Metagame np: SS Ubers Stage 8 - Ridin' Dirty (Calyrex-Shadow Suspect Test)

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because the former one doesn't have the tools to 6-0 teams once its defensive checks are down,

Saying that Kyogre can't snowball as well is Calyrex is nonsense. This wasn't the only game where it just 6-0d on lead either, you can see that happened in Fc's finals match vs crying. But anyways, that isn't the topic. Calyrex is. From what I have seen in UPL, Calyrex honestly isn't broken. Like Fc said, its a mon that promotes skillfull gameplay just like any other Pokémon in Ubers and the fact that it restricts the builder isn't that much of a point since you can always outplay the Caly in the game without much fuss if you're good. It's utility and presence is a good thing for the tier. Moyashi pretty much made all the points I wanted to wrt to Caly so just read their post.

 

[clementinabroccolina]

SS Ubers is not really a salvageable tier with or without Calyrex-S, so I think that instead of trying to bring in Ubers' historically inconsistent and vague tiering policy about whether something like CalyS is truly suspect worthy, more of the anti-ban posts should frame it more on the traits of the actual pokemon itself, because all of the important things CalyS brings that could be missed if it leaves (speed control and revenge killing for anti-setup, status clearance) are just kinda based on theorymonning. So what if the tier devolves into HO vs Fat hell? That bridge will be crossed if it comes to it and the exploitable nature of the mandatory YEN core I guess isn't as bad but isn't really healthy as we've seen with Magnezone, CalyS, and Kyogre (which I think is dishonest to not include in discussion and comparison since it can and has cleared teams with wincon sets which is why they gained traction LMAO)

That being said, I do think that Trick 50/50s combined with the quick snowball nature of CalyS are what push it over the edge (though I'm of course a bit on the fence cause even the non- MU fish bad anti Caly Yveltal sets can and have outplayed the mon) to feeling pretty unhealthy. Trick is hard to switch into in other tiers but its abusers of course don't have the same qualities as Calyrex where you risk the entire game spiralling out of control, instead of a blunder just being a misplay you can reasonably recover from. However I think sometimes the risk for Calyrex itself gets understated because it doesn't neatly fit into the pro-ban argument. Screwing up a trick greatly limits the things that Calyrex can offensively check and if it still wants to clean up, its teammates need to do a lot of pretty exploitable heavy lifting to get Yveltal chipped. While Trick isn't as bad as games being decided on Zacian clicking Assurance, I don't think it's a good thing to have in the tier because the recourse is just so limited and wonky

In both ways though I think that Calyrex as a trick abuser has had a pretty unhealthy influence on the meta now that it can more effectively prey on Yveltal with recent tournament sets. I agree with Moyashi that a mon being able to beat its checks in Ubers is really just another regular day in the tier, but I think the sheer variance in dangerous Calyrex sets and the fact that Yveltal struggles more to effectively limit it than it reasonably should these days makes me lean a bit more pro-ban than I once did

PS please no "Calyrex should be banned cause I have to use Yveltal", haven't we as a society moved past that

 

[Thestu]

I don't think it should be banned. Yes, it has 165 base Special Attack and 150 speed. Yveltal Is one of the best Pokémon in the ubers metagame, and it can't beat Yveltal without help, or playing cat and mouse with it. Although I do think its unhealthy to force just about every team to run blissey, or eviolite Chansey, or Zarude, Urshifu Single-Strike or T-Tar and have the meta revolve around it, there are other checks. With rocks up, Calyrex has no sash, and can be picked off by shadow sneaks. Aside from SubSeed sets, Calyrex doesn't use leftovers, putting it aside in favor of offensive items. With the effectiveness of other sets, and the variety that Calyrex can use (Example being Draining Kiss, and Leaf Storm) I do think against some teams, Calyrex is a bit too overwhelming, Everything has coverage to beat checks. This is just my opinion, and my thoughts.

 

[clementinabroccolina]

Idk why you clown bois try to ban Pokemon from ubers. If you are going to follow the same balancing framework as OU, then you're just going to end up with OU...remember, Ubers is the OU banlist at its core.

Unless you can make the case that something is so strong compared to the field as to be uncompetitive and just click buttons blindly (aka mega Rayquaza or ohko moves), then I can't see a reason for banning anything that isn't loaded with opinion on what things "should" be like. I don't think calyrex is "broken" in this regard, and honestly, there's worse stuff like xerneas or Kyogre.

I think this is a bit disingenuous honestly and reads like you haven't really engaged with arguments both for or against banning Calyrex.

Kyogre I kind of agree with but I don't want to derail the thread so oop. Xerneas is not worse, it's far more limited in terms of breaking past Necrozma than Calyrex-S is with Yveltal and isn't really on anyone's radar for very good reason lmao

When has a suspect test not been based on opinion in some regard or many? There aren't objective truths when it comes to a mon being potentially unhealthy or compromising the competitive integrity of a tier (you know... the better player winning) because there are numerous frameworks in which to analyze plays that players make as well as how restrictive is too restrictive. However, the existence of trick 50/50s isn't really all that subjective as much as the opinions on whether or not it's too much for the tier are.

If you have an argument for keeping Calyrex-S, it would be better to try and argue in better faith and bring up some substantial points and/or evidence

 

[LORD SAGIS]

I've dabbled in this tier on and off (beat the anti-semite once) for about a year now and my main gripe is this RBY style of team building with Yveltal, Necrozma-DM, and Eternatus on every good team. And seeing SCL winrates really forces that idea of forgoing one of them makes it more likely to lose than win.

While its true Ubers has a long history of forcing specific pokemon on every team like Primal Groudon at least those had a more limited amount of Ubers and usually you only needed 1 or 2 (If you count Arceus as 1). But my main issue with that is Pokemon like Pdon and Arceus forms were requirements because they were so good and useful but Yveltal is forced onto teams because its the only real answer to Calyrex. And not only that its usually forced to use subpar Specially Defensive sets because Calyrex is so powerful. Making very Yveltal easy to wall and always having to try and keep itself at full at all times.

While Calyrex-S is not technically broken in this metagame it does significantly make it a lot less enjoyable to build for. Which is unusual because Ubers has typically been my favorite smogon tier. Other posts have made great points to why Calyrex-S is such a threat in the builder so I won't go too in-depth so I leave this post saying I would rather explore this interesting Arceusless meta without Calyrex-S than keep the way it is.

Oh and shout out Lasen TJ for the minor tutoring when I was streaming ladder it was quite fun playing this tier when it was fresh in my head at least. I don't do reqs so I don't really have any power but I hope my post has at least some substance.

 

[Aberforth]

So I got reqs, and I'm definitely going to be voting No Ban.

I've said it before and I'll say it again, sticking to rigid definitions and concepts in tiering policy is something I dont like doing, especially with things like voting in suspects. Trying to argue that a pokemon reaches an undefined (and indeed, undefineable) level of "broken" or "restrictiveness" is just a fantastic way for people to talk past each other. I'll be voting on what I think is going to be best for the tier, and I dont particularly care to twist the definitions of a 3 year old thread into what I want them to say.

I find Calyrex-S a healthy part of the metagame. This is clearly something that some people will fundamentally disagree with me on, and it is what my vote will come down to in the end, but thats the simple truth for me. I find the centralisation it provides promoting of skillful gameplay, I like that fact, and I do not think that the extent it affects teambuilding to be nearly enough for me to want to ban it. People are right in that fast Yveltal alone is not enough to keep Calyrex-S in check these days, but this is where the other tools in the builder can be used. As just one example of additional counterplay, Ho-oh is a fantastic pokemon in its own right that can always be used as an initial Calyrex-S pivot. Even in the event that it loses its boots, it can still be annoying to teams by spreading burn and paralysis and the like, and Knock Off is one of the most common (and best) moves in the tier, so it is not at all unreasonable to think that you can get rid of the choice item should they chose to give it to you.

Now, Ho-oh is one of the only initial pivots that does this without stacking Dark types (which I think has a weird stigma, since doing so lets one use a much more offensive Yveltal which are honestly amazing in this meta), but having forms of priority or Choice Scarf pokemon in conjunction with Yveltal should also be enough in most situations. And importantly to me, none of these counterplay forms like Scarf Xerneas or Darmanitan, or Marshadow, or Ho-oh, or Zarude, are bad even if Calyrex-S does not come to the game. They are all useful pokemon without Calyrex-S on the oppsing team as well.

My sympathy to people losing because they decided a fast Yveltal with no other form of Calyrex-S counterplay on their team will make them solid against it, followed by running into a Calyrex-S designed to break through Yveltal, is very small indeed. That is a choice made in the builder that can be reasonably compensated for like by running a far bulkier Yveltal (which is not actually useless outside of the Calyrex-S matchup but thats a story for another day), or any of the other additional forms of counterplay because the mon, like many Ubers is very threatening if your only check gets weakened. Snarl isnt a fantastic move, but it has its place on teams that dont want to use any of the other forms of Calyrex-S counterplay, as it will still handle almost every Calyrex-S set incredibly reliably.

I personally really like the effect that Calyrex-S has on the metagame. There are very few pokemon that you can argue are invalidated by it existing (sorry Spectrier and Necrozma-Dawn Wings), and the offensive centralisation it provides I think makes the metagame better both as a builder and as a player. I think that back in the Zacian meta, the combination of Calyrex and Zacian were far too strong in conjunction with one another, and the centralisation of the tier was fundamentally broken because of how well the two of them synergised with each other. But since Zacian was banned, I truly think that Calyrex has been a useful and desireable part of the metagame, and as a result I will be firmly voting No Ban.

Also briefly Trick + Protect + Disable Calyrex-S is honestly, in my opinion, a bad set. Once those three moves are revealled, most Eternatus can deal with it comfortably, and it completely lacks any sort of breaking power unless you let it get a kill. 8 Astral PP is also really bad for this set. Disable is good, dont use this bad version of it. If I make any post after this one in this thread, it will probably be detailing what Calyrex-S gives up on each moveset tweak and what it accordingly gains, but that feels like it should be a video instead of a post.

 

[Eledyr]

I would like to explain a little bit more my thoughts regarding Moyashi's post.

You made an interesting point that Zacian-C (and, by extension, Zacian-H) turned games into “50/50” guessfests. As BasedWhat mentioned, the interaction between Calyrex-S and an opposing team’s checks (Yveltal, Ho-Oh, etc.) also boils down to unfavorable “50/50” interactions. The Calyrex-S user has no opportunity cost using it and can continuously pressure the opposition for the reasons Reje mentioned, which you can read about here. For all these reasons, you can argue that Calyrex-S is, in fact, reducing the quality of games and, to a lesser extent, the skill level. Even if Calyrex-S doesn’t get the Trick off on Yveltal, it can effectively cripple one part of your opponent’s defensive backbone, leaving your opponent’s team with holes that can be exploited later on (see Manaphy’s argument about a 5 vs. 6).

Also, if you’re unconvinced about the potency of Disable sets, I highly encourage you to try it out yourself! Modest NP + Disable Calyrex has enough power to blow past even max/max Yveltal (which is by far the best check to Calyrex-S). Specs + Disable Calyrex-S can cripple any part of your opponent’s defensive backbone, and if it catches the opposing Yveltal, you may as well click ‘X’. Sub + Disable Calyrex-S is an interesting option to beat Yveltal that doesn’t carry Knock Off and Foul Play (Snarl is not as viable). All of these sets have recently gained traction, which is why there aren’t that many games displaying them in their full potency. But it would be best if you realized that as the metagame continues to evolve, people found ways to make Calyrex-S even more restrictive to the builder. Calyrex-S is almost certainly the single most game-ending threat in Ubers. If you guess the wrong set, it’s over. As BasedWhat? mentioned, Ubers really boils down to how to create your gameplan based on the assumption of the Calyrex-S set you lose to the fastest. On an off-topic note, calling Zacian-H brainless is in my opinion an hyperbole. You had to predict (considering it was choice-locked), and more often than not, it couldn’t even break past NDM because NDM was often paired with valuable Regenerator pivots. Calyrex-S, on the other hand, while requiring some skill to utilize to its fullest, has a much easier time breaking through its primary checks because those checks (as Reje mentioned) are liable to get worn down or statused over time. For example, it only takes about 20% worth of chip for a Modest Specs Calyrex-S to 2HKO Fast Utility Yveltal. If you run a slower Yveltal, your team is liable to get destroyed by webs HO (and more often than not, it will if Yveltal is your only Defogger). There is one point I do agree with you on. Banning Calyrex-S won’t magically improve the quality of the tier. Only metagame development and innovation can do that. But, this year’s UPL showed me SS Ubers has very little room for innovation left (or else you risk losing to more consistent and standard teams). Calyrex-S is, without a doubt, the most metagame-defining threat and can end games even faster than its banned predecessor Zacian-H could. This brings me to my next point:

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Saying that Kyogre can't snowball as well is Calyrex is nonsense. This wasn't the only game where it just 6-0d on lead either, you can see that happened in Fc's finals match vs crying. But anyways, that isn't the topic. Calyrex is. From what I have seen in UPL, Calyrex honestly isn't broken. Like Fc said, its a mon that promotes skillfull gameplay just like any other Pokémon in Ubers and the fact that it restricts the builder isn't that much of a point since you can always outplay the Caly in the game without much fuss if you're good. It's utility and presence is a good thing for the tier. Moyashi pretty much made all the points I wanted to wrt to Caly so just read their post.

Kyogre cannot snowball as OFTEN as Calyrex-S, especially against faster teams. I’d say the only mon (while laddering for reqs) that could accumulate boosts at a similar (it’s still not close) rate to Caly-S was DD Zygarde. The replay you selected to show is fair, but I don’t think Alpha Rabbit’s team structure is optimal at all (see, Clefable being next to unviable on that team structure). Of course, Kyogre is a threat, hence why it is currently ranked S-, but it does not possess the sheer speed of Calyrex-S to snowball and defeat faster teams. This Kyogre set beat a team whose main form of speed control with a Calyrex-S and used a slow breaker in the form of Groudon. In other words, Kyogre thrives by snowballing against fatter teams whose only form of defense against it is Eternatus. Base 90 speed is a curse; any faster threat will force Kyogre out. Calyrex-S, on the other hand, has an easier time breaking through both fatter and faster teams, where you could never make the same argument for Kyogre. To quote the great Exiline, “you just beat Kyogre before it beats you.” One cannot make the same argument about Calyrex-S in good faith. Also, please ask yourself which mon you lose the most to while playing DLC2 SS Ubers games? Even if you played a game skillfully and optimally, the answer would almost certainly be Calyrex-S. So indeed, this is not a good comparison to make. The difference between Kyogre (or any other mon) having the tools to beat its checks and Calyrex-S is the fact that the latter has the best speed tier in the current meta. It forces both offensive and fatter teams to figure out a game plan around playing around which set they lose to the fastest. And should they guess wrong, more often than not, the Calyrex-S user will open an unpatachable hole in their opponent’s defensive backbone and make enough progress to win in a vacuum. The points Moyashi made were fair, but clearly did not consider previous posts on this thread. If anyone can give a thorough and thought out response to BasedWhat? and Reje’s posts, that would be interesting to read. The sheer amount of low-quality posts on this thread ultimately detracts from the essence of whether Calyrex-S is, in fact, too overwhelming for the tier or not. I, myself, am on the fence at the moment.

To conclude my post, I want to talk about Aberforth's post. In my humble opinion, this is by far the best structured post so far in this thread, and I would like to see more posts like this, as it is coherent and offers comprehensive arguments. I only want to mention that,

Also briefly Trick + Protect + Disable Calyrex-S is honestly, in my opinion, a bad set. Once those three moves are revealled, most Eternatus can deal with it comfortably, and it completely lacks any sort of breaking power unless you let it get a kill. 8 Astral PP is also really bad for this set. Disable is good, dont use this bad version of it.

Eternatus isn't the perfect answer to this specific set, because only heavily SpD invested Eternatus can survive 2 Astral Barrage if Stealth Rock are up, and has to rely on the fact that Calyrex-S does not run a Modest nature. 252+ SpA Calyrex-Shadow Astral Barrage vs. 168 HP / 248 SpD Eternatus: 211-249 (45.5 - 53.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock.
It still indeed drains half of Astral's PP, I'm not saying here that Eternatus isn't a Calyrex-S's check in this situation, which is reliably pressured by Pressure's effect to drain its PPs extremely fast.

 

[clare]

I think whether Calyrex-S should be banned depends less on whether its broken and more on what the playerbase wants the culture of Ubers to be going forwards. Relative to the tiering policy of any other tier, Caly-S is indisputably broken, basically mandating the usage of a bulky Dark-type or some obscure check like Porygon2. On the other hand, Ubers has always been very tolerant of centralizing threats (e.g. 5th-gen Kyogre, which mandated 2+ checks on every team and single-handedly allowed obscure Pokemon such as Gastrodon to have a place in the tier).

Consider the original Uber of Ubers: Rayquaza-Mega. By all means it was a good Pokemon, but what really got it booted out of the tier was the fact that it had no counters. In the strictest sense, a counter is a Pokemon that can switch into any possible set and beat its opponent one-on-one, and 180/180 mixed offenses combined with Flying/Ground/Fire coverage and the ability to hold an item allowed it to annihilate whatever came in. As such, it was kicked out and AG was created. Zacian-C suffered the same fate - the addition of Close Combat to its movepool caused it to have no counters (nominally, Quagsire was a counter, but Quagsire is bad and is annihilated by Solar Blade).

Caly-S is countered by Yveltal, in the sense that Yveltal with Snarl can switch in on any set and beat Caly-S one-on-one. The actual dynamics of the battle make things less straightforward, because if Yveltal gets Tricked on the switch Caly-S can just switch out and proceed to cause trouble later, but the fact remains that under the standard definition of a counter, Snarl Yveltal does force Caly-S out.

I would argue that banning Caly-S sets the precedent for actively enforcing some sort of policy to ensure a healthy tier, rather than strictly only banning strategies with no counters (for example, one argument for Shadow Tag's banning is that countering a Pokemon involves switching in a counter, and Shadow Tag prevents that). One could say this has already happened, since Dynamax and Baton Pass are banned, but there's some argument that the two are somehow uncompetitive in the fundamental sense.

Either way it goes, it will be interesting to see what happens.

 

[PiplupFiction]

Hi everyone,

First post on here after being on Showdown for ages!

Just throwing my two cents behind this one:

Firstly, Calyrex-S has an unreal combination of things to make it the most dangerous threat in Generation 8 Ubers: It's 150 Base Speed, 165 Base SpA, 120BP Ghost STAB, Ghost Typing and As One just give this mon unreal snowballing potential, way more so than Kyogre with Choice Scarf or Specs. I don't believe it is an uncompetitive mon by Smogon's definitions however I do tend to agree that it is unhealthy and restrictive in that you'll need multiple answers to have it under control and there are many games where it does have the final say. Teambuilding in this generation has been far less free to do compared to previous generations and it is in big part due to how overbearing Calyrex-S is. Its movepool is only just enough to give it enough options and variety to function in several viable ways: Offense, Choice Items, SubSeed and now Disable.

Ghost typing in Gen 8 has actually been an extremely good typing competitively due to the lack of viable Dark Types to check the upper echelon of the tier and the removal of Pursuit from the game which means the option to switch is not a death sentence. Spectrier, while banned in OU and for slightly different reasons, was ultimately banned in part because of these factors. Calyrex-S being a Ghost Type is a beneficiary of this and a large reason why it is running rampant in the Ubers tier.

One of the main reasons why Yveltal has a 80%+ usage rate is to keep Calyrex-S in check. Yes it is an amazing Pokemon this generation on its own merit however it is one of the very few consistent checks to Calyrex-S and isn't necessarily a counter 100% of the time, especially when it has a SpA boost, which is easy to get with Nasty Plot or a kill + As One boost. The new Disable set throws a spanner in this, however I believe this is a suboptimal way to get the most out of Calyrex-S but it is an answer. It is hard to build a team otherwise without Yveltal and feel you can adequately deal with Calyrex-S.

The common answers and top threats in Ubers and how they stack up.

As mentioned previously, it is the most consistent check by far. The best sets against it are the SpDef set (KO/Defog/Roost/U-Turn) or an offensive set with Sucker Punch. Nearly all teams have Yveltal to deal with Calyrex-S.

A good viable mon in the meta that can revenge kill with Shadow Sneak, a move that is never passed up. However, no pursuit in Gen 8 means a switch is always going to happen, especially mid-game.
OHKO'd with Astral Barrage after a NP or KO'ing a mon previously. Needs two Dragon Dances or a Rock Polish to outspeed it with correct EV investment.
+1 252 SpA Calyrex-Shadow Astral Barrage vs. 252 HP / 136+ SpD Prism Armor Necrozma-Dusk-Mane: 393-465 (98.7 - 116.8%) -- 93.8% chance to OHKO

Usually run as a back up check. The defensive set can take Astral Barrage unboosted but gets 2HKO'd at +2.
+2 252 SpA Calyrex-Shadow Astral Barrage vs. 248 HP / 52 SpD Ho-Oh: 310-366 (74.6 - 88.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
Destroyed with Psychic/Psyshock after a NP or KO'ing a mon previously, even for the typical SpDef spread.
+1 252 SpA Calyrex-Shadow Psyshock vs. 164 HP / 0 Def Eternatus: 492-578 (106.4 - 125.1%) -- guaranteed OHKO
+1 252 SpA Calyrex-Shadow Psyshock vs. 48 HP / 244+ Def Eternatus: 354-416 (81.7 - 96%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

Generally a good scarfer and can take a special hit on paper, however gets 2HKO'd at best and OHKO'd after a nasty plot. Scarf/Trick Caly-S is also a thing which can threaten Kyogre and then it's all kyOGRE now.
+1 252 SpA Calyrex-Shadow Astral Barrage vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Kyogre: 262-310 (76.8 - 90.9%) -- 25% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock

Can viably run Shadow Sneak to get the jump, but has issues vs Yveltal and Xern in the tier which make it hard to justify a slot.

I'm not a fan of banning mons in Ubers, but since both forms of Zacian have been banned this generation and AG is a thing, it's fair game. While there is no single action that will make SS Ubers salvageable (and trust me I have my issues with Ubers this gen!), I believe a ban will make the tier far less restrictive on teambuilding, an issue which Gens 6 and 7 did not have. I'm in favour of a ban for Calyrex-Shadow.

 

[658Greninja]

I was once pro-ban for Shadow Rider. On one hand, Calyrex is incredibly restrictive on team building, making every team have the same YEN core. We’ve also seen Sub-Seed/Disable/Trick Protect Disable sets designed to bypass Yveltal. One the other, there is enough counterplay to handle Calyrex. (Snarl fucking sucks so no)

Aberforth brought this up already so I’m just gonna echo what they say. Which are things alot of pro-ban players seem to not have arguments for.

Yveltal + Ho-Oh is a defensive core that beats Shadow Rider while avoiding the pitfall of pairing Yveltal with a sub-par ghost resist/immunity. Ho-Oh takes around 50-60 from Astral Barrage and bring in Fast Yveltal.

non-Specs variants can beat Yveltal but they lack the immediate power to OHKO most of the tier, even NDM can live an unboosted Astral Barrage. Disable Trick Caly beats Yveltal but then what does it do to Eternatus/Blissey/Ho-Oh? This is something to consider when you have 8 of these to fire out, made worse vs Eternatus. Yes it can run Psyshock, but if your not running Specs with or without Psyshock, your not breaking Eternatus.

Yveltal is amazing outside of its role as a Calyrex check. Providing endless utility with Knock, Taunt, Toxic, Defog, U-Turn, etc. Same with the other three mons I’ve mentioned.

One other thing that has not been brought up is that Shadow Rider has few switch in opportunities. Being frail by Uber standards coupled with a 4x weakness to Knock, and vulnerability to status, what does it switch into directly? Nothing. Its switch ins are limited to double switching, after KOs/sacks and pivots which are few in the Ubers tier. Being Yveltal, Lando, and Darm. Only out of 1/3 of them lure NDM. Even when Calyrex gets in, it will either be stopped by Yveltal, Yveltal + Ho-Oh/Eternatus, or rkilled by Marshadow/scarfers.

I was originally on board of banning Calyrex, even saying it should absolutely be banned in the survey, but after playing more games and watching replays, I came to the conclusion that Shadow Rider shouldn’t be banned.

 

[Denial]

Not gonna add more to Caly since Abers and Fcs amazing posts already say it all, but people need to get off this utopian world where YEN core magically drops in usage. It's not gonna happen. Banning Caly would only help buff the core. DDance bulky NDM loses one big check and PhysDef Yveltal is gonna replace all the SpDef variants to better check it, Cosmic Power Eternatus or any offensive set loses one big check, offensive Yveltal is now more splashable, and Hyper Offense as a whole just get incredibly buffed. If you're gonna vote on the basis that you want to free teambuilding, banning Caly is not whats gonna do it. I think Caly has more than an healthy presence in this meta and thats why im gonna vote No Ban.

 

[nimzowitsch]

Not gonna add more to Caly since Abers and Fcs amazing posts already say it all, but people need to get off this utopian world where YEN core magically drops in usage. It's not gonna happen. Banning Caly would only help buff the core. DDance bulky NDM loses one big check and PhysDef Yveltal is gonna replace all the SpDef variants to better check it, Cosmic Power Eternatus or any offensive set loses one big check, offensive Yveltal is now more splashable, and Hyper Offense as a whole just get incredibly buffed. If you're gonna vote on the basis that you want to free teambuilding, banning Caly is not whats gonna do it. I think Caly has more than an healthy presence in this meta and thats why im gonna vote No Ban.

I understand that the YEN core won't get any worse if Caly-S is banned (hell it might even get better with Yveltal being free to run non-SpDef spreads) but I actually don't think Calyrex-S reigns in Hyper Offense at all. Scarf Calyrex-S is the main set that keeps HO sweepers such as +1 Zekrom/Ray, +2 Xerneas, etc. in check, but that set is arguably not very good, as it can't touch Yveltal at all. If you Trick the scarf away, then you lose the ability to revenge kill these boosted sweepers. Things like Geoxern are more reliably checked defensively in my experience.

 

[Eledyr]

Yveltal + Ho-Oh is a defensive core that beats Shadow Rider while avoiding the pitfall of pairing Yveltal with a sub-par ghost resist/immunity. Ho-Oh takes around 50-60 from Astral Barrage and bring in Fast Yveltal.

There are two problems with claiming Yveltal + Ho-Oh is a defensive core that beats Calyrex-S. The first is running double flying types means there is increased pressure against SR should your boots get knocked off from either mon. This no longer makes them safe to switch into Calyrex-S, as they risk getting chipped for significant damage after rocks and Astral Barrage.

The second ties back to what BasedWhat mentioned earlier in his post, which I encourage you to read here. I could also go on and mention that the mons Calyrex-S is often partnered with (i.e., Zekrom, Groudon, Meteor Beam Etern, etc.) can simply smash double flying defensive cores, but that is not the point of this post.

non-Specs variants can beat Yveltal but they lack the immediate power to OHKO most of the tier, even NDM can live an unboosted Astral Barrage. Disable Trick Caly beats Yveltal but then what does it do to Eternatus/Blissey/Ho-Oh? This is something to consider when you have 8 of these to fire out, made worse vs Eternatus. Yes it can run Psyshock, but if your not running Specs with or without Psyshock, your not breaking Eternatus

This is simply not true. As I pointed out in my post, which I encourage you to read, it only takes one round of rocks damage for Specially Defensive Eternatus to get 2HKO’d by unboosted Astral Barrage from Modest Calyrex (i.e., 252+ SpA Calyrex-Shadow Astral Barrage vs. 168 HP / 248 SpD Eternatus: 211-249 (45.5 - 53.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock.) Sure, you are losing 4 PP in the process, but Specs Trick + Disable Calyrex-S is not meant to function as a sweeper. It is more of a breaker that has the potential to sweep in the endgame should it trick a fundamental part of your opponent’s defensive backbone.

One other thing that has not been brought up is that Shadow Rider has few switch in opportunities. Being frail by Uber standards coupled with a 4x weakness to Knock, and vulnerability to status, what does it switch into directly? Nothing. Its switch ins are limited to double switching, after KOs/sacks and pivots which are few in the Ubers tier. Being Yveltal, Lando, and Darm. Only out of 1/3 of them lure NDM. Even when Calyrex gets in, it will either be stopped by Yveltal, Yveltal + Ho-Oh/Eternatus, or rkilled by Marshadow/scarfers.

Pivoting, doubling, and sacking are all fundamental parts of the game. Obviously, your opponent will need to hold on to certain mons to win the game, so by forcing their hand via the aforementioned methods; you can safely bring Calyrex-S in more often than not. One thing that cannot be overstated enough is Calyrex-S is not as frail as it seems. It has the bulk to usually survive one unboosted hit from the vast majority of mons in the tier. I find it interesting that you failed to mention that the most opportune time to bring Calyrex-S in is when your opponent is forced to click a healing move. Not only that, but since "everything is a threat" to quote other posts, it's easy to find double switch opportunities.

 

[UnderFan10]

I can't believe I say that, but... I think we should BAN Calyrex-Shadow, the Focus Sash + Nasty Plot combo... I played it and it's very strong, I did a lot of kills with it, with Nasty Plot, Calyrex-Shadow is able to OHKO EVERY. SINGLE. POKÉMON! And due to its high speed, we need 1 of those things:
- Moves with +1 priority
- Yveltal
Also, if someone is dumb enough for playing an OU team in Ubers or AG (in fact, it often happens before 1200 ladder) well, it can easily sweep it. Also, I didn't play the Choice Scarf set, but I know that with Choice Scarf + Grim Neigh it will be very easy to sweep a non-prepared team.
My final choice: Ban

 

[DerpySuX]

Also, if someone is dumb enough for playing an OU team in Ubers or AG (in fact, it often happens before 1200 ladder) well, it can easily sweep it.

Yes, generally if someone brings a team to a tier with a power level it’s not equipped to handle, they will get swept very easily.
Should we ban Volcarona from OU because it can easily sweep UU teams (I don’t actually know if this is true I just picked a mon at random)? No, that’s absolutely ridiculous.
If you think Calyrex is problematic in Ubers, that’s fine, but being able to sweep teams that are not up to par with the power level of Ubers is NOT a valid argument in favor of your opinion.

 

[ZarbyXar]

It's not so good it needs to be banned to AG but I believe it deserves the ban.

1.Broken but Unhealthy
It is well known that calyrex can be counterplayed and has flaws but I believe he's extremely restrictive and unnecessarily restrictive in a humongous way. First thing is that his literal existence in ubers invalidates many picks for people in ubers and also putting him on a team takes zero,0 intelligence you can just put calyrex shadow on a team without much thought and he'll do good. I feel that through his ban weaker ubers can be used more often or even stronger ones like lunala. But with him in this metagame he invalidates many picks in the metagame of ubers including Zamazenta,Kyruem White and others with its speed + power of course these ubers weren't very good but his presence in this tier forces most players especially in the lower ladders to use Yvetal in every team.

2.Lacks Counterplay
He may have some counterplay but truth is his counterplay restricts teambuilding by forcing people to use the counterplay to fight one of the most common Pokémon in ubers. There is something called oppurtunity cost and not everybody can afford to put a blissey on their team to beat the chilling horse. You may think that all you have to do is put Yvetal on your team but the problem is relying on Yvetal to check this Pokémon is unhealthy for teambuilding,even though there are many Pokémon teams need to function because of their usefulness I feel that Yvetal is good but not every human being wants to copy-paste yvetal into their team or truly needs to.

In conclusion Calyrex-Shadow is an unhealthy thorn in the side of the ubers metagame and I believe that it should be banned for that reason

 

[Lobby Eeveee]

Caly-S has absolutely no opportunity cost for running it besides using a team slot (which all Pokémon do). This means you can slap it on any a balance or offense teams. Also, it is super ready to use, because Astral Barrage is that spammable and it’s stats distribution is just so good. I’m glad if it is banned, because spectrier requires lots of skill and has Shadow Ball and Hex. The former is weaker while the latter needs to burn and while it gets will o wisp it requires a ton of prediction

 

[SmellyJacket]

I think it should be banned, because forcing Yveltal to be on every team to have a chance at beating it isn't fun. Every time Calyrex Shadow gets a knock out, it gets +1 to its 165 base special attack, making it destroy everything without a supereffective priority move, due to its speed.

 

[GUBEHATESLUBE]

I vote ban for the most of the same reasons of what based what said, it’s kinda hard to say caly needs a massive brain when his main pressure are his 50/50’s, the game just turns into Rock Paper Scissors where you just gotta hope for the best you have the right set yvetal to beat that specific set of caly. The restrictiveness is a huge issue too I don’t understand how people are fine with the fact that if it isn’t a max health max sp def yvetal then it’s not really that great of a threat, as offensive yvetals get bodied by specs and sash variants and even passive ones get bodied by sub seed disable ones. The only way to truly make caly manageable is to have a second check, which is already restrictive as hell as it is but it’s what most teams are forced to have or at least some sort of buffer like max sp def ho-oh just in case. The lamest arguement too is that he good at keeping the offensive meta in check, to me that’s just lazy cause there’s so many ways to deal with fast threats, caly is just the easy way of doing it and keeping him prevents others pokemon from actually shining through. Edit hella people against banning caly are saying it’s against Uber to just ban a Pokémon causes he centralizes the meta game for anyone saying that where was that energy when zacian hero was banned lol

 

[1729is56time]

Much about caly-S has already been said. So I'll just point out one of its unhealthy aspects which hasn't been discussed (or I have missed out). Firstly I am not much experienced with this gen so I might be wrong. Anyway, in my opinion a metagame is unhealthy when a speed tie decides a lot of battles. This happens a lot with scarf and non scarfed caly ties decide the outcomes of many battles, as a Caly-S which gets a KO snowballs past the rest of the team. Also calyrex shadow can bypass it's most dedicated 'counter' without much effort(trick, disable, sub seed, etc). It's even easier if the yveltal set is built to provide support to team in the form of u-turn, speed investment, defog, etc.

Also caly-S invalidates usage of Caly-I, Offensive Lunala, etc but that is probably not reason enough to ban it.

Caly-S provides good speed control and checks many offensive mons, but its unhealthy aspects outweigh it benefits to the metagame. So, I'll be voting BAN.

 

[Manaphy]

Hey everyone, as a council member who's been very vocal about the tiering decisions of Ubers in the past, who wrote both the Yveltal and Calyrex-S analysis, and who even helped Aber write the OP of this thread, I just wanted to drop my two cents in here.

First, I'd like to start off by saying that I feel quote mixed on this issue. While I think I will still vote no ban, I am significantly more sympathetic to the pro-ban argument than I was a year ago. Why?

Well, when Calyrex-S was first released, people didn't fully understand it yet, and thus the meta was shaped by this. At the time, Timid Scarf Calyrex-S was the most popular set, which was great as an anti-HO tool, as people hadn't fully figured out modern HO staples such as offensive Taunt Yveltal and Weavile. At the same time, people tended to run very bulky Yveltal (usually Knock U-Turn), limiting the ability for Specs Calyrex-S to break past it with pure power. The main method of breaking past Yveltal was to Trick it and damage it over time with Stealth Rock or status damage. While this involves a lot of 50/50s, it overall takes a lot of turns and good decision making to pull off. Scarf being the most popular set also tended to be a limiting factor, as Scarf Yveltal could outspeed Calyrex-S given enough speed investment.

As the meta began to develop more and more, slower breakers such as Groudon, Mixed Zekrom, and Offensive Calm Mind Kyogre started to become extremely strong options, and Yveltal began to have secondary uses on teams checking these mons in a pinch with a clutch Foul Play or Knock Off. Marshadow also could be a pain to check, so throwing some HP investment over Special Defense could help ease that MU a bit. Additionally, HO began to employ many options that would limit how effective Scarf Calyex-S was. All of these things pointed to Specs Calyrex-S starting to become more and more effective. Additionally, players began to experiment and successfully use more and more creative Calyrex-S sets. One of the first notable ones was Trick Nasty Plot, which could abuse Yveltal using Roost after a Trick to boost up to massive levels. SubSeed sets also grew in popularity at this time, as did sets like Focus Sash Nasty Plot on HO teams, both of which would win against any Yveltal that didn't have the proper moves or investment to deal with them.

In our current metagame, as a natural occurrence of time passing, I think players have been experimenting more and more with creative team builds, which tends to mean dropping your typical 6th revenge killer mon like Marshadow or Scarf Caly, in favor of builds utilizing more and more bulky breakers and tanks like Zygade, Groudon, Kyogre, Xerneas, etc. This naturally makes Calyrex-S stronger as a breaker than it was before, especially if your team relies on Yveltal (and even more so a quick Yveltal) as it's sole check to Calyrex-S.
Additionally, players have been becoming even more creative with Caly's sets than they ever have before. Choice Specs sets with Nasty Plot began to start dropping Psyshock for Protect; while this means you autolose to Blissey, against the vast majority of teams, you could quite easily get off a Nasty Plot against a choiced Roosting Yveltal without having to make the tough 50/50 in the first place. The Disable set I invented recently can be extremely devastating against unprepared teams, being able to beat Taunt Yveltal which would normally win against SubSeed sets. Furthermore, on HO, it's quite easy to drop Psyshock on Sash NP sets in favor of Disable, which means that Sucker Punch Yveltal can usually be beaten without much trouble. One of the most recent developments are players dropping Timid for Modest on Specs sets, which can be used to give Caly just enough of that extra oomph to break past Fast Yveltal, especially when paired with passive damage dealers like Rocky Helmet Eternatus or Sticky Barb Clef.

With all of that being said, I am not fully sold on the idea of banning Calyrex-S. Firstly, it doesn't strike me as nearly as broken as Zacian-Hero was. That mon literally invalidated the vast majority of balance builds and only needed a few right predictions to just win the game on the spot. This made only a few possible builds viable, all of which relied on NDM in combination with a Regenerator mon like Tangrowth, Ho-Oh, or Toxapex. While Calyrex-S certainly does have an effect on teambuilding, I don't think it's quite as restrictive; it mandates a specially defensive Yveltal or a Fast Yveltal + another check. It can be said that the right Calyrex-S set will always beat the wrong Yveltal set, and I somewhat agree with this, but the degree to which this is true is also somewhat overblown in my opinion.
I'd like to quickly go through Caly's sets in more detail:

Scarf: It's fashionable to say this set is bad nowadays, but I think it certainly still have some uses on some builds; it's still extremely useful against a lot of bulky offense builds to prevent any threat from getting too out of control, and Tricking away a Choice Scarf can be more crippling to a lot of threats than Specs can be (Tricked Etern specs can actually be quite annoying...). That being said, this set is pure utility for revenge killing and cleric roles, and will rarely sweep without making a lot of correct reads against a Tricked Yveltal.

Specs: The truth of the matter is that, even when running fast Yveltal sets, Specs Caly can only 3HKO Yveltal (and even this tends to be a roll to 3HKO). Modest Specs Caly can push this, especially with passive damage, but it's still not totally undealable with Sucker Punch or any secondary check in the back. Bulky Yveltal sets are harder to break as well. Tricking away the Specs on Yve can be really devastating, but it depends on you furthermore getting the right reads, Stealth Rock up for passive damage, or otherwise just damaging it enough to 2HKO it on the switch-in. By the way, should Yve have a move unrevealed, all of this switching around with Trick and Stealth Rock is also dependent on Caly being careful not to get Sucker Punched at the wrong time.

Trick Specs + Nasty Plot: One of the more devastating Caly sets when used properly. I think Psyshock versions can become one of the best stallbreakers in the tier, provided that they can get the right read on Yveltal using Roost. They are still limited by Ho-Oh, Marshadow, Zarude, or even a clutch Sucker Punch. Trick Protect Nasty Plot versions, created by SS master sparksblade, can be quite strong against most balance builds, easing prediction significantly, but they do get walled by Blissey and have the same problems against Ho-Oh, Marshadow, Zarude, etc. Dropping Aromatherapy also loses you a ton of utility. Overall though, a very strong set and has some of the best ways for Caly to break.

SubSeed: As Fc put it best, "SubSeed is funny sometimes". I consider this set to be a nearly-Magnezone level of matchup fishing; it will probably work well against the majority of builds, but can be a 5-6 MU when played against the wrong team. I'd like to make this point clear: Snarl has almost never been used seriously in tournaments. Now we all know that Snarl is passive as shit, but I really don't like the notion being made here that Snarl is the perfect solution to beat all Calyrex sets. In actuality, SubSeed Calyrex-S has always been limited by the following sets: Taunt Yveltal, Whirlwind Ho-Oh, Blissey, and Zarude (I can't really consider U-Turn Yveltal as any competent player will run a shitload of defense on Caly, but U-Turn can still be useful for pivoting and getting damage on the sub at the same time).
All of the above mons are quite useful in their own right (Tony knows best, Dada is quite a great check to Twave CM Kyogre, Glare Zygarde, a secondary Caly check, etc). You can even run looser measures like Shadow Ball Etern which can KO Caly before it gets the chance to set-up or Roar Kyogre which can be useful in a pinch. Not to mention that the SubSeed set in general isn't super useful on its own should you play a HO team. Some of the above mons in theory get tossed by Taunt SubSeed sets, but I don't think those sets are amazing because lacking NP means you cannot boost, and thus you'd want to run something like Hex instead of Astral with its low 8 PP.
With that being said, the majority of teams do not feature the above mons, making SubSeed Caly quite strong. With the above mons not present, SubSeed can be nearly unstoppable provided it gets a turn to set-up. The question is: are you confident enough that your opponent will not bring one of them? Otherwise, it can be very risky.

Disable + SubNP: When I created this set, I did not think it would have pushed Calyrex-S to get suspected lol. While I do think this set is great, I am not going to lie to you and tell you that the set is perfect; at the same time, it definitely has way more potential than Fc has given it credit for. It's a set that requires good enough prediction and play, just like any other set. If you don't know what this set does, please check my post in the Metagame Discussion Thread where I go into very deep detail about it. My main point I'd like to make here is that: this set is not undefeatable if you don't have Dual Dark attacks Yveltal, Whirlwind Ho-Oh, or Blissey. The most important thing to note is that the turn Calyrex uses Disable is actually an extremely vulnerable turn, giving you an opportunity to switch to a revenge killer safely, or even throwing out Sucker Punch so that Caly can't Disable your main attack; now, this IS readable by the Disable Caly user, so they could fish for another Sub on that turn. This is more possible on Leftovers versions, as they can Substitute much more freely, but dropping Mental Herb means that Taunt Yveltal will beat you. It should also be obvious to a skilled player that Caly is Disable when it switches in and Substitutes turn 1. Still, I think a lot of these predictions are in Caly's favor, so it definitely is a set worth considering for these discussions.

Focus Sash + NP: A modern staple of Hyper-Offense teams, extremely useful for being able to reclaim its Focus Sash thanks to Draining Kiss. A lot of Fast Yveltal sets will usually be 2HKO'd by a +2 Draining Kiss, which can be devastating. As such, a lot of teams using Fast Yveltal will opt for Sucker Punch to counteract this; this is where Disable can come into play, Disabling Sucker Punch and even Knock Off should the Yve not have it can sometimes win the game on the spot. Should the Fast Yve team have Marshadow, Ho-Oh, or just something else that can live a a boosted hit in the back, they are a lot more safe. This mon is really where bulky Yveltal shines the best, as the extra SpD investment lets Yveltal comfortably take 2 Draining Kisses without worry. Modest could be run to have a better chance of 2HKOing some bulkier Yveltal sets, but losing the Speed can really suck especially on a HO build. Technically, Psychic Terrain is another option that can stop both Sucker Punch Yve and Marshadow, but it's riskier than Disable should Yveltal just stay in and attack normally.

Disable LO NP Protect: A new set Aberforth has theorymonned recently, this can be useful for the same reasons of the Sub Disable set, however, by opting for Life Orb, this will give the set a good shot of powering through Ho-Oh at only +2 instead of +4, in exchange for lacking Substitute's protection.

Trick Protect Disable: I don't think this set is very good, while it does technically beat every Yveltal set, you can't boost at all, meaning Astral's 8 PP gets used super quickly and it's really hard to break.

Given all of the sets above, I think the most consistent combinations of mons to beat Caly while using Fast Yveltal would be Yve + Whirlwind Ho-Oh, Taunt Yve + Marshadow, Yveltal + Zarude, or Yveltal + Blissey. Bulky Yveltal sets will win against Sash NP sets and thus don't really require a revenge killer.
If you are willing to (somewhat) sacrifice the SubSeed MU, then any fast Yveltal set will usually work with an additional check or revenge killer in the back to keep Caly at bay (this is where the majority of teams are).
I honestly think that SubSeed Caly provides the most problematic amount of MU fishing but I'm not sure if it's enough to make me want to ban it. Taunt, while not as 100% against SubSeed as Snarl is, is in itself is a great, non-passive option that has uses outside of SubSeed Caly, so it seems easy enough to slot on enough teams to make many players assume it's too risky to go for SubSeed.
On the topic of Disable sets, while they are extremely dangerous, they don't per say require Snarl or dual Dark attacks to win against, but they definitely are harder to play around without them.

So, with the above points, I'm not trying to make it sound like every team has to be Yve + Ho-Oh or Yve + Marsh. I think there's a lot of inbetween that can happen. Mons like Scarf Darm, Scarf Xern, Urshifu, Weavile, Kyogre, SpD Ferro, Giratina-O, Audino, etc., while not being able to switch in 100% of the time, can often revenge kill and/or take a hit if need be. It's not like Yveltal itself needs to be pigeonholed into 0 Speed investment or 252; there's a lot of in-between that can happen at 308 or 280 or 259, still providing useful Speed when necessary but maintaining more bulk. It's a perfectly viable and normal teambuilding decision to run a bulkier Yveltal to help compensate for teammates who are weak to it.

In addition, these teams will usually be packing NDM and Etern, which can have some situational usefulness vs Caly. I think Etern is the much more relevant one for Pressure and being bulky enough to live boosted Astrals, as well as being one of the best switch-ins for Caly's Trick. Full Sp. Def NDM can be useful, but honestly should not be often run; running anything less than 40 Spe leaves you vulnerable to Caly-I and lets paralyzed Etern and other threats outspeed you. Not good! A decent middle ground is 216 HP / 252 SpD / 40 Spe, which gives you a 50% chance of living a +1 Astral from Timid Caly, but this chance becomes even more suspect when you consider Modest Caly being used more and more. Additionally, you may already be running defense investment on your NDM in order to help against Weavile, so overall I don't see NDM as a great help vs Caly.

Certainly, I think it's shown by just the sheer amount of sets above that dealing with Caly takes a lot more metagame knowledge and smart plays than it did when Caly was first released. Does it make Caly banworthy? I'm not sure myself. While all of these new and unique sets do have significant costs, such as sacrificing Aromatherapy utility or losing to certain matchups they could otherwise win, they will do quite well against the majority of builds. Still, not to sound elitist but, if everyone played as well as SCL players do, I would definitely get the impression that it's banworthy, but not everyone does.

Another point that I think is important to bring up: while I don't like the idea of theorymonning hypothetical metagames, I don't think that banning Caly would have the effect of preventing YEN cores from being used all the time; NDM and Etern would be unaffected, while Yveltal would be free to use many of its devastating offensive sets (which, by the way, I think would force the use of pretty passive pokemon like Defensive Xern, Ttar, or Zama-C to adequately check it). I could also imagine threats like Mewtwo which were limited by Caly checking it being free to wreak havoc, being in some ways harder to check than Caly itself is (remember how nobody realized Zacian-H would be the threat it would become when Zacian-C was banned!). Alternatively, I could also imagine it as a more fast-paced meta like SM, with strong bulky offense styles being prevalent, and that could make it quite fun to the bit slower meta of current SS. Threats like Yveltal could be limited by their Stealth Rock weakness. There's no great way to tell and it's all pure speculation in my eyes. My main thinking in regards to this is, should anything be broken in a post-Caly ban world, I would rather have Caly suspected again than ban more mons.

My overall thoughts are this: Is the teambuilding restrictiveness and MU fishing that Caly brings to the tier enough to be considered banworthy? If you are going by a more traditional Ubers tiering framework, then I would say no; if you are treating Ubers the same way OU would tier, then I think Caly could -potentially- be considered banworthy. I don't think a mon being strong and centralizing is necessarily the worst thing in the world, and plenty of great tiers like GSC OU or many of the old gens Ubers tiers have had a few mons that are quite comparable. I think centralization can sometimes be healthy, provided that a variety of teams are viable and the more skilled player wins most of the time. Caly definitely doesn't feel broken to me to the point where players will very often lose just due to MU or 50/50 plays like Zacian-Hero did. Personally, I'm not finding that many of my games are being decided by Caly plays. But it does provide a questionable amount of team restrictiveness and hard-to-deal-with play in my eyes.
While the TC has mostly remained No Ban, over time more and more good players like Situm, Reje, and FatFighter have taken some pro-ban stances. While I am still hesitant to fully support the pro-ban side, as a TC member, I have tried to push for complete transparency; should Caly not be problematic, the qualified voters will vote that way, and if it is, then it will be banned and we'll have to deal with that meta as it is at that point. I have never viewed most tiering decisions as final for the rest of time, so if Caly gets banned, I have no problem seeing how the meta is, and if people think that meta turns much worse, then we can go back to a Caly-legal tier.

Certainly, I know for myself that, at least initially, the meta would be quite fun and a breath of fresh air, as most new metas are, but I have no idea if that impression would last over time. It could, in the long term, make the tier lose a lot of it's flavor; remember that people like playing Ubers because they can use the big and ridiculously strong mons. In any case, I definitely do not think that the timing of this tiering decision should have any effect on the outcome. I love you skooma, but the take of "meh it's too late who cares" is not a great one. I'd also hate for people to ban Caly just to get some quick excitement before the new gen drops in a few months. If Caly does end up being banned, I would hope it would be for the right reasons, and not just players in the 1400s or below on ladder banning something because they don't like it.

Hopefully some of the points I have laid about above will give you more of an idea of the development of Caly over time, as well as its current state in the meta! My apologies to you of I did not take a strong stance on either side, but I'm just honestly mixed on this one.

 

[Lasen]

Going to make this super short and to the point: very little has changed in the past few months and the "new" Calyrex-S sets do not push it past the imaginary line in the sand that truly would make it broken. Is it centralising? Definitely, but not to a point where it's unbearable, especially so when one considers what Ubers has had historically. Something demanding a check on every team has been a thing since day 1 in every single smogon tier; you don't wanna lose to GSC Snorlax? Pack normal resists and maybe a phazer. DD Salamence is tossing you around in ADV? Bring a bulky Water and click Ice Beam. BW Ubers E-killer is sending you its regards? Toxic Spikes it up and then bring in Fightceus broski.
Another point I want to make is that you CAN get away with using a check that is not Yveltal, even if it does mean having a worse match-up into some other threat/some extremely niche set.
I will be voting do not ban and I implore anyone who is voting based on balance to truly tell me that high level tournament play is dictated by Calyrex-S (hint: it's not!).

 

[Lobby Eeveee]

Going to make this super short and to the point: very little has changed in the past few months and the "new" Calyrex-S sets do not push it past the imaginary line in the sand that truly would make it broken. Is it centralising? Definitely, but not to a point where it's unbearable, especially so when one considers what Ubers has had historically. Something demanding a check on every team has been a thing since day 1 in every single smogon tier; you don't wanna lose to GSC Snorlax? Pack normal resists and maybe a phazer. DD Salamence is tossing you around in ADV? Bring a bulky Water and click Ice Beam. BW Ubers E-killer is sending you its regards? Toxic Spikes it up and then bring in Fightceus broski.
Another point I want to make is that you CAN get away with using a check that is not Yveltal, even if it does mean having a worse match-up into some other threat/some extremely niche set.
I will be voting do not ban and I implore anyone who is voting based on balance to truly tell me that high level tournament play is dictated by Calyrex-S (hint: it's not!).

You know, centralization can be healthy. For example, you actually only need one phazer, and GSC snorlax will be much more manageable. For ADV DD Salamance, you really only need just 1 bulky water, it’s bad to bring 2. And for E-Killer, toxic spikes are actually quite accessible and Fightseus is an amazing counter.
However, for CalyS, it forces you to waste at least 3 team slots, reducing creativity ideas. Besides, it can break through even its ”counters”. And please, no shit like ”but every Ubers mon can do that and Ubers is a special tier!!!1!” With that bullshit argument, every higher tier is too strong to have bans and every lower tier is too weak to have bans. If that is the case, than this suspect test wouldn’t have happened!

 

[Moyashi]

And please, no shit like ”but every Ubers mon can do that and Ubers is a special tier!!!1!” With that bullshit argument, every higher tier is too strong to have bans and every lower tier is too weak to have bans. If that is the case, than this suspect test wouldn’t have happened!

How you get from "Ubers is a special tier that tolerates seriously high levels of centralization" to "every lower tier is too weak to have bans" is beyond me but frankly it comes off as immensely disingenuous. When people say many Ubers can break through its counters, it's to illustrate that such a happening is not a good enough reason to ban CalyS by itself. There needs to be more. Past Uber bans were examples of the kind of things we should look for to determine if CalyrexS is banworthy. ZacianH didn't just centralize the tier, it invalidated most balance builds and made games 50/50 jokefests that were one right predict away from ending the game there. ZacianC famously made games assurance guessfests. We all know about dynamax, shadow tag and baton pass. And if we go further back to Mega Rayquaza in ORAS, we can see an even more extreme effect.

Also it's been said already, but this idea that YEN is gonna disappear with a CalyS ban or even drop in usage is just confusion.and I don't know where the sentiment is coming from. Especially as Yveltal would be free to run crazy offensive sets. So if anything the core gets better and could loss be more standard than it is now.

 

[MeHerman]

In my head this is close. This is an interesting suspect test.

Here is an argument I can make for voting for a ban. It has basically one or two viable (“y”-able) switch ins to astralbarrage Yveltal and eternatus. But psyshock is a two hit KO even on max HP eternatus w/o a boosting item (unless you’re running 252/252 bold eternatus with no rocks and black sludge) and even nonscarfed calyrex is faster than eternatus. Weavile, marshadow, urshifu (draining kiss), are not great switch at all IMO and even bulkier switch ins, like scarf kyogre get one switch in max. Also just saying that every team needs to run a choice scarfer faster than (non-choice scarfed) calyrex also rings a little hollow. Even zacian had to fear some scarfers. Now to discuss yveltal: First I don’t care if it is too overcentralizing, this is ubers, and yveltal is a great mon anyways, and primal groudon etc. etc. above arguments others are making better than I could. Yveltal is not gonna disappear if calyrex-SR is banned. Just stop it. Also, it's not like we need to run quagsire (looking at you zacian) or shadow ball porygon 2 to check it or anything like that. Now that was what my argument is not, now on to why, one could argue, it should be banned. Addressing the argument that includes running U-turn to deal with sub-seed: 60 def EVs means the uninvested U-turn from Yveltal doesn’t break the sub, and then if your yveltal gets its boots knocked by say another yveltal and rocks are up etc. etc. Also, I think that calyrex-SR limits yveltal’s sets, that’s bad, and here’s why. So unless you’re running some serious HO you need to run yveltal with boots, roost (because you don’t want to be getting worn down), dark move (usually knock off but lash out can work if you’re running poltergeist on the team), and snarl to get around sub (although I don’t see a lot of snarl on the ladder probably for good reason). I also contend that in any play style where you want defog on your team you need to run defog. Why? Because looking at the other defog-ers in the tier Yveltal is basically the only viable one IMO. Lugia is bad (sorry Silver fans). Giratina sees almost no play (like I’ve seen one Giratina on an opposing team in months), maybe in part because Calyrex-SR exists and Giratina is almost the opposite of a switch in to astralbarrage. Ho-oH, I’d like to see the usage statistics but on the high-ladder I feel like I am propping up its usage single handedly based on what I’ve seen, and I don’t use it as a defogger. As well (specially) defensive Ho-oH must be mortified of rock moves like meteor beam and whatever groudon is running and knock off by say necrozma-DM or yveltal because if it loses its boots then it is super scared by rocks and so on. Lunala, I’ve actually seen on some stall variants and has a small small niche but still suffers from being slower 4x weak to calyrex-DM without priority, so eww. Landorus can run defog, I guess but again except on some HO I’ve seen very few. Xerneas, great mon but loses so hard to necrozma-DM, a frequent rocker, I can’t really see it as a reliable defogger. So Yveltal is locked into this moveset on anything but HO it must run boots, snarl, knock off, defog, specially defensive. With this move set 1) Suddenly weavile, urshifu +/-, xerneas (well for xern there’s necrozma and snarl can be annoying…) can take advantage of you. 2) you lose important moves like sucker punch u-turn oblivion wing etc. (It’s hard to fit priority in ubers IMO.) 3) Being forced to run defog puts tremendous pressure on it because it has to act as a counter to Calyrex-SR and as a defogger, which I think sometimes stretches it too thin. Also, separate to yveltal’s movepool, set, or four moveslot syndrome that it generates, I think it can be argued that this Calyrex-SR makes play patterns so predictable and yveltal so one dimensional that the Calyrex-SR player can take advantage of these. I’ve definitely lost games because the calyrex player took advantage of my need to switch in yveltal every time calyrex came out. It doesn’t sweep your team like mega ray did or 2 hit KO the entire meta game like zacian, but there’s other ways a pokemon can be unhealthy.

Here’s the twist. With all that being said, at this point, I’m still leaning slightly towards voting no ban. I could echo the reasons others have said why I don’t think calyrex-SR needs to be banned, but there’s no need. I’m kinda on the fence about this one maybe 55:45 but maybe even 51:49 noban:ban. I’d like to hear more from the other players especially those who play tournaments. Even though I’m currently on the no ban side like Manaphy said I’m “sympathetic to the pro ban argument.”

Tldr: Calyrex-SR makes play patterns too predictable and viable sets on yveltal (on non-HO) too limited, which might be too much. But, personally, and for the same reasons others have posted above I’m still slightly, barely, leaning no ban.