Resource SV Ubers UU Viability Rankings (Post #207 for September Update)

[Frito]

(Inspiration Taken From Aberforth's SV Ubers Viability Rankings (Post-Home))

Artwork by sinnabyss
Hello all! Here's our first viability rankings for the Ubers UU metagame.

This is a list of all the viable Pokemon in SV Ubers, sorted top-to-bottom from most to least viable, not ordered within tiers.

Thread Rules

- Post intelligently. One-liners saying things like "X should be Y rank" without context or supporting evidence are likely to be disregarded or deleted.
- Be civil when debating other users. Any flaming will not be tolerated.
- This thread is for discussion of the viability rankings only. Those wanting to ask simple questions about why something is ranked or how to build a team should look to our SQSA for guidance.
- Be aware of our subforum rules and the global forum rules — they all apply here, too.

The VR Council

The Ubers UU Council is a group of experienced players and community figures selected to assess any new nominations from the community and vote on them before they become accepted into the rankings. This same council has the same jurisdiction over the upcoming Sample Teams thread. The VR Council also can internally nominate changes to the thread — it then votes on these, just as an individual user would in a post in this thread. We will document all changes to the Viability Rankings in the form of update posts, where votes and associated reasoning are collected in a spreadsheet. Be on the lookout for these.

The Ubers UU VR Council
Celeste
Finchely
FishyRoads
Frito
Leo Justice
Rasche
Shadow079


Rankings
(Pokemon are ordered alphabetically within tiers)

S
Giratina
Mewtwo

A+
Arceus-Electric
Arceus-Ice
Arceus-Poison
Roaring Moon

A
Dragonite
Landorus
Magearna
Samurott-Hisui

A-
Deoxys
Gouging Fire

B+
Araquanid
Arceus-Dark
Garganacl
Gholdengo
Lugia
Palafin
Palkia-Origin
Urshifu

B
Annihilape
Arceus-Fighting
Arceus-Rock
Chi-Yu
Cyclizar
Kyurem-White
Urshifu-Rapid-Strike

B-
Espathra
Iron Bundle
Mimikyu
Ogerpon-Hearthflame
Ursaluna-BloodMoon
Zamazenta-Crowned

C+
Alomomola
Arceus-Psychic
Blissey
Clodsire
Gothitelle
Grimmsnarl
Iron Treads
Mandibuzz
Quagsire
Reshiram
Scizor
Smeargle
Solgaleo
Toxapex

C
Arceus-Grass
Archaludon
Cloyster
Corviknight
Dialga-Origin
Dragapult
Great Tusk
Latios
Raging Bolt
Regieleki
Rillaboom
Ursaluna
Volcarona
Walking Wake

C-
Baxcalibur
Excadrill
Iron Valiant
Lokix
Moltres-Galar
Ninetales
Okidogi
Orthworm
Pecharunt
Sneasler

D
These Pokemon are only Ubers UU by tiering and possess no real metagame niche.
Arceus-Bug
Dialga
Palkia

 

[KineSquared]

This post is reserved

 

[Gambit]

Obviously this metagame just started so not trying to be harsh at all.
C+ to around A-
When I took a first look at this metagame, I realized that speed would be so important in this metagame. I decided to use Iron Valiant cause it causes mass destruction in OU so why not UUbers too? Behind a ub fromShed Tail, this mon becomes nearly unbeatable. With a Swords Dance, Fighting Tera Close Combat set, it becomes so insanely powerful. Spirit Break is also strong for Dragons such as Palkia-Origin. Then Knock Off for Gholdengo and other Ghosts.
A+ to S
Not much is needed to be said. Shed Tail is broken and so is Substitute due to the popularity of sweepers in this metagame. Rapid Spin is also very good for Spike spamming Magearnas. I haven't tried this yet but I think that Taunt will become very popular to prevent sweepers from sweeping. Would not be surprised to see this thing banned.

Again, just want to say metagame just started and everyone is trying to figure out good from bad, so no disrespect is intended.

I also think I got first post which is cool.

 

[SwordIsBored]

Obviously this metagame just started so not trying to be harsh at all.
C+ to around A-
When I took a first look at this metagame, I realized that speed would be so important in this metagame. I decided to use Iron Valiant cause it causes mass destruction in OU so why not UUbers too? Behind a ub fromShed Tail, this mon becomes nearly unbeatable. With a Swords Dance, Fighting Tera Close Combat set, it becomes so insanely powerful. Spirit Break is also strong for Dragons such as Palkia-Origin. Then Knock Off for Gholdengo and other Ghosts.
A+ to S
Not much is needed to be said. Shed Tail is broken and so is Substitute due to the popularity of sweepers in this metagame. Rapid Spin is also very good for Spike spamming Magearnas. I haven't tried this yet but I think that Taunt will become very popular to prevent sweepers from sweeping. Would not be surprised to see this thing banned.

Again, just want to say metagame just started and everyone is trying to figure out good from bad, so no disrespect is intended.

I also think I got first post which is cool.

I think the problem with Iron Valiant is just the Pokémon that run the tier, having poor matchups against Magearna and Zacian as well as being outclassed by Zacian as an offensive Pokémon who unlike Iron Valiant can maintain its reliability without its one time boost. As a stall breaker, it seems potent at first glance by its powerful moves coming off of Swords Dance yet it is easily blocked by common defensive Pokémon like Arceus-Fire, Arceus-Poison, Clefable and Moltres. Going back to when I said it was outclassed in a way by Zacian, it would have a niche if Zacian being so overpowered wasn't a flaw for it. What I mean by this is just about on every team there is a dedicated Zacian answer and those same answers also handle Iron Valiant and it is hard to justify using it over Zacian for most builders. C+ seems like a good spot for it in my opinion, potentially being a good option for some teams yet being outclassed by Zacian on most.

I think putting Cyclizar in S is a good suggestion though, being the best spinner in the tier by a mile and Shed Tail being broken.

 

[FluffyPets]

Obviously this metagame just started so not trying to be harsh at all.
C+ to around A-
When I took a first look at this metagame, I realized that speed would be so important in this metagame. I decided to use Iron Valiant cause it causes mass destruction in OU so why not UUbers too? Behind a ub fromShed Tail, this mon becomes nearly unbeatable. With a Swords Dance, Fighting Tera Close Combat set, it becomes so insanely powerful. Spirit Break is also strong for Dragons such as Palkia-Origin. Then Knock Off for Gholdengo and other Ghosts.
A+ to S
Not much is needed to be said. Shed Tail is broken and so is Substitute due to the popularity of sweepers in this metagame. Rapid Spin is also very good for Spike spamming Magearnas. I haven't tried this yet but I think that Taunt will become very popular to prevent sweepers from sweeping. Would not be surprised to see this thing banned.

Again, just want to say metagame just started and everyone is trying to figure out good from bad, so no disrespect is intended.

I also think I got first post which is cool.

I would like to add that Shed Tail is far less broken than you might think because Cyclizar's HP stat is so low that any reasonably common unboosted hit (say, Fleur Cannon from defensive Magearna, or Judgment from Arceus) will break the Sub. It's a very, very good pivoting move for sure, but actually keeping the Sub up is next to impossible. Cyclizar's low HP and defenses also limit its ability to stay alive throughout a game, even with Regenerator - it's often taking 60% or more from even resisted hits like Palkia-Origin's Hydro Pump. It's absolutely the best spinner in the tier, even has Knock Off for any Gholdengo that comes in to spinblock, but I don't think it's S-tier worthy nor broken - it's simply a fast spinner/pivot which happens to be one of the best at doing both of those things.

 

[AlicieLizzie]

I would like to add that Shed Tail is far less broken than you might think because Cyclizar's HP stat is so low that any reasonably common unboosted hit (say, Fleur Cannon from defensive Magearna, or Judgment from Arceus) will break the Sub. It's a very, very good pivoting move for sure, but actually keeping the Sub up is next to impossible. Cyclizar's low HP and defenses also limit its ability to stay alive throughout a game, even with Regenerator - it's often taking 60% or more from even resisted hits like Palkia-Origin's Hydro Pump. It's absolutely the best spinner in the tier, even has Knock Off for any Gholdengo that comes in to spinblock, but I don't think it's S-tier worthy nor broken - it's simply a fast spinner/pivot which happens to be one of the best at doing both of those things.

I have to agree. Shed Tail is a very good thing for a lot of Pokémon (including one of my favourite niche picks in Kommo-o), but it’s easily outplayed. A Cyclizar Mirror often comes down to prediction of who’s going to use Taunt or not, and if you get taunted you do basically nothing. Cyclizar is honestly an amazing Pokémon, but it is completely useless outside of utility. It usually runs a set of Shed Tail/Rapid Spin/Taunt/Knock Off which means it has absolutely awful damage output. It has terrible bulk, and most things can just delete it. If you take more than 50% damage whenever you’re trying to shed tail, you get screwed. In my opinion, the best thing about it is the speed stat. Always outspeeding Palkia-Origin and Arceus forms is the only thing keeping this thing afloat. If it had even base 120, the Pokémon would be infinitely worse. Having to tie with Palkia-Origin would put you in very dangerous situations, and if you had 119 or less it would make the Pokémon have a huge weakness holding it back.

 

[IcyScream]

Rapid-Strike from B- to C+

It beats very little, and is outclassed by palafin. It's also slow, frail and loses to most of the best pokemon, zacian, magearna, palkia-o and a good chunk of arc sets. Its best attribute is hitting through protect, which is only common on espathra, which Urshifu single strike does better against. Because of the guaranteed crit on surging strikes, it also can do well in to cosmic power arc (the meta won't grow without banning cosmic power arc) but Urshifu dark hits more arc types for neutral damage. While not a bad pokemon in its own right, it's overshadowed by its brother, and not worth using on most teams.

 

[Leo Justice]

Obviously this metagame just started so not trying to be harsh at all.
C+ to around A-
When I took a first look at this metagame, I realized that speed would be so important in this metagame. I decided to use Iron Valiant cause it causes mass destruction in OU so why not UUbers too? Behind a ub fromShed Tail, this mon becomes nearly unbeatable. With a Swords Dance, Fighting Tera Close Combat set, it becomes so insanely powerful. Spirit Break is also strong for Dragons such as Palkia-Origin. Then Knock Off for Gholdengo and other Ghosts.
A+ to S
Not much is needed to be said. Shed Tail is broken and so is Substitute due to the popularity of sweepers in this metagame. Rapid Spin is also very good for Spike spamming Magearnas. I haven't tried this yet but I think that Taunt will become very popular to prevent sweepers from sweeping. Would not be surprised to see this thing banned.

Again, just want to say metagame just started and everyone is trying to figure out good from bad, so no disrespect is intended.

I also think I got first post which is cool.

Like Sword said. Iron valiant finds itself greatly outclassed by Zacian. As such, most teams have a check for Iron Valiant to where its best traits are significantly overshadowed. Its ability to be mixed is rather underwhelming because one of the best pokemon in the tier, Arceus, has 120 120 defenses. Its physical sets are greatly outclassed by Zacian and its special sets haven't been experimented on that much, but they struggle to put a dent on magearna. It also does not benefit from Shed tail because of its mediocre defensive typing and bad defenses, meaning the sub will always break unless the opponent uses a dragon move. Its main niche is being a worse Zacian that outruns other Zacian and being able to run random coverage moves like Liquidation. It outruns really key pokemon like Scarf chi-yu, booster energy Iron Moth, Scarf Landorus-I, etc, but it struggles to do much damage without a lot of boosts and requires a lot of support.

As for Cyclazar, the main reason it isn't S is because it just isn't as splashable as Magearna. It only has one job. Don't get me wrong, it is one of a kind job, being the only actually good spinner in the tier, a great pivot, and being faster than base 120 speed pokemon. But it being so one dimensional means that people can very easily tech to beat it. Any random scarf pokemon will ruin Cyclazar's day since its paper thin defenses mean that any neutral attack will put it too low to shed tail, and running scarf has been found to be incredibly inferior to running HDB as it limits your utility by too much.

 

[MehIDKMan]

Arceus-Dragon

so i've never quite been able to be active in the discord so forgive me if this is super obvious, but I was wondering what holds dragon arceus back? dragon looks like a solid defensive type in this meta while also hitting other dragons with what amounts to a more reliable form of draco after the plate. is it just that it has a poor matchup against the fairy ladden top tiers and opportunity cost compared to Arceus-Dark and -Poison?

 

[FrostyRandom]

so i've never quite been able to be active in the discord so forgive me if this is super obvious, but I was wondering what holds dragon arceus back? dragon looks like a solid defensive type in this meta while also hitting other dragons with what amounts to a more reliable form of draco after the plate. is it just that it has a poor matchup against the fairy ladden top tiers and opportunity cost compared to Arceus-Dark and -Poison?

So, the tier is run by Magearna and Zacian mostly, as well as Palkia O speed tying it. It has a bad matchup into the top tier mons but can actively do good against just about anything else

 

[derppudding404]

from not tiered to D

So today I learned that uubers was an official unofficial tier now, so I decided to try it out, deciding I'd like to try a triple fairy team at first. After a bit of thinking on how I'd deal with steel types such as dialga I decided I'd like to give conkelldurr a shot since with max speed adamant nature it always outran tr dialga, and always outran para'd dialga-origin, but that meant giving up a ton of bulk I could use, so eventually after I did some calcs and tested it in battles, I figured out that max hp eviolite Gurdurr lived dracos from deffensive dialga most of the time, as well as surviving strong hits such as palkia-origin's hydro pump and palafin-hero's banded wave crash, while still being able to 2 shot dialga with iron fist drain punch + mach punch, along with doing heavy damage to the other mentioned mons with the same attacking combo. Gurdurr can also provide support with knock off, taunt, and if you're running a team that doesn't mind not having hazards up, defog. Overall I think the tools Gurdurr offers makes it a barely viable pick on specific teams, hence why I think personally it deserves to be D tier, which already has another NFE.

 

[SwordIsBored]

from not tiered to D

So today I learned that uubers was an official unofficial tier now, so I decided to try it out, deciding I'd like to try a triple fairy team at first. After a bit of thinking on how I'd deal with steel types such as dialga I decided I'd like to give conkelldurr a shot since with max speed adamant nature it always outran tr dialga, and always outran para'd dialga-origin, but that meant giving up a ton of bulk I could use, so eventually after I did some calcs and tested it in battles, I figured out that max hp eviolite Gurdurr lived dracos from deffensive dialga most of the time, as well as surviving strong hits such as palkia-origin's hydro pump and palafin-hero's banded wave crash, while still being able to 2 shot dialga with iron fist drain punch + mach punch, along with doing heavy damage to the other mentioned mons with the same attacking combo. Gurdurr can also provide support with knock off, taunt, and if you're running a team that doesn't mind not having hazards up, defog. Overall I think the tools Gurdurr offers makes it a barely viable pick on specific teams, hence why I think personally it deserves to be D tier, which already has another NFE.

It’s simple enough to say that we have Urshifu and Arceus-Fighting in this tier to do the Fighting-type role and whilst Gurdurr’s moveset seems useful the combination of Knock Off + Defog can be used by a much better Pokemon in Mandibuzz. This seems like a massive momentum stopper, especially in a tier with so much fairies and it shows its weakness by having a Mach Punch that even Chi-Yu can shrug off at max health after hazards are removed. It has a good moveset, yeah but any team with the slightest offense will overwhelm this PU Pokemon.

 

[KineSquared]

from not tiered to D

Just to clarify (I'll add this to the main post): The minimum viability placement is c-, and really that's what rank you're suggesting. D Rank is the home for completely unviable mons where Ubers UU is the lowest power level they could possibly exist. If gastrodon fell from c-, it would just disappear off the lost because it is usable in other, "lower" tiers. If darkrai fell from c-, it would go to D because this is the lowest power metagame where it can be played. Basculin is only in D because there's something unique in this tier that literally cannot function in lower tiers (last respects)

 

[Tristan2903]

I don't know why samurott-hisui is not in this viability ranking because this is in my opinion the best suicide lead of the tier because it is so easy to have two or three layers of spikes and in this meta spin or defog is really hard.

 

[Leo Justice]

I don't know why samurott-hisui is not in this viability ranking because this is in my opinion the best suicide lead of the tier because it is so easy to have two or three layers of spikes and in this meta spin or defog is really hard.

The main reason it is not in the VR is because it is completely outclassed. Its poor stats really hold it back in the metagame, in particular its low speed and the fact that you need to use a dark type attack makes it so that you can be set up really easily. It usually cannot get more than one layer of spikes up and has a bad matchup into most other leads. Hell, even Palafin lead has a good matchup since it breaks the focus sash with flip turn meaning it will get one spike at best. It also has 4MMS. It wants to run aqua cutter, Aqua jet, sacred sword, ceaseless edge, and taunt. If it chooses to not run one of these, it will struggle against other lead matchups. Aqua cutter is for STAB against neutral targets (think Espathra if it teras), ceaseless edge for spikes, sacred sword to deal with Meowscarada (Who otherwise stomps you), aqua jet for priority against other suicide leads, and taunt because if not you are absolutely screwed against Stored power shift gear magearna who can use Hamurott as a way to get enough boosts where it is quite literally impossible to stop by any offensive team. Hamurott in general has a bad matchup into opposing HO, making it relatively mediocre.

The premier suicide lead is Meowscarada, and you can see it in the VR. It has a good matchup into most of the other matchups in the tier, especially Cyclazar which you outspeed, can taunt, knock off or even play rough for a kill. It also means it can't taunt you preventing you from getting 2 layers up. The critical hit of Meowscarada's flower trick, access to fast taunt, and even overgrow or protean, means that it still hits pretty hard if left unchecked. It also gets access to both spikes and tspikes, meaning it is way more flexible.

 

[IcyScream]

I don't know why samurott-hisui is not in this viability ranking because this is in my opinion the best suicide lead of the tier because it is so easy to have two or three layers of spikes and in this meta spin or defog is really hard.

that's because its not the best suicide lead, sash meow and chomp are far more consistent due to their considerably better speed/bulk. Along with this it faces stiff competition, and is directly threatened by magearna, the best pokemon in the tier, using its best set. Hammourot also has an extremely poor stat spread compared to the power level of ou, which also differs from ubers uu as hammourot is a spiker which threatens great tusk, the most common hazard remover, but cyclizar can shed tail all day in its face. It is still odd why it's not on the vr, as i have seen it a couple times, but it is quite bad.

 

[Clas]

Zacian to S (from S-)

I'd like to ask how a lot of Zacian sets are seemingly under the radar? This can quite literally pick and choose its checks and counters between HDB SD, LO SD (the broken set), and CB, along with an unholy amount of Tera flexibility (seriously, grass and rock are viable tera options bc it has 10 viable tera types), and I'll assume potentially Scarf soon. Teams require both offensive and defensive counters to this to perform well, and even then a stray Tera Blast can end that. Let me list this thing's Tera flexibility, just to paint a picture...

Spoiler

Dark - Crunch, because glowking wasnt dead enough
Electric - Wild Charge to remove Moltres and threaten Alomomola
Fairy - obvious
Fighting - Close Combat STAB, 2HKOes Crocalor with a Choice Band after minimal chip
Grass - Quag who
Ground - 3 counters exist to this one with PFangs - Quagsire, Moltres, Tera Steel Cresselia. Everything else is 2HKOed, and you bet it'll be LO.
Psychic - OHKOes Amoonguss and threatens Glowking, fun
Rock - CB only I'd hope, but this one technically beats everything bar Quagsire unless you tech on Trailblaze and now its not really anything.
Steel/Water - Oh, you thought offensive pressure worked? lol. Steel gives free setup on Poison-types, while Water removes the numerous Fires in the tier.

Now, I don't have many replays obviously, but when you can just do this, its quite obvious that it's just a bit good. Not gonna drag it out as I can see this speaking for itself in the upcoming UUbers tour but I really expect this to get banned at some point, or at least move to S with Magearna.

 

[FrostyRandom]

Zacian to S (from S-)

I'd like to ask how a lot of Zacian sets are seemingly under the radar? This can quite literally pick and choose its checks and counters between HDB SD, LO SD (the broken set), and CB, along with an unholy amount of Tera flexibility (seriously, grass and rock are viable tera options bc it has 10 viable tera types), and I'll assume potentially Scarf soon. Teams require both offensive and defensive counters to this to perform well, and even then a stray Tera Blast can end that. Let me list this thing's Tera flexibility, just to paint a picture...

Spoiler

Dark - Crunch, because glowking wasnt dead enough
Electric - Wild Charge to remove Moltres and threaten Alomomola
Fairy - obvious
Fighting - Close Combat STAB, 2HKOes Crocalor with a Choice Band after minimal chip
Grass - Quag who
Ground - 3 counters exist to this one with PFangs - Quagsire, Moltres, Tera Steel Cresselia. Everything else is 2HKOed, and you bet it'll be LO.
Psychic - OHKOes Amoonguss and threatens Glowking, fun
Rock - CB only I'd hope, but this one technically beats everything bar Quagsire unless you tech on Trailblaze and now its not really anything.
Steel/Water - Oh, you thought offensive pressure worked? lol. Steel gives free setup on Poison-types, while Water removes the numerous Fires in the tier.

Now, I don't have many replays obviously, but when you can just do this, its quite obvious that it's just a bit good. Not gonna drag it out as I can see this speaking for itself in the upcoming UUbers tour but I really expect this to get banned at some point, or at least move to S with Magearna.

So yeah i've said Zacian is the best mon in the tier due to this exact reason and with Mag being easily chipped over a match due to the steady coverage of several mons which are high up on the VRs as well, boots specifically tends to be its best item because it allows you to stop webs from affecting it but lum berry is quite useful as well for when you do not want to tera. CB limits you too much imo but the other options are extremely good. Scarf is too specific on what it counters but I get the idea, but if need be it can run Trailblaze for the speed boosts.

 

[IcyScream]

Zacian to S (from S-)

I'd like to ask how a lot of Zacian sets are seemingly under the radar? This can quite literally pick and choose its checks and counters between HDB SD, LO SD (the broken set), and CB, along with an unholy amount of Tera flexibility (seriously, grass and rock are viable tera options bc it has 10 viable tera types), and I'll assume potentially Scarf soon. Teams require both offensive and defensive counters to this to perform well, and even then a stray Tera Blast can end that. Let me list this thing's Tera flexibility, just to paint a picture...

Spoiler

Dark - Crunch, because glowking wasnt dead enough
Electric - Wild Charge to remove Moltres and threaten Alomomola
Fairy - obvious
Fighting - Close Combat STAB, 2HKOes Crocalor with a Choice Band after minimal chip
Grass - Quag who
Ground - 3 counters exist to this one with PFangs - Quagsire, Moltres, Tera Steel Cresselia. Everything else is 2HKOed, and you bet it'll be LO.
Psychic - OHKOes Amoonguss and threatens Glowking, fun
Rock - CB only I'd hope, but this one technically beats everything bar Quagsire unless you tech on Trailblaze and now its not really anything.
Steel/Water - Oh, you thought offensive pressure worked? lol. Steel gives free setup on Poison-types, while Water removes the numerous Fires in the tier.

Now, I don't have many replays obviously, but when you can just do this, its quite obvious that it's just a bit good. Not gonna drag it out as I can see this speaking for itself in the upcoming UUbers tour but I really expect this to get banned at some point, or at least move to S with Magearna.

I definitely agree, however, you did miss a couple things, HDB is really the only set worth considering, as lorb deals far too much chip to be comfortable, band and scarf are easy to play around, scarf even more so. Along with this, most of these tera types can be consolidated, no need to run tera electric, when tera ground to be immune to twave is good enough, or tera fire to be immune to wisp, no need to run tera grass when you can smoke quag with just trailblaze, and tera psychic, rock, and water are niche at best. You forgot to mention however, tera fire, one of the more common sets, to be immune to wisp and threaten grasseus (ammonguss is far to niche to have to play into) tera steel iron head which can 6-0 veil teams as an anti lead and smokes clef. Often it's stated that zacian "relies too much on its intrepid sword boost too be that big of a problem" however, due to zacians incredible stats, and typing, and incredible tera variety, it can reliably get an sd up and sweep teams anyway.

 

[Magcargo]

-> A-: Salt Cure has no switch ins in this tier. All the Clefs are Unaware and there are barely any viable regen mons. Nothing in the tier runs Cloak. Pair it with a few hazard setters like Magearna and watch the opponent scramble to avoid dying via passive damage, either via entry hazards or Salt Cure passive damage. Its defensive profile is also quite solid in general, particularly as the main Pokemon that can threaten it such as Magearna, Palafin, Palkia, etc. never actually want to switch into it lest they want to lose over half their health to Salt Cure chip + Hazards. Tera Water Garganacl with Iron Defense is also a great stop-gap to some of the more dangerous physical attackers in the tier such as Palafin and Baxcalibur. Iron Defense in general has little issue 6-0ing certain structures. Garganacl's biggest weakness is its own vulnerability to passive damage from hazards.

-> A-: Mostly reiterating my points from the metagame thread, but Moltres is amazing in this tier. Its defensive typing is excellent vs a number of threats such as Arceus-Fire, Zacian, some Magearna variants, and Arceus-Grass. It isn't a perfect check, but it performs fine enough in the role. It is able to compress a great deal of utility in one slot, between Flame Body, Wisp, and Roar. Roar is lethal in this tier vs the slew of Stored Power sweepers and entry hazards being so powerful, and Moltres having Recovery + not always being worn down by entry hazards is a big advantage over its competitors such as Arceus, Dialga, and the like. Because of Roar, this Pokemon is very rarely passive, which is a fantastic trait.

-> S: I'm not even nomming this up for Shed Tail, although that is a fantastic trait. This Pokemon is the only real form of hazard removal in the tier, which are extremely lethal in this format. As such, it feels like a borderline mandatory inclusion on most teams in order to not get completely curb stomped by hazard spam. Compressing both Rapid Spin AND Shed Tail to give a breaker like Zacian a free switch in, or a wall like Garganacl more breathing room in dealing with the opposition is a very powerful and warrants a placement in S-Rank imo.

 

[Ataki]

After hitting top 10, playing 200+ games, and building a few high-level teams, I finally feel qualified to share some nominations:

Zacian: S- -> S
Clas' post was efficient and perfectly stated one of the primary reasons for Zacian's effectiveness as an offensive superweapon; its versatility, especially factoring in Tera, is simply insane. 120 +1 Attack is already tough to switch into with Fairy/Fighting/Psychic coverage, but how about Fairy/Psychic or Electric or Fighting/STAB 80BP of any type? You get the picture. Good teams usually use Zacian and bring multiple ways to deal with it. Besides, most of its checks are either abused by Zach itself or lured/chipped by other offensive threats. It can break (and easily clean) with Choice Band, or destroy teams with SD Boots/LO/Lum.

I said this on Day Two of the post-association metagame:
On the Zacian-Hero point, I think it is easily the strongest and most centralizing presence in the tier. I see the meta (from a team perspective) developing around either being fast and strong enough to take Zach out first (Weather, Scarf [users], etc.), outlasting it through multiple checks and Tera baits (Balance/Stall), or enabling your own Zach to win first (Shed Tail, Trapping, etc.). We will see how healthy it is as things move forward.

All of this is without mentioning one of the best aspects of Zach's kit: its bulk at that speed and power. 92/115/115 is usable bulk for a mixed wall, let alone an offensive threat, allowing it to set up on stuff it shouldn't and trade even in bad matchups. Oh yeah, and it sets the bar for speed; its presence and ubiquity (used on almost half of teams) encourages a lot of Scarf usage that has never seen the light of day in other tiers (Landorus, my Greninja).

Arceus-Dark: S- -> A
I don't know how this fraud lasted this long in S-. Blood God (Cosmic Power + Body Press) isn't viable enough or splashable enough to justify its place here, nor is standard Defensive (which basically invests Tera to become Arceus-Water). CM Judge is cool but you know, Magearna.

Arceus-Fire: A+ -> S-
If Palkia-Origin is in S- for being a demonic offensive demon from Hell, Arceus-Fire belongs there for the same reason. SDKiller is one of the most consistent sweepers around, and it has more than enough defensive utility to earn a spot on many teams. It's biggest flaw is the hazard weakness, but even that is not enough of a thorn in its side. While underutilized, CM Tera Fairy and Tera Grass Trailblaze (shoutout njnp) are other options that laugh at traditional counterplay.

Dragapult: B+ -> A-
Fast pivot, outspeeds Zacian and Palkio. GG.
More seriously, Pult needs more support than it ever needed in OU, but the speed carries it and it's just strong enough to be a fine offensive presence. I have enjoyed using Specs Hex on a team with status support (easy to come by), and I have seen a decent amount of Double Status + Hex on ladder. It also gets points for Infiltrator allowing it to threaten KOs or inflict crippling status through Substitutes (very important in a Shed Tail meta!) Dragon Dance is also a cool sweeper.

Amoonguss: B- -> B
I have been using this set on my best team to patch specific holes and it has worked wonders. Being able to spread Poison, reliably break Palkio's Sub with Grass Knot, clear CM Arcei boosts (among other setup threats), chip the top steels with Stomping Tantrum (it has respectable 85 base Atk), and hang around to take repeated beatings is peerless role compression that deserves recognition. Eject Button and Boots are nice glue options on Rain and Sand teams, respectively, and Rocky Helmet is an option to punish Palafin. Honorable mention goes to Spore for its ability to provide free turns and disable opposing threats, which is incredibly valuable in this fast-paced metagame.

Spectrier: B- -> B
This is definitely an underrated and unexplored threat. I haven't built with it or used it yet, but is it stressful trying not to be swept by this thing in-game. It has bad coverage, but Ghost/Fairy is enough, with good boosting options, great stats, and Taunt/Sub to subvert defense.

 

[Clas]

I definitely agree, however, you did miss a couple things, HDB is really the only set worth considering, as lorb deals far too much chip to be comfortable, band and scarf are easy to play around, scarf even more so.

I highly disagree that HDB is the only good set (and NGL it's probably its worst behind Scarf, which is just niche tbf. LO and CB both tear apart teams without a perfect counter, and you have to try to punish it with some sort of revenge killer which is often easier said than done. LO recoil is also a non-issue, as you're spending maybe 5 or 6 turns doing damage before you've done enough, and your natural bulk allows you to barely live to do 5, 6, or even, 7 attacks. CB and LO are also the only way to 2HKO Crocalor, which is really notable. Tera Rock is also the only way to remove Moltres and Crocalor at the same time, and TBH you can probably remove Quagsire with just CB Play Rough. It's also really quite easy to offset LO chip IMO, as Rillaboom is actually really solid right now and pairs nicely with Zacian, while Shed Tail Cyclizar is probably obvious as another good partner.

Along with this, most of these tera types can be consolidated, no need to run tera electric, when tera ground to be immune to twave is good enough, or tera fire to be immune to wisp, no need to run tera grass when you can smoke quag with just trailblaze, and tera psychic, rock, and water are niche at best.

This is fair tbh, they were mostly there just to show how rediculous its Tera freedom is. Electric I listed for its ability to threaten Moltres better while being immune to Thunder Wave, but I agree it's niche. Tera Rock, though, is most definitely not with the current state of the meta appreciating it a ton as Glowking can be threatened by Tera Blast, Crunch, or a partner, while Amoonguss hates Psychic Fangs and is also 2HKOed by Tera Blast. Tera Grass is only mentioned because Quagsire otherwise can survive and be an issue later on, and being able to threaten Water-types is just nice. Definitely niche, though.

You forgot to mention however, tera fire, one of the more common sets, to be immune to wisp and threaten grasseus (ammonguss is far to niche to have to play into) tera steel iron head which can 6-0 veil teams as an anti lead and smokes clef.

I actually wanted to avoid Tera Fire at the time because I didn't see it as that good past being immune to burns and threatening only Magearna, who needs Flash Cannon in the first place and Tera Blast Ground is kind of just better IMO, and Grassceus, who I haven't actually seen be too big a threat but CM is at least somewhat of a scare. Tera Steel Iron Head is definitely nice as well, I should've rememered to include that when I made the original post but it was 4am soooo

Often it's stated that zacian "relies too much on its intrepid sword boost too be that big of a problem" however, due to zacians incredible stats, and typing, and incredible tera variety, it can reliably get an sd up and sweep teams anyway.

I actually haven't seen this whole "Intrepid Sword reliance" thing be true in practice yet except on HDB, which I super dislike as a set because of its overreliance on Intrepid Sword and coverage to be a big enough threat.

 

[Leo Justice]

I highly disagree that HDB is the only good set (and NGL it's probably its worst behind Scarf, which is just niche tbf. LO and CB both tear apart teams without a perfect counter, and you have to try to punish it with some sort of revenge killer which is often easier said than done. LO recoil is also a non-issue, as you're spending maybe 5 or 6 turns doing damage before you've done enough, and your natural bulk allows you to barely live to do 5, 6, or even, 7 attacks. CB and LO are also the only way to 2HKO Crocalor, which is really notable. Tera Rock is also the only way to remove Moltres and Crocalor at the same time, and TBH you can probably remove Quagsire with just CB Play Rough. It's also really quite easy to offset LO chip IMO, as Rillaboom is actually really solid right now and pairs nicely with Zacian, while Shed Tail Cyclizar is probably obvious as another good partner.

This is fair tbh, they were mostly there just to show how rediculous its Tera freedom is. Electric I listed for its ability to threaten Moltres better while being immune to Thunder Wave, but I agree it's niche. Tera Rock, though, is most definitely not with the current state of the meta appreciating it a ton as Glowking can be threatened by Tera Blast, Crunch, or a partner, while Amoonguss hates Psychic Fangs and is also 2HKOed by Tera Blast. Tera Grass is only mentioned because Quagsire otherwise can survive and be an issue later on, and being able to threaten Water-types is just nice. Definitely niche, though.

I actually wanted to avoid Tera Fire at the time because I didn't see it as that good past being immune to burns and threatening only Magearna, who needs Flash Cannon in the first place and Tera Blast Ground is kind of just better IMO, and Grassceus, who I haven't actually seen be too big a threat but CM is at least somewhat of a scare. Tera Steel Iron Head is definitely nice as well, I should've rememered to include that when I made the original post but it was 4am soooo

I actually haven't seen this whole "Intrepid Sword reliance" thing be true in practice yet except on HDB, which I super dislike as a set because of its overreliance on Intrepid Sword and coverage to be a big enough threat.

LO on zacian is probably the worst item you can use, outside of scarf. Zacian's bulk is really good, and sacrificing that bulk to use LO is not very good. The best (consistent) benefit to LO is being able to 2HKO Magearna at +3 with Close Combat, which tera ground does it better anyways.

The main issue with LO is two fold. Part of it is that you now become super weak to hazards and are easily revenged. webs fell off before the tier was launched despite it being so popular early on because HDB on Zacian became the standard set, as it completely patched up the matchup. Without HDB, now webs has an actually great matchup into Zacian due to it losing one of it's greatest tools, it's natural speed. But it's not just webs, but also just hazards in general. Do you really want to take one quarter of your health every time you swap in, making it worse every time you attack? It means that your good natural bulk, which allows you to take even some SE attacks like Sneasler's dire claw, or the best revenging tools in the format, Arceus' exteme speed and Palafin's Jet punch, is not good enough anymore. In fact, by using LO, you're helping them get to the point where Zacian will get revenge killed easier.

And the lack of power on Zacian is very noticeable once you realize that without the initial boost, zacian is just a worse Arceus. Speed is nice and all, but exteme speed is better. Arceus' better bulk, access to recovery, and better STAB moves thanks to the plate, means that it can still pose a big threat if it's forced out.

 

[Zmaslan256]

LO on zacian is probably the worst item you can use, outside of scarf. Zacian's bulk is really good, and sacrificing that bulk to use LO is not very good. The best (consistent) benefit to LO is being able to 2HKO Magearna at +3 with Cloae Combat, which tera ground does it better anyways.

The main issue with LO is two fold. Part of it is that you now become super weak to hazards and are easily revenged. webs fell off before the tier was launched despite it being so popular early on because HDB on Zacian became the standard set, as it completely patched up the matchup. Without HDB, now webs has an actually great matchup into Zacian due to it losing one of it's greatest tools, it's natural speed. But it's not just webs, but also just hazards in general. Do you really want to take one quarter of your health every time you swap in, making it worse every time you attack? It means that your good natural bulk, which allows you to take even some SE attacks like Sneasler's dire claw, or the best revenging tools in the format, Arceus' exteme speed and Palafin's Jet punch, is not good enough anymore. In fact, by using LO, you're helping them get to the point where Zacian will get revenge killed easier.

And the lack of power on Zacian is very noticeable once you realize that without the initial boost, zacian is just a worse Arceus. Speed is nice and all, but exteme speed is better. Arceus' better bulk, access to recovery, and better STAB moves thanks to the plate, means that it can still pose a big threat if it's forced out.

I don't think hazards matter too much to LO Zacian, and that's because of Cyclizar. Not only can Cyclizar just flat out remove hazards as the only consistent hazard removal in the tier, but using Shed Tail to get Zacian in kinda nullifies the effect of taking spikes damage. Cutting into your bulk on a LO set isn't great, but the immediate power difference when compared to the HDB set while having a substitute to prevent revenge killing. The only hazards that actually affect Zacian switching in from Shed Tail is toxic spikes and sticky web, but smart play with Cyclizar to remove those before switching in is always an option.

LO Zacian just deals sooooo much damage that I think it's worth running LO over HDB in about 90% of situations. Its wallbreaking power is just so good that it's worth sacrificing its long-term sweeping potential.

 

[vesp]

LO loses a lot compared to Boots, a full HP can tank an absurd amount of hits, like overheat, jet punch, hydro Pump, and Dire Claw for example. The strength of LO comes at the cost of 's excellent bulk, making it easier to revenge kill. Without boots you take spikes chip and after 1 round of LO recoil, your dies to all of the aforementioned attacks.