Resource [Series 5] Sword/Shield BSS Viability Rankings

[Psynergy]

It's been awhile, but it's finally time for an update to the Viability Rankings. As you may expect, DLC threw a huge wrench into our plans so we've held off on voting for awhile now, which has unfortunately left the VR somewhat dated (i.e. Togekiss should've been S for awhile, but more on that in a second).

Now we have an entirely new metagame and despite it being live on PS for some time, it's still too early for us to accurately update the VR at this time. At this time we're only moving up Rillaboom and Cinderace, as these two have been in the meta for a longer time with their hidden abilities and their place in the meta is far more clear. We're also making some slight adjustments to the S tier for now since keeping the S tier accurate is the best we can do. While some of us feel that Togekiss is still S tier worthy, that discussion was during a previous meta so we'll be re-evaluating that one as soon as possible as there are new factors in the metagame that may push against it slightly.

Cinderace rises from B+ to S as the biggest standout in the new meta. We saw a huge surge in Cinderace usage when Libero was released, and that went a lot way in boosting it up from it's high B rank already. However, Libero alone is not what makes Cinderace a clear contender for S rank and it was debatable if it was quite S rank with just that. The G-Max form pushes it to yet another level that's previously unmatched in Gen 8 BSS, giving it an insane 160 BP Max move that has Mold Breaker effect. Between this, a solid physical movepool, and great Speed, it's difficult to contest Cinderace without a Dynamax of your own. It's not quite a Gen 7 Greninja in terms of versatility, but for the context of this metagame it's a more than worthy imitation.

Rillaboom rises from C to A- in a similarly insane spike in viability, and could even see a further rise as high as A+ in the future. Grassy Terrain and Grassy Glide are both immensely useful tools that turned Rillaboom from a reasonably niche pick into a major metagame threat, and having a G-Max move with a Mold Breaker effect is just icing on the cake. The increase in strong Water-types to contest Cinderace, such as Azumarill and Rapid Strike Urshifu, only serves to benefit Rillaboom further as it matches up favorably against all of them except Gyarados, which is still a reasonably neutral matchup. Rillaboom is everything Tapu Bulu wishes it was last gen and more, which of course includes being actually good.

Excadrill and Snorlax drop from S to A+ as well for the time being, as we don't feel they hold up as well as S tier threats for the time being. As stated before, keeping the S tier as updated as possible is the least we can do at the moment, and while it may turn out that one or both of these still deserves it, this feels more appropriate at the moment. Fighting-types actually exist now and Cinderace is bad news for both of them as well, so these two S rank threats feel like the ones that suffer the most from this immediate meta shift. We will see if things remain this way for these two though.

Additional nominations for the future:
Togekiss from A+ to S (for real this time)
Corviknight from A+ down to A/A-
Gyarados from A up to A+
Dracozolt from A- up to A
Primarina from B+ up to A/A-
Ditto from B+ down to B-/C
Conkeldurr from B+ down to B/B-
Durant down from B+ down to B/B-
Indeedee-M being re-ranked somewhere


However, that's not all I'm going to talk about today. It obviously wouldn't be helpful to wait until the metagame has settled to do anything with the new and returning Pokemon, so we've been discussing impressions on them so that we can at least give an idea of what to look out for in the early meta. Please keep in mind that this is still early meta so some of these impressions might turn out to be completely off-base once things settle a bit. However, for the time being this is what we feel about the new inclusions in the metagame in broad terms, similar to the OU Viability Rankings though they do it for the entire VR (credit to Finchinator and the OU Council for this approach).

Once we've had more time, we will try to rank these Pokemon properly, provided they remain meta-relevant. For the time being, these will be listed within the "New Pokemon Rank" at the bottom of the OP. Here they are in a easy-to-parse visual list, courtesy of marilli.

New Pokemon

 

[Gatto16]

New Pokemon
Amazing

• 
  Porygon2

Rules

• Post intelligently. Posts like "I think Pokemon X should be in this tier" without giving any reasoning will not be tolerated.
• Usage statistics may be used to support an argument or a claim, but avoid basing your entire argument around them.
• No flaming, if you disagree with someone please be civil about it.
• No one-liners or useless comments.

[/QUOTE]

I have had a lot of early success on cart and Showdown with Porygon2. I've used a physically defensive set with max Defense EVs, and, Porygon2 is capable of taking almost all physical hits, even STAB super-effective. Combined with Recover, a physically-defensive set is capable of wearing down most of the major physical threats, while also retaining enough special defense with Eviolite that special attackers have difficulty taking it out. Having access to Foul Play, as a counter to physical attackers, helps greatly if Porygon2's other primary moves are resisted, such as by Excadrill. Foul Play can also be used to avoid triggering Weakness Policy on mons like Rhyperior. Porygon2 also comes with the added utility of being able to paralyze fairly consistently with Discharge, or fish for other status, potentially with Ice Beam or Tri Attack depending on the set.

Porygon2 is also very strong at stalling out opposing Dynamax.

Porygon2 is as bulky as, if not bulkier than, the Rotom forms, with as much offensive power, coverage, and utility. For that reason, while it is still early to tell, I think Porygon2 will be at least in A tier.

 

[1_TrickPhony]

Hey everyone! Im sure a lot of you have been wondering how these new pokemon fit in our metagame, and luckily the VR group did a great job (huge props to Marilli especially) in helping make an initial impressions list for the VR. This can be found on the original post.

I went ahead and gave my best shot at a combined tier list, with a few moves of Pokemon within the original Galar dex as well. This was my final result.

(important note, this tier list maker did not have Type Null or Ditto included. These two reside at B-, replaced by the Gmax Eevee sprite and Johto Corsola, respectively).

I want to emphasize that this list is NOT an official list from the viability rankings group. This is simply my opinion, shaped from having played about 500 or so ladder games for BSLT Week 1. Use this as a general guide at your own risk! If you have any questions about where I've ranked anything feel free to PM me or tag me on the discord server!

edit: this has been updated as of 7/8/20

 

[Photon]

Cinderace rises from B+ to S as the biggest standout in the new meta. We saw a huge surge in Cinderace usage when Libero was released, and that went a lot way in boosting it up from it's high B rank already. However, Libero alone is not what makes Cinderace a clear contender for S rank and it was debatable if it was quite S rank with just that. The G-Max form pushes it to yet another level that's previously unmatched in Gen 8 BSS, giving it an insane 160 BP Max move that has Mold Breaker effect. Between this, a solid physical movepool, and great Speed, it's difficult to contest Cinderace without a Dynamax of your own. It's not quite a Gen 7 Greninja in terms of versatility, but for the context of this metagame it's a more than worthy imitation.

I'm not very well-versed in older gens and obviously G-Max Fireball being available now makes it even more ridiculous, but Libero seems plenty enough of a reason for it to be as high as it is in the rankings. Sure it doesn't have some of the tools Greninja had, but Greninja also didn't have Dynamax. Guaranteed STAB on everything and the ability to defensively change types under double HP... if you aren't getting hit with STAB LO-boosted super-effective hits, there's still a good chance that you are having to guess what type its going to be when you get around to attacking it. Combine that with the fact that the one meta threat that's actually faster than it has to worry about Sucker Punch.

The only thing that I think you could question about its S-Tier status is if its versatile enough, as both Dragapult and Mimikyu have (or at least had, meta changes notwithstanding) several sets they could run to remain unpredictable.

Excadrill drop from S to A+

Definitely agree with this. Excadrill is a great poke for sure but I've always felt that anything outside of SD-sets it is way too easy to pivot around. Sand Rush being the only decent form of speed boosting it gets hurts, especially since its easily telegraphed at team preview and makes it that much easier to gameplan around. Maybe at the beginning of Gen 8 meta alignments were just a lot kinder to it, but I think nearly every meta trend since then (new GMax threats like Lapras, incoming Alolan starters) has damaged it value.

Additional nominations for the future:
Togekiss from A+ to S (for real this time)
Corviknight from A+ down to A/A-
Gyarados from A up to A+
Dracozolt from A- up to A
Primarina from B+ up to A/A-
Ditto from B+ down to B-/C
Conkeldurr from B+ down to B/B-
Durant down from B+ down to B/B-
Indeedee-M being re-ranked somewhere

Looks good, nothing particularly unusual here. Cinderace has made hyper offense even more alluring than it already was, so threats like Togekiss, Gyarados and Dracozolt moving up seems natural.

Things like Durant, Conkeldurr and especially Corviknight falling makes sense as well. Durant not only has to deal with Flamethrower/Fire Blast Dragapult effortlessly eating it alive through Dynamax but now Cinderace as well. Conkeldurr has been a stealth favorite of mine but there is no denying that Togekiss and Mimikyu being absolutely everywhere up to this point make it a huge risk to run. I've heard that Mimikyu may be diminishing a bit because of GMax Cinderace and Urshifu, but the new Fighting bear is probably going to push Conkeldurr farther down rather than up. Finally, I think Corviknight has needed to fall for awhile. The consistent presence of the Rotoms and the rise of Dracozolt have really penalized its mostly passive sets; I think he has been a "feast-or-famine" tank for awhile, mainly holding on for as long as he did because he was basically the only thing that hard-countered everything former S-Tier Excadrill could do (outside of Horn Drill.)

 

[Psynergy]

I'm not very well-versed in older gens and obviously G-Max Fireball being available now makes it even more ridiculous, but Libero seems plenty enough of a reason for it to be as high as it is in the rankings. Sure it doesn't have some of the tools Greninja had, but Greninja also didn't have Dynamax. Guaranteed STAB on everything and the ability to defensively change types under double HP... if you aren't getting hit with STAB LO-boosted super-effective hits, there's still a good chance that you are having to guess what type its going to be when you get around to attacking it. Combine that with the fact that the one meta threat that's actually faster than it has to worry about Sucker Punch.

The only thing that I think you could question about its S-Tier status is if its versatile enough, as both Dragapult and Mimikyu have (or at least had, meta changes notwithstanding) several sets they could run to remain unpredictable.

It's arguable that Cinderace may have been S worthy even without the G-Max form, but there were some of us that weren't convinced that Cinderace was quite S rank when Libero released (though there was little doubt that it was at least A+). Cinderace already saw huge usage with just the release of its hidden ability, but it was difficult to discern how much of this usage was due to it being a strong new toy in a "dying" meta where many players were just waiting for the new stuff to come out. Most of the Pokemon that checked Blaze Cinderace were still fairly capable of checking Libero Cinderace too, and those two points are really where the doubts came into play.

Some of these checks may need to lean on Dynamaxing in response to Cinderace doing the same, but that's not a unique trait to Cinderace so that point left a few of us unconvinced. You could still reliably counter a Libero Cinderace with a Trick Room Mimikyu setup and countersweep with something like Rhyperior, Toxapex could still wall a Cinderace that lacked Zen Headbutt (though Libero Zen Headbutt does make things trickier than non-Libero), etc. The added tool of G-Max Fireball was just enough to convince the doubtful ones (such as myself) that this is S rank, since the ability to prevent Mimikyu from easily stalling out your Dynamax is pretty huge.

At the end of the day, whether it would've been S without the G-Max isn't super relevant though since we all pretty much unanimously agreed that for this current meta, Cinderace is definitely S rank and is unlikely to drop from there until the next DLC.

 

[Omastar68]

Nominating Coalossal for, at least to start, C rank. It's more common than Milotic, Ditto, and Cloyster(!) which are on here, and has really helped me vs Togekiss, Charizard, Rotom-H, Volcarona, Hatterene, and sometimes Rillabloom and Mimikyu. The typing is irritating but I think it is worth at least the lowest rank on here.

 

[MQJinx]

So with the end of season 8, the following Pokemon either from the top 50 or ones that are similar in the case of Chansey and Slowbro don't have a true rank yet. I'd support these Pokemon to be ranked but would like some discussion on where they should go.

Porygon2

Magnezone

Urshifu-R

Urshifu-S

Azumarill

Volcarona

Lycanroc-D

Dragalge

Scizor

Blissey

Chansey

Kingdra

Skarmory

Marowak-Alola

Porygon-Z

Zoroark

Slowbro

Slowbro-Galar

Indeedee-M

 

[Psynergy]

Hi, it's been awhile but now it's time to finally get the VR properly set for the Isle of Armor metagame. We've been talking on and off about this internally within the VR Council since before the last update, and there's been numerous changes in opinion throughout. We've all been very busy for one reason or another which is why this took so long, but be warned that this is a big one. Huge thanks to everyone on the VR team for putting up with this because it's frankly insane how much we're changing, and thanks to anyone who made suggestions prior to this. We looked at almost everything that was placed in the New Pokemon ranks plus a few others, anything not listed here didn't make the cut after all but if they show results in future they may be looked at.

Additionally we also made changes to the Pokemon that were already in the metagame, and there were just as many of these as there were adjustments for new Pokemon. The most important change here though is that Cinderace is getting ranked alone above everything else in S+. There was some debate on whether Cinderace should be the sole S rank and everything else be placed in A+, but we felt that the Pokemon in S are still a whole tier above the current A+ so we chose to do it this way instead. Either way we all agree that Cinderace is in its own league and probably will remain there for the duration of the Isle of Armor metagame.

You might notice that as a result of all the votes, A+ looks unusually small and the B- and C ranks look unusually large now. These aren't problems so they don't necessitate a fix, but there is a range of viability that I see in those lower ranks so the oft-discussed low tier split may finally happen. However, there were just way too many changes that were far more important so we didn't discuss this at all. If you have any opinions on these feel free to share them, but note that this is a fairly low priority discussion. If you have any suggestions for the higher ranks those are probably more important discussions than whether or not Galarian Corsola is B- or C+ or C or whatever. Simply put, feel free to discuss low tier stuff but please try to not turn this into a lower tier debate if there are other important discussions regarding higher tiers!

Thanks for being patient with me, and I hope this updated VR was worth the long wait!

New Pokemon

Porygon2 moves to S
Azumarill moves to A
Urshifu-Rapid-Strike moves to A
Urshifu-Single-Strike moves to A
Lycanroc-Dusk moves to A-
Magnezone moves to A-
Blissey moves to B+
Volcarona moves to B+
Dragalge moves to B+
Porygon-Z moves to B+
Kingdra moves to B
Scizor moves to B
Chansey moves to B
Marowak-A moves to B
Skarmory moves to B
Scolipede moves to B-
Terrakion moves to B
Zoroark moves to B-
Slowbro moves to B-
Cobalion moves to B-
Klefki moves to C
Krookodile moves to C
Talonflame moves to C
Slowbro-G moves to B-
Amoonguss moves to B-
Luxray moves to C

Regular Changes

Togekiss: A+ -> S
Rillaboom: A- -> S
Corviknight: A+ -> A-
Snorlax: A+ -> A-
Rotom-Wash: A -> A-
Rotom-Heat: A -> A-
Darmanitan-Galar: A -> A-
Hippowdon: A -> A+
Gyarados: A -> A+
Tyranitar: A -> B+
Dracozolt: A- -> A+
Cloyster: A- -> B-
Hydreigon: A- -> B+
Toxapex: A- -> A
Primarina: B+ -> A-
Clefable: B+ -> B
Grimmsnarl: B+ -> B-
Ditto: B+ -> B-
Diggersby: B+ -> B-
Conkeldurr: B+ -> B-
Durant: B+ -> B-
Gastrodon: B+ -> B-
Seismitoad: B -> B-
Rotom-Mow: B+ -> B-
Arcanine: B- -> B+
Hawlucha: B- -> C
Rotom-Fan: C -> B
Indeedee-M: UR -> B-
Mudsdale: UR -> C
Coalossal: UR -> C
Glalie: C -> UR
Type: Null: B- -> UR

 

[DragonWhale]

Someone asked about the reasonings behind the rankings of some of these pokemon so I'm going to write about my votes and reasonings here. Note that these are only my own votes and can be different from the actual results (though it's mostly the same).

S+

I think it's abundantly clear that Cinderace is the strongest Pokemon in the format. The combination of Libero, the speed tier, the movepool, and the accompanying max move effects simply makes Cinderace a Pokemon capable of completely turning games around with little to no support from other Pokemon in the party, especially against teams that are not prepared well enough for it. While a similar Pokemon in Greninja existed in the past and was one of the best Pokemon in the format, Cinderace takes it to another level thanks to Dynamax's ability to boost its own speed, attack, and bulk for three turns (which is oftentimes good enough) as well as facing a metagame that is relatively weaker than the legendary and Mega Evolution infested past two generations. Pokemon like Mimikyu were everywhere in the Gren days and made things difficult for it, but G-Max Fireball can rip right through Disguise too. There is also only one relevant Pokemon that is faster than Cinderace (three if you are very lenient and count Inteleon), so revenge killing Cinderace is not easy.

The most popular set from the very beginning is by far the 4 attacks Life Orb set, with Pyro Ball, HJK, Sucker Punch, and Bounce. If you run a slow team and put something in range of a Max Knuckle, its usually over. If you have a fast team and your Pokemon is in range of Max Airstream, its usually over. If you run out of Dynamax before you deal with Cinderace, it's over. There have been a few Pokemon in the past that get into winning positions in a ridiculously wide span of board positions (like Mega Kangaskhan after the Rocky Helmet mon died, or Mega Salamence after a DD and Stealth Rocks up), but none of them are even comparable to the ease Cinderace has to get into these positions.

One of the most effective ways to deal with the 4 attack Cinderace mentioned above is to send out an Intimidate user (Gyarados or Arcanine) or bulky walls like Kee Hippowdon that can weather Cinderace's Dynamax turns and status them in return. First of all, this requires you to keep these mons super healthy as otherwise Cinderace can easily Max Knuckle to neutralize the Intimidate drop and wipe past you on the second hit. This means the time you switch in better be to waste Cinderace's Dynamax turns, since if you take regular hits on the first cycle switchin you may not be able to come in to check the Cinderace in a later cycle when it Dynamaxes. This is also true with Kee Hippowdon, as once you consume the berry and you switch out the Defense boost is gone forever. The other effective strategy is to use Focus Sash + Counter, but that obviously comes at a very high opportunity cost and it is very loudly telegraphed to an experienced player when you send out a Urshifu or Lycanroc against a Dynamaxed Cinderace.

All of the things mentioned in the above paragraph is pointless, however, if you are facing mixed Cinderace that packs Electro Ball (at 12% usage according to stats). There are variants that pack 3 special moves + Bounce, or 3 Physical moves + Electro Ball, but the point is they all blow right through the answers mentioned above, albeit making the Cinderace slightly less effective against other Pokemon. Even the ultimate Dynamax Cinderace counter Kee Hippowdon gets blown away by Life Orb 0 Atk Max-Bounce into 252 SpA Max Fireball. Other new sets are on the rise as well, such as Assault Vest Cinderace showcased in the winning team of the July season, and Lum Bulk Up.

Cinderace has all the tools to dominate the metagame and adapt to trends that try to stop it, to a far higher degree than other metagame dominating monsters we had in previous generations (though SpDef Mence comes close), that it clearly places above every other Pokemon including the others in S-rank, and therefore belongs in S+.

S

Porygon2 is probably the strongest new Pokemon we got from Isle of Armor. Although Eviolite is the only item that makes it viable, the sheer bulk that it provides greatly makes up for the lack of versatility in terms of held items. P2 was a top tier Pokemon in past generations, but in gen 8 it gets a lot stronger with the removal of Toxic and Knock Off from the majority of usable Pokemon. Toxic was removed from P2's movepool as well, which is a very noticeable nerf (and creates timer stall situations with mirrors), but it still has access to speed control options like Thunder Wave (or Discharge LOL) and Trick Room, and a respectable special attack stat that can deal significant damage. In this format where other Normal types like Snorlax are dying out from the rise of Fighting types in the metagame like Urshifu and Cinderace, the fact that P2 is one of the best Pokemon despite being a Normal type is a statement to how good this Pokemon really is. On that note, it's the Ghost-resist of choice for the majority of teams, a trait that is not seen in most of the top tier Pokemon in the metagame.

The bulk, movepool, ability options, and typing makes Porygon2 fit onto almost every team, and given the excellent support it provides, it is a Pokemon fitting of S-rank.

A

I feel like Azumarill is still somewhat underexplored but even then it's pretty straightforward what it can and cannot do in the current metagame. One of the biggest things it lost from the previous generation is access to Knock Off, limiting its coverage significantly as the only viable coverage move option is now Superpower, but on the other hand it gained access to the combination of Sap Sipper + Whirlpool, which now allows it to effectively perish trap grass types. It still faces tough competition from Primarina due to their identical typings and ability to perish trap, and Dynamax prevents Bellyjet from sweeping effectively. It does however have very decent bulk, access to Huge Power and Belly Drum to skyrocket its damage output, and access to a great priority move in Aqua Jet. It is generally very difficult to keep all three Pokemon alive when it Dyanamaxes, as the added bulk makes it a lot harder to prevent Azumarill from dishing out heavy hits before being taken out. As such, I think this Pokemon belongs in the A tier.

(Rapid) A

Urshifu is an amazing Pokemon, especially when the most common option to deal the physically oriented metagame is to shuffle with Intimidate. Both Urshifus completely bypass this with their always critting signatures, but the Rapid variant has a multi-hit variant that lets it handle even more things that the Single Strike form cannot. Most notably, the abundance of Sash + Counter Pokemon that prevail thanks to Cinderace and Rillaboom also works against Wicked Blow, but Surging Strikes breaks through the Focus Sash without any issues. It's very apparent Game Freak had Mimikyu in mind when designing this Pokemon because it just happens to be 1 point faster than Mimikyu AND barely OHKO no-bulk variants without any boosting items. Adamant Scarf Urshifu has a chance to OHKO Dynamax Cinderace right off the bat (assuming Cinderace didn't get a speed boost of course) and has coverage moves like Iron Head and Thunder Punch at its disposal.

Of course, not everything goes in favor for this Pokemon, or else I'd have put it in S-rank. For starters, Dragapult is a huge problem for the Rapid-Strike variant since Dragapult resists both of its STAB options and can cripple it with a burn or paralysis. The other major downside of Urshifu is that it is weak to Max Airstream, one of the two best moves in the game. There is a bit of irony here considering the Gmax form is able to completely nullify the other best move in the game: Max Guard. While Urshifu does have the option of running Max Airstream of its own with the otherwise pathetically weak Aerial Ace, if it gets into a Airstream battle with Cinderace or Togekiss Urshifu is just never able to end up on top. Given these upsides and downsides, I voted Urshifu-Rapid to A.

(Single) A-

Most of its pros and cons are the same as the ones mentioned in the Rapid Strike variant, except for the fact that the Single Strike cannot bypass the Sash + Counter sets or OHKO Dynamax Cinderace but in turn is able to defeat Dragapult. Wicked Blow is also slightly stronger than Surging Strikes, with the added benefit of getting past Sitrus berries that can potentially evade the KO if it was hit by a multi-hit move. However, due to the combined element of Surging Strikes being better suited for the current metagame and the quad weakness Single Strike has to Fairy (and therefore become a risk factor when Dynamaxing), puts Urshifu Single-Strike slightly below its alternate form and goes to A-. In general, there are just too many techs on a team that is intended for Cinderace that also works for Dark Urshifu.

A-

Lycanroc-Dusk is perhaps the best Focus Sash user in the metagame, but at the same is almost entirely limited to using Focus Sash to be viable. While there are cases where top tier Pokemon has only one viable item (such as Porygon2 in S-rank and Mega Evolutions in the past), these Pokemon are brought to a completely different level with those items and almost never interfere with Item Clause (except for Porygon2 + Chansey). Focus Sash is an extremely valuable item for a lot of Pokemon, so using Lycanroc-Dusk removes that option from other members of your team. This has the additional downside of making it easier for the opponent to predict your held items at team preview.

That said, Lycanroc does have all the tools a Focus Sash suicide lead can ask for: a very powerful priority move in Accelerock, a fantastic support move in Stealth Rock, Taunt to block other lead support Pokemon from functioning, and Counter which has terrific synergy with Focus Sash. It even has access to Endeavor and Close Combat to deal significant damage. While Focus Sash is almost a necessity for this Pokemon, a case can be made for Life Orb. Thanks to Tough Claws, a Life Orb Accelerock is capable of OHKOing Cinderace. With a Swords Dance boost up, it is capable of OHKOing Dynamax Cinderace with Accelerock and Porygon2 with Close Combat. Of course, it is important to note that Lycanroc isn't exactly something that can easily set up without a Focus Sash. Taking these very clear strengths and weaknesses into account, A- seems like a fitting rank for this Pokemon.

A

Magnezone is a great Pokemon. Similar to Porygon2, Magnezone has three fantastic abilities to choose from, the movepool to put a lot of pressure on the opponent, and the typing to fit specific roles on many teams. The biggest upside of Magnezone is the sheer number of items that works with its ability, such as Weakness Policy + Sturdy to guarantee survive the super effective hit and skyrocket its offensive presence, Analytic + Choice Specs to completely obliterate switchins even through resists (e.g. OHKOing Excadrill with Steel Beam), and Leftovers + Magnet Pull to completely obliterate stall teams.

On the topic of stall, Cinderace's presence in the metagame and the addition of Chansey and Skarmory in the Isle of Armor gave stall teams a rise in popularity. Magnezone is single handedly the biggest threat to stall teams that lack Quagsire (which a lot of teams did not run due to it losing to Cinderace and of course Rillaboom), and it's easy to see why. Magnezone is immune to Toxic, resists Stealth Rocks, and is capable of breaking through Chansey, Toxapex, and Skarmory very easily. Chansey is the primary switchin to special attackers like Mag, but access to Iron Defense and Body Press means Chansey is no match for it.

Major downsides of Magnezone are its slow speed stat and common weaknesses. Ground type moves are on every team and Cinderace completely ruins Magnezone, especially with Max Fireball penetrating Sturdy. It's relatively easy to revenge kill but at the same time it's very difficult to prevent it from killing your team. Given this, I personally put it in A.

-----

Gonna continue in part 2, coming soon.

 

[marilli]

I had some time to look through the full VR. it honestly seems pretty OK.

My opinion:

Excadrill: A+ -> A

Excadrill's really fallen off in the metagame right now. It is still good, but I don't think it's particularly better than any of the Pokemon in A. Sash set has plenty of competition because of Item clause, as it is such a coveted item to combat the dreaded Cinderace. Especially competition from Sash users like Lycanroc and Urshifu-Dark that can actually check things like Cinderace and Rillaboom with Counter is so frustrating and significantly reduces my demand for Excadrill in teambuilding. It also loses 1v1 to both Cinderace and Rillaboom, which is kind of poor. As for the Sand Rush set now it better be Jolly or it gets outsped by +1 Cinderace, which is a travesty as it massively clips its damage potential, and if you're using WP Sand Rush, Life Orb Max Fireball just cleanly KOs through Excadrill's Dynamax unless you run a ridiculous spread. Furthermore, there's so many dedicated physical tanks due to Cinderace being simply overwhelming. Things like Wisp Dragapult, Intimidate Gyarados, defensive Slack Off Hippowdon, are all so many things that Excadrill has a lot of trouble getting past. Unlike Cinderace which can actually tech for its counters, Excadrill's "tech" here is just clicking Horn Drill and Praying, so I think Excadrill has really taken the full brunt of the physically defensive walls.The huge water Pokemon infestation in A/A- tier hurts Excadrill, too.

Most of the other things I think are pretty close. I believe I voted A for Primarina, but I think it's pretty close anyways. I was on the fence about Corviknight and Darmanitan-G staying A-, but I keep flip flopping my mind over them.

For the lower tier divisions, I think somewhere around current B & very few of the top B- Pokemon make a good cutoff point. I can understand things like Volcarona, P-Z, and such being in the same letter grade tier as say Clefable and Charizard, but I struggle to see how they could possibly be the same letter grade as Slowbro-Galar and such, or even things like Rotom-Mow.

A large number of Pokemon in B- would drop down to C, where I can see C tier being divided up into 2 parts, C+ and C, which would make sense seeing the vast number of Pokemon in the current B- and C. Things that have a good niche and actually see high level, repeated usage (like Avalugg, Torkoal, Ditto), or have a huge threat level and has high ceiling when supported or invested (Haxorus, Diggersby) in my opinion needs to go to C+, while things that just kinda exist and don't do anything too spectacular would be in plain C (many of the current C with aforementioned Pokemon subtracted). We could probably collapsable the C tiers, too.

Gothitelle needs to be ranked somewhere in C, in my opinion C+.

 

[Omastar68]

I think Lanturn should be unranked. It's only #137 in usage lol. Rotom_W seems wholly better...besides walling Rotom-W that is.

 

[marilli]

I think Lanturn should be unranked. It's only #137 in usage lol. Rotom_W seems wholly better...besides walling Rotom-W that is.

I am personally not for or against keeping or removing anything on C, but just a commentary on low rank VR nominations. Please stop basing your argument on usage placings. The lowest rung of the usage stats are very volatile because placings can easily shift 40-50 slots when the actual usage just differ by .1-.2%. It's just so tiny and end up being pretty statistically meaningless. Basing your arguments on big usage stat shifts, Pokemon usage rate rising by full percentages like 4-5% is one thing, but you shouldn't be basing your argument on meaningless usage differences, really. The usage arguments you posted above for Cloyster and Coalossal, it's shifted right back. Does that mean Coalossal is significantly worse in the current meta or Cloyster is much better? No, not really. It's just meaningless noise. Our 100+ Pokemon VR currently include similarly low-usage Pokemon, like Conkeldurr and Hawlucha. It's also a matter of consistency. If we want niche, pretty bad Pokemon like Coalossal on the VR, we're gonna also have to list similarly niche and bad Pokemon on the VR. That being said yeah, we probably don't lose a whole lot removing Lanturn from that VR list.

Currently, a low-tier sweep is in the works and planned after voting on Excadrill and maybe a few other high tiers. It is, understandably, pretty low priority. Not because I think innovating or using less conventional Pokemon is overrated, because I believe our finite effort can be better spent maintaining the more important, higher rank VR positions. I outlined a sneak peek of the low-tiers sweep on my post above (we may even see 3 C tiers, C+/C/C-, though obviously the details are subject to change based on what other people on the VR council thinks.

 

[Omastar68]

That's a good point about usage stats. With that in mind I'm not sure anymore if it should be removed. It does beat Togekiss and Urshifu Rapid-strike.

 

[Hermanator]

I think Lanturn should be unranked. It's only #137 in usage lol. Rotom_W seems wholly better...besides walling Rotom-W that is.

May I ask where you found the usage stats at?

 

[Zargon19]

May I ask where you found the usage stats at?

Apparently the home app on mobile has it, under options. But you can also look here: https://www.pikalytics.com/pokedex/gen8battlestadiumsingles

 

[marilli]

Magnezone A

I hope that this is taken as a Magnezone rise nomination for A- -> A. I think Magnezone is very much better than most of current A- for reasons stated by DW. I suppose Single strike vote can also be nominated, to avoid being biased - fwiw, I will be voting to keep it in A. I think Sash counter is a relevant part of the metagame, but only a small part of it. It's not a tier's difference because being hardwalled by Dragapult and not is a world of difference. Wicked Blow is also a far easier move to spam and its 'type advantages' compared to Urshifu-SS aren't as pronounced - it's still losing to Togekiss, it's is marginally better against Hippo for being far worse against Rillaboom.

Primarina A- -> A

I've been using a lot of Primarina, and I really don't know what exactly is putting Primarina a tier below other Water-types like Azumarill. They are able to stay on top despite the exact same weakness to Rillaboom and Dracozolt, which are big reasons why Azumarill can't go above the A tier, but what else? CM Primarina is a huge threat to Porygon2, which is a huge factor in its favor because it lets Primarina beat it without expending the Dynamax resource. It's also not crippled by Wisp Dragapult. It's got an actually better matchup vs things like Hippowdon that it's supposed to beat, and it's immune to counter. I think the only single problem against Primarina is that unlike Azumarill, Primarina is hard-walled by Ferrothorn and not as good vs Blissey. But that comes in exchange of having a way more practical tech against Toxapex and Amoonguss (Psychic, as vs Dig / Bounce). If I'm missing something here, do let me know.

------------------------------------------

Not a nomination here, but some meta snapshot / impressions. I would keep an eye out for Hippowdon, which is slowly inching into the Big 6 -> Big 7 territory. It's a great defensive tank against brokens like Cinderace and physical pult, and one of the few ways of reasonably handling Dracozolt. Talking of Dracozolt, it has met the perfect storm thanks to Mimikyu usage plummeting and having a perfect defensive typing to handle Rillaboom / Cinderace. There was really never doubt on whether Dracozolt can deal nuclear damage or not. It was just a question of whether using Dracozolt in particular, over other potential Dynamax beasts like Durant / Diggersby / etc. were justified. This was a lot more sketchy aspect of Dracozolt - the answer was decidedly "not really, but it still is a huge threat" when the Pokemon was stuck in B+ territory and very little defensive utility aside from nuking out Lapras and having a good matchup vs Rotom-W, on top of losing matchups to Dragapult and Mimikyu. Gone are the days of that, and here are the days of get your face kicked in by Dracozolt if you haven't got a Hippowdon.

------------------------------------------

Finally, the dreaded low tier sweeps. I posted my thoughts on it on Discord, if you haven't seen it it's OK i've changed my opinion like 4 times already. If we are to stop just short of it at the B/B- tiers.

Charizard: B -> B-
Terrakion: B -> C+

I've been going on about both of these noms on Discord a lot, so keep these brief. Basically Charizard sucks and has an obscene usage for an inexplicable reason when the meta is infested with Cinderace, Dragapult, Dracozolt, SpDef Hippo to set up Rocks, and Water-types. Home stats having 70% Blaze and 80% (combined special Fire move usage between Flamethrower / Fire Blast / Blast Burn) ~ 90 (Air Slash / Hurricane combined usage) special attacking Zard tells me enough about the userbase of Charizard: they don't really care about making competitive sense. It's just not seen with any consistent frequency high level play.

Terrakion is unironically outclassed by Lycanroc except in some niche case if you want to set up SDs and attack and take advantage of its bulk, but that's not really a line that goes well for Terrakion, either.

and Luxray C -> B- (Super good at cushioning and pivoting, it being hopeless vs Hippo is why it cannot rise any further though)
Torkoal C -> B- (Torkoal and thus sun, super good vs RillaAce, kind of nice.)
Venusaur C -> B-
and thus end up with B- of:

Amoonguss, Charizard, Cloyster, Diggersby, Gastrodon, Grimmsnarl, Indeedee, Torkoal, Venusaur

Amoonguss

Charizard

Cloyster

Diggersby

Gastrodon

Grimmsnarl

Indeedee-M

Luxray

Torkoal

Venusaur

is a list that makes most sense, and drop the rest of the B- into C and do a whole low tier sweep later.

I would assume many of the dropped Pokemon (things that can be super threatening situationally like Haxorus, Durant, or things that have a pretty clean niche like Corsola, Ditto, Umbreon, Zoroark) will make C+, along with other currently C Pokemon, but some of them (Scolipede, Slowbro-G) should drop further.

So, 3 votes that need to happen, which may or may not get combined into 2:
1. Vote on Excadrill / Primarina / Magnezone / Urshifu-RS (should happen in the next slate soon)
2. Vote on who exactly on the current B- stays there (maybe this could be done on its own, or be combined with 3.
3. A whole ass low tier sweep of the current C / B- (could take a while, not happening this slate)

 

[kakaks]

when will the vr be updated to seies 6?

 

[1_TrickPhony]

when will the vr be updated to seies 6?

Unclear, we will have a temporary ranking sometime soon (tm). Lot of us are busy but we should have something around the time of the series starting

 

[cant say]

when will the vr be updated to seies 6?

The format hasn’t gone live on the Switch games or Showdown yet. Anything we put up now would be purely speculative. Give everyone a chance to play the format first, then join in the discussion with everyone as we work to put something together.

This thread will be closed when this season ends. A new thread will be put up for the new rankings.

 

[Psynergy]

And with that, Series 6 has now begun so this thread will be closed for the time being. When Series 7 comes around this thread will likely be reopened and repurposed for what will likely be the Crown Tundra metagame.

For now, there will a new Series 6 VR posted in the near future. Due to the temporary nature of this metagame it likely won't be organized quite as rigorously as this one, but expect it to take a few days for to get a feel of what is actually good or not in this new metagame.