Alright time for my by-weekly VR novel.
Raises:
A --> A+
This things the devil. I think people are well aware just how much of a threat this is and its starting to cross the line of extremely centralizing for the tier as if you don't have a hard answer that can go the grind game, you're in trouble because no matter if you're playing stall, balance, HO, webs, or whatever it may be, this thing only needs 1 free turn and you can auto lose just on the cremie match up alone. Its threat level alone is worth the A+ rank on the stored power sets but you can mix it up with other variations too with Dgleam, Mystical fire, and recover sets. I don't think anyone didn't see this nom coming.
A- --> A
My personal favorite rocker and something I basically made daniYSB spam during his seasonal run. Offense is back and its the best rocker the playstyle has access to because it fixes your rotom, mane, and Kanga match ups while also pressuring all our common removal options and abuses key walls like Garbodor. Heavy slams also really fun for Alcremie.
EDIT: I was running heavy slam on this for cremie but it turns out SD rhydon just hard checks cremie because you win the set up war against it. So its a lot more generically good than I thought because its just a hard kanga, rotom, mane, and cremie answer in your rocker slot.
B --> B+
This is honestly my pick for something that can go even higher than this but more people need to start using the Night Shade taunt toxic sets before I really start pushing this up any higher. Its so solid in the metagame right now as its a physical wall not bothered by knock off (which is huge) that also gives you a water immunity against stuff like Specs Poliwrath and Cramorant which is just a side bonus to what the mon already does. It also slaughters any Clefairy/fat type teams.
B --> B+
Solid little glue mon. Currently one of the better rotom answers and all around special sponge. Not a lot to say about the little pancake that people don't already know. Its just good and widely used.
Drops:
A -->A-
Trend of teams straying away from this continues. Still good but generally not as favored by teams in the meta as these bulky pivots just aren't seeing a ton of play right now.
A --> A-/B+
So touching on the point of bulky pivots not really being as favored lately compared to when this was first ranked in A ages ago, Wishi also has the unfortunate downside of other water resists taking its place for a lot of teams. Things like Cram, Specs Poli (which while not super common yet has gotten a lot of important tournament wins this past week and I expect to start picking up even more), Jellicent which I think will only get even more common, and even stuff like Jynx, cuno, clef, and Ferroseed. I think we have plenty of amazing water resists to chose from right now and holding an A rank for a mon like this just is a product of a past meta sticking around on the VR despite the meta moving on past it.
A- --> B+/B
This one hurts my soul a bit as an avid stall lover. But this meta has just not been kind to the poor thing and full stall has seen a drastic drop off in both play and success in the tier. Its still a perfectly fine playstyle but I wouldn't call it one of the top tier play styles right now even tho I think it can be a good tournament pick because in a tournament you don't need to account for every random on and can more tailor a team. But as a general playstyle I think its rather hit or miss.
A- --> B+
Same story as Pyuk but it does have the saving grace of Audino balance teams still holding on to a bit more relevancy, but I don't think that's enough to keep it from dropping out of the A ranks.
A- --> B+
Thievul pretty much replaced this. And with Tangela being everywhere you don't even get the luxury of clicking SD and expecting to break. Knock into Leaf Storm still does 75% to Tangela so its still mildly annoying, but its really not as great as it was when it first rose up. Its also absolute Cremie fodder despite being a dark type thanks to it just getting LO recoil stalled.
B+ --> B-
This was good for like a week before Cram and Rapidash really showed up so it snuck all the way up here and has remained under cover ever since. I've tried to experiment with this mon so much but its just so lack luster in almost every way this meta.
Raises:
A --> A+
This things the devil. I think people are well aware just how much of a threat this is and its starting to cross the line of extremely centralizing for the tier as if you don't have a hard answer that can go the grind game, you're in trouble because no matter if you're playing stall, balance, HO, webs, or whatever it may be, this thing only needs 1 free turn and you can auto lose just on the cremie match up alone. Its threat level alone is worth the A+ rank on the stored power sets but you can mix it up with other variations too with Dgleam, Mystical fire, and recover sets. I don't think anyone didn't see this nom coming.
A- --> A
My personal favorite rocker and something I basically made daniYSB spam during his seasonal run. Offense is back and its the best rocker the playstyle has access to because it fixes your rotom, mane, and Kanga match ups while also pressuring all our common removal options and abuses key walls like Garbodor. Heavy slams also really fun for Alcremie.
EDIT: I was running heavy slam on this for cremie but it turns out SD rhydon just hard checks cremie because you win the set up war against it. So its a lot more generically good than I thought because its just a hard kanga, rotom, mane, and cremie answer in your rocker slot.
B --> B+
This is honestly my pick for something that can go even higher than this but more people need to start using the Night Shade taunt toxic sets before I really start pushing this up any higher. Its so solid in the metagame right now as its a physical wall not bothered by knock off (which is huge) that also gives you a water immunity against stuff like Specs Poliwrath and Cramorant which is just a side bonus to what the mon already does. It also slaughters any Clefairy/fat type teams.
B --> B+
Solid little glue mon. Currently one of the better rotom answers and all around special sponge. Not a lot to say about the little pancake that people don't already know. Its just good and widely used.
Drops:
A -->A-
Trend of teams straying away from this continues. Still good but generally not as favored by teams in the meta as these bulky pivots just aren't seeing a ton of play right now.
A --> A-/B+
So touching on the point of bulky pivots not really being as favored lately compared to when this was first ranked in A ages ago, Wishi also has the unfortunate downside of other water resists taking its place for a lot of teams. Things like Cram, Specs Poli (which while not super common yet has gotten a lot of important tournament wins this past week and I expect to start picking up even more), Jellicent which I think will only get even more common, and even stuff like Jynx, cuno, clef, and Ferroseed. I think we have plenty of amazing water resists to chose from right now and holding an A rank for a mon like this just is a product of a past meta sticking around on the VR despite the meta moving on past it.
A- --> B+/B
This one hurts my soul a bit as an avid stall lover. But this meta has just not been kind to the poor thing and full stall has seen a drastic drop off in both play and success in the tier. Its still a perfectly fine playstyle but I wouldn't call it one of the top tier play styles right now even tho I think it can be a good tournament pick because in a tournament you don't need to account for every random on and can more tailor a team. But as a general playstyle I think its rather hit or miss.
A- --> B+
Same story as Pyuk but it does have the saving grace of Audino balance teams still holding on to a bit more relevancy, but I don't think that's enough to keep it from dropping out of the A ranks.
A- --> B+
Thievul pretty much replaced this. And with Tangela being everywhere you don't even get the luxury of clicking SD and expecting to break. Knock into Leaf Storm still does 75% to Tangela so its still mildly annoying, but its really not as great as it was when it first rose up. Its also absolute Cremie fodder despite being a dark type thanks to it just getting LO recoil stalled.
B+ --> B-
This was good for like a week before Cram and Rapidash really showed up so it snuck all the way up here and has remained under cover ever since. I've tried to experiment with this mon so much but its just so lack luster in almost every way this meta.
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