No offense but I really don't like this theorymon. Are we that desperate to give Mence some sort of slight niche over the other Dragons to a point where we're giving it an ability that would allow it to spam a priority 60 BP weak as fuck Flying move? No, don't even tell me that a bulky Defog set would be good. Why in the right mind would you ever want to use Defog Mence over Latios, Latias, Zapdos, or Mandibuzz? It doesn't have nearly as much useful resistances as the Lati twins or Zapdos, nor does it have the insane amount of bulk or defensive utility that Mandibuzz has. Priority Defog could have potential clutch moments I guess, but is it really THAT worth using over the other amazing defoggers in the tier that have other useful niches outside of just using Defog?
First off, a few of the Pokemon you listed aren't OHKOed by Aerial Ace without some significant residual damage.
252+ Atk Life Orb Salamence Aerial Ace vs. 4 HP / 0 Def Greninja: 200-238 (69.9 - 83.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock
252+ Atk Life Orb Salamence Aerial Ace vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Deoxys-S: 157-187 (65.1 - 77.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock
Also, I'm a bit confused with your EV spread. If the goal of this set is to not be a complete joke against offensive teams, why are you letting it get outrun by basically anything that doesn't give a single fuck about Aerial Ace? Many Pokemon such as Excadrill, Gyarados, Mega Tyranitar, Bisharp, Kyurem-B, Landorus-T, and Dragonite outspeed it and destroy it, and most of them are very commonly seen on offensive teams.
While Salamence has more "overall" power than Talonflame with its other moves, Talon's Brave Bird is still the much better option when it comes to reliably revenge killing Pokemon on offensive teams.
252+ Atk Choice Band Salamence Aerial Ace vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Deoxys-S: 181-214 (75.1 - 88.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252+ Atk Choice Band Talonflame Brave Bird vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Deoxys-S: 256-303 (106.2 - 125.7%) -- guaranteed OHKO
It's not even a competition. Talonflame is meant to function as a revenge killer, while your set seems to be geared more towards wallbreaking. Offensive teams are still a thorn in Mence's side because there are still a lot of Pokemon on offense that gives zero shits about a piss weak move. Talonflame's brute force still makes it more of a hassle for offensive teams because it's able to overwhelm them with nuking Brave Birds, Flare Blitz, or U-turning into something else. It doesn't need anything else to be dangerous. Talon also has the advantage of having very high Speed, which keeps it from having to spam Brave Bird all the time. All in all, it would still not be a better tool against offensive teams than Talonflame.
Last but not least, with the exception of Talonflame, all of these Pokemon need to be HEAVILY weakened if you want the DD set to be able to bypass them, especially the latter two.
+1 252+ Atk Life Orb Salamence Aerial Ace vs. 248 HP / 136 Def Mega Scizor: 146-173 (42.5 - 50.4%) -- 94.1% chance to 2HKO after Stealth Rock
+1 252+ Atk Life Orb Salamence Aerial Ace vs. 4 HP / 0 Def Thundurus: 144-170 (48 - 56.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock and Leftovers recovery
And giving up valuable coverage just to hit Talonflame and a few other goons a tiny bit harder isn't really worth being walled by Steel-types like Skarmory or Heatran. DD Mence would still be pretty garbage.
All in all, Gale Wings really doesn't do much for Mence outside of just giving it something to pick off very frail Pokemon and a very select few Pokemon on offense. I would go as far to say that in most instances it other abilities would still be superior. Intimidate gives it a few set up opportunities if you're balsy enough to use Mence in OU, while Moxie lets it clean up easier if you manage to get rid of every revenge killer. I know that we're trying to be a bit creative here, but I don't see how Gale Wings Mence is better then just giving it fucking Brave Bird, which would at least give it a very powerful secondary STAB move to spam on Scarf or DD sets. Or just go all out and give it Aerilate ffs.
I just feel like some of these theorymons have been pretty subpar overall. Like Electric/Dark Luxray I almost thought it was some kind of joke or something. How would a simple retyping make something as shitty as Luxray OU viable? Isn't the goal of this thread to make something a lot more OU viable, not just more viable in general? Do more stuff like Ghost/Fairy Mismagius or Tough Claws Drapion, at least those things have a lot more potential then a shitty Electric-type that finally gets to have a STAB Crunch.
I don't mean to derail this thread, but I'm just so confused as to how something like Gale Wings Mence is being theorymoned over a million other better possibilities.
I know most of those Pokemon aren't OHKOed by Aerial Ace, the point is to revenge kill them after SR and a couple of LO rounds.
Of course Talonflame is a better priority user and better against offense in general, but Salamence can power through some defensive cores way easier, and has no problem 2HKOing Pokemon such as Rotom-W, Tyranitar, Slowbro, physically defensive Hippowdon, Landorus-T, Rocky Helmet physically defensive Garchomp, Mandibuzz, and Zapdos, which surely must count for something. One of Salamence's biggest problems in this generation has been lack of Speed and thus lack of usefulness against faster foes, which combined with his not so great wallbreaking skills made it mostly outclassed. However, the ability to act as a decent wallbreaker while being able to KO many faster threats with some previous damage makes it more viable than before.
About my spread, you are right about outspeeding those Pokemon, and Atk would probably be the best place to take EVs from, that's why i stated that the EV spread was made pretty hastily and was not optimized at all.
I agree that Aerial Ace wouldn't be so great on DD sets, but it's an extra option that is worth looking into, seeing as Talonflame is the main revenge killer for some offensive teams.
And yes, i would pick decently hard hitting priority over lol Moxie (have fun getting two consecutive kills with Salamence), or Intimidate, which is not that great on wallbreaker Salamence anyway, as Salamence usually likes to come in against defensive Pokemon that can't do much back, or weak pivots, or after something gets KOed.
Finally, the goal of this thread is to make the Pokemon we choose more viable than before, or viable in general if they weren't before. To what degree we succeed in doing this depends on many factors, such as quality of submissions, my own judgment, and quality of voters. Sometimes we manage to come up with great OU Pokemon, sometimes not, it's just how it goes.
If this many people are complaining about such an obviously inferior choice, why is the answer a warning for them to stop instead of, perhaps, conceding that it's a bad mon (as you yourself are even seeming to admit) and moving on to a new bunch that might make for actual positive discussion?
If you're not willing to allow people to be critical of bad theorymons (note: criticizing is not "bitching"), then discussion will just stop until the next round anyway. Might as well speed up the process and keep this thread productive.
If by being critical you mean one liners such as 'this theorymon sucks', then no, i don't want this kind of criticism in this thread. There is a reason we have a process and i just don't do anything i want, and my job is to make sure this process is followed correctly. I don't care if you or other people don't find this theorymon interesting, it's what the majority of us decided to talk about and you must respect that. And i definitely allow anyone to be as critical as he wants about any theorymon, as long as he actually posts something other than 'this theorymon sucks''. That's the point of discussing the theorymon in the first place, to see how bad or good it would be if it existed.
tl;dr if you want post something constructive, otherwise wait until the next voting stage, simple as that.
