlax for a while, but ogerpon-hempsmoke has fucking mold breaker so it's not even an actual fire resist. by far the most bullshit thing about ogerpon-henyathegenius is that she can choose exactly when in the match she wants to swap mold breaker for intrepid sword
at this point i've resorted to throwing things with rocky helmet and high hp at her and hoping she clicks wood hammer
Manaphy is the new suicune and I love it.
Manaphy @ Leftovers
Ability: Hydration
Tera Type: Dragon
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Rest
- Take Heart
- Scald
- Sleep Talk
Taken essentially from a random battles set with phone. Still adjusting to everything. However I'd like to mention ninetails as being unhealthy. I really don't care if it's more mid by itself. Screens show up every time there's something else strong asf in the tier. Being able to set both in one turn is nasty asf, and you have to either play around hypnosis or hope it doesn't start nasty plotting. Really no reason to keep the mon in the tier, hazards still solid asf, ho has ribombee for webs, and there's healthier screen setters, really don't see the point of keeping it.
Edit: Not worth a quickban but later on potentially worth a suspect.
It's so performative when people go "Yeah this Pokemon needed to be banned, and was awful, and removing it was good for the meta, but quickbanning it was so silly!"
In fact, one could say that if 95%+ of people are saying "Yeah this Pokemon needs to be banned, and was awful, and removing it was good for the meta" then perhaps that is exactly why it was quickbanned, and you are the one being unreasonable.
I haven't seen a single post about Darkrai suggesting any positive role it may have in the meta. Nothing about actual concrete and consistent offensive and or defensive counterclaim. Zamazenta supporters had a lot to say about its positives, both theoretical or practical. Even Bax was touted to have good positive additions to the tier, which until DzLC1 was able to somewhat justify its existence sgainst its negstive traits. The only arguments I've seen are "Iron Valiant" and "No Dark Void". Can someone please bring forward an actual reason why this Pokémon deserves a retest, and why it does more so than say, Urshifu (either form) for example, just to throw a mon out there.
I don't think we need to explicitly find positives to make a case for Darkrai to drop. On paper, the metagame's power creep and nerfs to Dark Void suggest that Darkrai will be most likely an average or top-level Pokemon in OU without being extremely overbearing. IMO it's hard to come up with "positive role" reasons when there's been little historical precedence for Darkrai's impact in OU play (independent of generation). Anyways, done playing Devil's advocate.
With that said, I'm still on the fence as to whether Darkrai belongs in OU. Even if Dark Void is gutted, Hypnosis is still "accurate enough" to garner some usage on NP or AOA sets. Assuming Darkrai in OU, you play around Darkrai by sending in a Pokemon to sack to Hypnosis and risk a Nasty Plot on the switch. That +2 SpAtk on Darkrai becomes a massive pain to play around unless you have a Pokemon like Clodsire.
Anyways, Darkrai is one of the lowest priority items for retests in the attempt to re-balance DLC. It might even be a topic to revisit only after DLC2 drops. I think it's an interesting re-test option down the road, not for its metagame benefits.
It's so performative when people go "Yeah this Pokemon needed to be banned, and was awful, and removing it was good for the meta, but quickbanning it was so silly!"
In fact, one could say that if 95%+ of people are saying "Yeah this Pokemon needs to be banned, and was awful, and removing it was good for the meta" then perhaps that is exactly why it was quickbanned, and you are the one being unreasonable.
Honestly I feel like a quickban was warranted, but I feel like we should’ve given it like one more week. The lesson we were supposed to take from the Walking Wake test was that sometimes things appear broken but that the strategies that can empower the broken aspects often have counterplay. Yeah, Bax in hail is broken, but we were given no time to experiment with counterplay to hail. A9T is quad weak to the stab of Kingambit/Gholdengo, two of the most common Pokémon in the meta. Taunt shuts down A9T. Loaded Dice Bax is weak to rocks. Snow can be countered by using a different weather (Torkoal and TTar can both set rocks, and the latter just got Knock Off). We just got a new physically bulky unaware fairy type (Clef) that would seemingly be very good against the kind of shenanigans breaking Bax. The best hazard remover (Tusk) can break screens with Brick Break; the second best hazard remover (Cinderace) can flip veil to your side. This meta might have the tools to deal with this if we have it time.
Was Bax oppressive in the first two days of this meta? Undeniably yes. But so was Walking Wake. Nothing else is even close to the radar, there is no external factor that would prompt rushing the process (ie WCoP for HOME), so I don’t see why Bax couldn’t be given another week in the meta, at least for us to try to find counterplay. The decision might still be the same, but why rush it? What if we just haven’t had time to figure it out? I’m not disagreeing with the decision, but I’m disagreeing with the philosophy that lead to this decision happening so quickly in a meta that never had time to develop.
My main worry about Darkrai is its speed tier, and how it can much more comfortably run Specs instead of Scarf. shares the same special attack stat at 135, but is significantly slower, and often is forced into scarf as a result.
Darkrai isnt as fast as stuff like Booster Val or Dragapult , but i feel like we shouldn’t compare all Pokemon’s speed to them haha
Darkrai outspeeds pokemon like Meowscarada,Sneasler , Ogerpon , and all ou pararox without booster speed
Not to mention Nasty plot to boost, Psyshock for special walls , Sludge bomb for fairies, and - if you’re insane enough to run them - Focus Blast and Dark Void
I think people view 135 special attack and think “Oh thats not that bad, its similar to Bloodmoon or Enamorus ” but fail to take into account how much easier Darkrai can pick up kills due to its speed
The reason I'm not that impressed with these calcs is because I could post the same thing except with Gengar instead, which isn't even ranked on the viability ranking thread.
Like literally, Gengar has 5 less sp atk, and could run Nasty Plot, Shadow Ball (over Dark Pulse), Focus Blast, and Psychic/Sludge Wave. You even get STAB on Sludge Wave.
I concede that 125 speed vs. 110 is significant, and that 70/90/90 bulk is a bit better than 60/60/75, (albeit Life Orb recoil makes the modest bulk increase less significant). I suppose you could make the case Dark Pulse is more spammable than Shadow Ball due to lack of immunities, but those moves are still pretty comparable.
Like I said before, I don't like theorymonning, but considering Gengar isn't considered viable, it seems wild to me that people think Darkrai is so laughably broken it doesn't even deserve to be tested.
Edit: fwiw Gengar even gets Knock Off like you mentioned for Darkrai too
While the comparison is a biiit shoddy, the point made in this post is very real. We’ve seen time and time again how the sort of scary calcs people love to post mean absolutely nothing without proper context. Just wish people would stop posting random calcs trying to prove a mon is broken.
Reminds me of this funny calc: 252+ SpA Choice Specs Tera Electric Pincurchin Rising Voltage (140 BP) vs. 4 HP / 252+ SpD Blissey in Electric Terrain: 298-352 (45.7 - 53.9%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock
Honestly I feel like a quickban was warranted, but I feel like we should’ve given it like one more week. The lesson we were supposed to take from the Walking Wake test was that sometimes things appear broken but that the strategies that can empower the broken aspects often have counterplay. Yeah, Bax in hail is broken, but we were given no time to experiment with counterplay to hail. A9T is quad weak to the stab of Kingambit/Gholdengo, two of the most common Pokémon in the meta. Taunt shuts down A9T. Loaded Dice Bax is weak to rocks. Snow can be countered by using a different weather (Torkoal and TTar can both set rocks, and the latter just got Knock Off). We just got a new physically bulky unaware fairy type (Clef) that would seemingly be very good against the kind of shenanigans breaking Bax. The best hazard remover (Tusk) can break screens with Brick Break; the second best hazard remover (Cinderace) can flip veil to your side. This meta might have the tools to deal with this if we have it time.
Was Bax oppressive in the first two days of this meta? Undeniably yes. But so was Walking Wake. Nothing else is even close to the radar, there is no external factor that would prompt rushing the process (ie WCoP for HOME), so I don’t see why Bax couldn’t be given another week in the meta, at least for us to try to find counterplay. The decision might still be the same, but why rush it? What if we just haven’t had time to figure it out? I’m not disagreeing with the decision, but I’m disagreeing with the philosophy that lead to this decision happening so quickly in a meta that never had time to develop.
This proves that you don't actually play the meta. Baxcalibur was banworthy even before DLC. DLC only made things worse. This is nothing like Walking Wake
It's so performative when people go "Yeah this Pokemon needed to be banned, and was awful, and removing it was good for the meta, but quickbanning it was so silly!"
In fact, one could say that if 95%+ of people are saying "Yeah this Pokemon needs to be banned, and was awful, and removing it was good for the meta" then perhaps that is exactly why it was quickbanned, and you are the one being unreasonable.
People love wasting two weeks in a meta that will last 3 months at most. Then again, I thought that for the Kingambit suspect test thinking a ban was obvious and then the OU playerbase decided to Uno reverse card lmao
Also lowkey hot take but from testing one of the teams that was posted here, Ogerpon-Wellspring might be the 2nd best form. It's got more defensive utility than the other forms with Water Absorb (notably cucking the shit out of Manaphy even more than other Ogerpons) and Water/Grass/Fairy coverage is really great even if the mon isn't uncounterable like Hearthflame. It feels less high reward, but a lot less risky than Hearthflame is.
i am not convinced life orb is a good item in modern gens. in SS the only 'mons that ran it were clefable (magic guard) and weavile; rillaboom, garchomp, kartana, and blaziken settled with other items like leftovers & protective pads as the metagame progressed. life orb is even worse in SV as priority has doubled, low-key tripled in strength. the distribution is only getting wider now with vacuum wave iron valiant & bloodmoon, grassy glide rillaboom, and DLC2 raging bolt. hazard control is also in an awful state which makes the item choice even more questionable. only baxcalibur *commonly* ran it and that was due to ice body cheating recoil on that amazing mind gaming team.
post as many +2 life orb darkrai calc's as you want but the same can be said about other SV threats, all of which don't opt for it. sneasler has similar offensive stats and can use swords dance + life orb. unlike darkrai, sneasler has two stab options: 120bp close combat & 80bp dire claw, which has a broken secondary effect. add tera fighting and shadow claw as coverage and a list of calc's can show you how life orb sneasler is unwallable bar landorus-t. on the special end i'll bring up tornadus-t, whose sole stab at +2 has similar rolls to darkrai's dark pulse because bleakwind storm is 100bp. sneasler and tornadus-t also have actual abilities in poison touch and regenerator unlike bad dreams which has few in-game applications.
in no way am i saying darkrai = tornadus-t / sneasler but if you look past the fact of "omg it's darkrai," it's not all that. 135/125 offensive stats are nothing new to fairy gens while it has an impractical ability, barely passable bulk, a reliance on focus miss, and a singular 80BP stab option. for more context here's some of the balance, bulky offense, and stall structures spammed towards the end of home & OLT swiss:
doubt dropping darkrai would suddenly fuck up the metagame, far from it in fact. in the case of CTC's balance, life orb darkrai doesn't have many safe entry points due its poor defenses and how sketch coming in on gholdengo can be. even if you do get it in unscathed, clicking nasty plot is awkward when 'mons like dondozo, ting-lu, and moltres (has u-turn too) can trade damage before going multiscale dragonite for the revenge kill. speaking of awkward interactions, great tusk, the most used 'mon in the tier, resists both dark pulse + sludge bomb, meaning your best option is focus miss. because of this your best opportunity for set-up vs these structures are against zapdos, rotom-w, and slowking-g, all which commonly run thunder wave or a pivoting move. the stall and sneasler teams do not struggle vs nasty plot darkrai bar psyshock variants, which requires sacrificing coverage for either dark- or fairy-types. i say all of this without mentioning the life orb recoil or hazards by the way, the latter being notoriously difficult to remove in SV.
because of this and SV's climate, i don't think life orb will be its best set but actually heavy-duty boots. a set of dark pulse / focus blast / sludge bomb / ice beam is more likely to be its flagship, being comfortable switching in this hazard heavy climate and giving us a strong, but not overbearing special attacker. darkrai is piss weak without life orb after all; it reminds me of a special zamazenta where it theoretically has coverage for a ton of 'mons, but requires significant support to pick up ko's. dropping one of these moves for nasty plot, thunder, psyshock, will-o-wisp, or knock off is an option, but that sacrifices either (a) coverage vs gliscor if you drop ice beam, or (b) coverage vs fairy- / dark-types if you drop sludge bomb / focus blast.
i have seen a lot of players claim darkrai brings no value to the tier. i respectfully disagree and this is not me playing the contrarian. a trait of SV i feel is under-discussed is how low the speed tiers are compared to SS & SM. zamazenta (another darkrai check) and dragapult almost always opt for +attacking natures while choice scarf is near non-existent as an item. darkrai's introduction would put more emphasis on speed, reducing the power creep to an extent. booster energy iron valiant is the only relevant outlier when it comes to speed tiers this generation tbh.
gliscor is also a S-tier rank 'mon post-baxcalibur ban (imo), extremely oppressive even without roost..... having a solid non-hazard weak ice beam 'mon would be appreciated, similar to m-latias in gen7. it's not like we're freeing arceus-dark or some shit to accomplish this. to give you an idea of boots darkrai's damage output, ice beam does ~26% to ting-lu while dark pulse barely pushes the 30% range against garganacl. SV not only has an insane offensive power creep but a defensive one too. finally i believe boots darkrai will challenge us to play more creatively instead of mindlessly throwing out our static/flame body 'mon at a threat and praying for a proc.
not only do i think darkrai is fine, but after typing this out i believe it is more balanced than volcarona. yes, i said it. i would expect it to be A+ for the rest of the generation, but not overbearing to the point it needs a ban. this is also factoring tera. but if a tera ban was to happen i don't think this shit would even be A+ rank tbh. maybe A, no disrespect. that said, i would not test it now. this test would have to come after DLC2 stabilizes as it will be less likely to be a "temporary metagame," along with the introduction of new priority, more speed control, and a wider array of dex additions to amplify its 4mss.
is its speed tier, and how it can much more comfortably run Specs instead of Scarf.
shares the same special attack stat at 135, but is significantly slower, and often is forced into scarf as a result.
or Dragapult 
, but i feel like we shouldn’t compare all Pokemon’s speed to them haha
,Sneasler 
, Ogerpon 
, and all ou pararox without booster speed 
, Sludge bomb for fairies, and - if you’re insane enough to run them - Focus Blast and Dark Void
or Enamorus 
