Metagame SV RU Metagame Discussion (Moltres-Galar banned, see post #104)

[Feliburn]

Alright, so we finally got hit with the huge bulk of drops from Pokémon Home releasing. Here are the new additions to the tier:

As you can see, this is quite the list, so feel free to post your thoughts and comments about the drops here. As time goes on, more educated posts will be able to assist the RU council to see what mons are being more problematic than others, just know that this is quite a chaotic state, so have patience while we figure out how to move forward!

Some of my personal thoughts:

​

The set-up dangers


These mons are those who have really high wallbreaking/sweeping possibility thanks to set up sets.

The hard hitting demons


While these have access to set up sets, they are more notworthy due to their high offensive stats and high damage output moves.

What are we doing in the sun


So we finally got auto sun, as well as 2 new strong hitting abusers. Tyranitar and Gardevoir dropping are good tools against this, but we'll need to see if sun teams will have the tools to get past their answers.

Psychic terrain


We also got Indeedee back, but this time we have some really dangerous abusers of psychic terrain. Armarouge is known for having the strong hitting Expanding Force, while Iron Leaves will have access to a boosted Psyblade to hit answers like Slowbro-Galar way harder, as well as block First Impression from Slither Wing.

And that's all I got, happy posting!

 

[Beraldo]

These new drops are hype as fuck and I am honestly pretty excited to see how the tier will develop from now onwards since I was not really enjoying the last RU Metagame. Obviously, HO will be a pretty strong archetype right now due to the new stuff, but having some good balance tools dropping as well is pretty interesting. I don't need to say stuff like Jugulis, Leaves, Gyarados, etc are probably going to be banned, while both Slowbros and Wo-chien are going to be some awesome defensive options since these are things everyone probably already realized. For now, I would like to talk about specifically two mons that Feli didn't mention in his post, and both imo have a good potential to be banned in the near future, maybe after the first ban waves.



Pawmot is one of the mons I really did not want to drop (alongside Maushold and Mew) since I don't see how this guy could be balanced at all. Pawmot's speed tier is not one of the best around, but being able to hit 339 is still pretty valuable, but what makes this guy really troublesome is its great combination of STABs in Double Shock + Close Combat, and having access to a good coverage move in Ice Punch. And, well, that's all it needs really. Fourth slot can easily be things like Mach Punch for priority (+ Iron Fist), Revival Blessing, and Rest (+ Natural Cure). As items, all between Life Orb/Choice Band/Choice Scarf seems good, but what makes me think this mon is probably broken is the Life Orb Rest 3 Attacks set. Keep your eyes on this guy.



Bisharp is an intriguing one because I am not that sure it will be broken but, imo, he has some problematic elements that may lead it to a ban later. I think having access to Eviolite + its natural bulk being already good, Swords Dance, Sucker Punch, AND tera might be way too much for this tier. When I talked about it in the discord, people told me it would not be broken because it doesn't have Knock Off anymore, but I really don't think it needs it to be potentially busted. Swords Dance, Sucker, and tera is all it needs really.

Fun fact is that I am like 90% sure Pawmot is broken and will be banned at some point, which could make Bisharp even stronger

Anyway, these are the thoughts I wanted to share for now, I will probably write something else later in the week. I hope to see some interesting discussion in this thread and I am looking forward RUWC to see the new metagame being developed in a team tournament

Have fun everyone :)

 

[angelthesaucegod]

This meta shift was a bit bigger than I expected, anyways it doesn't matter because Big Stepper Slither Wing is here:


I played a tiny bit of UU early on and fell in love with this silly guy, I love it's wall breaking abilities while also having not horrible bulk. I'm going to start using Tauros-Blaze a bit more because of this silly guy.



I think we all welcome Meloetta, i don't have too much to say about her besides, she's going to pick up where she left off in SM and do some solid work in this tier, great move pool, U-Turn, Thunder Wave all that.

These are the two I was most excited about dropping, as everything goes along I'm sure that all of us will have some new fun in this tier! <3

 

[Denial]

Those 2 feel far too strong, fast and versatile to be any healthy for the tier, i expect them to be gone in the near future.


Easily gonna be the best pivots in the tier thanks to their high speed and unresisted coverage. Juguliss carries Knock Off which is cool and Thundurus can do some Weather shenanigans.


Special mention to this guy who i think can potentially be very clutch. Its obviously faster than everything and its fast enough to outspeed something like Gyarados at +1 which makes it great against HO. Pretty unresisted coverage if we also add tera to the equation! Probably not gonna be better than the 3 i mentioned earlier but worth considering imo.


Probably gonna be our best answers to HO thanks strong prios and bulk. As a bulky steel Bisharp probably isnt worth it as its neutral to Moonblast so thats kind of a flop.

HO is gonna be so strong with all the new options in Iron Leaves, Lucario, Slowbro-Galar, Mimikyu, Mew ect. so its gonna be interesting to see if it can keep the hype or die down the line. Balance also got some new interesting tools like both Slowbros, Rotom-Heat, Chesnaught, Alomomola, Wo-Chien, Tyranitar, Diancie, Forretress and all the pivots, so balance might be able to evolve and keep up.

A lot of interesting new breakers as well like Basculegion, Gallade, Pawmot, and Tyranitar are definetely gonna keep things exciting. There's some stuff im still unsure about like Armarouge, Typhlosion or Meloetta but overall there seems to be a ton of fun stuff to test around with, so im looking forward to the upcoming RUWC.

 

[Yuelia]

Just wondering, is any of RUBL going to be freed? I just don't think it makes a whole lot of sense to keep the banlist as-is, in the face of this many drops, a good number of which are probably stronger than some of the RUBL mons.

 

[Hot N Cold]

made this fun sun team just if someone wanna try it!
https://pokepast.es/c133f4bb18768f13

idea is to abuse charizard + protosynthesis mons such slither wing under sun while hazard control (spin + defog + magic bounce), u-turn + eject pack makes easier to abuse charizard with sun up against opposite team. fight tera blast espeon + bp koal to deal with tyranitar easier which seems threat #1 against this team.

 

[btboy]

btboy here to ruin the speculative fun and turn this into a policy review thread. I personally am much less interested in theorymonning about individual Pokémon or even archetypes than I am about the way council plans to tier the chaos that is to come. There are several ways it could be approached and I think there’s discussion to be had on how to handle tiering actions going forward.

I’m sure that pressure will be on council to take swift and decisive action against new threats, but I’m not sure that successive rounds of multiple quickbans is the best course of action (long-term), especially because presumably the meta won’t have crystallized before people start deeming things broken. To be clear, that is not intended as a criticism of anybody in particular or the community as a whole; it is in our nature to be somewhat reactionary, especially when excited (as people rightfully are by a shift this massive).

Anyways, removing the most broken Pokémon one at a time, and reevaluating the meta after each ban, should theoretically result in the best and most diverse meta over time. However, in all likelihood, the initial excitement over 36 new Pokémon will quickly give way to frustration about losing to broken mons and/or broken archetypes. In that case, people may grow fatigued of the tier, and meta development may slow in turn.

But, I want to bring attention to something which we all understand on some fundamental or subconscious level: each of these Pokémon are entities that exist within a system, and removing or adding one changes the complexion of the entire system. For example, ‘broken’ Pokémon A may be easier to account for it if broken Pokémon B is banned, OR an unbroken Pokémon may become broken following the departure of threats that had restricted it. And with that in mind, some sort of ‘stepwise procedure’, where variables are removed one at a time, seems best here long-term.

The practical considerations here are 1) the aforementioned quality of life for a playerbase that will inevitably be annoyed by one or more broken aspects of the new meta, and 2) the fact that the relative balance of the metagame affects the integrity of the ongoing circuit tour (Seasonal) and, to a lesser extent, the upcoming one (Pentathlon).

I certainly do not envy the task at hand for Council, and I am not sure what is ultimately the best way forward. But I do think that we need to both be patient with council and have an open-ended discussion with them about how to approach all of this, because everything that will happen from here on out creates a domino effect. That is not to say that the community as a whole or individual members of the community should or will instruct council, but instead that there should be dialogue between representatives and constituents. I am very interested to hear what other people think about this, non-council included. Glhf everybody

 

[Gondre19Wedj]

One mon I'm interested in seeing react to the tier shift is Grimmsnarl. Of course, it's NUBL rn, but with so many new setup sweepers (as Feliburn pointed out), HO has so many new tools and I could see Grim becoming a big contributor. The utility of screens plus pshot can enable so many more Pokemon, so I am expecting a rise in usage from Grim.

Edit: Accidentally put Grim as currently RUBL. Whoops

 

[EviGaro]

So before any thought that would be way, way too early beyond Slither Wing being super cool and fun, the RU Council is currently voting on the current RUBL to see what will be allowed back in the tier. Expect results sometimes tonight or more likely tomorrow.

On btboy's post, it certainly brings a lot of issues that are difficult to handle in the context given to us by Smogon. This is effectively a whole new tier of mons being added, but treating it like we would alpha is theoretically impossible as he said, because of tours and other engagements. I also agree that this is moreso something that should be in policy review, rather than here, because it's not something that will change with the current model - DLCs coming relatively soon are going to have a similar effect - and it's a problem for every tier but OU. When you consider that PU is going to get this happen to them during SCL, it's going to be extremely unfair on shane and the others to expect radical actions.

I haven't really discussed it with Feli and the others, but one possible avenue early on would be to act on problematic playstyles, if the need arises. We already have banned Light Clay and we are not voting on this right now, but if Sun and Psychic Terrain, which I consider the two most obvious examples given the drops and what I have seen so far today, happen to be problematic on their own, it's probably not worth trying to hack at the playstyle, and instead just remove it for the time being. I kinda want other opinions on this and I know it wouldn't fix everything, but if it could save us like four or five bans and solve the problems, it's certainly worth considering.

 

[Stranger Meursault]

Releasing RUBL will be a tough call. RU has been one of the more active tiers when it comes to banning, with 10 pokemon in BL (compared to 3 pre-Home in UUBL). The tier just gained a lot of pokemon that are clearly better than some of the ones currently banned.

One example is Iron Leaves vs. Zarude. Zarude is currently RUBL, due to its combination of bulk, speed, and swords dance. Iron Leaves is slightly less bulky and almost exactly the same base speed, but with booster energy it comes in at 506 speed and outspeeds most of the scarfers in the tier. It isn't that difficult to bring it in safely and get a free SD. Between its STABs and close combat it has great coverage, and it can sweep teams after a single swords dance. It has bad defensive typing (like Zarude), but tera (fire) can fix this, and allow it to take a hit (and get a second SD). Zarude needs to trailblaze to get to the same speed tier, and that takes a setup turn and a move slot. Leaves just comes in, outspeeds everything instantly, hits an SD and wins. It was UUBL pre-Home for these reasons, and would still be up there if Skeledirge didn't give it such a hard time. I've been testing it in RU, and it is pretty ridiculous.

Point being, I can't see how it would make sense to keep Zarude banned if Iron Leaves is legal (IMO, Leaves is banworthy). There are a number of other examples of this with the current RUBL, but I think this is a pretty straightforward comparison, since Leaves and Zarude are both swords dance grass-type physical attackers with stats that are higher than average for the tier.

 

[Fabi_ODST]

I haven't really discussed it with Feli and the others, but one possible avenue early on would be to act on problematic playstyles, if the need arises. We already have banned Light Clay and we are not voting on this right now, but if Sun and Psychic Terrain, which I consider the two most obvious examples given the drops and what I have seen so far today, happen to be problematic on their own, it's probably not worth trying to hack at the playstyle, and instead just remove it for the time being. I kinda want other opinions on this and I know it wouldn't fix everything, but if it could save us like four or five bans and solve the problems, it's certainly worth considering.

I feel like, for the sake of consistency with the Light Clay ban, the tier should go into nerfing the playstyle's related items first instead of gutting the mechanics straight up. The two (maybe three) mechanics that may arise to a broken state are sun and psychic terrain spam (maybe sand if ttar stays and the abusers stand out). All of those can be nerfed by removing their extending items with little to no collateral damage while also being consistent with the way screens was nerfed.

The state of the tier will probably change drastically once the dlc drops, with the possibility of even more setters of the mechanics mentioned above. Having the items gutted would mean less issues down the line while keeping the most amount of mons possible.

If the mechanic keeps being broken even when nerfed (for example, if psyspam teams keep being dominant with 4 turn psychic terrain), then the mechanic would be removed.

Maybe I'm making too many assumptions regarding how the tier works, but at least that's the path that makes the most logic sense to me

 

[Weakness Policy Contrary]

frankly, for me i feel like the RUBL mons are fine for the most part. Screens seems like it could still be a huge issue, but in my personnel opinion

While still being...Flamigo, its close combats are mostly stopped by Slowbro coming back, which was its main counter. It mainly became a lot more unbalanced when Slowbro temporarily left the tier, and Mimikyu can set up on it when its locked into band. Granted, if its allowed back in it'll be absolutely powerful, no doubt, but i feel like there are several mons that can help limit what it does. Even more, galarian slowbro is more naturally bulky than normal bro.

Many faster mons have entered the tier, with speed slowly creeping up against Zarude. A large majority of them have U-Turn aswell, which, given Zarude's typing, is quite scary for it. I'm not too sure on this one since I don't know too much abuot Zarude, but that should be something to note.

 

[SnackWasTaken]

Have fun in the sun RarelyUsed

 

[Feliburn]

SPEAKING OF RUBL...

The council has decided to vote on the previously banned RU Pokémon, as the whole idea is to treat this as a brand-new meta. However, there are some elements that, at a simple glance, would make RU way too chaotic and unbalanced, so we've decided to be selective when allowing them back in RU.

As a result....

Drednaw, Hariyama, Toxtricity, Flamigo, Oricorio-Pom-Pom & Staraptor have been unbanned and are now allowed to be used in RU!

Meanwhile…

Lycanroc-Dusk, Hawlucha, Polteageist & Zarude will remain RUBL!

Tagging Marty & Kris to free them, thanks in advance.

Votes

 

[Sneakyplanner]

I'm going to highlight some of the mons that are flying under the radar a bit. Not the stuff that should get banned or that will rise next month, the stuff we'll be using for a long time.

Did somebody ask for Altaria to actually be good? Finally we have a fast offensive hazard controller. Also, while it's not the most broken thing in the tier right now, I expect specs noivern to be really good once things settle down and gyarados+a few others leave. Specs noivern was all the rage in early UU and it's looking like our tier pretty closely resembles that one. Tyranitar is a problem, but that gets chipped down and handled by slither wing. Specs is far from the only set though, boots + 3 attacks is like a somewhat different Kilowattrel and it makes a great defogger, either with bulk or attack investment. Also if you are really cooking, noivern has about as much physical bulk as Altaria...

On the topic of Noivern, Diancie's typing actually looks really useful. It's a hard wall to Noivern and handles Jugulis pretty well. It gets spikes now, by the way. I have only seen it a couple times but a set like felizong with calm mind and iron defense/diamond storm also looks really promising with tera. It can win good matchups even faster than bronzong. And now that staraptor is unbanned and probably staying that way, diancie is an excellent wall to that.

Pawmot seems to be here to stay, and it's a really strong attacker. Best part is that with no quagsire in this tier, you don't need to run seed bomb and are free to use that fourth slot to do a bit of necromancy. Scarf is very useful but I've found it really struggles with prediction and being revenge killed itself with all the ghosts and grounds in the tier. Life orb looks like the stronger set in my opinion, more damage and no choice locking but still lots of speed.

This thing kind of sucks. It's great at trading 1 for 1 with the opponent's least valuable pokemon but other than that it's just alright. Its moves are all just so weak. But despite sucking, it is still pretty decent because strong sucker punch is good against Gyarados and Revavroom.

 

[GW8]

SPEAKING OF RUBL...

The council has decided to vote on the previously banned RU Pokémon, as the whole idea is to treat this as a brand-new meta. However, there are some elements that, at a simple glance, would make RU way too chaotic and unbalanced, so we've decided to be selective when allowing them back in RU.

As a result....

Drednaw, Hariyama, Toxtricity, Flamigo, Oricorio-Pom-Pom & Staraptor have been unbanned and are now allowed to be used in RU!

Meanwhile…

Lycanroc-Dusk, Hawlucha, Polteageist & Zarude will remain RUBL!

Tagging Marty & Kris to free them, thanks in advance.

Votes

We did it, boys!

Staraptor is no longer BL!

 

[Pabloaram]

SPEAKING OF RUBL...

The council has decided to vote on the previously banned RU Pokémon, as the whole idea is to treat this as a brand-new meta. However, there are some elements that, at a simple glance, would make RU way too chaotic and unbalanced, so we've decided to be selective when allowing them back in RU.

As a result....

Drednaw, Hariyama, Toxtricity, Flamigo, Oricorio-Pom-Pom & Staraptor have been unbanned and are now allowed to be used in RU!

Meanwhile…

Lycanroc-Dusk, Hawlucha, Polteageist & Zarude will remain RUBL!

Tagging Marty & Kris to free them, thanks in advance.

Votes

Free the Monke pls!!!

 

[LBN]

I rarely do metagame discussions but I think this is a fun meta so idm doing a post highlighting some Gods, some sleepers and some frauds. Let's get it.

God
What did we expect. Our checks are mostly finnicky, Slowbro seems ok at the task but taunt dd or sub dd forces a psyshock, and that assumes it's not packing a tera blast that hits it super effectively. Speaking of tera blast, tera flying not being the only thing it can run is an adaption I've messed with, and I can confirm tera fairy is also goofy as hell on this thing. Water Fairy is good offensive coverage and while there's some gaps, it hits most things at least neutrally, aswell as the defensive profile being better for things like Bisharp Sucker. That also doesn't include things like earthquake, and once it dances it's very hard to stop without either faster scarfers or priority, which imo the tiers priority is ok at best rn.. speaking of priority. If any one pokemon is a safe pick for QB#1, it's Gyarados.

Sleeper
Somehow, I barely see this thing despite it's qualities. Tera normal espeed is alright, but I think gyarados existing is a net negative for it. Once it leaves though, I think it might struggle. With the tier settling down I think slowbro (regular) will find it's place on far more teams, and that will be very annoying. Mimikyu aswell, being able to revenge kill it easily. Competition from Slither Wing, the Tauros forms with superior defensive profiles, and Gallade is a stiff bar. While I think it'll be solid once people remember life orb SD tera normal is not the only set in the game, it took SS players like 3 years to do that so frankly it'll take awhile, lord knows im not helping this mon

Fraud
Yo this mon stinks. Tyranitar is top 1 splashables right now, competition from Regular slowbro which provides a better check to the former Luke, aswell as better vs Gallade, and checking Armarouge if you feel like taking 85% from an armor cannon. That aside, Slowbro is far superior and drastically outclasses this thing. Losing scald is terrible as it lets Ttar seemlessly check the cm sets that made it dumb last time. Yes, it has coverage for ttar, but slowbro doesnt need to waste a slot for that when it has it to begin with. Overall, not worth the trouble.

God
Yes, I'm including booster energy among the brokens ranking and here's why. First though, I will reiterate that while precedent doesn't exist in official tiers, Godly gift, Camomons and multiple other OMs have banned booster energy, so this take isn't an unreasonable take. For starters, this item specifically absolutely pushes Iron Leaves over the edge, being able to get a free scarf on your sweeper which has clicks that consistent is a fast track to a clean sweep, with options like priority from bisharp and MMQ stifled by Tera. Iron leaves isn't the only abuser though, Slither Wing's Acrobatics set is very goofy and lends itself to cleaning games up fairly easily, and most tera options to stop it are either incredibly telegraphed, like tera ghost ttar and Bisharp, or just don't kill it after a Bulk Up, in the case of Emergency Mimikyus (because play rough sucks use drain punch). And frankly, most tera mons don't pick types that resist flying, so acrobatics is generally, very free.

Jugulis isn't very broken in comparison, but sets with Tera Ground Work up can prove to be game ending aswell, or other tera types as an option aswell, abusing the fact that Ttar has to check more than just Jugulis. Overall, I think booster energy is the cause of 2/3 of the woes surrounding these pokemon. But i hear you say, But iron thorns isnt broken, bu-but bonnet isnt broken! Ok, you're right. But were every single paradox form broken in these OMs? Likely not, and I would like to atleast open up the discussion to sending Booster Energy to hell instead of Leaves and Slither, as I think they could provide something interesting to the tier, and the item is their root cause for being broken.

God
Choice Specs Armor Cannon. Brother the calcs on this pokemon are insane. Did you know Aura sphere just OHKOs CB Tar off Modest Specs? Thats just the prelude, ohkoing the pokemon you'd think is a good check is the iceberg. You reckon slowbro can handle i-
252+ SpA Choice Specs Tera Fire Armarouge Armor Cannon vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Slowbro: 252-297 (63.9 - 75.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
OH NO certainly not! What about the dragons ay maybe Noivern got that dog- Nope take 85% from Cannon. What about tera walls like mudsda- 63%.
Defensive utility on point too, Iron leaves check right here baby, and if you hit it once now you have an OHKO monster who now outruns your entire team. Endure sets suck, i love dying to Sand Stream before i do anything. Of course, that doesn't mean Armarouge is a 1 trick pony. Room Service OTR is capable of clearing games vs Offense aswell, and CM Weak Armor sets are solid without relying on endure to clean house. Overall checks to this pokemon really just don't exist and I expect it to become too much to handle very soon.

Not doing more than this for now, other pokemon like Mimikyu, Wo Chien, Dragalge, Noivern and Gardevoir are still solid threats in the meta, but are generally self explanatory but I'm very lazy so I'm not doing all of them hf yall (ban gyarados first and only)

 

[C0nfiden1 0yster]

Hi, i would like to discuss some tiering

I absolutely agree with btboy's post, I think it key that open-ended discussions are held, here in this forum about the future of this tier. Council does not really have time to put out a bunch of surveys and do a ton of suspects and hopefully this tier is able to reach a playable state by the start of RUWC in two weeks. I think it's best for all, that people have discussions here rather than ru discord or ru room about tiering since it is easier for council to gauge the community. The current procedure for dealing with these tiering decisions when all these pokemon drop mid gen isn't as optimal as it probably could be, but this isn't a policy review thread so no changing that.

Now I have never felt super comfortable about making tiering posts and what not. Ive always felt "underqualified" I guess to really comment on this kind of stuff and I still do, but I see this as the best way to explain my early thoughts. I do hope others verbalize their thoughts in a similar way.


I believe these are the two most broken/banworthy pokemon right now. Iron Jugulis' coverage is way too much for this tier and the speed tier it hits combined make it difficult for all styles of teams to effectively deal with. It has a really solid stab in Dark Pulse, which can unfairly flinch past some of its checks. I have a number of times tried to use a mimikyu or an air balloon Revavroom to revenge it, only to be flinched and lose the game. Hurricane can also similarly be unfair with its confusion chances but obviously that is less consistent. In terms of coverage, it can utilize Earth Power to chunk a lot of its would-be checks such as Klefki or Bisharp. Diancie takes ~35% from Earth Power and is quoted above as a solid check but when you consider Diancie's weaknesses as a wall (neutral to rocks, lefties dependant, no recovery), it ends up overwhelmed in the not-so-very long term. Diancie can also get bopped by the uncommon yet existent Flash Cannon. Jugulis also has Focus Blast to do even more damage to Tyranitar or the aforementioned Bisharp. It also has a very fast Knock Turn set which can break past its checks overtime just the same, as a lot of the "checks" I have mentioned don't have recovery moves, relying on lefties for durability. It does have some weaknesses though, as it offers little defensive presence, can't run all the moves it might want to, and is weak to rocks if booster energy, but the progress it makes in every game outweighs those setbacks.

Slither Wing is the other pokemon that should go. There are two main sets that I believe to be most effective and most banworthy. A Heavy-Duty Boots set is very difficult to deal with. Its strong, 135 base attack, Adamant, STAB U-turns have a limited number of answers themselves, and combined with Close Combat, make it even more limited to check it and still maintain momentum. Only Noivern can still maintain some momentum and deal with this set, but that can be overwhelmed by its power as its defenses aren't as great. First Impression makes it even more tricky to deal with and it requires stricter timing of offensive sweepers, which I suppose isn't unhealthy. I believe this set to be an unhealthy pivot that enables a bunch of other threats. The second set I believe is banworthy is the Flame Charge Acrobatics set, as it can straight up kill many of its Heavy-Duty Boots set checks like Noivern with its Booster Energy. This set is also prevalent on Sun, again limiting counterplay. I believe Slither Wing itself has a narrow pool of counterplay, and in conjunction with the way it enables its teammates, makes it too much for the tier.

The post above suggests banning Booster Energy but I do not believe that changes these pokemon to a significant extent, as they fundamentally still do the same, perhaps just less easy to maneuver. I also don't think its exactly feasible.


I do not think any of the above is clearly banworthy at the moment. I think Iron Leaves is too dependent on Psyterrain to block priority and I have found solid positioning to be effective against it as it is not difficult to take advantage of its many weaknesses. Even if it does get to click SD, there are still a few pokemon that can check it and it isn't terribly difficult to tera a pokemon to get rid of it, again because of the weaknesses. I don't really think Sun / Heat Rock is a big issue. Typh-Hisui is not broken under sun and the lack of chlorophyll users make it difficult to really get the most out of sun. The only pokemon that becomes too good under Sun is Slither Wing which can easily just be banned. Psy Terrain is interesting because it removes priority as a viable method to deal with threats like Iron Leaves and Azelf. There are some really good Psy Terrain teams but I've never really felt it directly enables these threats to an unfair degree. Gyarados strikes me as a tera dependent kind of pokemon and I've never really had a ton of trouble with it personally. I also think it is too early to tier Pawmot as it struggles a bit I think. I could easily see either of those two being too much in the future, but I don't think they should be the first to leave the tier at this moment.

ty for reading

 

[Rarelyme]

Alright so I'd like to talk about the ban worthy pool of mons that we got going on at the moment in the tier.
First off, I think it's important that I shortly explain my view on what a 'perfect tier' would look like. Given the very nature of Pokemon Showdown, tiers must be competitive meaning well-suited to birth successful competition. Moreover, a successful competition happening on a popular video game based simulator cannot thrive without fun and ways for less successful players to enjoy it. Then, it is all about balance. To cut it short, I think it is all about balancing offense and defense. Right now, the tier is obviously unbalanced due to the fact that offense is dominating the format. However, to achieve my idea of a 'perfect tier' I think offense should always have a slight advantage over defense in order to keep things enjoyable and somewhat entertaining to spectate at every level. I won't go deeper in this because there is all the background needed to get my opinion on some mons I'll be talking about after this. Though I'll be happy to discuss more about this if some of you are interested.

I have spent a lot of time trying to put together defensive cores that would fit this new meta and let me tell you, it's a pain. There are a couple on mons that extremely restrict balance oriented builds and concise defensive core in general, making by themselves styles other than hyper offense not worth building most of the time. These mons are Iron Leaves, Iron Jugulis and Gyarados.


Iron Leaves is quite strange because it has unprecedented breaking power with SD and its nearly perfect coverage while being one of the fastest Pokemon in the tier thanks to its ability coupled with Booster Energy BUT it is very weak to strong prios now all over the tier like First Impression, Shadow Sneak or Sucker Punch. That said, it does not make this mon any less toxic for the meta partly thanks to our beloved 9 gen mechanic which allows it to resist these attacks and still destroy the opposing team afterwards. I do think that in a Teraless meta it would still be unhealthy for the tier as your only consistent answer is to revenge kill it with the few tools we have that are able to actually revenge kill it, because let's not forget that Iron Leaves has better defense stats than mons like OU Zapdos or Gholdengo and the only thing making it worse than these is its typing which is clearly not worse enough to make it enjoyable in RU.


This guy is too much as well in my opinion. The pressure that this Pokemon is able to apply is just insane. It is great against balance archetype thanks to its coverage making it able to hit every Pokemon for outrageous damages and even against more offensive ones as it can outspeed most mons in the tier thanks again to Booster Energy and threaten to easily OHKO all the glass cannons. Tyranitar does not make the presence of Iron Jugulis less toxic mostly because it is not reliable enough to really counter it because of it's lack of recovery and the fact that Jugs can still run Focus Blast.


We've seen what a good Dragon Dance user can do to this tier before and it was not pretty. Gyarados is just history repeating itself. It is bulky enough to muscle pass defensive checks like Slowbro or steel types like Bronzong and just like Iron Leaves, Tera only makes its unhealthiness more glaring. LBN talked about it very well already so I will stop there and I don't care how cool Gyarados is, it can be cool somewhere far from this tier.

For now, I don't think Slither Wing, Bisharp, Gallade, Thundurus (still on the fence with this one) or Lucario are banworthy as we have a good amount of reliable checks that can fit in every play style and be useful thanks to filling key roles like removers, offensive pivot or else. I have been testing back the former bad Oricorio set with Defog which does very well against Slither Wing by the way, even the QD ones with some additional defense invests can work.

I very much agree with you 0yster on this feeling of being 'underqualified' to talk about tiering actions. Putting the feelings you go through while building or laddering in words is pretty hard and organizing them here is even harder when you're not a prominent smogon or ps figure but we have to keep in mind that every opinion matters and making the effort to express our thoughts is always worthwhile so let's keep posting !

 

[Ampha]

Meta opinions moment:

The busteds

Ok so, in my opinion this is probably the first ban wave or close to it, Mew is insanely nuts with NP set (drain/flame/psyshock) and theres the fact that we haven't even explored the 303933949 sets it can use. Gyarados is pretty straight forward, DD up, kill something and snowball, pretty unhealthy and would love to see this go asap, gonna cover both paradoxes here but in my opinion Booster energy IS NOT what makes them broken, but just a added bonus, Iron leaves would still be too much for the tier with or without booster energy, SD sets can basically cover everything on meta for super effective and considering that it has the same speed tier that Delphox(a mon that was broken on last meta) is just nuts for me. Iron Jugulis has the same thing, its a very strong breaker that can use it but not limited to it, HDB sets would still be as effective, as would Choiced sets be nutty, this thing also has Knock off(!!!) to chip its checks and wear them down long term. Going back to the waters, I think from votes that eifo does have a similar opinion to me that Shell smash dred is still as busted with a +2 hit, this thing can also Tera to basically any offensive type and just blow you, even tera rock is bonkers since you can p much explode wo-chien with a little bit of chip damage. lastly but not least, is Armarouge, LBN basically covered how I feel about it, both choice specs and Expanding force sets with terrain are just obnoxiously busted.

Very good mons but not overbearing(new mons)

Ok so most of these are p self explanatory, ttar has a nice offensive/defensive prowess on current meta, with DD, support options (SANDSTORM TEAMS ARE NOT VIABLE DONT TRY MAKING THE DOGS WORK, THEY SUCK LMAO), wo chien is very bulky but a bit explotable if id say, mimi is just as good as it was last gen, Bisharp is insanely sick, ive loved some silly interactions like coming in on florges and getting +2, coming up on defogs, or just tera'ing on Decidueye-hisui and getting boosted while resisting it, Pawmot is a little annoying but idt its been overbearing currently, plus i've seen only 1 person use rev blessing. As for Slither wing, I feel like its just of adaptation, meta is still crazy right now, and due to that less people are using Slither wing checks, thus making it sound too broken, but from tests i've done it's not that difficult to deal with. As for thundurus, Im still surprised this thing is not outright busted and more of a healthy(currently) addition

These pokémons SUCK

Shorter one but just wanted to shoutout those 3 for being really bad right now, Forretress is NOT good and i've been really vocal on that on discord, super passive, spinning is bad on it since it loses to all setters, and is just too easy to chip. Basculegion suffers from the lack of a (real) ghost stab and has been underwhelming in every battle i've faced it, not even being able to KO a Mudsdale (?_?), and Slowb-g has been p much what LBN described, suffers too much from meta rn and the competition with Kantonian sibling makes it worse.

These mons are (still) surprisingly good

This category is mostly for mons which surprised me despite the harsh meta changes, zong still keeps to be a incredible defensive tool, being one of few viable steel types, Ches is a decent viable spiker and Iron press sets are nasty as well, Diancie was surprising to me bc it was way bulkier than I expected and tera helps to patch some of its weaknesses.
Hear me out, Decidueye-hisui is THE HAZARD control we needed, not only this thing is very thick, but its defensive typing along with tera can also be very useful in almost any match, from experience with ladder, this thing was a real surprise for me, since it does what it does so well, and Triple arrows is a sick move on it.
Gardevoir is as useful as it was before shifts that it rose, less Steel usage= Gardevoir being better, its a insanely good scarfer and cleaner on late games and in the same vein, Rotom Heat is also a mon that has been pretty consistent for me, HDB pivot with wow has been real clutch for me as it stands right above some busted mons speed tiers. Slowbro doesnt need much explaining but it's been the same consistent mon as it was before shifts. And as last, Typhlosion hisui has surprised me due to it being the typhlosion made right, more utility sets with HDB and Infernal parade are sick, and its power is way more explosive than Normal typhlosion, with added bonus of Frisking what items some mons have or not.

PS: is still awesome, Roar shenanigans is great on current setup spam meta

In another note, theres a couple of mons I didnt cover, which I think are alright for meta, not being too bad but not that awesome as well, and I didnt feel much to write about them so yeah

 

[Feliburn]

I've been laddering for a bit, managed to top the ladder, and I have a few points I want to discuss.

The top mons



These are the mons I have the most experience with, after facing & using them. Slither Wing to me has felt like the most solid mon in the tier in more ways than one. Be it HBD, Wisp sets that are good vs the set-up mons, CB sets & the BU Tera Flying Acrobatics set (this one has swept way too many people from what I've seen) just feel like a lot of utility, breaking power and insane set up sweep opportunity all in one mon. At first, I thought it was good cause it helped check most of the fast breakers around, and I thought with Slowbro-Galar, Altaria & Noivern we'd be fine, but then BU Acro sets made me feel like the answers might be too limited, but who knows, the other mons I'm about to mention have a more clear unhealthy presence at the moment. Iron Leaves is just a solid SD mon. It's one of the best mons at either breaking a team, or just finishing the job. SD and + speed Booster Energy make it one of the easiest breakers to use, and the decent bulk make it spammable as well. Gyarados is just a massive threat, and while it does somewhat rely on tera, it's also one of the few mons who can run a wide variety of teras with all of them feeling just as good in plenty of matchups, adding all the mindgames when dealing with it. Lately I've seen Electric for Pawmot and Thundurus (Prankster TWave), Dark for strong hitting Crunches, Flying for the Tera Blast STAB, and other mentions like Fairy and even moves like Taunt being used. It's imo the more unhealthy presence out of all the brokens, but that's very subjective. Finally, Iron Jugulis is known for the really high combination of good offensive stats, and coverage for all the defensive counterplay, and in an offensive meta, it manages to also do well vs offensive teams thanks to + speed Booster Energy, making it hard for hyper offense teams to just set up and sweep. It's an insane pokemon overall. Thse are the 4 mons I consider to be the more "broken" mons around.


The anti offense breakers



These 2 mons could see arguments for being insanely good and overbearing SD breakers, but I also think the state the 4 mons mentioned above force upon the tier just make these 2 better than they probably are. Both are really solid tools to both aid and counter hyper offense, as they are strong SD breakers with priority. I do think a meta that has a more established defensive presence has the tools for handling these 2, but that's also pure speculation. Overall, I really like these mons, but I also think they are not high priority mons at the moment.

The psychic duo



After playing for a while, I can safely say these 2 shine more for their roles as HO leads, rather than the NP sets speculated. I've played both sets, but Azelf & Mew (mainly Azelf) just perform better as suicide leads for HO. Mew can pull NP sets way easier thanks to the bulk, and I agree that NP Tera Fairy Draining Kiss (I use Aura Sphere over Flamethrower) makes Mew an incredible threat for slower teams that can't pressure it as easily. I'm not sure if I think Mew itself is broken when compared to the other mons, but logically you'd think that once HO is made more balanced and manageable, Mew would shine even more than it does now, and perhaps Azelf would as well.

My personal question marks



I've seen discussion about Pawmot around, and while I do agree that on paper, Life Orb sets are pretty good into normal BOs / Balance, I also believe the set that has shine the most right now has been Choice Scarf sets, as it's one of the better anti offense sets, alongside a fun tool for them thanks to Revival Blessing. It's also a mon that forces you to tera in order to keep clicking your electric STAB, which is not to say it's bad because of it, but it has certain implications when used. The coverage, all the abilities and raw power it has is great, and we all agree that Revival Blessing is a lame move overall, to me the power creep is too high for it to be considered something to look at in this first initial wave, probably in a similar boat as Lucario and Mimikyu.

Tyranitar is the second mon I haven't had the time to use fully yet. I've only tried a rocker set with Heavy Slam as coverage for the already mentioned tera fairy psychic types that are around, but I know a lot of people feel a certain way about Dragon Dance sets, which I can totally see. Strong and bulky set up mons with access to tera are always dangerous until solid counterplay is found, and so far we've seen Tera Flying sets to get past Chesnaught, Decidueye-Hisui and even Wo-Chien. My lack of experience with it prevents me from thinking it deserves to go in this initial wave, so I'd like to see more opinions on it.

Finally, Armarouge has the insane damage output, as well as a speed boosting ability that basically forces you to try and kill it in one turn, or it becomes really hard to revenge kill without the proper preparation (which in this meta is hard to try and prep for everyone, my approach is break before they break you). I know people are saying this mon is broken cause of terrain or sun, but I've barely seen either archetype really shine that much right now. Armarouge to me has been doing solidly in or outside those types of teams, and I know CM sets are equally scary to deal with. I'm a bit less on the fence about this mon, but the other mons just have had a stronger impression on me so far.

I'm only talking about what I've experienced so far, as I know there's a lot of stuff I have not tried or seen, but here are my thoughts so far, and I know that there are some points most of us agree on which is good. Keep those post coming!

 

[Hot N Cold]

hazards are super strong on this metagame with lot of options (specially mew), solid spinblokers like mimikyu, defiant & competitive mons such bisharp and galar-articuno that can put you in a serious situation, several faster mons which can run taunt like iron jugulis, mew, gyarados, etc. all this makes makes difficult to remove hazards, I feel sometimes you wants to run boots and give away that hazard war lol

iron leaves + gyarados is an exceptional offensive core in offense.

 

[EviGaro]

I feel like, for the sake of consistency with the Light Clay ban, the tier should go into nerfing the playstyle's related items first instead of gutting the mechanics straight up. The two (maybe three) mechanics that may arise to a broken state are sun and psychic terrain spam (maybe sand if ttar stays and the abusers stand out). All of those can be nerfed by removing their extending items with little to no collateral damage while also being consistent with the way screens was nerfed.

The state of the tier will probably change drastically once the dlc drops, with the possibility of even more setters of the mechanics mentioned above. Having the items gutted would mean less issues down the line while keeping the most amount of mons possible.

If the mechanic keeps being broken even when nerfed (for example, if psyspam teams keep being dominant with 4 turn psychic terrain), then the mechanic would be removed.

Maybe I'm making too many assumptions regarding how the tier works, but at least that's the path that makes the most logic sense to me

For the record, I completely agree usually. I did not whine for months in 2020 about Drought bans for no reason! My perspective there was just, look, it's very possible we need to nerf a lot of things fast and banning mons is always immediate, whereas items isn't - we would need a PR post for those - and since it could be multiple playstyles, it's a bit of an unique situation and we would want to give people a tier that works somewhat and NU about as good a shift as we can next month.

But now I don't really think it's needed anyway. I wasn't sure if we would free Hawlucha and Polteageist when I made that post and that would have made a very significant difference for psychic terrain. Sun is... weird I think. It's a bit of a letdown in my experience though obviously strong, I just am also unsure we have seen the best builds on it. I kinda think Brute Bonnet is just ungood now and I have seen it on most suns.

This thing however, I think is super problematic on both playstyles. In fact, I think it's easily the most questionable thing in the current metagame. There's no real counter to it, sure people can say ttar exists but like... if you are running offensive ttar, you are slower, and you die to +1 Aura Sphere. Not even focus blast. If you are running bulky ttar, you don't ohko with crunch anyway, so you either twave or roll the rock stab dice (Stone Edge is a fairly low roll to kill, even ignoring the miss chance). This is all without tera being into the equation btw, and it's on its most direct counter. Diancie is probably better vs it, but gets chunked by psyshock on the switch fairly well. The rest? Ugh. Playing around Weak Armor is even more annoying than playing vs Mimikyu, Specs on sun is just absurd - 252+ SpA Choice Specs Armarouge Armor Cannon vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Diancie in Sun: 127-150 (41.7 - 49.3%) -- 85.9% chance to 2HKO after Stealth Rock, wahoo - and the one negative is just speed, but no special mon comes in on it very well, and physical mons always have to keep in mind a tera that will allow it two hits on you. I don't know, I can't see balance ever developing right vs it, and it trades too well vs offence if you get it on the right mon.

- I have some funny sets I have been using so why not share them:

Pawmot @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Volt Absorb
Tera Type: Electric
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Double Shock
- Close Combat
- Volt Switch
- Ice Punch

Of course Feliburn JUST posted about it, but this mon is very cool with a very solid speed tier. Personally I much prefer Volt Switch on Scarf over Revival Blessing - meta too fast and strong for a 50% mon to work out often, imo, but hey - because grounds are awkward and very few of them likes the prospect of switching into a Close Combat, bar Mudsdale or... Palossand. Momentum is just everything the moment you can get it, so good mon. And even with Scarf Tera Double Shock surprisingly breaks very well.

Grafaiai @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Poison Touch
Tera Type: Dark
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- U-turn
- Knock Off
- Foul Play
- Poison Jab

Another weird scarfer, though one that was decently used in the last meta. I'm basically treating this as the Scarf Salazzle of early SV, as it revenges a lot of threats fairly well with foul play, is faster than pretty much all setup - Jolly Gyarados is faster at +2, Adamant is not, same with Armarouge depending on nature - and isn't worthless when you just click uturn because Poison Touch can be a game changer. Good mon, would like to fit switcheroo but like its kinda hard.

Basculegion (M) @ Choice Specs
Ability: Adaptability
Tera Type: Water
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Surf
- Shadow Ball
- Hydro Pump
- Aqua Jet / Hex

Physical Masculegion? Bad. Special? Honestly it kinda works. Physical only really has Wave Crash which can be awkward as hell, but with Special you gain super safe stabs on both typings. Adaptability really makes what would be a middling base 80 able to secure key milestones, and its fat enough without investment to be a decent check to dangerous threats, like Lucario. I think Hex on tspikes can be really really strong, but I also think Aqua Jet has a place to secure kos on like Armarouge and stuff.

Wo-Chien @ Leftovers
Ability: Tablets of Ruin
Tera Type: Poison
EVs: 252 HP / 228 Def / 28 Spe
Impish Nature
- Knock Off
- Foul Play
- Taunt
- Leech Seed

Please tell me we can keep him it solves so much in one slot and is finally one bulky mon with knock that's like meta. Great at blocking slower and faster setup in a way that Umbreon just wasn't really able to as well.

Most of the other stuff I have used so far has been very obvious but some quick ones. Spikes Diancie is pretty good, its definitely not as passive anymore with Body Press and Draining Kiss is honestly a cool add to it. Slither Wing is easily the best mon in the tier, so splashable, idt its broken at all. Gyarados is weird, like sure you need a faster mon - that part is not very hard - and ideally bulky mons that can stomach one or two hits so your fast stuff can secure, but... idk it feels very possible so far, the low power on its moves is helpful and the fact that it has to think so hard about its moveset is also unhelpful for it a tad. I think Tyranitar is super mid. Bulky has a favourable matchup against sun that cannot be ignored, but my main problem with using it as a key component of a team is that its a prime tera target, and making it your tera to prevent that can be super awkward since you're losing it on potentially game changing offensive mons. DD is also super tera dependent, but it's SO slow. Thorns was too slow in a way weaker meta, I don't think that can fly anymore, especially when you have Drednaw right there now. And sure, it has Crunch over its future counterpart, but there is legit zero mon in the tier that switches into Tyranitar that is like oh no, not Crunch, what am I gonna do!!! Idk, I actually like that it makes sand somewhat viable though.

More on potentially broken mons when we have a slate for it, but I doubt my opinion is going to change that much with it.

 

[TyCarter]

Been playing around with some stuff since drops came out and -insert comment about how this tier looks a lot like pre-home uu- or -insert this looks like dpp ou joke-. The tier has a lot of stuff that can be extremely overwhelming. It's fun but admittingly unbalanced af.

If you've played SV UU Prehome, it's very likely you've encountered booster spam at some point. booster energy spam was a playstyle that was very much viable. It's a team archetype that does well here too. While there is no booster shocks to replicate as aggro hazard lead, booster does that job ok enough from what I've observed as it goes really well into lead . Throw down hazards and then get a booster , , or even and ur in business.

, the classic SD with booster speed set is pretty potent in the tier due to no good unaware user that can force it out. Slap on a Tera Fire to negate burns and gain resistance to First Impression and neutrality to sucker and shadow sneak. Tera Electric is also pretty good too since a lot of run Thunder Wave. and are the closest things I'd call reliable counterplay offensively anyways. does have to be weary of TB Fire since it can be run for the Leaves mirror match in addition to destroying Zong and ig forry too. I wouldn't be surprised if it got banned.

, I'm a big fan of booster work up 3A Jug since this thing forces a fair amount of switches so it can get a free setup turn potentially and it's prankster immune. Thundurus normally could try to get a revenge kill on it but Tera Ground Jugulis is pretty stupid in that it can also prevent itself from getting twaved and gaining valuable resistances to stuff such as that normally threaten it. Iron Jugulis also has plenty of good coverage moves it can go for depending on team needs such as Fire Blast, Hydro Pump, and even utility moves like taunt, knock and u-turn. Hydro has merits if you want to get the jump on Rotom-Heat fwiw.

probably one of the few things that can at least hold off the special attackers and isn't totally passive. It's a positive addition to the tier and both SR and CB Sets can do a lot of work, it's also good into the popular psychic suicide leads atm. Defensive sets that rock utility moves like Twave are fine as well.

the original one-man stall army has it's work cut out here and it won't be stalling out RU immediately, at least not until the metagame stabilizes. Rest talk is probably its best set at the moment and being able to spam knock is great too. Leech tect sets are kinda ass, since u not only have a worse MU against grass types but also for the mirror match. IMO it's last move choice comes down to either Foul Play or Ruination. Foul Play is super good for punishing physical sweepers esp with tera ghost factored in. Ruination is ok if your team has ways of handling physical setup sweepers and you are getting consistent damage. Just partner it with a and a Slither check and you are prob good to go in terms of defensive backbones but Tera Ghost wo-chien can technically fulfill that if your team doesn't need to use any of the other mons for tera.

Side Note: Gyara should not waste its time taunting the Wo-Chien EVER if it has foul play, you just lose it outright. I've prob had like multiple games where people just do that and lose their gyara for nothing.

Demon Sets with BU and Flame Charge with acrobatics is good sure as are the pivot boots sets, pretty annoying to face for sure. It's a fairly cut-and-dry mon. It could go but I think defensive counterplay for Slither Wing is certainly out there and offense has enough tools to handle it as well imo.

Prankster Taunt makes it a decent fat breaker and Nplot on its own can put some real pressure on backbones. Just a good mon overall. Focus Blast imo feels near mandatory on Thundy sets simply because of Tyranitar's existence being a notable one.

Yes I can tell by all the calcs everyone posted itt that it hits hard. However, atm with the amount of instant game ending offensive threats flying around, it's a bit annoying to build around this and expect it to do work consistently on a game to game basis. It does feel like it experiences heavy 4mss since it has a lot of valuable coverage and options it desires. Weak Armor is a good deterrent for denying u-turns and rapid spin attempts. It feels very on paper simply because it has issues coming into the game safely where it will get 1 or 2 kills tops and it can feel like deadweight against HO. It's more of a mon that thrives against passive fat teams which idt are nearly as good at the moment. However, I can see this mon potentially being an issue later down the line.

Not sure what to make of it yet, with no Talonflame to ruin its day in RU it can definitely do work although Facade sets were also a thing that was tried in the past to combat burns if you were not gonna tera fire. Need to see more of it in action before I can come to a solid conclusion.

Another DD'er although maybe the defensive powercreep that accompanied it can slow it down? No idea yet tbh, would not be surprised if it got nuked with that said.

Ig you can call them early thoughts or w/e but yeah. Tier feels fun af to play.