Lower Tiers RBY Ubers Hub

[Oiseau Bleu]

The way I used to play rby Ubers was unsatisfaying for me. Here is the basic game plan I applied:
1. Put asleep something
2. Spread paralysis on key opposing Pokemons
3. Pressure opposing team with Snorlax and SD Mew
4. Finish the game with Mewtwo as soon as nothing can stop it anymore
It's look very simple and very effective. However, it's easier writen than done. The two first steps are basics: send Exeggutor (or your sleeper) at the right moment, click Sleep Powder, then Stun Spore, etc. Nothing undoable. True troubles happen in the third part. In many games, when you send your Snorlax on a paralyzed foe, oppoenent will just switch on its own Snorlax and try to make the trade with Bslam + Self Destruct or just SD, etc. Paralyzed foe might stay and try to hit Snorlax or to paralyzed it (Chansey may do that for ex.), meaning it will be easier for the opposing Snorlax to switch in on and play the trade. You can accept this trade, but this means all the efforts you made to obtain this favorable position were useless. This trade also brings you closer to the critical situation that I will talk about later. So you might attempt to switch out your Snorlax, trying to absorb Self Destruct, or to pressure opposing Snorlax better with a more appropriate Pokemon like Exeggutor or Slowbro. But this is also risky. Bslam can induce dangerous paralysis on Slowbro and Exeggutor, and opposing Snorlax can continue its wild ride. Here is a typical example from my RBYPL. On turn 14, I switch in on a paralyzed Chansey my own PhysLax, predicting Soft Boiled or SToss. However, Ctown knew it and used Twave. Of course, there is no point to stay with Chansey, so Ctown sent its own Snorlax on my BodySlam. Here Ctown didn't have the momentum and I knew, in order to neutralize my initiative, he had to make the Snorlax trade. Moreover, he had a BoltBeam Mewtwo in back, meaning in a perfect world, if every Pokemon trade except Mewtwos, he has high chances to win the duel, since I rarely bring Ice Beam Mewtwo. So, he is inclined to this kind of trade. This is why, on turn 17, I predicted SD by sending my Exeggutor and then force it out (he could have used SD earlier, but nobody does that tbh). The situation reapeated on turn 20, and this time, on turn 22, I correctly predicted SD. In this example, everything happened well to me. However, how many times it could have gone wrong in this game? What if Ctown's Snorlax paralyzed my Exeggutor? What if he predicts all my predictions and if delays its SD (like i did with my Snorlax against its Mew later in the game)? What if I just do not have a Pokemon to send on its Snorlax? The exact same thing can happen with Mews and Tauros. And this led to the critical situation: once every physical attacker trades, only remain Mewtwos. Then the Mewtwo with Ice Beam is considerably advantaged. But, do I want to let the hasard decide the result of the game (in case of both / none Mewtwos bring Ice Beam)? Of course no. I wanted to be safer...

How to improve strategies to overcome these problems? My first idea was to play very solid checks to every member of ubers big 4: Reflect Mew + Reflect Snorlax + Light Screen Chansey + SubTbolt Mewtwo. Even the "screen core" looks very passive, my idea was that Rest Reflect Snorlax can pressure paralyzed Chansey at long term. And if the opponent sends its PhysLax, in order to trade, you can set up Reflect, and you will win the duel. I also wanted to play Sub+Tbolt Mewtwo because I needed an other way to win. It appears that this Mewtwo is very good. So I created the first version of what I called the "screen stall":

​

On the team completion: Exeggutor is a very natural pick here. It is the most solid sleeper, and contrary to Jynx and Gengar, it doensn't need a ton of support. Exeggutor is also very good against Rhydon. It's important to mention since my Mewtwo might have trouble to beat it. I chose Alakazam for the lead spot because I didn't want a to be "electric weak". Ice Beam Chansey is played to punish opposing BoltBeam Mewtwo. I don't want to epilogue on this team, because i didn't play it much and I will have other occasion to describe this "archetype" later.

​

Screen stall v1: there are many reason to prefer Starmie rather than Alakazam here. Firstly Starmie has the edge against "historical" lead. Tauros doesn't want to be criple by paralysis, Gengar is threatened by Psychic, Exeggutor hate Blizzard and Jynx is just bad. Especially, Starmie is very dissuasive for Tauros (vs Jolteon or Alakazam, it wouldn't be totally stupid to just use Bslam / EQ with Tauros lead for example). Moreover Starmie is a very good sleep absorber, and it's not rare to see it try to wake against mono-Ice Beam Chansey, in late game (many sleep absorber can't do this). Starmie also has a better coverage than Alakazam, especially has an Ice move, meaning you can play for the freeze early without any risk. Rest on Exeggutor because i'm paranoic. Counter on Mew because I wanted to have a lot of PP and to surprise Tauros and Mew going wild.

​

Screen stall v4: let's make a long stop on this version. I put Stun Spore on Exeggutor because, tbh, Rest was useless, since i havenot seen any Rhydon or Submission Mewtwo. Stun Spore greatly help my team to spread paralysis, especially because I don't want to risk to trade paralysis with my Chansey as long as I don't know opposing Mewtwo set. I opt for SD + Reflect Mew instead of Transform Mew because previous set was too passive. With this set, I still have a good match up against opposing Mew. I haven't writen yet about this Mewtwo set. Submission over Psychic mainly aims to beat Chansey faster. Submission also has a lot of PP. This means that SubmissionTwo has high chances to beat opposing Mewtwo lacking of Ice coverage. This also means you can play aggressively with you Mewtwo early game, without fear of loosing a PP stall war later. Thunderbolt especially helps against Slowbro. About team strategy. The first step of the gameplan is still the same: put a something asleep with your Exeggutor. Then Stun Spore something, and pressure it with Snorlax. Like I said, the point of this Snorlax is that it surely win the duel against the oncoming Snorlax. Cripling the opposing Snorlax is a huge for your Mewtwo. Use Rest when you need and restart to pressure again. Try to remain your Chansey unparalyzed, in order to check Mewtwo and to some extend Mew. When opposing Mewtwo comes in, send Chansey, and advise according to the Mewtwo set. Use your Mew against an opposing Mew or against a paralyzed Mewtwo out of control. However this team has several drawback. Gengar can be problematic since my Mewtwo and Mew can't directly threat it. You might think that an opponent could abuse my asleep Snorlax. It's true. But, if the opponent send Mewtwo, you can just send you Chansey, and nothing happens (even if Mewtwo freezes instantly your Chansey --> you are now super safe with your PP stall Mewtwo). And if he send Mew, you can send your own Mew and sets up Reflect. But, if your Snorlax left the field asleep, it might have trouble to switch in again on Snorlax and Tauros. Especially, Tauros can go wild in these situation. Note how much an unparalyzed Chansey is precious in this team. In every game, i did everything to preserve it from paralysis.

Improvements:
I don't really like Reflect Mew as a Mew Counter, because, 1. Gengar / Rhydon walls you, 2. opposing Mew might win the duel if it paralyzes your Mew early. So I decided to try a standard SD + BSlam + Eq + SoftBoiled Mew instead. I think it's generally better, but it leaves me without a good way to deal with opposing Mew combined with a lot of momentum. I didn't find a satisfying solution in a "MieEgg" team.

The main draw back of Reflect Snorlax: the opponent sends its Snorlax to pressure on of my paralyzed Pokemon (usually Mewtwo). I send my Snorlax, looking mischievously my opponent, thinking I will just use Reflect an negate its action. However, he predicts my Reflect and sends a very threatening Pokemon (Exeggutor, Cloyster, Zapdos, Mewtwo...). And my Snorlax just lost 25% for nothing, and then I will have more trouble to deal with opposing Snorlax coming back later (this also means that the surprise effect is very important). Reflect Snorlax is unexpectedly terribly bad in defensive plays. When I faced this situation, I usually send my Chansey, and use SoftBoiled thrice and then, Twave. This led me to this solution: I will play Chansey with Reflect / Defense Curl and i will keep PhysLax. My first idea when I played Reflect Snorlax was to prevent the opposing PhysLax from checking my own PhysLax. But I can play differently: instead of staying, I can send my Chansey, but this time, I have Reflect / Defense Curl, so I can decently curb the opposing Snorlax. Here is the team:

​

I played this team in this game. My Defense curl Chansey totally stopped the Snorlax and forced it to use SD on turn 22. This led me to a favorable position, since my paralyzed Mewtwo now is very hard to curb, and I still have my PhysLax to pressure his team whereas he doesn't have a good Snorlax response. Mr.378 might try to pressure my Mewtwo with his SD + EQ + Explosion Mew, but I still have my Exeggutor, my PhysLax, and my own Mew to deal with it. However Mr.378's Mewtwo managed to force my Mewtwo out with multiple paralysis. The game ended with an ultimate 50/50 on turn 37. Either I predict Explosion, and I sacrifice my Mewtwo on it, either I predict EQ, predicting my Explosion prediction. I did the wrong choice.

Mixed solution: I put Gengar instead of Starmie and Reflect on Chansey. It solves the two previous problems. Gengar prevents Reflect Mew from going wild, and Reflect Chansey can safely switch on Physlax. I tested it and it seems fine.

​

Personal VR

About my RBYPL:
I clearly abuse from Reflect Snorlax during RBYPL. At first, it worked very well. The surprise effect was insane, and managed to win many games effortlessly. But, once the surprise effect dissipated, I realized I was very predictable. Because of that, I lost games I should never have lost. Anyway, I manged to obtain a good record of 4-2 (even i'm not proud of my performance...).
Here are all the teams I played in my RBYPL games: https://pokepast.es/be90023809721522
I also built many shitty team you can use for fun. I didn't test many of them btw: https://pokepast.es/e2c9a305d3f2248f

 

[pac]

So, I have a strange one today.

plz don't leave..​

So, for those who don't know, Enigami is kind of infamous as the RBY gimmick lab monster. Between Tackle Porygon, Fury Swipes Persian, and Mega Punch Mewtwo, he's created a lot of funny things. But this one is one of my favorites, due to the fact that Golbat is my favorite Pokemon, and theoretically RBY Ubers is its best tier.


The idea is simple, you are looking for a MU fish to wall EQ + Boom Mew, aka a Flying-type. In this search, you begin to look for one that is not cockblocked by Golem or Rhydon. These Pokemon are:

• Gyarados (Hydro Pump and Blizzard)
• Dragonite (Blizzard)
• Articuno (Blizzard)
• Charizard (SD and Earthquake)
• Golbat (Mega Drain) Golbat Mega Drain vs. Rhydon: 156-184 (37.7 - 44.5%) -- guaranteed 3HKO

Of these five, Golbat is unique due to Screech and Confuse Ray being genuinely quite useful.

This combo is especially nice versus tier-king Mewtwo, where a paralyzed one is put in genuinely uncomfortable positions. At -2, it dies from full to a Mew Explosion, and takes annoying chip damage from CRay (and potentially stops an Amnesia/Attack turn). In fact, in a super tight situation, you could even potentially force through it with Golbat.

Mewtwo Psychic vs. Golbat: 318-374 (90 - 105.9%) -- 38.5% chance to OHKO (Factor in Full Para and Confusion Flinch and this gets REAL funny)
Mewtwo Ice Beam vs. Golbat: 222-262 (62.8 - 74.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
Golbat Double-Edge vs. -2 Mewtwo: 136-160 (32.7 - 38.5%) -- 99.3% chance to 3HKO

But what we came for is that it makes EQ + Boom Mew's life miserable, and boy it sure does. Unless it wants to trade with this shitstain, it can't really harm it. Then when it switches out, Golbat gets to CRay/Screech stuff like Chansey (or Mewtwo as mentioned above) and apply some neat pressure.

Golbat Double-Edge vs. -2 Chansey: 353-415 (50.2 - 59%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
Starmie Hyper Beam vs. -2 Chansey: 493-580 (70.1 - 82.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
Mew Earthquake vs. -2 Chansey: 408-480 (58 - 68.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
Mew Earthquake vs. -2 Mewtwo: 156-184 (37.5 - 44.3%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
Mew Explosion vs. -2 Mewtwo: 530-623 (127.7 - 150.1%) -- guaranteed OHKO

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https://pokepast.es/efcd7eab8d9387a5


Here's the team that me and Enigami came up with. With Screech support, you get some really dumb shit like random HBeam snipes from Starmie on Chansey, PhysLax becomes super threatening, and Mewtwo gets pressured heavily which is always a good thing. You really want to get paralysis down on Mewtwo, as once that happens is when Golbat actually starts truly working. This team also features a unique Mew set (EQ Explosion Transform Soft-Boiled) that I came up with for the team (at least I think I did, Eni hadn't heard of it before), and I think it has real potential.


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tl;dr/final thoughts

Obviously, Golbat is pretty bad outside of one very specific MU, but if you are hard-predicting an EQ + Explosion Mew thx to some heat prep, it becomes genuinely quite interesting. Ubers is definitely its best tier, and it's quite fun to run. Apologize if I didn't explain something thoroughly, as I kinda suck at this kind of thing.

 

[Ctown6]

Howdy folks,

Upon being eliminated from the RBY Ubers tour, I decided I would come and share my thoughts on the current meta, as well as dump a few of my favorite teams here for all to use. It’s been incredible the amount of exposure this tier has been getting since the start of 2022. Many new faces are trying the tier and it’s awesome to see for the oldest ubers meta out. I hope it continues to grow and hopefully some of these teams will help spice up your playing experience.

I’m gonna break this down into a few parts;

1. Current Meta

2. New Techs/ Whats next?

3. Team Dump


Current Meta

Things have changed quite a bit since RBYPLII. Some of the most notable changes have been Tauros declining, Jynx being almost non-existent, Thunderbolt + Submission Mewtwo become more common, Slowbro once again rising in popularity, and Exeguttor and Gengar becoming really good leads.

First of all, Tauros is not a bad mon. It still very much has its place on offensive teams as a lead and can find some usage in the back. The main problem is that it simply flops too often. When now in most games, it’s leading into one of Egg, Gar, Zapdos, Starmie, or Alakazam. While it can always pull some bull magic, it loses to all of these on paper, with the exception of Gengar and Alakazam. Gengar is usually played with a Flying type or Exeguttor in the back for the likely t1 Earthquake Tauros is clicking. Meaning, it doesn’t even win that exchange. Against Zam it’s only one critical hit away from KOing, however it has to eat paralysis in exchange for this Body Slam attempt. God forbid Tauros should full para, as now Zam is away Scott-free and the opponent can go into Snorlax or something to take care of Tauros. Also if Tauros gets paralyzed, the mon is nearly worthless, making it really difficult to stay in and click a move.

With that being said, Tauros can still click moves and destroy you. Zam can get crit and KOd, Eggy can get crit and paralyzed and miss stun spore/sleep powder, etc. With the lack of Jynx currently I’ve been dropping Stomp for Blizzard, and have been clicking it t1 vs Gengar. I think this is one way to get slightly more out of Tauros, as it doesn’t really need Stomp to do anything reliable. Currently I’d place Tauros behind Egg, Gar, Zap and maybe (Probably) Rhydon and Slowbro. You simply get much more on average out of these mons.

Thunderbolt + Submission Mewtwo is nothing new, but it’s been steadily cementing itself as a commonplace Mewtwo set. Before RBYPL it was nothing more than a niche set with occasional use for big benefits. Not too blow my own horn, but I’ve been clamoring about this set for sometime, ever since Enigami destroyed me with it in one of my first Ubers tournaments. This set is just really great at giving you security in the Mewtwo mirror. As either your opponent needs to Hax you with their own Mewtwo, lose the pp war and drain as much as possible, or switch around and open themselves up to big boosted damage. All of this with the added benefit of absolutely molly whopping Chansey.

There are some drawbacks here of course. You become weak to Ice Beam/ Blizzard Mewtwo if you aren’t paralyzed. You essentially lose to Rhydon, and let Exeguttor come in for free. However if you can work around these things this Mewtwo set is absolutely phenomenal and I’m really glad it’s picking up a lot of usage. I’d rank it as the 3rd best Mewtwo set currently behind Tbolt Psychic and Bolt Beam.

For Slowbro, it never really left, it just dropped in usage. But recently it has begun to rise once again, thanks mostly to its ability to switch into Mew and Twave or Amnesia up on the switch. You do solid damage to Mewtwo after a boost and if it’s paralyzed it really doesn’t take an absurd amount of hax to break through. Furthermore, Slowbro fits on a variety of styles and pairs well with many mons. It can fit on slower paced teams, with SubBolt Mewtwo to stall out the opponents Mewtwo. It can fit on Hyper Offensive teams that use Boom2 to remove the opponents Mewtwo, or even more standard teams looking for a mew check and overall good physical answer.

One thing to note is the days of Ice Beam Slowbro are over, absolutely never run that. Keep it standard with Surf and see for yourself how great this mon is.


The Lead Meta

I was gonna make a tier list or something but I’m lazy atm so another day.

a quick run down of the common(ish) leads in order of how good I think they are

Exeguttor- Great against Alakazam Jolteon and Chansey leads, Good against Tauros and Gengar, no Jynx running around to mess with it right now. You can get sooooooo much value out of a lead Exeguttor. Getting a stun spore off on Tauros or Gengar means you’re probably beating them one on one and getting sleep off against a bigger target. I also like sing Chansey with Exeggutor in case I have to change the game plan. This thing goes 2 for 1 very often and can break the game wide open really early.

Gengar- Gengar has the speed tier to be an absolute menace, pair it with sing Chansey just like in OU and you have a great early game setup. The most popular styles currently are GarZap and Gar Egg. Ground immune and ground resist in the back to soak up Tauros EQ’s or even Snorlax in the early to mid game. Gengar never hits hypnosis so that sucks but regardless you still outspeed every other sleep lead and have counter play for the paralysis leads

Zapdos- This is a very interesting and fantastic lead, the only paralysis lead that destroys egg and Chansey, making Mewtwo the most common answer if there’s no Rock or Lead Jolteon, and overall you just get so much value out of Zapdos it’s rediculous, just be prepared for rocks.

Alakazam- I really have been liking Zam recently, despite not playing it in tour. I think it’a a great lead that absorbs sleep really well and spreads a good amount of para. It has a bad egg matchup which sucks but it doesn’t let Gengar pull any shenanigans and overall it’s quite solid.

Jolteon- similar to Zap, I think you have to go Pin Missle however, to make sure you hit Eggy. Also, you’re much less likely to successfully Rest and wake in ubers so you can afford it. Pairs really well with Slowbro and in general is just a solid lead who threatens a lot.

Ros- already talked about he bull, I don’t think it’s great rn

Starmie- pls don’t scream at me, I think this is kinda dogshit. What does it even do? Best case scenario freeze Chansey? And twave one other mon? Maybe soak up a sleep? Then proceed to do nothing? I’m exaggerating a bit but I really don’t think starmie is a great lead

Lapras- Behold, the new Jynx. Improved bulk for a better ros matchup, outspeeds eggy and 2hkos, can freeze, can hit starmie and other waters, hyper beam for finishing blows and sing for its own sleep. Could be much higher on this list it’s just a bit underexplored

Jynx-meh


New Techs/ What’s next

Mew’s Sets- the primary Mew sets being used are almost always in the form of Swords Dance user. Running Earthquake and Body Slam alongside Softboiled is the most common. Earthquake and Explosion is still seen. And occasionally, ggmew. Or SDmew with Reflect and Body Slam.

However I think a different style of Mew could be rising up. That being Support Mew

bingbong

Mew
Ability: No Ability
- Thunder Wave
- Swords Dance
- Body Slam
- Soft-Boiled

Mew
Ability: No Ability
- Thunder Wave
- Psychic / Ice Beam
- Explosion
- Soft-Boiled

I think these sets are really good, after not being a believer at first. If you want to enable something and need Paralysis support this is your set. I especially like the set with Psychic and Explosion, which I’ll be calling nessamew from now on.

Psychic hits many of the mons that might attempt to check/ stay in on mew. It 2HKOs Gengar, 3HKOs Tauros and Rhydon, and 4HKOs Snorlax and Zapdos, without account for special drops or crits.

In addition to this it spreads paralysis very well and is one of the best lures to get a twave off on opposing Mew, who often switch out of slowbro, Chansey, or Starmie/Zam. The cherry on top is a powerful Explosion to take out a key target once chip and Paralysis have been spread.


Boom2/ asd assassin

I’ve been liking this MewTwo set a lot and have been putting a lot of effort in to explore its possibilities.

bingbong2

Mewtwo
Ability: No Ability
- Thunder Wave
- Thunderbolt
- Self-Destruct
- Recover

The secret is, powerful special attackers and offense in general can often win games if Mewtwo is out of the way. You lure in opposing Mewtwo, paralyze it, get a crit thunderbolt, self destruct. You won’t KO Mewtwo unless you crit, but it’ll be in range to where you can run it over with the rest of your team. It’s a risky strategy but a surprisingly effective one. It’s very hard to stop a slowbro with no Mewtwo. Other threats like Amnesia Snorlax, Poliwrath, Persian and Tauros can often take big advantage of this as well

More Jynx- Jynx should have a resurgence since tbh it’s pretty good right now with no one expecting it and often neglecting its existence.

Less Chansey- Chansey can be dropped more often than usage stats say. It can be pretty beneficial to drop Chansey, and I expectmore people to start doing this.


Team Dump

Some of my favorite teams

https://pokepast.es/a7d4ac736db006d9

GarZap

Gengar
Ability: No Ability
- Hypnosis
- Thunderbolt
- Night Shade
- Explosion

Chansey (F)
Ability: No Ability
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD / 252 Spe
IVs: 2 Atk
- Sing
- Thunder Wave
- Ice Beam
- Soft-Boiled

Snorlax
Ability: No Ability
- Body Slam
- Hyper Beam
- Earthquake
- Self-Destruct

Mew
Ability: No Ability
- Swords Dance
- Earthquake
- Explosion
- Soft-Boiled

Mewtwo
Ability: No Ability
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD / 252 Spe
IVs: 2 Atk
- Amnesia
- Psychic
- Ice Beam
- Recover

Zapdos
Ability: No Ability
- Thunderbolt
- Drill Peck
- Thunder Wave
- Agility

This team is phenomenal, my most played, favorite team, by far. It doesn’t seem to matter the matchup, this team overwhelms opponents and has amazing synergies. You get off to a quick start with the combination of Gengar and Zapdos in the early game. Using Zapdos and Snorlax to break early to mid game, using gar as a pivot/ sleep sack, and using Ice beam psychic Mewtwo to hopefully freeze the opponents in the mirror. Earthquake Explosion Mew to truly rip a team open or finish them off.

The Mew and Mewtwo can be changed to your liking but fr this team is incredible.
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen1ubers-608273


https://pokepast.es/1995c3fec06176ad

EggDon

Exeggutor
Ability: No Ability
- Sleep Powder
- Stun Spore
- Psychic
- Explosion

Mew
Ability: No Ability
- Swords Dance
- Body Slam
- Reflect
- Soft-Boiled

Mewtwo
Ability: No Ability
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD / 252 Spe
IVs: 2 Atk
- Amnesia
- Psychic
- Thunderbolt
- Recover

Snorlax
Ability: No Ability
- Body Slam
- Hyper Beam
- Self-Destruct
- Earthquake

Chansey (F)
Ability: No Ability
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD / 252 Spe
IVs: 2 Atk
- Sing
- Soft-Boiled
- Ice Beam
- Thunder Wave

Rhydon
Ability: No Ability
- Substitute
- Earthquake
- Body Slam
- Rest

Another great team, I built and started spamming this for rbypl. It’s very solid across the board and has some incredibly good matchups, without too many bad ones. Your goal is to spread paralysis early (notably going for stun spore on Gengar and Tauros) and sleeping Something in the back preferably. Rhydon acts as primary wall breaker, and Rest Is used because Rock Slide is less valuable and you can stay healthy against mono Body Slam mew. This team also uses ggmew since you have Rhydon to handle Gengar.
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen1ubers-609915



https://pokepast.es/8b2ebc5dc1b954b7

EggyAero

Exeggutor
Ability: No Ability
- Sleep Powder
- Stun Spore
- Psychic
- Explosion

Aerodactyl
Ability: No Ability
- Reflect
- Rest
- Double-Edge
- Fire Blast

Snorlax
Ability: No Ability
- Body Slam
- Hyper Beam
- Earthquake
- Self-Destruct

Chansey (F)
Ability: No Ability
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD / 252 Spe
IVs: 2 Atk
- Light Screen
- Thunder Wave
- Ice Beam
- Soft-Boiled

Mew
Ability: No Ability
- Swords Dance
- Rock Slide
- Earthquake
- Soft-Boiled

Mewtwo
Ability: No Ability
- Amnesia
- Thunderbolt
- Submission
- Recover

I’ve really been enjoying building with Aerodactyl, and this was my best creation using it to this point. Aero is a phenomenal wall, hard walling physlax and most common Mew sets. It’s supported here by a solid stall core, with Rock Slide Mew for Zapdos support, Tbolt Sub Mewtwo to stall out in the mirror, and light screen Chansey to help with Mewtwo and soak up freezes. You can utilize fire blast burns to help in stalling opposing Mewtwo, which I think is really cool. A bit of a slow team but I like it a lot.
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen1ubers-605614

Aero>Starmie


https://pokepast.es/ca658084976d53f9

JoltBro

Jolteon
Ability: No Ability
- Thunderbolt
- Thunder Wave
- Double Kick
- Pin Missile

Slowbro
Ability: No Ability
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD / 252 Spe
IVs: 2 Atk
- Amnesia
- Surf
- Thunder Wave
- Rest

Chansey (F)
Ability: No Ability
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD / 252 Spe
IVs: 2 Atk
- Sing
- Ice Beam
- Thunder Wave
- Soft-Boiled

Mewtwo
Ability: No Ability
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD / 252 Spe
- Amnesia
- Thunderbolt
- Psychic
- Recover

Mew
Ability: No Ability
- Body Slam
- Swords Dance
- Earthquake
- Soft-Boiled

Snorlax
Ability: No Ability
- Body Slam
- Earthquake
- Hyper Beam
- Self-Destruct

This team is really Standard but also quite powerful. You spread paralysis and chip with Jolteon, using Snorlax to wall break. Slowbro can come in on Mew to spread its own paralysis on Mewtwo and Mew. Mew comes in to threaten Mewtwo and do big damage, helping Slowbro get opportunities to boost up and go crazy.
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen1ubers-607357


https://pokepast.es/2233133c02adce38

LapEgg

Lapras
Ability: No Ability
- Blizzard
- Thunderbolt
- Sing
- Hyper Beam

Chansey (F)
Ability: No Ability
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD / 252 Spe
IVs: 2 Atk
- Thunder Wave
- Ice Beam
- Counter
- Soft-Boiled

Snorlax
Ability: No Ability
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD / 252 Spe
- Body Slam
- Earthquake
- Reflect
- Rest

Mew
Ability: No Ability
- Swords Dance
- Earthquake
- Body Slam
- Soft-Boiled

Mewtwo
Ability: No Ability
- Amnesia
- Thunderbolt
- Submission
- Recover

Exeggutor
Ability: No Ability
- Sleep Powder
- Stun Spore
- Psychic
- Explosion

Credit to Mikon for the team. Lead Lapras is really cool, I’ve tweaked this team slightly to my liking. Mew is your primary wincon here using your other goons to wall break and set it up for you. Hopefully Nessa will come and bless us with all the Lap infos.
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen1ubers-609908



https://pokepast.es/d64efabc06d7e193

A fun one

Tauros (M)
Ability: No Ability
- Body Slam
- Hyper Beam
- Earthquake
- Blizzard

Mew
Ability: No Ability
- Thunder Wave
- Psychic
- Explosion
- Soft-Boiled

Mewtwo
Ability: No Ability
- Thunder Wave
- Thunderbolt
- Self-Destruct
- Recover

Persian
Ability: No Ability
- Slash
- Hyper Beam
- Bubble Beam
- Screech

Snorlax
Ability: No Ability
- Amnesia
- Body Slam
- Blizzard
- Self-Destruct

Exeggutor
Ability: No Ability
- Sleep Powder
- Stun Spore
- Explosion
- Psychic

I’ve been experimenting a lot with Boom2 and it’s possible teammates. I really like this physical style, with added amnesia lax. It’s an all or nothing team, but it can overwhelm quickly and win games.
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen1ubers-1527356450-y098gu6sa3dl1y1bkn6wrp0m2kw51xvpw


Conclusion: Ubers still has a ton of room to grow and a load of things to discover and innovate. I’m really excited to see how all the amazing players change the meta. Also massive shoutout to Mikon my #1 person to get games with and a huge support to me through UWTT.

 

[Mikon]

Hi, Ctown wanted me to go over Lead Lapras, though I do have a couple other things to talk about as well.

Lapras and Hypno
Lapras and Hypno are two underexplored lead options that match up comfortably against Exeggutor while having solid matchups against other Pokemon like Tauros. Ctown went over Lapras briefly in his post, but here's a more detailed list of what it can do as a lead:

• It outspeeds and 2HKOes Exeggutor with Blizzard, or it can use Sing to put it to sleep. In the event that Exeggutor manages to get sleep off, using Stun Spore to catch the switch is risky, as this move and Lapras' bulk gives it some room to wake up on it.
• Lapras has around a 27% chance to 2HKO Tauros while rarely being KOed by the combination of 2 Body Slams and a Hyper Beam in return.
• Lapras has multiple lines available to work around Starmie. Lapras can switch into Mewtwo and back to likely persuade the opponent into switching out, allowing Lapras to likely try for a Sing before the foe can do anything to it, or it can switch to Chansey to get off Thunder Wave, letting Lapras force sleep onto something else, or Lapras could simply just use Sing on turn 1, as Starmie can't even 4HKO it with Psychic. Alakazam is similar to Starmie but 4HKOes Lapras and technically isn't as pressured by Mewtwo to switch out, though it still has very little reason to stay in.
• Gengar is an actual negative matchup for Lapras, but Lapras can still try to put it to sleep with Sing if it misses Hypnosis, or it could use Blizzard to put it in KO range of Mewtwo's unboosted Psychic and Snorlax and Mew's Earthquakes. Gengar can also go for Thunderbolt, which 3HKOes.
• Zapdos and Jolteon are negative matchups for Lapras too, but Lapras can just switch out.
• If Lapras takes paralysis and remains reasonably healthy, it can block status in the short term from Chansey (and Exeggutor to an extent, though Lapras must be careful not to switch into Psychic)

Hypno possesses a largely similar matchup spread to Exeggutor, but fares better against it, Starmie, Zapdos, and Lapras thanks to its higher Speed and lack of weaknesses. Hypno also gets Counter for the Tauros matchup if you're into that, but Seismic Toss or Rest are probably better choices. Pairing Hypno with Exeggutor allows you to have most of the latter's utility in the lead slot while not posing the danger of compromising it on the first turn of the game. Lapras and Victreebel could be decent partners for it as well, forcing sleep on more valuable threats after Hypno uses Thunder Wave on the lead.

Sandslash
Everybody knows what Sandslash is supposed to do at this point, so I won't go into that, but I will go over what it should be running. Earthquake and Swords Dance are its main selling points and are both obviously mandatory, allowing Sandslash to 2HKO the entire unresisted metagame after a boost. Substitute should virtually never be dropped either, as Sandslash has the bulk to set it up on quite a few different Pokemon, like Jolteon, Zapdos, Submission Mewtwo, and unboosted Mew without special moves or Hyper Beam/Explosion. Even if it doesn't hit these matchups, it can still fish for full paralyses with it. Rock Slide and Hyper Beam are the only real options for the last moveslot. The former grants Sandslash perfect coverage, preventing it from being walled by Aerodactyl, but the latter hits the much more common Exeggutor for massive damage after a boost. Don't bother with Rest on Sandslash, Rest Rhydon walls everything it can and much more, and even if you do hit a good matchup for it, Sandslash should be taking that opportunity to set up and sweep. Body Slam isn't much better, you're relying on a 30% chance when you should have paralysed everything you need to before you bring in Sandslash anyway.

Here's some replays showing Sandslash off.

Poliwrath
Poliwrath is very untested, but it seems to have some potential here. +2 Hydro Pump (which Slowbro doesn't get) 2HKOes Snorlax and Mew and does 36.8-43.3% to Mewtwo, STAB Submission does a huge amount to Chansey and requires no setup turns, and Poliwrath's Speed puts it in the same position as Sandslash where it often just needs the Mews to be paralysed and the lead dealt with to outpace entire teams. Blizzard is probably the best choice for the final moveslot, hitting Exeggutor is important and it's going to be difficult to find an opportunity to land Hypnosis by the time Poliwrath comes out. Slowbro's popularity is unfortunate for it, but Poliwrath can 2HKO it around 41% of the time at +4, so Poliwrath does at least have a chance to break through it if Slowbro is forced out immediately after it uses Rest.

edit: forgor to mention, hip made psy/twave/boom/soft mew.

 

[Torchic]

Howdy folks,

Upon finished Ubers Winter Team Tournament and RBY Ubers Tournament, I decided I would come and share my thoughts and sets for RBY Ubers. At first I want give a shoutout to Oiseau Bleu who gave me some building ideas from UWTT week 2 onwards.

Team Dump

I will share a team I used to huge success in tournaments:

Importables

Version Red
Version Blue

Zapdos is a quite solid lead for current meta, threatens Waters, Eggy and Tauros, also good to be a sleep sack and always has a chance to crip lead Gengar with opposing Hypnosis miss. Zapdos is bulkier than Jolteon with no ground weakness and does more damage to Snorlax and Mew for midgame. Last move of Zapdos is a filler. With Eggy putting something to sleep reliablely, Chansey's set can be flexible, Counter/Light Screen/Reflect are all good to use, Seismic Toss is better choice here for attacking and PP stall.

Games

VS. Enigami

Comments

Zap sleep sack, Counter Chansey works, Mew counters paralyzed Mewtwo. Eggy Sweep.

VS. Lutra

Comments

Bad openning overall and lose Eggy speed tie. Break with spc boost Snorlax with blizzard and Counter Chansey. Mew Sweep.

VS. Stunner

Comments

Zapdos bad luck against Mie and Chansey, but we get better sleeping for midgame with Eggy. PP War to the last with Zapdos Sweep

VS. Inder

Comments

Eggy bad luck against Zam for double miss. Light Screen Chansey stalls Slowbro. PP War to the last with Chansey Sweep.

Here are some detailed thoughts:

Mewtwo should max Atk stat even it doesn't carry physical moves.
With Max attack stat Mewtwo can use struggle with Max power, as showed in replay vs. stunner, Mewtwo can meet a situation where you want to have better chance OHKO/2HKO unhealthy opposing mons like 10%+ Zapdos and 20%+ Tauros with Struggle.

Integer Divisions
Thanks to Enigami for explanation, should take care of this mechanic when playing, as showed in replay vs. Inder, Chansey speedtie with Slowbro even Bro takes 5 t-waves so both should take care about their turn using recovery moves.

Details

Slowbro Speed: 158
39 (after being paralyzed)
9 (after being paralyzed x2)
2 (after being paralyzed x3)
0 (after being paralyzed x4)
Chansey Speed:
198 49 (after being paralyzed)
12 (after being paralyzed / amplified x2)
3 (after being paralyzed / amplified x3)
0 (after being paralyzed / amplified x4)

Speed of mons below 79 Base will be 0 after 4 drops, other mons will be 1 after 4 drops. Mon like Mewtwo will drop to 0 speed if it make a special drop on opposing max boosted Amnesia mons and they use Amnesia 1 more time.

Thank you for reading!

 

[Mikon]

Here are usage stats for the RBY Ubers Tournament as nobody else got around to it:
Moves and Teammates / Combos
Usage

+ ---- + ------------------ + ---- + ------- + ------- +
| Rank | Pokemon            | Use  | Usage % |  Win %  |
+ ---- + ------------------ + ---- + ------- + ------- +
| 1    | Snorlax            |  133 |  95.00% |  50.38% |
| 1    | Mewtwo             |  133 |  95.00% |  49.62% |
| 3    | Mew                |  123 |  87.86% |  44.72% |
| 4    | Chansey            |  121 |  86.43% |  52.89% |
| 5    | Exeggutor          |   70 |  50.00% |  48.57% |
| 6    | Gengar             |   46 |  32.86% |  63.04% |
| 6    | Tauros             |   46 |  32.86% |  41.30% |
| 8    | Slowbro            |   37 |  26.43% |  45.95% |
| 9    | Zapdos             |   25 |  17.86% |  48.00% |
| 10   | Starmie            |   22 |  15.71% |  27.27% |
| 11   | Rhydon             |   18 |  12.86% |  44.44% |
| 12   | Jynx               |   14 |  10.00% |  50.00% |
| 13   | Alakazam           |   13 |   9.29% |  46.15% |
| 14   | Cloyster           |    3 |   2.14% |  66.67% |
| 14   | Jolteon            |    3 |   2.14% |   0.00% |
| 16   | Persian            |    1 |   0.71% | 100.00% |
| 16   | Sandslash          |    1 |   0.71% |   0.00% |

• Missing 1 Pokemon from LUTRA.
• Missing 1 Pokemon from NAEL222.
• Missing 2 Pokemon from FC.
• Missing 2 Pokemon from SAGE.
• Missing 1 Pokemon from OISEAU BLEU.
• Missing 1 Pokemon from CT0WN.
• Missing 3 Pokemon from CT0WN.
• Missing 1 Pokemon from LUTRA.
• Missing 1 Pokemon from CUREPERSONA.
• Missing 1 Pokemon from FARCE OF THE DEATH.
• Missing 1 Pokemon from FRRF.
• Missing 1 Pokemon from OISEAU BLEU.
• Missing 1 Pokemon from CT0WN.
• Missing 2 Pokemon from CT0WN.
• Missing 1 Pokemon from LUCKY-SAMA.
• Missing 1 Pokemon from INDER.
• Missing 3 Pokemon from SAGE.
• Missing 3 Pokemon from FRRF.
• Missing 1 Pokemon from CURE★PERSONA.
• Missing 1 Pokemon from STUNNER047.
• Missing 1 Pokemon from OISEAU BLEU.
• Missing 1 Pokemon from CURE★PERSONA.

Leads

+ ---- + ----------------------- + ---- + ------- + ------- +
| Rank | Leads                   | Use  | Usage % |  Win %  |
+ ---- + ----------------------- + ---- + ------- + ------- +
| 1    | Gengar                  |   42 |  30.00% |  66.67% |
| 2    | Tauros                  |   25 |  17.86% |  48.00% |
| 3    | Starmie                 |   21 |  15.00% |  28.57% |
| 4    | Jynx                    |   13 |   9.29% |  53.85% |
| 4    | Exeggutor               |   13 |   9.29% |  46.15% |
| 4    | Alakazam                |   13 |   9.29% |  46.15% |
| 7    | Zapdos                  |    6 |   4.29% |  50.00% |
| 8    | Jolteon                 |    3 |   2.14% |   0.00% |
| 9    | Chansey                 |    2 |   1.43% |  50.00% |
| 9    | Mewtwo                  |    2 |   1.43% |  50.00% |

 

[Plague von Karma]

With the spotlight ladder up, I made a yt vid featuring some teams I made with Enigami and Ctown. I think they're of varying viability but it worked out quite well regardless. You'll hear me spitballing about what I think works and stuff. If you're after teams to play on the ladder or in the tournament, this should give you a nice little boost.

 

[Plague von Karma]

Hi, I was told to come here regarding a potential tiering decision to make. This is extremely pedantic, would probably not affect anything, and would thus essentially be a formality.

If you're familiar with RBY Mewtwo, you may know it has two unused moves in its learnset, by virtue of the lack of a move deleter. Specifically, it cannot learn Confusion or Disable, because it's caught at L70, wherein Barrier and Recover overwrite it. It appears that it was meant to be caught at L60 at some point in development, where its learnset would make sense. I did a video on this here, I discuss it at 3:50ish. You can see the L1 learnset in the disassembly here.

There following tiering decision from the past year makes it seem justified to allow Confusion/Disable Mewtwo in Ubers;

• The Head RBY Council accepts the Mew Glitch on the basis of it not being broken​

These are two methods that would allow Mewtwo to "naturally" learn these moves. However, I don't believe any action has been made regarding this, so I am bringing it up here. I can see Confusion Mewtwo being used for long-term attacking PP, but Disable probably wouldn't do much. Regardless, I think we are at a point where it's justified to let these unused moves run free. In fact, they're the only occasions in the game where a move in a learnset is completely unobtainable despite being there.

I guess I should page the Ubers Council, given this is sort of a tiering proposal;
Ctown6 Enigami Lutra Oiseau Bleu Sevi 7

EDIT: I tested the Level Wrapping theory and it appears RBY doesn't prompt L1 moves to be learned for some reason. RBY Discord messages here. Mew Glitch works though.

 

[Enigami]

With all the RBY Ubers tournaments done for the time being, it's time to share some thoughts on Pokemon in the current Ubers meta.


Seems like 2 Special Attacks Mewtwo has settled into being the norm again. Psychic + Ice Beam has been under the radar for a bit, but that set can brutally punish low Slowbro usage from your opponent as long as you can avoid paralyzing your opponent's Mewtwo. Thunderbolt Submission Mewtwo and Selfdestruct Mewtwo shouldn't be overlooked though, and Thunder Wave even without Selfdestruct is underexplored and might have some use on teams otherwise lacking paralysis support and would like to have opposing Mewtwo paralyzed. Body Slam might similarly work for a support Mewtwo as a more offensive variant, as it can paralyze opposing Mewtwo while also being able to 3HKO opposing Mewtwo with critical hits like Ice Beam and Thunderbolt can. Body Slam also would let it pressure Chansey very heavily with crit Body Slams doing over 50%.

I'd also like to explore Confusion and Disable at some point. If we opt to include those as May suggested way back in August of last year, both moves could have solid niches. Confusion lacks Psychic's power, but it can still pair with Thunderbolt like Submission while providing 40 PP and doing not insignificant damage at 999 Special while creating more openings against opposing Mewtwo with confusion status. Disable is more questionable, but Mewtwo paired with a Ground-type has time to fish for it against Pokemon like Chansey and opposing Mewtwo to disable moves like Softboiled/Recover, allowing it to make the most of its limited attack PP, or Ice Beam on Chansey or whichever attack is paired with Thunderbolt Mewtwo to provide a 100% safe switch to the Ground-type to set up Swords Dance/Substitute.


Really love how diverse Mew sets can be nowadays, with even occasional non-Swords Dance sets. Earthquake / Explosion / Softboiled has dipped a fair bit since people exploited its weakness to Flying-types, but now I've been using some full offense Body Slam / Earthquake / Explosion sets to success. Body Slam / Earthquake / Softboiled and Body Slam / Reflect / Softboiled are still strong as usual, and there's been a fair bit of Thunder Wave and Special Attacks too. Haven't checked the usage stats but Transform seems to be the least common variety of Mew.


I feel like I'm sleeping on Snorlax's other sets, it's too easy to just go with old and reliable Body Slam / Earthquake / Hyper Beam / Selfdestruct Snorlax. I'm not sold on Amnesia sets, but Reflect sets can definitely put an opponent in an awkward spot when their Snorlax can't trade with yours and sprinkling in Counter in your teams is highly recommended to gain a massive advantage in the very common Lax dittos. Speaking of which, Counter needs to be scouted for more often. You can afford to use Earthquake once and still get the other Snorlax in Hyper Beam range, and catching a Counter turn is absolutely worth it.


I've had success with Chansey-less boom spam offense teams and one of my favorite teams I used in ALT PL, Zapdos / Exeggutor / Slowbro / Snorlax / Mew / Mewtwo. I can say without a doubt that Chansey is highly recommended but not mandatory in RBY Ubers, you can definitely build without it. Going Chanseyless can make your team a bit awkward against BoltBeam Mewtwo if both yours and their Mewtwo are unstatused though. Ice Beam / Sing / Thunder Wave / Softboiled Chansey is "the" RBY Ubers Chansey set at the moment, and I don't expect that to change unless people start figuring out how to use Ice-types to exploit it effectively or it ends up providing too many opportunities for Slowbro to get in and cause trouble. It just provides so much utility, bringing sleep, paralysis and freeze to the table on top of checking Mewtwo.


Sleep + Explosion is just too useful in the meta. Gengar I think is easily the 5th best Pokemon in the metagame. Even while asleep or frozen, its Normal immunity is just insanely valuable/frustrating as the opponent can no longer mindlessly click Body Slam or Explosion and expect to be rewarded with some kind of progress. Since its most important trait is blocking Normal moves, you could run very exotic non-standard sets and still have a functional Gengar. Lots to explore there. Egg of course is great as always with its Psychic pressure and dual status along with Explosion, particularly on teams that might want a better matchup against Ground-types. You can put either of these two as your lead or in the back and they should be able to pull their weight.


The non-boom offense trio of RBY Ubers. All of them can spread paralysis, Zapdos and Tauros can exert a ton of pressure through high power attacks, critical hits, and even Stomp paraflinching in Tauros' case, while Slowbro of course has its potentially game winning Amnesia Surf sweeps. Zapdos' 4th move is way more varied than in OU. The usual Agility is a nice option, but other moves such as Hyper Beam in the lead slot to punish a Lovely Kiss miss from Jynx, Reflect to better brawl with Snorlax and Mew, Rest to wall Rock Slide-less Rhydons, Substitute to fish for full paralysis against a Mewtwo, Flash to mess with opposing setup and even Thunder for the extra damage are all contenders here. Most these moves listed I've actually been able to use in the right situation to positive effect. I don't have much to add about Slowbro since there's just the one viable set, but it's great especially if the opponent opts to overuse Psychic + Ice Beam Mewtwo. Tauros falls behind a little bit due to lack of a reliable paralysis inducing move and lack of defensive utility, but it can more than make up for it with the usual hax Tauros brings. Especially Stomp Tauros. No Blizzard might be good news to Dragonites, Rhydons and Exeggutors, but when your team is paralyzed you will really fear the threat of paraflinching.


The Rocks are strong offensive pieces, but do struggle a bit with their awful speed and huge vulnerability to Special attacks. As always, they are the best counters by far for Zapdos so don't forget them while teambuilding. The gap between Rhydon and Golem isn't quite as big in Ubers, as Explosion has a lot more value in Ubers due to the threat it presents to setup Pokemon like Slowbro or the Mews, giving Golem a stronger role than it has in OU. So if you want a Rock, don't just default to the more defensive Rhydon, the aggressive style of Golem might be better suited to your team. As for sets, their OU standards can work just fine, but dropping Rock Slide for Rest on Rhydon or Substitute on Golem are viable options as Rock-weak Pokemon that aren't Zapdos are rare and Zapdos is walled by them anyway.


Slowbro is great, which means Victreebel's niche is the strongest it can be with it tanking Surf with ease and shredding Slowbro with Razor Leafs while also bringing sleep and paralysis with it. Dragonite works kind of like an alternate Zapdos, providing Earthquake immunity and paralysis (unless you opt for Agility over Thunder Wave), but trades the immediate power of STAB Thunderbolt and Drill Peck for checking Rocks with Surf. Both of these, of course, have Wrap, which lets them brutally ravage paralyzed teams as long as RNG doesn't fail them. They are a bit of a matchup fish though, as they can struggle to get the full threat of Wrap to bear against Gengar teams and work best when Victreebel faces Slowbro and Dragonite faces GolDon respectively.


Probably the best Pokemon in the tier for spreading paralysis, as teams often lack good switch-ins to the combo of Psychic and Thunder Wave that aren't their Mew, Mewtwo or Chansey, all of which have advantages in not being paralyzed that the opponent might want to keep. It struggles to accomplish much offensively while Chansey or the Mews are still around though, so it should be used alongside Pokemon that prey on paralyzed opponents to make up for this.


Haven't seem a whole lot from these old lead Pokemon lately, but it makes sense since they all have issues. Jolteon checks Zapdos, but beyond that it's mostly just a worse Zapdos with lower damage output and no Earthquake immunity. Jynx brings sleep and freeze fishing, but it is flimsy and freeze fishing is worse than in OU because freezing anything but Mewtwo makes an opposing Mewtwo now have no fear of ice moves, but with Chansey being almost all mono-Ice Beam maybe there could be some lines that could let Jynx get more value in games. Starmie similarly might have some possibility in taking advantage of mono-IB Chansey but otherwise is like Alakazam but with an unwelcome weakness to Zapdos and Thunderbolt Mewtwo. At the moment Alakazam has a proven role while Starmie feels lacking.


Electrode is an alright lead if your opponent doesn't bring a Rock. Most other leads might get nothing done but taking sleep, while Electrode is going to at minimum use Thunder Wave and paralyze something before that. I like to run it with Flash in case of Exeggutor. If I can paralyze + Flash it before taking sleep, it takes Explosion off the table as the opponent won't want to risk a 1/3 chance of exploding doing nothing and makes Exeggutor safer to switch into in general. Electrode's Explosion, while weak compared to the Explosions many other Pokemon have, is still handy for inflicting a chunk of damage while denying a turn to what is almost guaranteed to be a slower opponent, which can be excellent to put Pokemon like Chansey, Mew and Mewtwo into KO ranges for teammates.


Bet you weren't expecting this here. Arbok is mostly a straight up inferior Wrapper to the likes of Victreebel and Dragonite... except that Arbok's rare access to both Earthquake and Wrap makes it one of the only wrappers that doesn't fear the very common sight of Gengar in Ubers, and it actually works quite well in concert with the other Wrappers. Mew and Mewtwo provide a very strong backbone that helps to keep a wrap spam team alive until enough paralysis has been spread, then the combination of Glare Arbok, Thunder Wave Dragonite and Stun Spore Victreebel can try to cripple any remaining Pokemon with over 70 Speed and get to work Wrapping everything to death. Or in the case of Gengar, paralyzing it, wrapping it and bringing in Arbok to Earthquake it to death. Definitely has an effective niche here in Ubers that has resulted in wins for me against strong opponents.


Honestly... I just don't like it. On paper, it walls physical Snorlax and Swords Dance Mews, but in practice it gets exploited too hard as Pokemon like Slowbro and Mewtwo just don't care about anything in Aerodactyl's move pool and abuse Rest turns with ease, and sometimes Aerodactyl just gets paralyzed on the wrong turn and gets KO'd by the Pokemon it was supposed to counter. If you want to counter physical Snorlaxes and Swords Dance Mews, run Reflect Porygon.


A bunch of stuff that I haven't used, faced or seen enough lately to have an opinion on other than they have possibly useful niches. Of these, Sandslash, Cloyster and Hypno probably have the biggest chances of being good. Porygon also might be legitimate as Reflect can wall typical Snorlax and Swords Dance Mew sets fairly reliably while also having tools to prevent easy switches like Aerodactyl provides in Thunder Wave and Ice Beam, but I haven't worked out a good team structure for it yet despite potentially walling a third of a typical Ubers team by itself. The rest are mostly hypothetical setup Pokemon that could sweep paralyzed teams or Haunter which could juke an opponent that sees a Gengar gone and thinks they are free and clear to click Explosion. And Lapras. Which seems like it could have the right tools in a metagame full of IB Chanseys and Slowbros with Water/Ice resistance and Sing, Thunderbolt and Confuse Ray.

 

[Sevi 7]

I don’t have anything fun or meaningful to add to what Enigami said, but I think what he wrote was great, and it made me want to say something that’s been on my mind for a while.

I think Ice -types are being slept on the most right now.
Lapras is probably the best in theorymon. STAB Blizz, Bolt, Sing is strong vs both offensive and defensive teams, and not paralyzing your opponent can actually make Lapras scarier. As you threaten sleep and freeze. I’ve tried Sing + CRay and it’s a little random for my liking, if the RNG works, Lapras honestly feels unfair at times though. Lap is great at taking and delivering damage and vs slower teams and/or teams without an Electric, Lap has the potential to stop teams in their tracks. I’ve even began working on a Jolt Egg Bro team, because Lap is low-key scary.

Cloyster is barely meta still in my eyes, but it should still be meta. I think Lapras is a bit better in general, but Cloyster has a better matchup vs some teams. Clamp makes pivoting and chipping down possible and that can be the key to games. Despite having boom, I haven’t really found a boom offense team where I like Cloyster, and it might be better suited for defensive teams, but it does that role really well. Cloyster will take advantage of poorly built teams and can be a cornerstone of momentum similar to how Tentacruel can be in UU.
I also think, in theory, Boom Offense may want Cloyster instead of Lapras in some matchups, so please don’t stop trying to make it work there too.

Articuno has a niche right now, but it’s a very meta dependent mon, and if Cloy and Lap pick up in popularity, Art may not even really be viable anymore. For now though, it does the STAB Blizzard thing the best, and this is the time to take care of it as so few teams have solid switch-ins to Art. If only it had something else going for it besides STAB Blizz and a Massive Special.
Art is either going for hit and run in the mid game or sweep in the late game. Late game is super situational and you’re basically basing your whole strat on a counter team, so I don’t think it’s very reliable. I think mid game is where Art is at, and I think Sky Attack is a better move than Agility. Going for Sky Attack as the opponent switches in a paralyzed Chansey or Mewtwo to take the Blizz can be a huge shift in momentum. Crit Sky Attack does a surprising amount of damage, and especially if there’s some previous chip, Art can catch an opponent sleeping on just how scary Art can be. But Art does live or die on strong pivoting and prediction skills, so it’s a harder mon to use. Switching in Art against Lax/Tauros/GolDon using EQ or Egg using DE or something is sometimes easier said than done. I tried a Gengar + Art team to try and play mind games to win, but it’s too many guesses for me personally. However, when it works, it works well. So you may find something by giving it a shot.

Jynx is an interesting mon. I think it’s pretty bad in the lead, but it does occasionally do well there. Leads are so varied nowadays that’s it tough to bring one that just does ok a lot of the time. Outside of the lead it can threaten Egg, Zap and Don with Blizzard and, if you wait till later in the game, it can put a more important mon than opposing lead to sleep. Rest can help with stalling Chansey (but it’s a huge moment sink), Counter or even just the threat of Counter, can help with Tauros/Lax, Body Slam shouldn’t be forgotten as I’ve gotten a cheeky paralysis with it that changed the game’s momentum, and SToss is ok sometimes. Jynx is the most mediocre of the Ice-types though. I think using the opponent’s fear of what Jynx may be capable of is more effective than what Jynx actually does. Sleep and Freeze can make an opponent make mediocre plays sometimes and taking advantage of that can flip games.

Dewgong is menance if you’re extremely lucky. After you freeze the first mon with Blizzard, use Body Slam on what switches in and paralyze it. Then Headbutt the opponent into Blizzard range. Hypno arguably does it better, but why not make the opponent question their life choices with Dewgong instead.

Anyways, I’m sleep deprived and not sure if that makes any sense, but don’t sleep on the Ice-types. They have a nice place in the meta and people aren’t prepping enough for them at all. Figure out how to handle the opposing Mewtwo/Chansey and go to town with STAB Blizzards that have a 10% chance to just KO the opponent.

 

[phoopes]

Bumping this because there’s been a fair bit of discussion on Discord about this recently but… is Tauros actually number one? Like IMO it can’t be it just HAS to be Mewtwo… right? But I think we’ve seen with some meta development that Mewtwo is more expendable than we once thought, and that Tauros is even better than we thought. I think I would put it ahead of Mew actually, but not ahead of Mewtwo. I’m not the expert though, would love to hear what some more dedicated Ubers players think.

 

[Sabelette]

Bumping this because there’s been a fair bit of discussion on Discord about this recently but… is Tauros actually number one? Like IMO it can’t be it just HAS to be Mewtwo… right? But I think we’ve seen with some meta development that Mewtwo is more expendable than we once thought, and that Tauros is even better than we thought. I think I would put it ahead of Mew actually, but not ahead of Mewtwo. I’m not the expert though, would love to hear what some more dedicated Ubers players think.

Fuck Tauros, this asshole keeps getting 3+ KOes on me in situations where it has to luck them. I’m convinced it’s better than Chansey, not sure beyond that, but watching it 5-0 my teammate in a situation it should never pull that off was convincing. Twave Mew/2 are starting to feel necessary to stop it and also facilitate it really well, and Tail Whip para reapplication feels disgusting too. I think the meta will adapt but leading Tauros was definitely not it. The answers to Tauros also require weakening your Mew/2’s coverage or reducing your offense, so I’m not sure how tenable it is to avoid Tauros weakness without getting rolled by classic teams.

 

[Ctown6]

Bumping this because there’s been a fair bit of discussion on Discord about this recently but… is Tauros actually number one? Like IMO it can’t be it just HAS to be Mewtwo… right? But I think we’ve seen with some meta development that Mewtwo is more expendable than we once thought, and that Tauros is even better than we thought. I think I would put it ahead of Mew actually, but not ahead of Mewtwo. I’m not the expert though, would love to hear what some more dedicated Ubers players think.

tauros hasn’t actually Ascended to number one, it’s ascended to being the best revenge/ engdamer. It can’t pass m2 or mew these teams simply change the purpose of their mews to be in full on support tauros mode. This allows for tauros to be extremely deadly and efficient but doesn’t make it better or more valuable then the mews, even on its own team.

tauros can be as high as 3 but I have it at like 6, unique in what it does for sure and has a very strong and a usable role

 

[Tree69420]

i dont think mew/mewtwo can be in any place outside 1/2 theyre just too good and consistent at what they do even if what they do is spreading para and blowing up for a tauros sweep

 

[NotVeryCake]

Tauros​

Tauros is the third best Pokemon in Ubers in my opinion, it outclasses Chansey by a landslide thanks to not being a passive egg that sits there and gets blown up on, and is better than Snorlax in my opinion for its bull qualities; the crit rate, the speed, and its ability to bullshit its way through any matchup through status re application with Tail Whip, creating very trapped situations for the opponent where the Pokemon that should on paper check Tauros get blown down by a Slam > Beam.
To go on a side tangent:

Chansey
This mon fucking mid lmao.​

 

[Sabelette]

Hello friends,

The Ubers council has decided it's about time to update the Ubers Viability rankings! Here are the criteria we will be using for submissions:

Made semifinals of any of the following individual tournaments:
RBY Ubers Tournament II
RBY Ubers Tournament III (ongoing)
RBY Ubers Open I
RBY Ubers Open II

Won at least 2 games and played at least 3 games in any of the following team tournaments:
RBYPL III
RBYPL IV
ALTPL I
ALTPL II (ongoing)
UWTT
UWL II
UPL XI
ROA Olympics VII

With that in mind, our voter list is currently as follows. I will update with the conclusion of the two ongoing tournaments and ping as appropriate.
Blui (ROA Olympics VII)
CollectorEly (RBYPL IV, ALTPL I)
Ctown6 (RBY Ubers Tournament II, RBY Ubers Open I, UWTT, UWL II, UPL XI, ROA Olympics VII)
Eledyr (RBY Ubers Open I, RBYPL III, RBYPL IV, ALTPL I)
Enigami (RBYPL III, ALTPL I, UWTT, UWL II, UPL XI)
Evuelf (RBY Ubers Tournament II)
Fc (RBYPL III, ALTPL I, ALTPL II, ROA Olympics VII)
FriendOfMrGolem120 (ROA Olympics VII)
Frrf (RBY Ubers Open II, UWL II, UPL XI, ROA Olympics VII)
Ice Yazu (RBY Ubers Open II)
Kaz (RBYPL IV)
kjdaas (RBYPL III, UWTT)
King Billu (RBYPL IV)
Leru (RBY Ubers Tournament II)
MTB (RBY Ubers Tournament II)
nicole7735 (RBY Ubers Tournament II)
Oiseau Bleu (RBY Ubers Open I, RBYPL III, UWTT)
Paulluxx (ROA Olympics VII)
Peasounay (RBYPL III)
royzin (RBY Ubers Open II)
Sabelette (RBY Ubers Tournament II, RBY Ubers Open II, RBYPL IV)
SaDiSTiCNarwhal (RBY Ubers Open I, UPL XI)
Sceptross (ALTPL II)
shiloh (UWL II, UPL XI)
stunner047 (ALTPL I, UPL XI, ROA Olympics VII)
Torchic (RBYPL IV, UWTT, UPL XI, ROA Olympics VII)
tylerfitz8 (RBY Ubers Open II)
Unowndragon (UWL II, UPL XI)
YBW (RBY Ubers Open II, ALTPL II)

Your VR should be submitted to me or posted in this thread. You will have one week from the completion of ongoing tournaments (RBY Ubers Tournament III, ALT PL II) to submit your VR, meaning we expect about 4 weeks to submit, but we encourage those not in any of these tours to submit sooner. Please do not feel obligated to submit a VR if you feel unqualified or out of touch with the meta; the requirements are broad and we expect to capture both a lot of active players and some inactive players in these submission reqs. You can let me know if you do not intend to submit and I will make sure I do not ping you for submission reminders.

Your VR does not need to include tiers, but it may. Only an ordered list is required. Please rank any Pokemon you think has use in Ubers - the more detailed the better!

For example:
1. Bulbasaur
2. Charmander
...
30. Squirtle

Here is a template you can use if you like tiermakers - PLEASE make sure your VR is ordered!
https://tiermaker.com/create/rby-viability-rankings-yellow-sprites-15191342

 

[YBW]

Explanations of Ranks

S: The GOATs - The outcome of the interactions involving the 2 Ubers (with each other or anything else) dictate who wins the vast majority of the time. Nothing wins games as much as these. They really live up to the billing; top 2 by some distance

Mewtwo: For a time I flip flopped and had Mew #1 but imo the recent rise of Lead2 gives it another role in the metagame that propels it back to top dog. What more is there to say? Even at +2 SPC it can 1 or 2hko the most pre-eminent threats in the tier. It has submission option for Chansey, can wear it down with spc frops, has frz chances, can run twave, can heal, can boom or stall. It's a Swiss Army Knife and is the RBY goat for a reason

Mew: A perennial threat, almost always a serious danger to outright sweep or at the least trade with another uber. The classic Phys Mew set(SD, slam, EQ, sboiled) evolved to Twave Mew a lot recently but it risks being walled by either ghost or flying. Twave/Reflect/Explosion or even Transform gives it other tools but its a bit more one dimensional than Mew2. Regardless, it's still a formidable poke.

A: Elite Mons

Snorlax: Speaking of formidable, Lax's versatile movepool gives it a spot in the top 3. Like with the top 2 I debated hard about #3/4. They're very close and on another day maybe Egg takes 3rd but for right now I put Lax here. Its powerful STAB Self Destruct leaves almost everything in the tier one shot at worst and crit hyper beam can even fell the mighty Mewtwo at full HP. Slam is always great ofc with the paralysis chance. Counter gives it a great option in the mirror, or revenge OHKO on Tauros after catching the beam. Earthquake covers Gengar, Rhydon and Golem. Under explored sets include AmnesiaLax and RefLax but typically its full offence 4 attack set causes enough havoc anyway, especially once Rival Lax is out of the way.

Exeggutor: Amazing utility being the most viable mon with access to sleep and paralysis (eat your heart out Chansey). Unlike the aforementioned Chansey it is a constant threat to paralysed Mew/Mewtwo with the ever looming shadow of Explosion synergising well with spc drops that reapply paralysis. It eats Mew hits extremely well, even at +2. It can tank Psy/Tbolt Mew2 relatively well and has a more reliable sleep move than the other most prominent sleeper/boomer, Gengar

Tauros: The bull isn't quite as dominant in Ubers as it is in OU but it's still not to be trifled with. Its perfect coverage, powerful STAB and crit rate threaten almost everything, Stomp has a niche in Ubers to bullshit its way through opponents and Tail Whip ros is a huge late game threat, albeit usually at the cost of dropping either Earthquake or Blizzard. A very threatening Anti lead or sweeper

Gengar: The fastest viable sleeper gives it a strong role already, and its great stats + coverage of Thunderbolt, Night Shade, Psychic or even Mega Drain all can have big uses. But it is its typing that really makes it #6. It can completely wall certain Mew or Snorlax sets, take most of the sting away from Wrap users and handle EQless Ros very well. Explosion is where it really shines most though. Access to the move is huge in a tier so full of hyper offence and its total immunity to boomers gives it a unique role

Rhydon: Powerful STAB Earthquake and rock slide go hard. Leer/T Whip plus substitute make it as massive an endgame threat as Tauros but like Gengar, it is its typing that really solidifies it as an elite threat. Almost totally walling Zapdos and resistance to explosions and hyper beams is valuable. Without unfortunate matchups against prominent threats Exeggutor and Slowbro, I'd probably rank the Don even higher

B: Solid viability

Chansey: For too long now imo people have called Chansey part of a 'Big 4' in Ubers. Whilst this is a stretch in my view it is still a fantastic pokemon and must be respected. Its considerable bulk allows it to tank hits from a fully boosted Mew2, which nothing in the tier besides Mew2 itself and possibly Slowbro can reliably do. Amazing utility (sleep, paralysis, frz fishing) with options such as Light Screen to further aid in stalling out Mewtwo, Reflect to somewhat neutralise physical attackers, Counter to threaten OHKO's on Snorlax/Tauros and the ever reliable Seismic Toss for consistent damage. Chansey can fill many roles and can keep dangerous mons in check. Where it really suffers is its maximum damage output, and it is only this that made me rank it outside A Tier

Slowbro: Slowbro brings an automatic danger with Amnesia, but also has decent physical bulk; allowing it to tank hits and spread paralysis/reapplication. It has the capacity to sweep, although it finds it much tougher to setup than Mewtwo and Chansey can also be an issue for it. Also tbolt Mew2 destroys it. Its lack of speed is harmful; it needs status support to really shine (unlike Mewtwo). But its ability to wall the common Psychic/Ib Mew2 set is a huge attribute. By and large though, it is a budget Mewtwo

Zapdos: Zapdos is largely a danger due to the same reasons it is in OU; powerful STAB Thunderbolt and Drill Peck, alongside a solid crit rate. However its immunity to Ground comes to the fore in Ubers much more. It walls the common Twave/EQ Mew set. Solid as a lead and can stop Slowbro from bullshitting its way through teams

Jynx: If you asked me a few months ago where I'd rank Jynx I'd've said it was borderline viable at best, yet here we are. The rise of Jynx is simple. Lead Mew2. It is the best answer to the most common sets Lead2 runs. Fastest 75% sleep user in the Meta, it is a great anti lead to Exeggutor, Zapdos and Chansey also, and doesnt exactly fill Gengar leads with much security. Outside of sleep the frz chance is ofc a permanent threat, and it can put in some work with Toss, Psychic and even counter. But its main job is sleep

C: Decent mons - Bit less detailed thoughts from now because this is taking a while

Golem: A better tank than Rhydon but trades for less damage output (compare Dons Earthquake 98% chance to 3hko Mew vs Golems 0.2% chance) However it has access to Explosion, which Don does not. Bit of a budget Don, but worth throwing in the builder every now and again

Sandslash: Most viable Dancer that isnt Mew, great typing allows free switchins to twave but its bulk isnt great. Even Zapdos can whittle it down fast. Needs twave support to work but substitute in conjuction can buy free turns. Its perhaps disingenous to rank so high as I've rarely ever actually seen it, but Its potential to outright sweep is there A possibly devastating mon but usually works out better in theory than in practice

Dragonite: Flying gives it the same advantage and influence on Mews set as Zapdos has. Twave access but its real viability stems from Wrap. With status support it can clean up on its own, although it's infamous for choking

Persian: Great revenge killer/follow up cleaner on hyperoffence Boom teams. Gengar concerns it greatly but without it checking the Cat even in Ubers Slash is scary. Slash hits follow up ranges that Tauros and Snorlax slam cannot

Aerodactyl: The ultimate case of what could've been. Aerodactyl is built to thrive in RBY Ubers. Resistance to Normal and Ground Immunity, with access to Reflect and Rest. It's the ultimate check of Mew, Lax and Blizzardless Tauros. Its issue is in its movepool. It can run Toxic but its offence is limited to only Sky Attack as 'viable' STAB and reliance on Dedge/Beam and FireBlast (which admittedly synergises well with RefRest and its typing. Regardless of its pitiful damage output, its ability to slow down or even force out some prominent mons in the meta gives it some viability

D: Borderline Viability

Hypno: I'd been cool on this for a while, but after seeing Cake talking about analyses of Lead Hypno, and most notably Ely using it to some aplomb recently I am beginning to warm up to it, especially as an answer to Lead2. Sleep, twave, toss is always solid. Mostly still outclassed by the other sleepers tho

Jolteon: Never really ran it but it has value as lead getting paralysis off early and taking sleep. Chansey and Exeggutor can even be bullshitted down with crits and it is a good check to Zapdos but the Grounds are a more prominent in Ubers and a constant issue

Starmie: Another one I never really ran yet but, as with OU, its a pretty solid lead against common Gengar/Exeggutor cores with PsyBlizz. Great at fighting Lax, Ros and Don but the Mewtwo matchup just really hinders its viability

Alakazam: Can run some niche grade A bullshit with Kinesis/Twave/Toss or even Submission that gives it a better matchup against the Ubers and Chansey than Starmie, and is great lead vs Gar and acceptable vs Jynx, Hypno and Egg. However it it has almost total reliance on Toss for damage against those, and quickly runs out of Psychic PP which it needs to leave a dent on Lax, Don, Ros and even Dnite. Pretty underwhelming compared to OU Zam

E: Niche/Underexplored options (NO PARTICULAR ORDER, THESE ARE FOR FUN)

Electrode: Fastest mon in the tier, twave and boom access. Can be a semi decent lead vs Mewtwo, Gengar, Tauros, Zapdos. Struggles hard againstExeggutor and can hardly lay a glove on the Grounds, especially Don and Golem

Cloyster: Has all the tools needed but another that prob looks better on paper. Great physical bulk, trapping, frz chance and boom access. There may come a day when Cloy sees more usage, but I won't hold my breath on it

Lickitung: Another case of what might have been. On paper Lickitung is an absolute animal... until you get to its stats. It can learn Toxic, Submission, Counter, Toss, Blizz, Earthquake, Fireblast. But it's its Normal moves that really catch the eye. Access to Swords Dance, Wrap, Hyper Beam, Screech, Dedge and Stomp really could make Lickitung an enormous endgame threat vs a paralysed team. The issue is in those stats. It has very poor bulk and needs some free turns. The risk is huge (85% accuracy Screech and Wrap for example) but the reward is great too

Raticate: Super Fang + Hyper Beam go BRRR. Seriously, go calc it. Problem again is in its bulk. It gets destroyed by spc attackers

Ditto: Pretty self explanatory role

Arbok + Victreebel: The only other semi-viable wrap users. Vic has status options too ofc and is the best answer to an amnesia'd up Slowbro.

 

[Fc]

Kinda unsure on how I ordered some of the lower tier mons or if they should all technically count as viable enough to be ranked but I think I picked a decent enough cutoff ybw inspired me to talk about some of the mons so I did.

Rant on why boom2 sucks and also kinda my placements

Mewtwo is mewtwo, broken but stop using boom2 that mon is ass mewtwo is the best wincon ever made just click amnesia

Mew is mew, broken and just kinda does everything lowkey harder to deal w than mewtwo

Snorlax is snorlax, broken and I think just makes your team worse if you drop it but this is all common stuff everyone runs lax always

I'm still a top 4 Chansey believer, I see some hate in this thread but I think it just does too much. It can hit w all the good statuses, checks mewtwo, outspeeds lax, and forces a lot of reactionary play especially off sing sets, and can always just trade w lax using counter or force a boom somewhere. Chanseyless is definitely viable so it's worse than the other 3 but I still have it top 4.

Egg is actually broken, it outspeeding chansey and lax makes it insanely difficult to actually deal with, sleep para psychic boom does numbers on all team styles no matter what and it can usually get out of a game getting like 2 status and 1-2 kills minimum if you're willing to just blow it up after para'ing some things which is probably good. If anything takes 4 from chansey it's this thing.

Gengar still warps the lead meta, insta sleep bc of the speed is so nice and it has a threatening boom if it stays awake. Good sleep absorber too since it usually only needs to do its thing on turns 1-3 then can kinda sit back as you play a 5v5 but you've likely taken out something more valuable from the opponent and done some damage.

Slowbro is honestly kinda a fish but it's such a strong fish, you get it set up and a lot of teams now really can only blow up on it to try and kill it. Bulk gives it good mu's into the normals and Rhydon so it's worth a spot here, even can wall egg if you've already sleep foddered smth and forces a boom.

Rhydon walling normals is really good and also this thing is just mad strong, para spam w leer can shred through teams especially ones lacking egg, which it can still slam fish on. Easier to bait out w stuff like blizz lax and tauros but really strong still

Tauros is good, hits hard and is fast. Not a complex mon, just spams normal moves and kills stuff. I find it's a little hard to get it to do more than the mons above just because it has no resists and is kinda frail while also being slower than mewtwo, but by no means does that make it bad since it'ws an offensive mon, just a bit behind the others.

Zapdos is also a fish since it does literally nothing into rhydon teams unless you play a long game where you're spamming moves w lax or tauros, but it's a good cleaner and para spreader. I've also seen a lot of mono eq mew recently or just eq boom which this just completely farms, you don't want to be trading mew for zap in almost any scenario so having a flying mon really helps there to pressure it and force chip elsewhere.

Jynx is a sleep lead, sleep lead is good. It beats lead2 (terrible mon stop using it) which makes it probably a bit better in current meta than normal just bc of that trend. Slower than most other leads but bulky enough to live a hit and only has to contest with gengar really as an actual threat it can't sleep more often than not, but it still has decent odds. It does have a bit more than gar if it does pull a good sleep mu because it scares any switch in super hard by spamming ice beams, freeze fishing chansey lax mew etc which is good.

I'm a zam believer, faster twave than gar and tauros and strong psychics is good. Also does well vs boom2 (bad set) and can kinda sit on chansey and sometimes egg which is good if you manage to keep it around. It's really only a lead but one that I think is pretty decent so I put it right below jynx.

I think cloyster is pretty strong, good boom and clamp blizz is a scary combo to switch into. Needs some para support but a lot of mons do, and this can facilitate really offensive teams with like 4-5 boom mons by just clicking clamp like twice then blowing up on something that has to switch in. Still has flaws since it relies on fishy moves like clamp and boom for its only progress but not terrible.

Starmie kinda mid lowkey but I think it's better than the mons below just bc it's bulky and has recover while also having the same lead traits as zam where it's a fast twave psychic. It can spam ice moves after twave tho so it has something really nice where it scares egg from coming in and freeze fishes vs normals so it's not bad.

I haven't really used hypno much but I've played vs it, really tough mon to deal w if you don't sleep it t1 on lead. Similar to egg tbh where it just dual statuses then spams psychic, just no boom, less sleep accuracy, and worse vs rhydon type stuff so it's way lower, but it has some sauce.

Lap is good clicking confuse ray is really funny, if you can para mewtwo and maybe lax this thing goes off, freeze fishes when you need to and para confuse is such a strong momentum gainer. Issue is that it's a lapras and it's slow af with somewhat weak damage output and no boom to compensate so I have it a bit lower than cloy.

Jolt is another fast lead, pin missile double kick threatens egg chansey rhydon even if just a bit so I have it a lot higher than electrode, but not being a psychic makes me put it below zam and mie even tho it has positive lead mu's into those.

Golem really just blows up, I haven't found much use for it ove rhydon aside from that but blowing up in this meta is strong, so just run it on some para spam offense and you'll probably kill trade w it and maybe get some extra eq damage if you're lucky. Not amazing but not a bad mon since it's a rock.

Vic is the best wrap user probably, sd hyper beam is strong af in an endgame where everything is para'd, but it really has to go unrevealed for a long time to make it work and ofc still relies on wrap to win which is iffy always.

Porygon walls lax tauros mew bar crits or lax/mew blowing up, kinda switches into rhydon since it outspeeds and can reflect even tho eq does over half on a roll. Fish mon but it has something going.

Aero is the same as porygon kinda but it's just way better at walling the normals at the cost of being able to be slam para'd. I've lost games off slam para into like 8 full paras or being forced to rest at a really poor time so I'm putting it below porygon.

Dnite clicks wrap, nothing special it's just worse than vic bc no sd imo but it's a cheeser.

Articuno clicks ice moves which is always good, kinda lowkey threatening as an offensive presence too it's just para bait which sucks but it has a niche here imo.

Moltres fire blast is strong as shit and burns are a pretty slept on status that actually can win games since things are chipped so often, if you get a burn on something like lax or rhydon it's also really good. apt is less accurate bc fire spin but can also force a lot of progress mixed with burns so it's got something going, just needs more exploration.

Clef has sing and is a normal type, honestly idk when you'd ever use it but I added it because it has enough qualities to actually do something in the lowest rank of niches but really mid.

Poli is a super cheeser with hypnosis amnesia, slow as shit so it can rarely do all this and actually make a lot of progress but it can do something with the broken moves so it's here.

Dodrio is kinda strong idk I'm running out of ways to call a mon bad but not terrible enough for me to ignore it, click agility and spam hyper beam in an endgame or just use tauros since it's better.

Electrode is fast. Click twave then blow up. All the other para leads accomplish more usually but this guy is fine.

 

[stunner047]

Will edit comments later

 

[Paulluxx]

Do want to say that I added a few extra mons for aesthetic purposes. Honestly after Jynx everything is for fun/saucing your opponent.

 

[Ctown6]

details later (I was bored)

 

[Eledyr]

I don't really have the energy to make comments, but here's my personal VR. I know a lot of low tiers are missing, but I don't feel confident enough to rank them, simply because I've never faced / used them.

 

[Sevi 7]

Just thinking about this from a point of view that players will be looking at these posts to see where people ranks things, and not just as a means of synthesizing the information together. The rankings here are going to be fun to see, but I don't know how useful they'll be. The problem with ranking Ubers is that play styles completely skew how mons function, and there's so much obvious bias in these rankings because of that. For example, I agree with NotVeryCake that in offense, Tauros could easily be the third best mon and Chansey is only niche. Of course this plays completely different in balanced and stalls teams of course this is obvious in other gens, but talking with Gen 1 players these last few months, I've seen people forget this. It's not a thing in other gen 1 tiers, because every other tier's meta is based around some form of Balanced at the end of the day. So, I think getting that paradigm shift might be difficult. Perhaps just saying what your preferred/best play style before the rankings might be really helpful when looking at them.

With that said, after 3-4 months of exclusively asking for Ubers games in chat on Showdown. Here's my thoughts as a offense player who does some balanced and never stall.

Mewtwo is still obviously #1. It can cover so many roles as an offensive, defensive or utility mon that there's really no reason to drop. I've tried to find some team that would be better without it, and I'm not sure if it's really possible if you're trying to win.

Mew is a solid mon with good bulk and decent attack. We all know why Mew is good, but I want to say what Mew lacks and why I don't always run Mew anymore. First, Mew is slow both in terms of it's actual speed stat (100 Base is really middle of the road) and how long it takes to actually do something. 100 Attack without STAB isn't actually too impressive in Ubers . It needs set-up to actually do something. And while you're using Swords Dance, you could be attacking twice and doubling your chances at a secondary effect or a crit (and don't forget that crits are useless or harmful after Swords Dance). I'll talk about Tauros more later, but Tauros is a better mon than Mew when it just comes to pure offense.
Mew makes up for it with good defense stats, which makes it a good bulky set-up mon or good utility/defense mon. However, not every offense team wants something like that. Also, because Mew lacks Sleep, there's been times where I'm wondering if I should run Mew or something like Egg in that last slot. Of course Mew is still still solid and deserves the S rank but it's not as strong as Mewtwo and it is a dropable mon sometimes.

The Big 4 are solid in Ubers and I think they're all a step above the other mons, in their own category. They're lack of effective diversity keeps them below the Mews, but they're all solid, and you even just a Big 4 + Mews is a solid competitively viable team. I ordered them by how good they are on a variety of teams instead of how strong they are. Lax is solid in every strat, Egg is great in balanced and offense and an option in stall. Tauros is amazing in offense and solid in balanced. And Chansey is great in balanced and stall.
One mon I want to gush about a little bit it Tauros though. I would say Tauros is actually a little bit of an underrated mon in the tier. Although a really solid lead, Back Stomp Tauros is the best sweeper hands down. Coming in with it at the end of the game, when your opponent's team is paralyzed and bruised gives Tauros such an easy path to victory. Leer Tauros and double Special sets have become more popular and I think that's neat. I think the standard OU set is the best, overall, but it's cool to see that even Bull has a variety sets/options in this tier

Slowbro is a great defense mon and closer in Ubers. It's one of best checks to Mew, and makes Mewtwo regret not running TBolt. It also hits non bulky mons real hard after an amnesia or two. One set that is really underrated is double attack though. Blizz + Surf/Psychic is definitely a real set. Blizzard smacks Egg (the biggest Bro check), as well as hit Zap and give Bro a decent chance at freezing M2 in the 1v1. Standard TonyBro is going to be better in general, but don't sleep on the two attack sets. PsySurf might also be good with the roll over glitch.

Gengar doesn't need much said about it. But I will say that Mega Drain Gar is a real thing. I wouldn't run it all the time, but there's definitely times where you want it and it should be considered a legitimate OO and not a gimmick pick

Rhydon is a strong attacker that does a terrifying amount of damage if you're weak to QuakeSlide. It's ability to run two different sets and have a few different options is what really sets it above Golem.

Zap is Zap. Good as a lead and solid in the back. It's lack of speed really gets to me sometines though. I think it's not as good as Rhydon because it can get hard walled and it needs crits to beat the Mews, but I think its strong offense and variety of teamslot options put it above Golem

Y'all are crazy with these Golem ranks. Golem slaps in this tier. Solid damage with QuakeSlide and an Explosion that means you're never truly safe switching in. Golem is a meta mon and should definitely see play and given more respect. I've had/seen games flip because a Golem used Body Slam and got a paralysis on the incoming mon or because Golem used Sub as the opponent switch. This thing can be terrifying, even moreso than Rhydon, in the late game. That lesser bulk is big and Golem's STAB doesn't hit as hard though, so keep that in mind. But Golem is absolutely right up there with Rhydon in this tier.

Jolteon is also really underrated and underutilized. This is a solid lead in offense and good in balanced. You guarantee the turn 1 para and can put speed everything. Bolt, Pin, and DKick means you can hit everything hard or at least decent with a crit (except more niche things like Sandslash), and Jolt is a decent mon in the back to revenge kill or even sweep late game. tl;dr use more lead Jolt.

: Cloyster: Lap and Cloy are two more mons that don't need much said about them. They're solid defensively and STAB Blizz is never fun to go up against. Lap has some cool options with both Sing and CRay being good, but you're really gambling with both, and sometimes that bites you back. I'm not sure if Lap is better or not, but it's a good lead, so I put it first. Both might be on the same rank as Jolt. Was a difficult decision to keep all together or separate them out.

Sometimes I wonder if Zam, Mie and Jynx should even be considered meta, and sometimes I see them pull their weight and then some. They're both somehow meta while also kinda being niche in my opinion. I wouldn't run them on a lot of teams, but they're still around enough and can do enough to make you want to make sure you're not weak to them. (Don't really feel like talking about their pros and cons right now though, sorry)

Aerodactyl is a good option in all playstyles and would be meta if it had a better movepool. My appreciation of Aero grows more every time I see someone win with it. But it's good typing and amazing speed/crit rate can't make up for it's bad attack stat and speed.

Hypno is a great lead and ok in the back. Lead Zap, opposing lead Eggs and, the less common, lead Lap make lead Egg a bit of a gamble sometimes. Hypno doesn't have that issue though. Also, Hypno has some variety with Counter and S Toss which means Tauros has to worry about BSlamming you and you can threaten Psychic leads after sleeping them. Both of which Egg can't normally do. You're getting a more accurate paralysis with a less accurate sleep and a lack of explosion though, so keep that In mind. But Hypno should be a slightly niche if not meta lead imo.

Sandslash and Victreebel are both really good mons that play well as strong offense options in the late game. Not much to say, but Sleep, Stun, Wrap, Razor Leaf, is Vic's best set imo.

Persian is a solid attacker with pretty good speed, but it can't take a hit which means it can't take status, and it doesn't do as much to Mewtwo as meta physically attacking mons. Generally, physical mons being able to breakthrough M2 is the best thing about them, so that's always been really disappointing to me imo. Also, Sub Persian is really cool.

DNite is DNite. AgiliWrap, and/or TWave gives it something to do against everything but Gar, and you can never truly be out as long as Nite can set-up. Lead Nite sometimes comes out and it's not so bad (but it's niche)

I'm not as confident with ranking the mons from here, but I feel like they've got a strong enough niche to be competitively viable, but not enough to consider them for team that Im noy building around them

Dodrio is cool with STAB Hyper Beam and Agility, which gives it a good chance at sweeping. But you only want to use it if you're opponent isn't running a Rock or Electric type and that's a big ask right there. And you only want to run it over Tauros if you're opponent is running two mons that are weak to Drill Peck. I have swept with it a few times though, so I can't not mention it in a ranking conversation.

The rest of the E Rank is more like honorable mentions. They all want your opponent to not run a very meta mon while also running a specific meta mon or two. If you can fish that matchup they're decent options, but ultimately not worth running most of the time.

Anyways those are my thoughts.if you see me on Showdown I'm probably under a different name. I logged out of my account and logged into an alt like 4 months ago and haven't been bothered to log back in to my main accounts. Hope to play some of you one of these days though. This is the only tier I still really enjoy to play.

EDIT: Also should point out that I'm writing this for entertainment and educational purposes only. I don't expect my opinions to affect the rankings.

 

[royzin]

 

[King Billu]

S tier: The GOAT tier, all three of these mons should NEVER be dropped in my opinion and are staples of the tier creating a Big 3 which should be on everyone's teams.

Mewtwo: Needs no introduction Mewtwo is the best mon in the tier for sure. It has a wide variety of sets that all have their uses. The best set being the standard recover amnesia 2 attack set which can single handedly win you a lot of games, however you can also use other moves such as boom, twave, barrier, and even the lead2 set which is one of my favorites.

Mew: Mew is the best setup sweeper in my opinion, I'm sure everyone has thought to themselves that mew could be better than mewtwo which in hindsight, if mew was a normal type not affected by body slam paras it would probably be better than mewtwo. Can also use a wide variety of sets with different uses such as a utility set, reflect, transform, but the set that puts it above everything else is the swords dance set with the other moves being three of twave, eq, slam, hb, boom, soft boiled. I'm sure some sets are unexplored aswell.

Snorlax: Lax is not nearly as good as the other 2 goats above, however the reason I put it in the same tier is because I truly believe you should never drop lax on any viable team. Unlike OU where you are (most of the time) forced to use reflect lax, the most common set is the all out attacker set (slam, hb, eq, boom) with 4 attacks and this mon is honestly brutal. At the very least lax gets one kill and is one of the best mid game pokemon in the tier. Lax can also use counter, icebeam, or even the reflect lax set, however besides counter I wouldn't really use anything else. Resting with lax gives your opponent free switch-ins to mewtwo which ultimately will lead to you being in a very disadvantageous position which I don't think is worth.

A tier: The Superstar tier, these pokemon are the best aside from the big 3 staples and truly define the meta and what direction your team is going to be.

Chansey: Chansey offers the most utility out of any mon in the tier, aswell as being the best check to mewtwo besides your own. Many consider it to be a staple of this tier ultimately creating a big 4, however, you can definitely drop chansey if you have a good enough reason to do so because of how passive it can be at times. The most common set is the soft boiled twave seismic toss sing/lightscreen set, but you can use other utility moves or attacks such as icebeam, counter, reflect, or flash. I do believe chansey should be on most teams and if you are new to the tier, you should not ever drop Chansey.

Tauros: The king of OU to nobody's surprise is very very good in Ubers aswell, but just isn't a staple. Tauros can be used as a lead to punch some holes into the opponents team for the early game, or can be used for the mid-late game to cleanup. Tauros is the best physical cleaner in the tier and uses the same all out attacker set as it does in OU with slam, eq, hb, blizzard, but can use moves such as stomp, leer/tail whip, fblast, tbolt. Tauros being faster than mew and having the ability to beat a paralyzed mewtwo with some luck / prior damage can put in so much work in the endgame.

Exeggutor: Egg is the best sleeper in the tier who has access to explosion which is one of the most defining moves of the meta game. Egg also offers a bunch of utility for teams being another psychic resist, having access to stun spore, and having good bulk. Egg can also be used as a lead to get sleep off immediately and is a great special attacker to hit common threats in the metagame and only is resisted by psychics which don't want to get paralyzed or boomed on. Exeggutor can check mewtwo if it doesn't have icebeam and can check mew aswell if it's mono eq and even body slam doesn't do much.

Gengar: Gengar is the fastest sleeper in the tier and has the rare ghost typing which allows for mind games with the opponent so they can't just freely spam explosion. Also has access to moves like tbolt, nightshade, and explosion which is the set that offers the most help to a team. Gengar is very good into wrap teams and can check eq less mew, bull, lax.

Zapdos: Zapdos just like in OU is one of if not the best late game sweeper. Ground type pokemon such as golem/rhydon and even jolteon are harder to fit on Ubers team making zapdos impact arguably even better in the tier. Zapdos can also work as a lead which can spread paralysis and do some damage to the opponents team. Also forces mew to boom if it wants to kill you as body slam doesn't do enough damage. Once mewtwo and chansey are weakened and you have an agility up it's joever for your opponent. I was considering putting this as the best mon in tier b but decided otherwise.

B tier: The Allstar tier, these pokemon are great pokemon however they are much harder to fit on teams compared to the tier above.

Rhydon: Rhydon is the best ground type and the best physical attacker in the tier besides lax and bull. Offers a great typing which is immune to electric and resists the very common normal type attack. Rhydon is a great switch-in to a predicted hyperbeam or even a boom and offers some very powerful damage outputs to every other mon. The main set for rhydon is sub, eq, slam, leer/tail whip, this is honestly all it needs to really punch holes into enemies. Don is one of my faves just can be hard to fit on teams sometimes.

Slowbro: Bro has very good physical bulk and has potential to be the most scary amnesia sweeper. Tanks a ton of hits aswell as spreading paralysis while boosting its special stat for a sweep. It also checks non tbolt mewtwo and can easily get the ball rolling and sweep most teams once Chansey and mewtwo are weakened. It would've been ranked higher but it is still RBY and slowbro is the easiest pokemon to get cheesed and just die to a crit when you have the game secured since crits ignore stat boosts.

Jolteon: Jolteon is good but only really used as a lead in this tier. I really like jolteon as it does well vs a lot of leads and speed ties the best mon in the tier mewtwo. Jolt can spread paralysis and do some heavy damage with its strong attacks and has one of the highest crit ratios. Tbolt is very strong stab, double kick crit can 2hko chansey and pin missle is good vs Exeggutor.

Jynx: Jynx is the fastest mon who has the most reliable sleep move in lovely kiss. Is a very lead but doesn't offer anything after putting an opponent to sleep besides going for blizzard freezes. In other words, jynx is really just an early game pokemon and besides that should be sacked to sleep or used to switch in to predicted booms from the opponent.

C tier: The niche tier consists of pokemon who are good but only have a very specific role on some teams. I ranked these pokemon properly having used them all, I just got lazy to write about them but they are pretty decent and some are unexplored to their full potentials.

D tier: I don't even know what to call this tier and I haven't even used them enough to write about them, nor is my placement for this tiers rankings that reliable.