Tera has been one of the aspects that caused almost every single pokemon we've had banned to be banned. I'll go through them to prove my point
Palafin: Used Tera Water to kill everything and Tera Steel + Bulk Up to beat its normal checks (a common theme throughout these bans)
Flutter Mane: Used Tera Steel/Fire to beat priority users
Chien-Pao: Used all of Dark, Ice, and Fighting Tera to get past checks like Dozo or Garg
Shed Tail: Tera on everything behind substitute allowed them to get 1 more setup turn or survive revenge killing attempts behind a substitute. Could also be used on the passers for more consistent Shed Tail.
Espathra: wouldn't have fire/fighting coverage so it would be handled by Ghold and many bulky Darks like Gambit
Chi-Yu: Used Tera Fire to get past many potential checks like Clod or Garg, as well as losing Fighting weakness to stifle revenge-killing attempts from stuff like Breloom or Pawmot
Houndstone: Used Tera Fighting to deal with the normals and dark types that hindered its sweep
Bundle: Tera Ice blows everything up
Please, don't disrespect the anti-Tera side by saying banning Tera would be "lazy". We think banning Tera will lead to a better metagame, so please respond with actual arguments if you want to be taken seriously
Most of these would be broken with or without Tera, but there's no denying mons like Espa and Pao were 100% forced out due to Tera.
With Home + DLC we will see more cases like that; mons that would be perfectly fine will be forced out or become insufferable due to Tera.
When Walking Wake dropped it was a lot of fun, because one mon has the potential to change so much in a meta.
I don't understand why people would sacrifice mons, especially good ones, to keep a gimmick around.
I love Z moves in gen 7, they literally add another dimension of play and could be compared to Tera much more than Dmax in regards to breaking past checks, but if that meant Kart, Mage, etc would be forced out then I would have no problem playing without it.
No Mage means specs Lele would go crazier, no Kart means we lose a premier revenge killer- and the meta gets worse.
I don't want to bash Tera in this post but I will never understand how anyone thinks it's competitive lmao.
"Just manage your Tera, bro!"
Man just say u like to click auto-win buttons, holy shit.
Anyway.
There's already a list of mons that people assume will be broken w Tera, and it's not a short list.
Even some fairly mid mons are at risk.
What's ironic about the post you responded to is that suspecting Tera is actual more work and less lazy than just banning mons.
A well-handled Tera suspect would require work that I'm just not sure council is going to take the time to do, or care enough to put in the effort.
It would require a separate ladder and at least 3-4 weeks of testing, as well as figuring out which mons to unban for each ladder.
I've been 100% wrong before, but as of now I don't think the issue will be addressed properly, if at all.
just FYI not here to argue,
quickly tho: the example I used with 3x giga drains from tangrowth does about 50%, in theory the ape user can just bulk up or try and drain punch back after a bulk up or 2. But then each turn it’s not taunting, it’s risking sleep powder or leech seed. And if it taunts and takes another 17% from tangrowth. Ape needs +2 with 2 hits taken to 2HKO tangrowth. So worst case scenario for tangrowth is getting 3 hits in (and dealing knock off + giga drain + helmet damage (~15% + 34% +50% ). it might force out a Tera fire and lose (in theory), but then for eg if your backup-strong hitter is garchomp, you’re forcing it out or revenging later.
it needs 3x bulk ups to outheal helmet damage. 3 rounds of helmet damage is coincidentally about 50% too. Rage fist eventually KOs the tangeoeth user, although you have a toxapex up your sleeve that you can switch in for more helmet damage or to deny drain punch healing! Eventually you need to hit the Pex to 2hko it with rage fist, although you’re taking a number back.
long story short, if you’re not switch cycled on with correct 50/50 predicts, you’re pulling one of them down eventually. At the cost of being sub 50% HP.
Please stop.
Any pro-Ape post gives me second-hand embarrassment.
Rage Fist is as OP as Last Respects, and Ape + RF literally invalidates entire playstyles, even in the silliest theory situations.
I'm not even going to waste time picking this one apart lmao, but essentially no ape is setting up turn 1 bro, just stop.
Annihilape, Chien-Pao, & Espathra all bring unique issues outside of Tera which were addressed in their respective suspect/quickban threads. Saying they were broken "because of Tera" is misleading because as I alluded to in my initial post it's only one of several reasons. I'm not sure why you even mentioned the mons in your second paragraph. As you stated, they are broken totally irrespective of Tera.
I'll be open and say that I'm not the best player, but all this talk on Tera being a factor in (most) Pokemon's bans up to now really has me confused. Like, I can clearly see how mons Espathra and Annihilape would be broken BY Tera (even if, in my humble opinion, the former would still be uncompetitive matchup-fishing garbage and the latter would still be severely problematic for any non-HO teamstyle), but I'm not seeing it for mons like Palafin, Bundle, Flutter Mane, or even Chien-Pao. They all seem to have very blatantly busted aspects that would've at the very least landed in hot water whether Tera existed or not.
Espa and Pao are the agreed upon mons that were 100% pushed over the edge due to Tera and I'll explain v roughly.
Espa is def cheese, but if you played last gen we had a mon called Demon Mew. It was essentially the same thing but better in some ways, worse in others, but basically a stored power sweeper.
It either had to run Taunt to stop Toxic, or run Body Press not to insta-lose to Dark mons.
It wasn't OP, just a serious matchup fish mon lol.
Espa can't touch Dark without Tera.
+3 252 SpA Espathra Dazzling Gleam vs. 236 HP / 0 SpD Kingambit: 209-247 (52.2 - 61.7%) -- 97.7% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
And that was being generous, none of them ran max Spa.
So even without Sucker mind games, the King can always 1v1 an Espa w/o Tera.
Ting can always come in and wind out
+3 252 SpA Espathra Dazzling Gleam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Vessel of Ruin Ting-Lu: 228-270 (44.3 - 52.5%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
It goes on but it's basically a Demon Mew variant, which again is cheese, but it would have stayed if not for Tera.
Pao is even more simple.
Pretty sure most ran max speed towards the end, but I'll go Ada just for a steel-man argument.
252+ Atk Choice Band Sword of Ruin Chien-Pao Crunch vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Dondozo: 178-210 (35.3 - 41.6%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
A 3hko means Don can come in, curse/rest, and wall forever.
Not with Tera Dark boosting Pao, though.
252+ Atk Choice Band Sword of Ruin Tera Dark Chien-Pao Crunch vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Dondozo: 238-280 (47.2 - 55.5%) -- 75.4% chance to 2HKO
There are other calcs highlighting this insane power boost, but this is the premier example.
Espa I couldn't care less, I think it was a fun mon in some ways but I'm not sure it added to the meta in a meaningful way.
Pao, however, was a premier breaker and the meta misses it.
Tera, either by way of breaking past the obvious flaws the mon has for balancing, or by making 3hkos into 2hkos, will push mons on the edge into Uber.
Like I said, even some mid mons are at risk such as Volcanion, where AV pex turns into a 3hko vs a 4hko in rain w specs- stuff like that.
Mons like G-Molt, again fairly mid in gen 8, will be at risk due to Tera Fairy/Ice/whatever gets rid of its flying/dark type.
If you don't see how Espa and Pao were pushed out then that's very fair, they're not super obvious on how Tera pushed them out, but you will see mons that are much better examples.
The most obvious will be Leki, and then many other will follow.
So if you have a mon that you're excited for in Home/DLC, don't get too excited as long as Tera remains.
