Other XY OU Viability Ranking Thread (V2) (Last update on post #5189)

[alexwolf]

Also, i forgot to say that the argument ''Espeon / Vaporeon / etc are useless outside of Baton Pass teams'' means nothing. Kingdra and Kabutops are useless outside of rain teams, Deo-D is useless outside of HO, etc, this means nothing if the playstyle that those Pokemon should be used in is one of the best in OU.

 

[Karxrida]

Also, i forgot to say the the argument ''Espeon / Vaporeon / etc are useless outside of Baton Pass teams'' means nothing. Kingdra and Kabutops are useless outside of rain teams, Deo-D is useless outside of HO, etc, this means nothing if the playstyle that those Pokemon should be used in is one of the best in OU.

Deo-D can run a bulkier set with Rocky Helmet, Recover, Taunt, SR, and Seissmic Toss/Knock Off that can set up Rocks more than once for balanced and Bulky Offense, but otherwise your point is valid.

 

[Don Honchkrorleone]

Also, i forgot to say the the argument ''Espeon / Vaporeon / etc are useless outside of Baton Pass teams'' means nothing. Kingdra and Kabutops are useless outside of rain teams, Deo-D is useless outside of HO, etc, this means nothing if the playstyle that those Pokemon should be used in is one of the best in OU.

But Deo-D is usable in balance and bulkier teams with his Recover set. And if Kingdra is useless outside of rain teams then why did QC approved the mighty Hidden Power Poison CritDra set? I understand your point, but it creates a paradoxal loophole, because SmashPass is also broken. If the BP staples (except Scolipede, I'm indifferent on moving it up or not) move up, so need Smeargle, Gorebyss and Huntail as well.

 

[rachet67]

But Deo-D is usable in balance and bulkier teams with his Recover set. And if Kingdra is useless outside of rain teams then why did QC approved the mighty Hidden Power Poison CritDra set? I understand your point, but it creates a paradoxal loophole, because SmashPass is also broken. If the BP staples (except Scolipede, I'm indifferent on moving it up or not) move up, so need Smeargle, Gorebyss and Huntail as well.

Chansey is ranked A- because of the support it gives stall teams, not because of how well it performs outside of them. Smash pass, at least in OU, is far from broken, and its users have many flaws and are often unable to do their job properly. Baton Pass on the other hand can be very effective, and Espeon and Scoliopede provide invaluable support to them.

 

[the-bumper-car]

I agree Shuckle needs to go up at least to B-. Unlike shitty hazard setters like Galvantula or Forretress, it actually can do something outside of the lead position. It can switch in mid-battle to put up hazards again. It has other roles aside from hazard setting. It has multiple sets with different means of countering it. The only thing stopping it from going up higher, IMHO, is the fact that its utter lack of offensive presence makes it too similar to Deoxys-D (with shittier stats and a different typing) so all the stuff people are running to stop Deoxys-D will also probably stop Shuckle.

 

[alexwolf]

But Deo-D is usable in balance and bulkier teams with his Recover set. And if Kingdra is useless outside of rain teams then why did QC approved the mighty Hidden Power Poison CritDra set? I understand your point, but it creates a paradoxal loophole, because SmashPass is also broken. If the BP staples (except Scolipede, I'm indifferent on moving it up or not) move up, so need Smeargle, Gorebyss and Huntail as well.

Deo-D might be ''viable'' with the set you mentioned on balanced teams, yet i haven't see anyone use it on tour play or even at the top of the ladder, which suggests that it's just not good enough. Same goes with CritDra, it's really not a good Pokemon. And when i say ''useless'' i don't mean it by the strict sense of the word, rather not S / A / B rank worthy, so it could still have small niche out of it's preferred playstyle but that niche is so small that it doesn't really affect the Pokemon as a whole, which is the case with Deo-D, Kingdra, Kabutops, and BP staples such as Vaporeon, Mr. Mime, and Espeon. Those Pokemon are ranked where they are 95% because of how good they are in their preferred playstyle (Kingdra in rain HO, Deo-D in HO in general, and BP staples in BP teams, even though they are not ranked where they should be atm).

Also, i already addressed Smeargle as a staple on BP teams, and as for Gorebyss and Huntail, this is an entirely different matter, as those are used as quickpassers on offensive teams, not on dedicated BP chains.

 

[Jaiho]

Also, i forgot to say that the argument ''Espeon / Vaporeon / etc are useless outside of Baton Pass teams'' means nothing. Kingdra and Kabutops are useless outside of rain teams, Deo-D is useless outside of HO, etc, this means nothing if the playstyle that those Pokemon should be used in is one of the best in OU.

The reason why I wouldn't bring them up ranks (except for maybe Scolipede), is that for the most part, they are cogs in a machine. Without one part of it, the system fails. A cog itself is useless; if you try to sell it, you get next to nothing. The machine however, is greater than the sum of its parts, and is worth a lot more. While BP might be immensely powerful as a collective, most of the individual parts are more or less awful. Therein lies the key difference between the pokemon you named. Kingdra and Kabutops are extremely good, but only on rain teams, but they don't need the excessive support from every poke on the team. On a rain team, the only poke required is Politoed. Because Kingdra and Kabutops need support from it, they were placed accordingly in B+. BP requires that Scolipede, Espeon, Mr. Mime, Vaporeon, Sylveon, And Smeargle/Zapdos be on the team. each of these 'mons needs the support of all the others around them, thus dropping them into a lower viability ranking.

 

[rachet67]

The reason why I wouldn't bring them up ranks (except for maybe Scolipede), is that for the most part, they are cogs in a machine. Without one part of it, the system fails. A cog itself is useless; if you try to sell it, you get next to nothing. The machine however, is greater than the sum of its parts, and is worth a lot more. While BP might be immensely powerful as a collective, most of the individual parts are more or less awful. Therein lies the key difference between the pokemon you named. Kingdra and Kabutops are extremely good, but only on rain teams, but they don't need the excessive support from every poke on the team. On a rain team, the only poke required is Politoed. Because Kingdra and Kabutops need support from it, they were placed accordingly in B+. BP requires that Scolipede, Espeon, Mr. Mime, Vaporeon, Sylveon, And Smeargle/Zapdos be on the team. each of these 'mons needs the support of all the others around them, thus dropping them into a lower viability ranking.

But this thread isn't meant to rank pokemon according to how good they are in general, its meant to rank them according to how viable they are. People who use full BP deserve to die, but full BP is a reasonably viable strategy, and on full BP Espeon is mandatory. Even though Espeon sucks stand alone, it provides invaluable support, and is extremely viable if you're looking for BP members. Seeing that its absolutely mandatory, shouldn't it be ranked as high as we deem full BP as a viable strategy?

Edit: If it is a strategy that is just un-competative and match-up reliant (it is), it just needs to be banned. But until it is banned, and while it still has reasonable success against the ladder, I don't see how we can just ignore it.

 

[Flamer]

The reason why I wouldn't bring them up ranks (except for maybe Scolipede), is that for the most part, they are cogs in a machine. Without one part of it, the system fails. A cog itself is useless; if you try to sell it, you get next to nothing. The machine however, is greater than the sum of its parts, and is worth a lot more. While BP might be immensely powerful as a collective, most of the individual parts are more or less awful. Therein lies the key difference between the pokemon you named. Kingdra and Kabutops are extremely good, but only on rain teams, but they don't need the excessive support from every poke on the team. On a rain team, the only poke required is Politoed. Because Kingdra and Kabutops need support from it, they were placed accordingly in B+. BP requires that Scolipede, Espeon, Mr. Mime, Vaporeon, Sylveon, And Smeargle/Zapdos be on the team. each of these 'mons needs the support of all the others around them, thus dropping them into a lower viability ranking.

I actually made a similar post to this a few weeks back when someone first mentioned moving up members of BP. When you think about it, they require an entire team of support, which classifies them as C/C- in the viability descriptions. Just because collectively the mons are good, apart (most of them) are complete and utter shit. Keep them all where they are unless they are able to do something on their own.

 

[Andrew]

Can Roserade drop to C- or even D Rank? It's complete and utter shit and it has not served me of any use in any of my battles testing it. It has lower stats than Mega Venusaur everywhere bar Speed and Special Attack by only three points. 90 Speed isn't as amazing as it used to and Roserade has terrible bulk to take hits, 105 SpD is decent, but it's hampered by 60 HP, along with a middling 55 Defense. Roserade's main niche has always been setting Toxic Spikes, but honestly, that's just bad nowadays, with Excadrill and Defog being so present, it really doesn't matter as much as it used to. Only 12 of all S, A+, A, and A- Pokemon care about Toxic Spikes and are even impacted by it. It lost that niche, and what it does have is Technician Hidden Power, which is cool I guess, but it's not enough to save it from being walled with that horrid type coverage. With Hidden Power Ground it's left walled by Skarmory, with Fire, it's walled by Heatran, it's not that hard to switch into and I've failed to ever have issues with it, I've seen it maybe once in all my battles, and it was a shit team in the low 1200s anyways. It struggles against all priority, except Azumarill I guess. It has three very common weaknesses - Fire-, Ice-, and Flying-type weaknesses, and now with Rain died down from last generation, it can't even sponge their special hits. Sleep Powder is now available alongside Toxic Spikes and Spikes, but Roserade is just not good anymore. It's not Gen 4 anymore and Roserade does not belong with Pokemon like Tornadus and Magnezone, it belongs with shit like Jirachi and Cloyster, both formerly good Pokemon, but lost effectiveness as the metagame adapted.

While overall I agree that Roserade isn't *that* great, it has served useful to me in an offensive FWG core up to the 1700 ELO ranking..whether that means anything is debatable, so I will try to support Roserade with a few other thoughts.

First, grass types are in short supply/hard to come by/generally bad in this metagame with fly spam/priority and grass generally isn't seen as a good type, however grass poison as seen on mega venu, especially with his extra fire/ice resistances, is excellent. However, I don't think Roserade should be compared to M-Venu Defensively - rather, offensively, Roserade has excellent 125 sp A along with decent 90 speed, along with a good defensive typing that resists prominent fighting, water, electric and fairy, as well as 4x resist grass (lol). Like Breloom, Roserade has similar defensive stats - low hp and defense, but a much higher special defense than Breloom. Roserade also falls just short of Breloom's excellent when fully invested 130 Attack which is further boosted by technician. What a surprise, Roserade also has Tech, as well as another useful ability in Natural Cure.

just a few calcs:

252 SpA Life Orb Technician Roserade Hidden Power Fire vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Mega Scizor: 359-426 (104.3 - 123.8%) -- guaranteed OHKO
252 SpA Life Orb Technician Roserade Hidden Power Fire vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Ferrothorn: 322-385 (91.4 - 109.3%) -- 87.5% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
252 SpA Life Orb Technician Roserade Hidden Power Fire vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Skarmory: 333-393 (99.7 - 117.6%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock

252 SpA Life Orb Roserade Sludge Bomb vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Azumarill: 445-525 (110.1 - 129.9%) -- guaranteed OHKO
She has bulk enough to at least counter Ass Vest Azu with Play rough + Aqua Jet, and can come in on Choice Band Azu, take a Play Rough or Waterfall and outspeed

252 SpA Life Orb Roserade Leaf Storm vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Rotom-W: 369-437 (121.3 - 143.7%) -- guaranteed OHKO

Note that Roserade is faster than these mons

252 SpA Life Orb Roserade Leaf Storm vs. 4 HP / 0 SpD Landorus: 324-382 (101.2 - 119.3%) -- guaranteed OHKO
---Landorus can't switch in
and she can always threaten switch ins/slower mons with a sleep powder

252 SpA Life Orb Technician Roserade Hidden Power Fire vs. 32 HP / 0 SpD Bisharp: 333-393 (119.3 - 140.8%) -- guaranteed OHKO
252+ Atk Life Orb Bisharp Sucker Punch vs. 4 HP / 0 Def Roserade: 259-305 (98.8 - 116.4%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock
---Bisharp can't switch in, Bisharp Priority Sucker punch puts a damper on Roserade

252 SpA Life Orb Technician Roserade Hidden Power Fire vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Aegislash-Shield: 177-208 (54.6 - 64.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock and Leftovers recovery
--Aegislash can't switch in, although Aegi beats her 1 on 1 with Shadow Ball + Shadow sneak

252 SpA Life Orb Technician Roserade Hidden Power Fire vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Mega Mawile: 260-307 (85.5 - 100.9%) -- 43.8% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
252+ Atk Huge Power Mega Mawile Sucker Punch vs. 4 HP / 0 Def Roserade: 234-276 (89.3 - 105.3%) -- 37.5% chance to OHKO
---I think full HP Mega Maw has the upper hand here.

252 SpA Life Orb Roserade Sludge Bomb vs. 4 HP / 0 SpD Thundurus: 224-265 (74.6 - 88.3%) -- 93.8% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
252 SpA Life Orb Thundurus Hidden Power Ice vs. 4 HP / 0 SpD Roserade: 161-190 (61.4 - 72.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock
---Thundurus can't really switch in, he wins 1 on 1

252 SpA Life Orb Roserade Sludge Bomb vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Clefable: 408-484 (103.5 - 122.8%) -- guaranteed OHKO
252 SpA Life Orb Roserade Sludge Bomb vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Clefable: 289-343 (73.3 - 87%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

252 SpA Life Orb Roserade Leaf Storm vs. 4 HP / 0 SpD Excadrill: 382-450 (105.5 - 124.3%) -- guaranteed OHKO
--beats non scarf/sand rush variants, exca can't switch in

252 SpA Life Orb Roserade Leaf Storm vs. 4 HP / 0 SpD Garchomp: 308-364 (86 - 101.6%) -- 50% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
252 Atk Garchomp Earthquake vs. 4 HP / 0 Def Roserade: 232-274 (88.5 - 104.5%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock
---I guess chomp can't reliably switch in? but he is gonna RK every time with SR up

252 SpA Life Orb Roserade Leaf Storm vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Hippowdon: 476-562 (113.3 - 133.8%) -- guaranteed OHKO

252 SpA Life Orb Roserade Sludge Bomb vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Zapdos: 204-242 (53.1 - 63%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock and Leftovers recovery
--she is faster than generally used phys Def Zapdos though loses to offensive variants.

252 SpA Life Orb Roserade Leaf Storm vs. 4 HP / 0 SpD Gyarados: 269-317 (81 - 95.4%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock
252 SpA Life Orb Roserade Leaf Storm vs. 4 HP / 0 SpD Mega Gyarados: 429-507 (129.2 - 152.7%) -- guaranteed OHKO
252+ Atk Mold Breaker Mega Gyarados Ice Fang vs. 4 HP / 0 Def Roserade: 252-298 (96.1 - 113.7%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock
--she is faster, so I think she wins 1v1. After a boost tho, no

252 SpA Life Orb Roserade Leaf Storm vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Landorus-T: 321-380 (84 - 99.4%) -- 75% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
--can't switch in, loses to max speed/scarf 1 on 1

252 SpA Life Orb Roserade Sludge Bomb vs. 4 HP / 0 SpD Breloom: 564-665 (215.2 - 253.8%) -- guaranteed OHKO
252+ Atk Life Orb Technician Breloom Mach Punch vs. 4 HP / 0 Def Roserade: 99-117 (37.7 - 44.6%) -- 4.7% chance to 2HKO after Stealth Rock
--sash variants win reliably with a rock tomb + Mach Punch/4Hit bullet seed

questionable, i.e. bad matchups include Zard X/Y, Mamoswine, latios, Chansey, M-Venusaur, Deoxys-S, Talonflame, plus a lot of other shit.
I basically wanted to try to support reasoning for her being OK as having an enjoyable experience with using Roserade on a team previosly.

A 'bulky' set trying to lay spikes/t spikes may be outclassed, but i think an all out attacker set may be useful imo
also sorry if these calcs are skewed or anything, i tried to be as objective as possible but i might have messed up in a couple places

I would say she plays similarly to Breloom in that she can't switch in on much but once you get her in safely she can break stuff not named Heatran/Chansey
She also loses in a lot of 1 on 1 situations due to 'average' speed, but not a lot really wants to switch in on her, but then the question is, why would you switch out in the first place? probably if you were slower and she was threatening with 125 sp A LO Leaf Storm, sludge bomb, or tech hp fire

btw, I am speaking of a set such as this:

Roserade @ Life Orb
Ability: Technician
EVs: 252 SAtk / 252 Spd / 4 HP
Timid Nature
- Leaf Storm
- Sludge Bomb
- Hidden Power [Fire]
- Sleep Powder

yes, with a moveset of Leaf Storm / Sludge Bomb / Hidden Power Fire / Sleep Powder she is horribly walled by Heatran as you said Ches, and ground with Skarm.

Also, whether she moves up or down is mostly irrelevent to me, I just wanted to try show a few things she can do. Yes she has the defences of a paper bag like breloom, speed could be better, but she has enough power and coverage to get by, as well as having an acceptable speed tier for slower mons and having the option of sleep powder/natural cure/spikes. Priority fucks her as well as bird spam, so there's that, but I generally don't believe she's quite as bad as you make her out to be Chesnaught.
She definately has her amt of flaws, and i may have messed up here in some of my attempted reasoning (im not very good at this #tryhard), but there you go, I at least think she shouldn't drop to D rank ;~; grass waifu fuk this shit pokemon suks balls i hate all of you i wish i could go back to playing pokemon without getting pulled into all these goddam arguments and figure shit out bymeslf i guess i just have to kepp trying to meddle and stick my dick in where it doesn't belong ;~; i need a fkn girlfriend

 

[Jaiho]

But this thread isn't meant to rank pokemon according to how good they are in general, its meant to rank them according to how viable they are. People who use full BP deserve to die, but full BP is a reasonably viable strategy, and on full BP Espeon is mandatory. Even though Espeon sucks stand alone, it provides invaluable support, and is extremely viable if you're looking for BP members. Seeing that its absolutely mandatory, shouldn't it be ranked as high as we deem full BP as a viable strategy?

Edit: If it is a strategy that is just un-competative and match-up reliant (it is), it just needs to be banned. But until it is banned, and while it still has reasonable success against the ladder, I don't see how we can just ignore it.

I agree with you, BP is a very viable strategy. However, we are ranking pokemon, not a playstyle. Espeon requires enormous team support to do what it has to do, and by placing Espeon in A- or whatever, we are ranking Espeon with the support, rather than Espeon objectively, based on its own merits. I could just as easily say that since Keldeo is often paired with a pursuit trapper and a m-Venu counter, it should be S-rank, or that Chansey should go up in rank since it is backed by physically defensive walls on a stall team. However, that is not what this thread is about. If we were ranking team archetypes, BP would be near the top. But if we look objectively, Espeon's niche is bouncing back status moves, Vaporeon's is being water immune and boosting its defense, Mr. Mime's is being immune to sound based moves, and Smeargle's is that it can sleep things and ingrain. Without considering any factor other than the 'mon itself, these are small niches, comparable to many of the 'mons populating C Rank, which is where I believe they should stay.

 

[the-bumper-car]

Ok, my assessment of the viability of BP Abuse pokemon
Mr. Mime - Still at D. Literally the worst mon on BP teams, with an extremely specific niche (countering Perish Song, which is an extremely specific counter to BP teams run on either Rain Teams (Politoed) or mons that have way, way better things to do). Until Perish Song or Rain Teams become more popular, then it should stay here.
Vaporeon - Up to C+. Works as a back-up Def booster via Acid Armor, back-up Regen passer via Aqua Ring, and can provide Burn support via Scald. Still not that great, and ultimately replaceable.
Smeargle - Up to B. We already know what Smeargle's problems are, but it is irreplaceable on current BP team builds thanks to its ability to restart a broken BP chain. Its presence gives BP chains a resilience that makes them infuriating to beat.
Espeon - Up to B-. Yes, you can't build a BP chain team without it. It still gives too many headaches for a BP team - it is one of the "weak links" that makes it easiest to break a BP team.
Sylveon - Stays at B. It's additional uses outside of a BP team doesn't change the fact that it's only got one set on a BP team.
Scolipede - Stays at B+. We can argue that it deserves to go to A-, but I'm not confident that its being the other major contributor to how broken BP teams are deserves to push it to the next tier.
Zapdos - Goes up to A. A good mon that can be broken under specific circumstances.

 

[Eievui-Nymphia]

About Goodra, I use it in that famous Assault Vest set in early XY, and it works relatively well. The problem with Goodra is that the metagame is so physically oriented that against teams goodra is not worth it if it can check one/two pokemon at best. But against special attacker, his Assault Vest set makes her one of the best special wall of the metagame, alongside the things of Snorlax and Cresselia and only behind the pink blobs (Chansey and Blissey).

But this pokemon is not means for stall, it's meant to bulky offense (having a wall like that is those types of teams with offensive presence is great). The Assault Vest has the advantage of not having OHKOed by Specs Latios' Draco Meteor, which is one of the most powerful moves in the metagame. Also, it can avoid an 2HKO from every Ice special attack (except MAbomasnow Blizzard) and it's not 2HKOed by any fairy special move except MGardevoir's Hyper Voice and the rare Specs Sylveon's Hyper Voice.

I think C rank is the right fit. It's an effective way to deal with special attacker with also having offensive presence and an excellent movepool but the metagame is around physical strangth, who is Goodra's main flaw.

I hope that this thing drops to UU. In that metagame, it's not that bulky, it's a metagame more specially based, but there's enough physiucal pokemon to keep it in check.

About Celebi and Jirachi, I think that Psychic types are inferior in this metagame unless they have a specific niche because the presence of Aegislash, who makes every Ghost-type bar itself and Gengar unviable.

 

[Ninja Charizard]

Ok, my assessment of the viability of BP Abuse pokemon
Mr. Mime - Still at D. Literally the worst mon on BP teams, with an extremely specific niche (countering Perish Song, which is an extremely specific counter to BP teams run on either Rain Teams (Politoed) or mons that have way, way better things to do). Until Perish Song or Rain Teams become more popular, then it should stay here. Also Roar, Dragon Tail, and Hyper Voice. The first one is useful because you can't always bring Espeon and you don't always have Ingrain already set up. The second one is also pretty good, assuming Sylveon is not easiliy available. The last one is because otherwise Mega Gardevoir wrecks the bp team.
Vaporeon - Up to C+. Works as a back-up Def booster via Acid Armor, back-up Regen passer via Aqua Ring, and can provide Burn support via Scald. Still not that great, and ultimately replaceable. It's a deffensive booster that takes hits much better than Scolipide, and it's the default switch in against physical attackers. It's pretty hard to boost defense with Scolipede only.
Smeargle - Up to B. We already know what Smeargle's problems are, but it is irreplaceable on current BP team builds thanks to its ability to restart a broken BP chain. Its presence gives BP chains a resilience that makes them infuriating to beat. True. Also Ingrain.
Espeon - Up to B-. Yes, you can't build a BP chain team without it. It still gives too many headaches for a BP team - it is one of the "weak links" that makes it easiest to break a BP team. True.
Sylveon - Stays at B. It's additional uses outside of a BP team doesn't change the fact that it's only got one set on a BP team. Irrelevant. It doesn't matter if that's the best set. Sylveon is nearly irreplaceable in BP teams.
Scolipede - Stays at B+. We can argue that it deserves to go to A-, but I'm not confident that its being the other major contributor to how broken BP teams are deserves to push it to the next tier. Yeah, but remove it and the BP team will have a much harder job at the beginning of the match.
Zapdos - Goes up to A. A good mon that can be broken under specific circumstances. True.

 

[escarlata]

View attachment 13774 Mantine for C/C+ Mantine is heavily un-appreciated for what it can do on teams (mainly stall/semi-stall). Mantine has the ability to solidly check the three most dangerous sp.attacks in the OU tier, landorus i, keldeo and mega zard y. Mantine can switch into infinite earth powers from lando, countless hydro/scalds from keldeo and plenty of fire blasts from mega zard Y and attack back with scalds/air slashes. Although these are all great pros, mantine has quite a few things keeping it from being an A ranked pokemon. Firstly Mantine has a annoying weankess to stealth rock. This limits the amount of times it can switch into keldeo and Zard y withought defog/spin support (unless it wants to run defog itself which is too much 4mms and it is not a good defogger anyway). Another problem is that mantine has pretty bad defence and needs (and I mean needs) to be backed up by physical walls that check the heavily physically offencive threats of the OU meta. Another problem mantine has is its lack of recovery, mantine has no roost or whatever and that means withought wish support specially offensive cores such as zard y and keldeo can break through mantine. Although these are all bad flaws, mantines worst flaw by far is its hellish 4x weakness to electric. Thundurus, one of the most common OU threats can easily KO it with a thunderbolt, mega man and raikou are also decently popular high ladder and these all cause hell for mantine, and withought a ground type or two mantine will be unable to do much work against teams with thundy, mega man and raikou. Although these are all crippling flaws, with the right support mantine can be such a valuable asset to many stall teams and should definately be in the high C's.

Fun fact: Mantine is only marginally bulkier than Gyarados specially and much weaker physically and has much worst utility moves. I'd rather use RestTalk Gyara over Mantine anytime.
252 SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Landorus Focus Blast vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Gyarados: 101-120 (30.5 - 36.2%) -- 48.1% chance to 3HKO
252 SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Landorus Focus Blast vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Mantine: 75-90 (27.6 - 33.2%) -- guaranteed 4HKO

In other words, why would anyone run Mantine for that role instead of Gyarados?

 

[escarlata]

mantines sp.defence is something like 40 superior

And loses 30 in terms of base HP. And has terrible physical bulk. And has no phasing move. And has no offensive presence whatsoever.

0 SpA Mew Psychic vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Gyarados: 97-115 (29.3 - 34.7%) -- 9.1% chance to 3HKO
0 SpA Mew Psychic vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Mantine: 73-87 (26.9 - 32.1%) -- guaranteed 4HKO

0 SpA Mew Psyshock vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Mantine: 117-138 (43.1 - 50.9%) -- 3.9% chance to 2HKO
0 SpA Mew Psyshock vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Gyarados: 105-124 (31.7 - 37.4%) -- 88.8% chance to 3HKO

Mantine is about (34.7-32.1)/32.1 = 8.1% more specially bulky than Gyarados, but Gyarados is about (50.9-37.4)/37.4 = 33.7% more physically bulky, and that is not even counting in Intimidate. Why would anyone in their right mind rather have 8.1% more special bulk at the expense of 33.7% physical bulk?

 

[Salt]

In other words, why would anyone run Mantine for that role instead of Gyarados?

Mantine gets Defog, Gyarados doesn't. Obviously this isn't huge but it makes it usable on defensive teams. D-rank should be fine, placing it anywhere above that is a bit too generous because Gyarados is 100% better otherwise.

 

[Ajwf]

Fun fact: Mantine is only marginally bulkier than Gyarados specially and much weaker physically and has much worst utility moves. I'd rather use RestTalk Gyara over Mantine anytime.
252 SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Landorus Focus Blast vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Gyarados: 101-120 (30.5 - 36.2%) -- 48.1% chance to 3HKO
252 SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Landorus Focus Blast vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Mantine: 75-90 (27.6 - 33.2%) -- guaranteed 4HKO

In other words, why would anyone run Mantine for that role instead of Gyarados?

For stall, Defog and the instant win vs Rain Dance Manaphy (using water absorb). Haze is also a fantastic thing manaphy can do for you. It is a bit of a deadweight offensively and C+ is definitely too much. Probably C- if anything, because it does have a niche on stall as a spdef skarm... but minus roost.

 

[Agent Gibbs]

Mantine is garbage and does not need a rank. As has been mentioned before, Gyarados can achieve almost the same levels of special bulk while also claiming far more physical bulk (not to mention Intimidate), more offensive presence, phazing utility, and more speed. Defog really is nowhere near enough of a niche to warrant using Mantine because it's honestly a pretty crappy Defogger. Unlike literally every other common Defogger in the metagame, it doesn't have any form of reliable recovery. Combined with a weakness to Stealth Rock, this makes Mantine far less consistent than other Defoggers. Honestly, it falls under the same category as Donphan where I have to ask myself, "Is it really better to use one Pokemon that can perform multiple roles but is mediocre at all of them rather than using two Pokemon that can perform the same roles and more with much greater effectiveness?" I'd much rather use defensive Gyarados alongside a more viable Defogger in order to check the threats that Mantine checks while offering Defog support rather than use Mantine, who is far too specialized and isn't even all that good at walling things nor Defogging.

 

[jbtc10]

For stall, Defog and the instant win vs Rain Dance Manaphy (using water absorb). Haze is also a fantastic thing manaphy can do for you. It is a bit of a deadweight offensively and C+ is definitely too much. Probably C- if anything, because it does have a niche on stall as a spdef skarm... but minus roost.

The good versions of Rain Dance Manaphy always run a second attacking move like Psychic, so unless Mantine has Haze (and it's a fairly mediocre Haze user due to having no reliable recovery which allows it to be played through in most cases anyway), this happens:

+6 252+ SpA Manaphy Psychic vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Mantine: 204-240 (61 - 71.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

 

[Halcyon.]

The good versions of Rain Dance Manaphy always run a second attacking move like Psychic, so unless Mantine has Haze (and it's a fairly mediocre Haze user due to having no reliable recovery which allows it to be played through in most cases anyway), this happens:

+6 252+ SpA Manaphy Psychic vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Mantine: 204-240 (61 - 71.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

The "good" versions of rain dance Manaphy must have 5 moveslots then because Manaphy has absolutely zero room for a second attack on that set. You obviously need rain dance and rest to actually recover or else it's not a rain dance Manaphy. Rain support can't work either since Manaphy will usually need more turns than Politied can provide and shouldn't be switching out once it's come in. I'm also assuming that you're not getting rid of Calm Mind since your calc shows +6. So what does that leave? Are you replacing Scald with Psychic? Cause yeah of course Water Absorb Mantine will lose to mono-attacking Psychic Manaphy, but I'm guessing that's not a very common threat.

EDIT: and what rain dance Manaphy is running 252 SAtk?

 

[Liarliarpantsonfire]

For stall, Defog and the instant win vs Rain Dance Manaphy (using water absorb). Haze is also a fantastic thing manaphy can do for you. It is a bit of a deadweight offensively and C+ is definitely too much. Probably C- if anything, because it does have a niche on stall as a spdef skarm... but minus roost.

If you're going to be using Mantine for Defog then you might as well be using Pelipper. And that's saying a lot about Mantine's potential, especially in a tier like OU. No need to rank stuff like this.

(I love Pelipper btw, but you can't deny that it's pretty garbage in anything but NU/RU).

 

[jbtc10]

The "good" versions of rain dance Manaphy must have 5 moveslots then because Manaphy has absolutely zero room for a second attack on that set. You obviously need rain dance and rest to actually recover or else it's not a rain dance Manaphy. Rain support can't work either since Manaphy will usually need more turns than Politied can provide and shouldn't be switching out once it's come in. I'm also assuming that you're not getting rid of Calm Mind since your calc shows +6. So what does that leave? Are you replacing Scald with Psychic? Cause yeah of course Water Absorb Mantine will lose to mono-attacking Psychic Manaphy, but I'm guessing that's not a very common threat.

EDIT: and what rain dance Manaphy is running 252 SAtk?

Rain Dance Manaphy is mostly meant to be a stall breaker since it doesn't really get that many good opportunities to actually use CM + RD + Rest against any decent offensive team who will be able to take it down before it can do anything like that. Because of that, Modest is definitely the preferred nature because that's what stall breakers benefit from the most, it already has more speed than most commonly used stall mons and most pokemon on stall use special attacking moves so Bold achieves little most of the time too. Against offense, 100 base speed doesn't outspeed very much anyway and only ties with certain things like Charizard who beats you regardless if you move first or not, so going Timid on Manaphy is a pretty bad investment and you get a lot more out of investing in HP and SpA.

Manaphy @ Leftovers
Ability: Hydration
EVs: 252 SAtk / 252 HP / 4 SDef
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Tail Glow
- Surf / Scald
- Psychic
- Rain Dance

Rain Dance lets it beat Unaware Quagsire and Clefable, and lets it 2HKO even 8 HP / 248 SpD Chansey when at +6. Psychic destroys Amoongus and Mega Venusaur after a single Tail Glow. This was posted in the Stall thread a while ago so you can check out the calcs and whatnot in more detail there: http://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/stall.3490051/page-33

 

[New World Order]

Just because Espeon Baton Pass doesn't mean we should be boosting it's viability ranking. Baton Pass chains are less than worthless, they're toxic and literally add nothing of positive value to the metagame much like Swagplay. No team should be allowed more than two BP users in the first place, but that's beyond the point. I'm astounded at how many people want to push garbage like Espeon into A range or *shudder* Vaporeon/Mr Mime into B range. Lets look at the definitions:

A Rank: Reserved for Pokemon who can sweep or wall significant portions of the metagame, but require some support or have some flaws that prevents them from doing this consistently. Supporting Pokemon in this rank may give opponents free turns or cannot create free turns easily themselves, but can still do their job most of the time.
B Rank: Reserved for Pokemon who cannot sweep through or wall significant portions of the metagame, but can properly fulfill a given offensive/defensive niche. Support Pokemon in this category have flaws that prevent them from doing their job or are setup bait for dangerous sweepers. Pokemon who are partially outperformed by a Pokemon in A or S Rank, but are otherwise very dangerous, may also fall into this category.

A Rank Pokemon can sweep/wall with some support, B Rank Pokemon can properly fulfill a given offensive/defensive niche. Espeon is pretty much not viable unless you run 3 of Scolipede+Smeargle+Vaporeon and two of Zapdos, Sylveon, and Mr. Mime, most who run the exact same 4 moves in every incarnation of the team. That's not some support, that's a legion of mobs of brigades of swarms of squadrons of flocks of flying fucktons of support, to the point where flexibility is almost nonexistent. Espeon can't wall jack shit and is pretty much worthless offensively unless it's buddies are there with it.

C Rank: Reserved for Pokemon who can be effective given the right support, but either have crippling flaws that prevent them from consistently executing their strategy or are completely eclipsed by a Pokemon in the above ranks.

That is Espeon, a Pokemon who has crippling flaws unless you run 5 other Pokemon all designed to mitigate those issues to be effective. Vaporeon and Mr. Mime are even bigger jokes since you literally have no reason to use them outside of Baton Pass, and wouldn't even be ranked if Espeon didn't exist. If there's an E rank, that's where those two pieces of garbage should go, at least Espeon can bounce hazards and status outside of a BP chain. Sylveon is also completely outclassed by Clefable and would have trouble even being C+ if it weren't for it's role in Baton Pass. Smeargle is only usable for Sticky Web gimmicks outside of BP chains, and having it in the B range is a travesty. The only ones that I'd be okay with being moved up are Zapdos and Scolipede, because they're legitimately good even without Baton Pass, and in a BP chain they go from great to ridiculous, unlike Espeon who goes from fecal matter to ridiculous. Now if this were a playstyles tier list, BP chain would be near the very top behind only the likes of Deosharp teams, but as individual Pokemon, all of them bar Scolipede and Zapdos are complete and utter jokes and we should be doing everything we can to advocate against their usage, not promoting new players to toss Vaporeons and Mr. Mimes onto their teams.

 

[Delibird is Amazing]

Sylveon is also completely outclassed by Clefable and would have trouble even being C+ if it weren't for it's role in Baton Pass.

sylveon is b rank because it is a very good special wall and cleric. fuck ton better special bulk than clefable+not hitting like a wet blanket=not outclassed. Personally I think clefable is shit and outclassed as a cleric and it should stick to cm sweeping, be it magic guard cm or unaware cm (both of which are fantastic sets)

I've used both clefable and sylveon a lot and while I think clefable is better overall sylveon is better at what it does imo