Given current poll standings, I think I have to post my thoughts.
Every intelligent post whose goal is to demonstrate power needs three things: a claim, a warrant, and an impact.
Let's start off with a claim, one which I strongly believe.
Water Bubble is broken.
Warrants can be provided in a few ways, and damage calculations are one way. Instead of just a confusing laundry list, however, I will group my calcs into categories, each intended to demonstrate a different argument. If
RNGIsCancer 's dump hasn't convinced you that Water Bubble is broken, hopefully this more organized list will.
1. 252 SpA Water Bubble Kyogre-Primal Steam Eruption vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Mewtwo-Mega-X: (129.7 - 153.5%) -- guaranteed OHKO
vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Mewtwo-Mega-Y: (111 - 131.4%) -- guaranteed OHKO
vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Yveltal: (102.6 - 121%) -- guaranteed OHKO
vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Regigigas: (99.5 - 117.9%) -- 93.8% chance to OHKO
2. 252 SpA Water Bubble Kyogre-Primal Steam Eruption vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Zekrom: (66.8 - 79.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Rayquaza-Mega: (64.9 - 76.9%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Kyurem-White: (58.3 - 69%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Kyogre-Primal: (44.5 - 52.7%) -- 26.2% chance to 2HKO
3. 252 SpA Water Bubble Kyogre-Primal Steam Eruption vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Audino-Mega: (68.7 - 80.9%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Registeel: 248-294 (68.1 - 80.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Chansey: (62.5 - 73.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Zygarde: (53.7 - 63.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Solgaleo: (50.2 - 59.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
4. 252 SpA Water Bubble Kyogre-Primal Steam Eruption vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Giratina: (38.8 - 46%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Dialga: (27.2 - 32.6%) -- guaranteed 4HKO
vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD AVest Gyarados-Mega: (23.3 - 27.4%) -- chance to 4HKO
vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Eviolite Imposter Chansey: (14.4 - 17%) -- possible 6HKO
5. 252+ SpA Choice Specs Water Bubble Kyogre-Primal Water Spout vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Giratina: (65 - 76.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Dialga: (60.8 - 72.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD AVest Gyarados-Mega: (52.2 - 61.9%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Eviolite Chansey: (32.3 - 38.3%) -- 97.6% chance to 3HKO
1. shows how the
standard, Water-neutral "bulky" attackers of the meta fare. This is benchmark for WB Kyogre-P in comparison to non-defensive meta threats.
2. shows how the
standard, Water-resistant "bulky" attackers of the meta fare.
3. shows how the
standard, Water-neutral SpDef walls of the meta fare. This is the benchmark for WB Kyogre-P in comparison to defensive meta threats.
4. shows how the
standard, Water-resistant SpDef walls of the meta fare.
5. shows how the
standard, Water-resistant SpDef walls of the meta fare against the
most immediately powerful WB Kyogre-P set. Consider this to be about a x2.25 boost in damage from the regular 252 Steam Eruption.
Finally, the impact of these damage calculations. What can we learn from them, that will help us make our decision of whether Water Bubble is broken or not?
From
1. we see that standard, Water-neutral "bulky" attackers of the meta fare horribly. I consider Mega Mewtwo Y to be a fair benchmark, which is why I highlighted it -- MMY is the most all-around offensively potent attacker with the best natural SpDef, as everything is either weaker or frailer. It, as shown, is cleanly OHKOd by Steam Eruption from standard Water Bubble Kyogre-P. Even bulkier (by virtue of investment) attackers are cleanly OHKOd. So, of course, being Water-neutral is simply not enough when it comes to being an offensive check.
Then, from
2., along with what we have learned from 1., we can conclude that all forms of offense fare horribly. Water-weak, of course, fares much worse.
No offensive Pokemon can survive more than just a hit from Water Bubble Kyogre-Primal. This is scary; this means that momentum absolutely has to be forfeited if a Water Bubble Kyogre-P can get a safe switch in. This is detrimental to gameplay already, considering the fact that gaining momentum in such a way has no drawbacks and extremely little risk - as Water Bubble Kyogre-P is significantly bulkier than the hard hitters of last gen, like MDiancie and Kyu-B, thanks to its better typing and better stats.
From
3. we see that standard, Water-neutral SpDef walls of the meta struggle. All 5 sets - UnawareDino, Prankster Registeel, Fur Coat Chansey, SpDef Support Zyg-C, and even RegenVest Solgaleo are all 2HKOd by regular WB Kyogre-P. This means that none of them can even check Water Bubble Kyogre-P, as switching in will get them 2HKOd. This is even further complicated by the fact that none of these Pokemon can do much back to Kyogre - which can easily shrug off uninvested attacks and finish them off.
From
4. we see that standard, Water-resistant SpDef walls of the meta do ok. Consider, however, that these are among some of the bulkiest special walls in the metagame, and many of them (especially AVest Dialga and MGyarados) have gained significant viability simply because of how well they do against Water Bubble. In this regard, Water Bubble does have checks. Dialga and Giratina can Core Enforcer and halve Kyogre's power, and Mega Gyarados can deal significant crippling damage with Knock Off. If all you care about are these calcs, you might not actually think Water Bubble is broken.
From
5., however, we realize that conclusions drawn from
4. do not tell us the whole picture. Suddenly, the metagame's best Kyogre counters are no longer even checks. When facing Specs Kyogre, the only thing you can do in a situation where it gets a free switch in is to sack a Pokemon and hope to revenge kill.
So, from 3., 4., and 5., we see that, while resistance against WB's onslaught can be stopped, it depends way more on what kind of set Kyogre chooses to run, and less on what the metagame can muster up to stop it. Because of 3., 4., and 5., we see that resistance is not enough to beat Water Bubble -
you must bring immunity or absolutely absurd bulk (like Imposter Chansey) in order to not have to sacrifice and revenge kill.
And, I will reiterate, these calcs don't even come close to providing the whole picture. What I've listed are the absolute
best answers to Kyogre-P in the metagame - and this list contains not but 20 few Pokemon, and not but 5 when talking about 252+ Specs Water Spout. Everything else does up to twice or even thrice as poorly. The two main impacts, the pressure Water Bubble inflicts upon both offensive and defense, is what justifies our banning of the ability. Such an unmitigated and risk-free offensive strategy cannot be allowed to stay in Balanced Hackmons.
Now, I don't want my post to get too long, but I do want to comment on some line-by-line argumentation and logic that I think is flawed.
If you gain nothing else from this post, certainly read this section, because too many people are tied up in the specifics and are ignoring the big picture. The big picture is that Water Bubble gives certain Pokemon power to the extent that has never been before seen in Balanced Hackmons at extremely low cost, power to the extent that makes it unhealthy for the BH metagame.
Here are some arguments that I think are particularly bad, and I hope not to see any more of these after I write this post:
1.
But you can just run Water-immune Pokemon!
This is the worst argument I've seen by far, but unfortunately also the most common one. Water-immune abilities are otherwise practically useless, so the fact that almost every team needs to carry one is only additional testament to the brokenness of Water Bubble. Honestly, how can you look at random things like Water Absorb Mega Audino and tell me that a dual immunity to Water and Dragon, two otherwise fairly uncommon offensive types, is all that is needed for a set to be viable in Balanced Hackmons?
Ignore the technicalities of Core Enforcer use. It doesn't matter whether Core Enforcer stops Desolate Land or Water Absorb all the time. It doesn't need to. All Core Enforcer needs to do is pose the threat. Also, considering the impact of when Core Enforcer works (you lose your only Water Absorb counter in a team that is otherwise completely swept by Water Bubble) vs when it doesn't (Kyogre is forced to switch out), even if it could only be used correctly 25% of the time, that's still a massive further drop in the amount of times Water Bubble can be stopped.
2.
But there are counters!
This is in specific reference to all of the non-Water-immune counters that I mentioned in my list of calcs up above. Though this argument is factually true, its implications are irrelevant. Almost everything has counters. What matters is how reliable those counters are (they are not), how many options each teambuilder has in countering (not very may), and how viable those counters are otherwise (they are not very). Water Bubble is simply too powerful.
3.
But it's just Kyogre-Primal!
This is not true either. Ash-Greninja is also an extremely potent user of the ability whose Choice Specs set is even more potent than that of PKyogre. Given that, we could predict regular Kyogre to be a potent threat as well, considering it has only 3 less base SpA than Ash-Greninja, and still extremely good stats, just not to the extent of Kyogre-Primal.
More evidence that Water Bubble is inherently powerful can be found in non-Water-type Water Bubble users. Even Pokemon like Mega Mewtwo Y can use Water Bubble to pull of surprising KOs and to help them muscle past their traditional counters, few of which are Water-resistant. While it may be true that PKyogre requires a suspect (I don't think it does), Water Bubble is still definitely broken on its own.
4.
But I want to suspect other things!
It doesn't matter. The fact of the matter is that we're discussing Water Bubble right now. That said, everything that needs to be suspected will eventually get suspected in due time. Besides accuracy, time is the most important thing to consider - the more time we save by expediting unanimous decisions, the sooner we as a community can reach our desired metagame.
5.
But banning things is inherently bad!
This has never been true. This was never been intended to be true. This will never be true. This is not how Smogon tiering policy works. If you qualify it by saying "don't ban unless we need to ban" then your post is empty because everyone knows that and it does not contribute to our specific case in any way at all.
6.
But I want to suspect it just to see!
Why? We've had the meta for a while now, and there is absolutely no reason to have a suspect if you already believe something is broken. You don't get a tiering badge from this if that's what you want. I'm in it to make BH as balanced and fun as it can be for everyone, and if you already have an opinion on how to achieve that (hint: quickban Water Bubble), then you should act on it. I refuse to believe that 60% of you actually don't think Water Bubble is broken. Don't tell me that you're just going to vote for ban if you can vote for ban right here right now and save us all the time and energy of going through another suspect.
Please my friends think logically, think with experience, and think of the big picture. Thanks