STAB STABmons

[TheGameAce]

Alright, I've got some new additions to the initial sets I posted, a lot of which are significantly better. Some are pretty simple, but nonetheless I've found them quite worthwhile.


BuzzSwole:

Buzzwole @ Life Orb
Ability: Beast Boost
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- No Retreat
- Drain Punch
- Storm Throw
- Leech Life

Buzzwole is by far one of the strongest Pokemon right now in STABmons, thanks in part to No Retreat giving it a very appreciable +1 to each of it's core stats, allowing it to out-speed almost everything and take hits well. Drain Punch & Leech Life give it the survivability it needs for foes it can't OHKO, and Storm Throw gets past setup walls such as Cotton Guard Ferrothorn.

Incineroar:

Incineroar @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 252 HP / 176 Def / 80 SpD
Impish Nature
- Sacred Fire
- Obstruct
- Parting Shot
- Darkest Lariat

Incineroar makes good use of it's typing and natural bulk that's backed up by by Intimidate. With access to Dark and Fire moves, it gains Sacred Fire and Obstruct. SF allows for high burn potential with some damage output, and Obstruct can be great to compensate for a lack of strong physical attack.

Fastest Web in the West:

Accelgor @ Focus Sash
Ability: Unburden
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Sticky Web
- Acid Spray
- Encore
- Bug Buzz

Fairly basic Accelgor set, but now with Sticky Web access. Encore allows it to pester hazard setters and setups. Acid Spray gives it some potential to cause damage with Bug Buzz. Other than that, nothing too special. Just beats out some of the slower web setters. Optionally, Toxic Spikes + Yawn can be run over Acid Spray + Encore, to put additional pressure.

Thundurus:

Thundurus-Therian (M) @ Life Orb
Ability: Volt Absorb
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Nasty Plot
- Thunderbolt
- Aeroblast
- Grass Knot

Thundurus doesn't get much to help it out in here, but it does get one key thing it lacked before: STAB Flying moves. While it has access to the much more powerful Hurricane, Aeroblast is significantly more reliable on this glass cannon. With Nasty Plot, it can OHKO most of the meta, and even breaks past special walls like Blissey. It also greatly appreciates Sticky Web being active to keep fast checks to it in line.

Diggersby:

Diggersby @ Soft Sand
Ability: Huge Power
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Swords Dance
- Rapid Spin
- Earthquake
- Facade

While Diggersby unfortunately doesn't get access to Thousand Arrows, Extreme Speed, or Precipice Blades, it does gain access to the very useful Rapid Spin. With Rapid Spin now giving speed (and even having a more respectable 50BP), it allows Diggersby to both clear hazards, and get a useful speed boost for potential sweeps. Rapid Spin itself hits fairly hard on Diggersby with his enormous attack and STAB, and can often get a KO on a weaker Pokemon as well. Coupled with Swords Dance for boosting, and it hits like a very fast truck. Soft Sand is used since the usual Stealth Rocks don't really cause a problem for Diggersby (no need for Heavy Duty Boots), and it appreciates the extra 20 base power to help with some KOs that it might otherwise miss out on. Facade is a backup that punishes toxic or burn users, and gives it a workaround for flying types.

 

[in the hills]

Dragonite and Aegislash have been banned from STABmons!!!​

The metagame after Tapu Bulu and Garchomp's ban has been incredibly volatile. Hyper Offense has an insane presence right now, and it is very difficult for other playstyles to adapt. While there are a lot of prevalent Pokemon on HO that are compounding this issue, Dragonite and Aegislash have stood out throughout WCoOM and Swiss as the most devastating to teams. Dragonite has been on our watchlist for a while, and has the biggest influence on teams right now. While we had discussed banning Dragon Ascent previously, the metagame is not currently in a place to properly assess the impact of the move. We may decide to reevaluate this decision once the metagame settles down.
Aegislash on the other hand has been dominant on HO teams, with Swords Dance sets with either 3 attacks or Autotomize sweeping teams fairly easily. On top of Swords Dance sets, Aegislash's options were incredibly wide which made it much scarier to face in practice.

Here are the votes:

Pokemon​	drphdbj​	in the hills​	stresh​	RESULT​
Aegislash​	BAN​	BAN​	DNB​	BAN (2-1)​
Dragonite​	BAN​	BAN​	BAN​	BAN (3-0)​
Tapu Lele​	ABS​	DNB​	DNB​	DNB (0-2-1)​

As you can see we also voted on Tapu Lele (for like the 5th time or something? lol) Like usual, we feel that while Tapu Lele is very borderline broken and is broken on paper, in practice it has yet to really prove itself. I will note that it is definitely in an upward trend that I do believe may lead it to being banned soon, especially with non-Choice sets popping up that are potent. I'm sure we'll end up voting on this yet again soon, so as always it's very close on our watchlist.

As I've mentioned a bunch of times during this post, HO is a clear issue in the metagame right now. It is unsurprising that this is the case after Tapu Bulu's ban, and we are carefully examining plans towards a solution. While there were quite a few Pokemon people wanted banned, there's honestly too much to even consider banning all at once. I've taken note of the 11 things people have mentioned so far for bans and they're almost all valid concerns. We'll likely be making another vote very soon to take a further look on offensive presences in the metagame, but hopefully Dragonite and Aegislash's bans will shake things up for the better. If there's something you wanted banned that wasn't, don't worry because we have plans to address the metagame more rapidly for a little bit, while still carefully examining the impact of bans on the metagame.

Tagging Kris to implement Dragonite and Aegislash bans.

 

[Dr. Phd. BJ]

With OM Swiss and OM World Cup approaching an end, I thought I would post a few observations that I have made from the games that I have seen

Ghost Types - The biggest trend that has been seen in the past couple months is the rise of ghosts. When I first joined council, one of the first things that I brought up was the lack of ghost resists in the tier. Ghosts now have more accessibility to Moongeist Beam, Poltergeist, and Spectral Thief. The most common ghost resist in the tier is Tyranitar, which struggles switching into Aegislash, Mimikyu, and Gengar. Ghost types also get a lot of opportunities to click their moves. For example, Gengar, Blacephalon, and Mimikyu have a great speed tier. Mimikyu also has the additional benefit of the ability Disguise, which essentially gives Mimikyu a free turn. On the other hand, Aegislash gets a lot of chances due to its solid bulk, and amazing defensive typing. Other mons such as Polteageist and Marowak-Alola have been used effectively during this time.

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8stabmons-1462035015 (Greybaum vs Nalorium omwc)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8stabmons-1458630516 (MAMP vs drphdbj swiss)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8stabmons-1456441909 (Jqlove vs drphdbj omwc)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8stabmons-1462139836 (LBDC vs The Immortal omwc)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8stabmons-1459140666 (Ren vs Chazm swiss)

Fighting Types - The biggest tool that fighting types receive is No Retreat. This move allows the most common fighting types in the tier to become win conditions, and even breakers to an extent. Many of these win conditions have workable speed tiers, solid bulk, great coverage, and absurd attacking stats. The added utility of Thunderous Kick and Final Gambit has been seen on mons such as Buzzwole and Urshifu-Rapid-Strike. Final Gambit is a great panic button on scarfers, as well as a lure for mons such as Toxapex. Fighting types have the luxury of not needing to run Heavy-Duty Boots, which allows these mons to free up an item slot. With the recent bans of Dragonite and Aegislash, expect many of these fighting types to see an increase in usage.

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8stabmons-1462613196 (LBDC vs Greybaum omwc)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8stabmons-1456441909 (Jqlove vs drphdbj omwc)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8stabmons-1462575477 (drphdbj vs Terra omwc)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8stabmons-1437728115 (PA vs motherlove stab ssnl)

Screens - In my opinion, screens is currently the best play style in stab. Grimmsnarl provides additional utility with Memento/Parting Shot in stab. These moves allow Grimm to set up screens twice in many games, or at the very least ensures that Grimm can get a chance to allow another mon to set up with Memento. The set up sweepers on screens are also pretty versatile, which makes prepping for screens a tough task. A big issue that screens teams will face in the future is Surging Strikes. This move always crits, which ignores the effects of screens. With Dragonite getting banned, many screens teams will simply lose to the combination of Surging Strikes + speed control (most notably Swift Swim and Crawdaunt under Trick Room). In addition, Court Change Cinderace is becoming more common. I believe that there is a good chance that screens become worse after the most recent ban slate and with the meta prepping more than ever for screens.

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8stabmons-1453287202 (Fc vs drphdbj omwc)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8stabmons-1459792221 (Fc vs Jqlove omwc)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8stabmons-1462694031 (Greybaum vs The Immortal omwc)

Weather - The most common balance builds in the tier are sand, and rain teams should only be getting better after Dragonite / Tapu Bulu bans. Weather provides great speed control, hazard control, and immediate breaking. Dracozolt is an insanely potent win condition on many sand teams, especially with the lack of ground types in the tier. Rain used to dominate gen 7 stab. However, this has not been the case in gen 8. Tapu Bulu, Dragonite, no Mega-Swampert, no Ash-Greninja, and the lack of z-moves have made it infintely harder to pull off throughout the gen. I have seen hail teams have more success than rain this gen. I expect rain to become much better after the ban of Dragonite

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8stabmons-1458630516 (MAMP vs drphdbj swiss)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8stabmons-1461409434 (ItsChew2 vs LBDC omwc)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8stabmons-1462050613 (Greybaum vs ItsChew2 omwc)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8stabmons-1457369064 (Ryuji-Sempai vs Andyboy swiss)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8stabmons-1462687036 (Terra vs Byyleth omwc)

Stall - Stall has been notoriously bad since the early days of stab. Mons such as TauntNasty Thundurus, CB Head Smash Aerodactyl, V-Create Zard-X, Pursuit Tyranitar, and others have discouraged stall. Stall has never dominated stab, in fact some may argue it has never been viable. In gen 8, stall is still not great. So why am I writing a post about stall in stabmons? In omwc and swiss, there has been a lot of hyper offense. Stall is currently a really good matchup fish vs players that spam hyper offense. Many hyper offense teams run no form of hazard control, which allows for stall to have an easier time than they already do vs ho. Stall has the potential to beat balance teams this gen, but in general it is difficult to find a way to consistently beat balance with stall in stab.

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8stabmons-1457905737 (Fc vs Terra omwc)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8stabmons-1459830259 (ItsChew vs Nalorium omwc)

The Future - There are three mons I wanted to end this post with: Cinderace, Magearna, and Tapu Lele. in the hills made a list of 11 things that people find broken in stab in the post before this. I wanted to talk about 3 of them.

Cinderace - This mon is extremely good right now, I have found the Fire Lash/HJK/Court Change/U-Turn set to be the best. This set is very hard on most builds at the moment due to the speed tier, the ability to consistently swap field effects, reliable coverage, and Fire Lash being hard to switch into. This take is probably controversial, but I hate playing against this mon more than I hate playing vs Tapu Lele. This mon has great natural speed, basically immune to hazards, and seemingly never loses momentum. I hate it. I am curious what other people think of Cinderace

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8stabmons-1462694031 (Greybaum vs The Immortal omwc)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8stabmons-1462139836 (LBDC vs The Immortal omwc)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8stabmons-1419881068-tnvagqfnl6hhl03rebfweo4bnpmqgx7pw (The Number Man vs drphdbj stab ssnl)

Magearna - I think Magearna is the scariest mon to prep for on screens. Magearna just doesn't die behind screens, and it recovers everything off with Draining Kiss. If you dare hit it with a super-effective hit, the odds are that you just lost to weakness policy stored power. This mon without screens is solid, probably not banworthy. I do think Choice Specs Magearna is probably the second best set, and I think people should stop running spedef Doom Desire.

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8stabmons-1437728115 (PA vs motherlove stab ssnl)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen8stabmons-595097 (Fc vs byyleth omwc)

Tapu Lele - This is probably the mon that most people in the community complain about, and I feel as if my opinion changes on it every week. This mon is one of the best revenge killers, breakers, and panic buttons in the tier with Trick. Unfortunately, Lele has to sacrifice one of Speed or Power in its item slot. I do feel as if Lele has offensive and defensive counterplay, and in most games it doesn't sweep. I saw a game where it was Scarf Tapu Lele vs no psychic resist, and it only got one kill. While I do believe that Lele is borderline, I feel as if there is enough counterplay in the tier right now to handle it. I also believe that by banning Lele, this would be removing one of the last good revenge killers in the tier, and the best Trick mon in the tier.

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8stabmons-1458405786 (The Immortal vs Nalorium omwc)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8stabmons-1457369064 (Ryuji-Sempai vs Andyboy swiss)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8stabmons-1453823837 (Redflix vs Quantum Tesseract swiss)

 

[in the hills]

Small update!
xavgb has unfortunately decided to step down from council. Been a long and fun run the past year and a half (seriously how has it been so long) and stresh has definitely helped pave this tier to what it is now. Make sure to give him a huge thanks to all the work he has put into the tier!

On that note, we have two new members to the STABmons council! Welcome Byleth and Fc! I'm sure they will help us a great deal moving forward, can't wait!
on an even smaller note i updated sample teams without saying anything in an effort to keep consistent teams for new players to use, will probably plan on updating resources in a similar fashion soon

 

[in the hills]

STABmons Viability Rankings:
(last updated 12/19/2021)​

S Rank:

S Rank

Tyranitar

A Rank:

A+ Rank

Cinderace

Corviknight

Ferrothorn

Tapu Lele

A Rank

Blacephalon

Excadrill

Heatran

Magearna

Thundurus-Therian

Tornadus-Therian

Toxapex

Urshifu-Rapid-Strike

Zeraora

A- Rank

Buzzwole

Clefable

Seismitoad

Slowbro

Slowking

Weavile

B Rank:

B+ Rank

Aerodactyl

Blaziken

Dracozolt

Gengar

Grimmsnarl

Hippowdon

Keldeo

Kommo-o

Obstagoon

Rillaboom

Skarmory

Sylveon

Terrakion

Volcarona

Zapdos

B Rank

Blissey

Celesteela

Drapion

Gastrodon

Gyarados

Kyurem

Latios

Reuniclus

Rotom-Heat

Rotom-Wash

Salamence

Slowking-Galar

Starmie

Tangrowth

Tapu Fini

Victini


B- Rank

Alakazam

Crawdaunt

Hawlucha

Hydreigon

Mamoswine

Melmetal

Mew

Mimikyu

Nidoking

Scizor

Steelix


C Rank

C Rank

Araquanid

Azumarill

Darmanitan

Ditto

Heracross

Jirachi

Mandibuzz

Marowak-Alola

Moltres

Moltres-Galar

Ninetales-Alola

Pelipper

Porygon2

Regieleki

Shedinja

Togekiss

Vaporeon

The VR has been updated! Been a lot of meta shifts and bans since the last update so there's too many changes to list, but some key rises are Blacephalon, Thundurus-Therian, Urshifu-Rapid-Strike, Magearna, and Kommo-o. These are all threats that have risen to prominence in the metagame recently. Offensive Fighting-types in general have rosen to prominence more, with Urshifu-RS, Kommo-o, Buzzwole, Keldeo, Blaziken, and Terrakion all rising. Tyranitar has risen to S once again due to its splashability in the meta and ability to check key special attackers. Rillaboom also rose quite a bit as a replacement for Tapu Bulu, though it is considerably less impactful on the metagame. There aren't many notable drops, though Skarmory has dropped some due to recent bans.

Here's our votes on (some of) the marked changes:

Hide

we only voted on potentially contested things, so assume everything else was unanimous

 

[in the hills]

Blacephalon has been banned from STABmons!​

Hey team! The council decided to do a small voting slate prior to the start of STABmons Open on some of the more mindless strategies. The metagame is in a very good spot right now, and we're excited to see how it develops over Open. That being said, there were a few issues with the metagame that were brought to our attention, namely Blacephalon and Tapu Lele. Both of these have been on the chopping block before, with Blacephalon being on the ban slate early on in DLC2 and Tapu Lele consistently staying on it throughout. After discussing, we still feel that it's not time for Tapu Lele to go, we feel that Choiced sets (which tend to still be the most used by far still) are more easily checked with offensive counterplay and various defensive switch-ins. Blacephalon, on the other hand, has returned to the spotlight in the metagame and once again has caused very unhealthy restrictions on teambuilding, given the only reliable switch-ins to it are Tyranitar, AV Toxapex, and the random fat Normal-type (Blissey, Snorlax, Type: Null). Tyranitar is by far the most reliable of these checks and has become near required on teams due to Blacephalon. The council unanimously agreed that Blacephalon is the most unhealthy thing for the tier right now and needed to go, "All my homies hate Blace" if you will.

As I mentioned earlier, we kept this slate light since the metagame is in a really good spot for the most part and we'd like any shakeups in the meta to come from new ideas rather than more bans. I hope everyone enjoys STABmons Open with Blacephalon gone, and sign up if you haven't!

Votes:

Pokemon​	byleth​	drphdbj​	Fc​	in the hills​	RESULT​
Tapu Lele​	BAN​	ABS​	DNB​	DNB​	DNB (1-2-1)​
Blacephalon​	BAN​	BAN​	BAN​	BAN​	BAN (4-0)​

Tagging Kris to implement Blacephalon ban.

 

[drampa's grandpa]

I'm here to break the streak of In The Hills posts!

The current metagame has a ton of high-level, borderline broken, offensive threats that every team needs to be prepared for.

The best known of these is Tapu Lele, which has been voted on several times now, and is generally agreed to be super borderline due to its high power, good Speed tier, and the general difficulty of reliably switching into it. I don't feel the need to prove that this Pokémon is extremely borderline as its legality has been a source of controversy for months.

Next is Thundurus-Therian. Thundurus has a combination of brutal offensive potential and a surprising amount of defensive utility. While it is technically possible to wall most teams are forced to keep constant offensive pressure on it in order to prevent it either sweeping or claiming a kill every time it comes in. Many defensive Pokémon cannot deal enough damage to Thundurus to prevent it setting up easily. Sets with Roost and / or Taunt are especially abusive of more passive Pokémon such as Ferrothorn or Seismitoad, while its typing lets it abuse less passive Pokémon such as Excadrill as well.

Between 3 Attacks Roost, Nasty Plot and all its variety in coverage, and the less common choiced sets there is a lot to take into account when preparing for Thundurus.

Tyranitar is frequently used as the primary counterplay for Thundurus, but Tyranitar is easily lured in and removed through Focus Blast. The most consistent defensive counterplay is... Stunfisk I think? There are some switchins, but they tend to be Pokemon who, like Stunfisk, aren't actually very good, even with this one niche. The best reliable switchin I have found, which I go into below, is Nihilego.

Overall Thundurus is an amazing momentum abuser and keeper. It forces the opponent into very specific plays in order to not lose a mon, and generally does not require significant prediction or get punished much by mispredicts.

HOWEVER
Thundurus sits at 101 Speed in a metagame that favors offensive archetypes. This isn't bad, per se. But it means that Pokemon such as Terrakion, Weavile, Aerodactyl, and various others, including most Scarfers, get the jump on it. It's also super weak to the most common priority in the tier, Accelerock.

While it can boost its Speed, either through its own Scarf or with Agility, both of those come at a notable cost, and are among its weaker sets. Scarf gives you a significantly weaker and more prediction-reliant Thundurus, while Agility takes away a precious moveslot and requires you to spend a turn setting up with a Pokémon that thrives on momentum.

Thundurus is a lot easier to check and pressure than it is to counter. But its Ground immunity, status as a Volt Switch blocker, and Fighting resist in a metagame which is pretty friendly to Fighting types (cough required for Tyranitar cough) give it plenty of opportunities to come in if played well, which in turn gives it plenty of chances to abuse its lack of distinct counters.

Magearna is the last Pokémon I wanted to discuss as borderline broken. The two things about Magearna that stand out to me as potentially problematic are its sheer flexibility and its potential under screens. Trick gave Choice Magearna new lease on life, allowing even Scarf to cripple slower walls it normally wouldn't be able to get through. However the set that I find most problematic is

Magerna (Magearna) @ Weakness Policy
Ability: Soul-Heart
EVs: 132 HP / 252 SpA / 124 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Shift Gear
- Calm Mind
- Stored Power

And of course a fourth move, but I've seen this set run with several different moves in that last slot and it's always been scary. With Magearna's natural bulk and obscenely good defensive typing it gets a LOT of opportunities to set up, and once it has set up it's very difficult to take down. It resists several of the most common priority types, most notably Rock and Normal, without being weak to any of them. Offensively pressuring it is extremely difficult, especially as sacking Pokémon to it only feeds its power thanks to Soul Heart. You'll note in the replay below it sets up on a Slowking, one of the Pokemon you'd hope would be able to leash it in thanks to the awesome bulk, Regenerator, and resistance to Stored Power.

I'm selling Magearna really hard I know. The trick to managing this set tends to be either crippling it (such as through Paralysis), phazing it (such as with a Blissey or Chansey), or simply making sure your team does NOT allow it to set up, which as I mentioned above, is difficult thanks to Magearna's natural bulk. Since it takes two turns for Magearna to reach its true sweeping potential however, this offensive pressure isn't impossible to keep. It's also important to note that Chansey and Blissey are not likely to want to switch into a Magearna directly for fear of being Tricked, although it is often fairly easy to tell when a Magearna is Choiced after a turn (Did it set up or Volt Switch on you?).

Check out this replay from Week 2 of the STABmons open!


Some other, less meta-shaping Pokemon I want to talk about just for fun, but that aren't broken by any reasonable standards


Nihilego has two sets it can reasonably run. First is a Meteor Beam set which aims to use Beast Boost to wrack up boosts. Second is a utility set with Stealth Rock. Both are useful for taking on the common Thundurus-Therian, while simultaneously being able to punish Volcarona and choice-locked Tapu Lele. Its lack of a Fighting weakness makes it significantly better than Tyranitar at actually switching into Thundurus, while its Speed tier sitting just above the 100 mark and above Thundurus's 101 is extremely beneficial to it.

A couple calcs

252 SpA Nihilego Power Gem vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Thundurus-Therian: 308-366 (103 - 122.4%) -- guaranteed OHKO
252 SpA Choice Specs Tapu Lele Fleur Cannon vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Nihilego: 126-148 (35 - 41.2%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
+1 252 SpA Volcarona Psychic vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Nihilego: 238-282 (66.2 - 78.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 SpA Nihilego Power Gem vs. +1 0 HP / 0 SpD Volcarona: 336-396 (108 - 127.3%) -- guaranteed OHKO

Any Nihilego set requires a good deal of support. Nihilego's coverage is rather limiting, notably missing Steel types and only having Grass Knot for Ground types. You need to be able to punish Pokémon such as Excadrill who can easily come in on any set. Nihilego is also only bulky on one side, with its Defense being atrocious. You cannot rely on it taking anything on that side, which includes most priority. Lack of reliable recovery makes it imperative that you aren't switching it into attacks too many times, meaning that it needs to be on teams which function at a faster pace such as Bulky Offense or more offensively oriented Balance teams.

To be clear: Nihilego will not fit on most teams. It needs pretty specific support. But it can function, and is the best Thundurus counter I have found so far that isn't Stunfisk. Shut up Fissure.

Check out this replay where a Nihilego sweeps my Nihilego team in the STABmons open!


Accelgor is my boi. I used him a fair bit last generation, and he has maintained his viability as a dedicated hazards lead.

Accelgor @ Focus Sash
Ability: Unburden
EVs: 252 HP / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Sticky Web
- Spikes / Toxic Spikes
- Final Gambit / U-Turn
- Encore

This is the only set that really works. There are only five Pokémon that outspeed Accelgor unboosted, and only one of those is both legal and actually used in STABmons. This makes Accelgor nearly always able to go first, which in turn enables it to get up two layers of hazards, typically webs and a layer of Spikes. Final Gambit allows you to block Rapid Spin and Defog, while also hitting hard if you manage to avoid taking a hit first. U-Turn can be used if you wish to be able to preserve your Accelgor as a sack or to re-set hazards, but does not block hazard removal in the same way.

Accelgor only fits on Hyper-Offense, and whatever team it's on is a Webs team. As such it's limited in the type of partners that work well with it. However given that Webs is an archetype dependent on Sticky Web being laid, and Accelgor is arguably the best dedicated Webs setter in the tier (see below), it fits very well on those limited teams. Good partners are typical Webs abusers: Gengar, other less fashionable Ghost types, Bisharp, Thundurus (only Therian now but Incarnate is scary on webs. Both are good.), etc.

Accelgor faces severe competition for its job from Ninjask, which can do all the same stuff but faster and without Encore. There are a couple Scarfers in between their Speed tiers, but the Speed difference doesn't make much of a difference for any of them besides maybe Rotom-W/H. The difference is minimal. Another Pokémon that competes heavily with Accelgor and Ninjask is Scolipede! Slower turn 1, but Speed Boosting turn 2 and on, Scolipede grants access to all three hazards mentioned here (not Stealth Rock, none of these do that) alongside Endeavor

The tl;dr of the previous paragraph:
Encore, Final Gambit, Toxic Spikes, no Endeavor, least offensive pressure
Most Speed, Final Gambit, no Toxic Spikes, no Endeavor, best typing for offensive pressure
Slowest but Speed Boost, no Final Gambit, Endeavor, highest Attack for offensive pressure

Webs are good right now, helped along by the plethora of borderline breakers I was talking about above. While there are other setters that aren't dedicated leads (Buzzwole for example) these three are pretty much the best at getting webs down at the start of the game and keeping them there.

Check out this replay where Accelgor does its job and then I throw and get bailed out by hax! Also in STABmons open!

That's all for now! Open isn't over so I need to pretend I have other cool mons I'm keeping under the hood.
I want to say I'm enjoying the post-Blacephalon metagame more than I've enjoyed mons for awhile. Good job council peoples! Let me know if I said anything totally crazy or if I left a sentence half-written so I can fix it.

 

[Brambane]

In the greatest crossover of the 2022, sign-ups are open for a CAP STABmons Tour! Yes, I am shamelessly plugging my own tournament, but I figured the STABmons regulars would be interested in trying out the meta with some new mons!

CLICK THE CAPs BELOW FOR TOURNAMENT SIGN-UPS!

 

[in the hills]

Heyo, gonna write some thoughts about the metagame now that Open is coming to a close. If you haven't seen it yet feel free to check out my team dump from the tour as well.

General Metagame Thoughts
Overall, I'd say STAB Open was a great success and we saw a lot of great builds and new ideas being tried out all around. I'm really happy with how this tour went and I'd say that the metagame is mostly in a good spot right now. There are a few things that the council will be voting on soon that I'll address later in my post but overall the metagame has started to settle down very nicely since previous bans.

Metagame Trends

I'd say the biggest rising trend that has come out of Open is the rise of DD Flying-types in the metagame again. Salamence and Gyarados are both very potent sweepers with access to either Intimidate (my personal preference) to allow for more setup opportunities, or Moxie to snowball better. These two perform largely the same role and have very similar resists, notably making fantastic offensive checks to Cinderace, but the main difference between the two is that Gyarados opts to run a SubLefties set more often than Salamence. SubLefties Gyarados is potent because it is able to OHKO revenge killers such as Tyranitar and Aerodactyl from +0, and Substitute makes it much more difficult to get them in safely through the use of pivoting. I'd say these two are the biggest trend to look out for as we move forward

In a somewhat similar vein, Aerodactyl is another offensive Flying-type that has resurfaced lately. Band Aerodactyl is once again terrorizing teams, though the impact has yet to reach anywhere close to its reign in previous generations. Aerodactyl is arguably one of the scariest Pokemon on paper right now, but in practice it still is seeing the issue of being prone to chip from Stealth Rock or Rocky Helmet.

I definitely debated splitting these two up as they're each amazing in their own way, but I can't stress how good these two are in the current metagame. Seismitoad is easily the best Spiker in the tier right now, and it does a great job at keeping the pressure on teams. A large part of Seismitoad's success, in my opinion, is the lack of other good Electric-immune walls in the metagame. Seismitoad just does the job better than its competitors as they lack one of or multiple of the tools Seismitoad has at its disposal. One trend with Seismitoad that we've started to see more is dropping Thousand Waves for Toxic on its sets. Originally, I was very opposed to this set, but the more we've seen it the more I can see the benefit of it. While you do lose out on trapping and a way to damage walls like Toxapex, you can still maintain hazards and momentum very well while also dissuading switchins for opposing Seismitoad, Tornadus-T, and others.

Ferrothorn on the other hand hasn't necessarily changed much recently, but it does appreciate Blacephalon's ban tremendously. Ferrothorn is a great blanket check to most of the metagame and while at times it can be a little passive, I don't think there's many matchups where Ferrothorn isn't a vital piece to any team its put on. To touch briefly on its passivity, I'm interested to see what move options people are running on Ferrothorn, as it has a lot of options but there's generally not an overwhelmingly popular combo. While I usually don't use it, I could see merit in Grav Apple sets rising in the future if SubDD Gyarados and other things like Seismitoad or Rotom-Wash continue to gain prevalence.

Buzzwole is quite interesting. Despite so many powerful Flying-types in the metagame, I'd say Buzzwole has cemented itself as one of the best Pokemon in the metagame. Defensive sets provide great utility and momentum for balance teams, Choice Scarf is great speed control and has Final Gambit to take out almost anything if it needs, and No Retreat sets are terrifying to check, especially under Screens. Buzzwole has such a wide range of sets and a key part of its success comes from Thunderous Kick and U-turn. Buzzwole is a great segway into my next topic; Fighting-types

+other fighting-types like Blaziken, Keldeo, and Terrakion
Fighting spam has been a rising strategy recently in Open, and it's not hard to figure out why. Right now, Fighting-types have a plethora of strong tools at their disposal, namely Thunderous Kick, No Retreat, and Final Gambit, that make them even more threatening than Fighting-types generally are. I think that Final Gambit is the key to making Fighting spam work as a team archetype, but Thunderous Kick and to a lesser extent No Retreat are what make Fighting-types so threatening in the current metagame. I'll touch on this again towards the end of my post but I think it's becoming clear that Fighting-types are a bit overwhelming at the moment.

+other ghost types like Polteageist, Mimikyu, Golurk, and Doublade
Since Blacephalon's ban, Ghost-types have taken a bit of a sidestep from the spotlight. However, they're still very potent sweepers under the right conditions. Specs Gengar is a fantastic breaker, and has gained some traction recently. Chandelure has taken Blacephalon's spot and boasts both Choice Scarf and Choice Specs sets. The benefit of Chandelure that Blacephalon didn't have is Energy Ball, which allows it to KO threats like Gastrodon, Seismitoad, and Tyranitar. I'm also a fan of more fringe Ghost-types, namely Golurk and Doublade. Doublade I think is especially underrated as I feel that it can somewhat fill the void of Aegislash's absence if people try it more.

Rotom-Wash is very interesting right now, and its resurgence comes largely from a somewhat broader topic; burns are very strong right now with such a physical biased metagame. Rotom-W is one of the best burn spreaders in the metagame with access to both Scald and Will-O-Wisp, only really being rivaled by the likes of Moltres. Rotom-W also has a solid defensive typing and ability that helps it check things like Cinderace, Gyarados, and Excadrill well. I'm generally not a fan of the Rotom formes as their bulk is pretty mediocre in general but I do think that Rotom-W has finally found a solid niche in the current metagame.

Sylveon @ Pixie Plate
Ability: Pixilate
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
- Boomburst
- Rapid Spin
- Glare
- Soft-Boiled
This one is less of an existing metagame trend but rather one that I am pushing and expect will take off some in the future. Offensive Sylveon is very potent right now and Pixie Plate boosted Boomburst does insane damage to even resists or special walls. The main issue I've had with Sylveon in DLC2 (which has primarily only been defensive sets) is how it played- trying to use Sylveon primarily for the purpose of keeping hazards off the field makes it much more difficult for Sylveon to gain progress against teams and leads it to getting easily chipped by things like hazards, Rocky Helmet, or pivoting moves from hazard setters. With Offensive Sylveon, I find that it's a lot easier to play it more aggressively, and threaten huge chunks of damage or paralysis on switchins.
Calcs:
252+ SpA Pixie Plate Pixilate Sylveon Boomburst vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Slowking: 145-172 (36.8 - 43.6%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
252+ SpA Pixie Plate Pixilate Sylveon Boomburst vs. 248 HP / 0 SpD Corviknight: 184-217 (46.1 - 54.3%) -- 57.8% chance to 2HKO
252+ SpA Pixie Plate Pixilate Sylveon Boomburst vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Ferrothorn: 141-167 (40 - 47.4%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ SpA Pixie Plate Pixilate Sylveon Boomburst vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Seismitoad: 406-478 (98 - 115.4%) -- 87.5% chance to OHKO

What's on the Radar?
With a lot of metagame development, there's bound to be a few threats that come up on the council's radar. I'll briefly touch on the main things we've discussed and plans for action coming up.
Magearna

Throughout Open, Magearna has come up increasingly more in discussions about unhealthy threats in the metagame. Magearna has a pretty wide range of sets, from Defensive to Specs to Shift Gear 3 Attacks to most importantly Double Dance. While all of these sets are very potent and push Magearna to the edge as is, I'd say that Double Dance is the set that pushes it over the edge. This set was previously overshadowed by Aegislash and to some extent Drapion in the past, but with the absence of Aegislash it has found its way to the forefront of Hyper Offense teams and has shown how little setup it needs to sweep. While there's certainly counterplay to this set, it's very difficult to adequately prepare for both Double Dance sets on top of all of Magearna's other sets, and any misjudgment of what set it's running could easily lead to you being swept.

Thunderous Kick

As I previously mentioned in the Fighting-types section, Fighting-types are arguably too potent right now. With all of the added tools they have at their disposal right now, it's a bit difficult to discern just which one is making them too good, maybe it's multiple of these moves. However, as it stands the council currently has our eye on Thunderous Kick, as the Defense dropping move is found much more universally on Fighting-types and transcends playstyle in its potency. We're seeing Thunderous Kick Pokemon on both offense and balanced builds and in each case it's arguably too easy to spam Thunderous Kick to wittle down walls. We'd love to hear other opinions if anyone strongly feels that No Retreat or Final Gambit are bigger issues, or if maybe you feel that Fighting-types are fine at the moment. Feel free to share in the thread below if you have a strong opinion.

Tapu Lele

If I have to talk about Tapu Lele one more time I think I'm gonna cry. We all know why this is on the council's radar, I'm not gonna repeat myself for the 7th time. I will say though that as Open has allowed for us to develop the metagame, it has become more clear that Tapu Lele's counterplay tends to be more constrictive on teambuilding than most other threats in the metagame, as typically one strong check isn't enough, and in some cases having a secondary check isn't enough either.

The council plans to vote on the 3 aforementioned items sometime in the near future, so keep an eye out on that. Until then, we'd love to hear thoughts and opinions on the current voting slate, and if there's anything else you strongly feel should be banned feel free to comment and we may add it to our voting slate. Thanks!

 

[Hi nhi]

Well, i found something that might interest everyone
It's cloyster
Well, maybe you won't like it but it's is well really broken,really really broken.
See this is the set
Cloyster @ Focus Sash
Ability: Skill Link
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Shell Smash
- Surging Strikes
- Icicle Spear
- Rock Blast
Now skill link just blasts anyone which doesn't resists it (well urshifu does)
In AG the only problem with copy were bulky steel types and ditto
Well nearly( well nearly) nobody uses ditto in stabmons but steel is still used
So it's probably best (remember probably)

 

[Greybaum]

Well, i found something that might interest everyone
It's cloyster
Well, maybe you won't like it but it's is well really broken,really really broken.

i like the set, but cloyster isn't particularly strong even with skill link and a lot of pokemon now get far better move options that leave it pretty much entirely outclassed while cloyster is the same RU pokemon just with surging strikes added onto it.
barbaracle, for example, has access to the ability sniper which in combination with surging strikes makes it way more powerful than cloyster. despite this, it's not even listed on the viability rankings because there are just better set-up pokemon in this tier, with gyarados and urshifu-rapid-strike being the most comparable two.
gyarados has more initial bulk and a better typing, giving it set-up opportunities on common pokemon like seismitoad, excadrill, and most ferrothorn variants. dragon ascent being a huge buff to it as well, of course. urshifu-rapid-strike has way more bulk and an often more reliable set-up move in no retreat, and because it's not as weak to hazards as cloyster it can more feasibly carry protective pads to avoid losing half its health using surging strikes on a rocky helmet or iron barbs user (e.g. ferrothorn), which is one of the bigger problems other surging strikes pokemon face. here's a pretty good demonstration of it putting in work from a recent tournament game
these pokemon are also far less vulnerable to priority; even after cloyster sets up, it's still prone to being dropped by accelerock users like tyranitar or aerodactyl, or other forms of priority like sucker punch cinderace, while urshifu-r-s can more easily stomach these hits thanks to its typing and +1 defense and gyarados can situationally play around them with substitute.

here: https://pokepast.es/e32cd0a87b6e9d46

 

[Hi nhi]

Fact is nearly nobody uses urshifu cuz surging strikes available to all and moreover
+2 252 Atk Cloyster Rock Blast (5 hits) vs. 0 HP / 252+ Def Gyarados: 380-450 (114.8 - 135.9%) -- guaranteed OHKO
+2 252+ Atk Cloyster Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. 4 HP / 0 Def Urshifu-Rapid-Strike: 180-215 (52.6 - 62.8%) -- approx. 2HKO
So if you get a free smash just kill and
It's nearly same using strikes cuz they ignore defense boosts
What's more : -
+2 252+ Atk Cloyster Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Celesteela: 360-425 (107.4 - 126.8%) -- guaranteed OHKO
Sorry gotta sleep now : ( tho will add later more

 

[Greybaum]

Fact is nearly nobody uses urshifu cuz surging strikes available to all and moreover

urshifu is one of the best pokemon in the tier regardless of how many pokemon now get surging strikes. in the ongoing stabmons open tournament it's currently the 9th most used pokemon (with a 66.67% winrate at that) - saying nobody uses it is just incorrect.
besides that, you missed the point; im not saying gyarados or urshifu wall a set-up cloyster, im saying that they do the same job better.
cloyster, as i said, has a much harder time setting up than gyarados, and is prone to being hardwalled by far more pokemon that gyarados (& urshifu) either break past or sometimes even set up on. unless king's rock gets unbanned i really don't see a justification for using cloyster right now.

+2 252+ Atk Cloyster Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Buzzwole: 210-255 (50.2 - 61%)
+2 252+ Atk Cloyster Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Ferrothorn: 215-260 (61 - 73.8%)
+2 252+ Atk Cloyster Rock Blast (5 hits) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Slowbro: 170-200 (43.1 - 50.7%)
+2 252+ Atk Cloyster Rock Blast (5 hits) vs. 252 HP / 116+ Def Tapu Fini: 180-215 (52.3 - 62.5%)
all of these pokemon are either going to be taking out a -1 cloyster or pivoting out into something like rillaboom/ttar/aerodactyl that can finish it off instead. cloyster can win games, because yes, at +2 it's strong, but it has a harder time doing that than the far better alternatives available.
and yes some offensive pokemon can comfortably take a boosted hit too
+2 252+ Atk Cloyster Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Urshifu-Rapid-Strike: 180-215 (44.5 - 53.2%)
+2 252+ Atk Cloyster Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Keldeo: 195-235 (60.3 - 72.7%)

 

[Hi nhi]

urshifu is one of the best pokemon in the tier regardless of how many pokemon now get surging strikes. in the ongoing stabmons open tournament it's currently the 9th most used pokemon (with a 66.67% winrate at that) - saying nobody uses it is just incorrect.
besides that, you missed the point; im not saying gyarados or urshifu wall a set-up cloyster, im saying that they do the same job better.
cloyster, as i said, has a much harder time setting up than gyarados, and is prone to being hardwalled by far more pokemon that gyarados (& urshifu) either break past or sometimes even set up on. unless king's rock gets unbanned i really don't see a justification for using cloyster right now.

Hum but well i have played nearly 20 ladder games and not encountered any which so far
And Only I misunderstood what you said
But there are better mons than urshifu if we take a look round
Like in fighting(no retreaters) (well who forgets him) buzzwhole, halluchwa, (well my find Pyro ball, high jump kick, any coverage) blaziken and (to some extent specially) komoo(somthing like that) and many more
In water well there isn't a lot competition(surging strikers or water spouters) if you take in inteleon ,volanion , gyrados barraswada ,well cloyster as i suggested or barbacle as you suggested
So all in all i wont deny gyra and shifu are decent ,if not very good
But still after some time i got to play i played a match(after waiting for 1/2 hour or so) and got the result as https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8stabmons-1515631629 this
Well i don't think my opponent was a lot brainy but still cloy swept

 

[in the hills]

Magearna and Tapu Lele have been banned from STABmons! Thunderous Kick has been restricted!​

Following the previous On the Radar post here, the council voted on the aforementioned items. As such, Magearna and Tapu Lele will be banned and Thunderous Kick will be restricted!

Moving forward, I don't think there's much to keep an eye on bar continuing to monitor the impact of Fighting-types/No Retreat/Final Gambit in the metagame. I think the meta ultimately won't shift tremendously from these bans, but some lightened restriction on builds from Tapu Lele may cause a bigger shift than I'm anticipating, who knows! Either way, I'm excited to see how things pan out from here.

We'll begin working on updating resources pretty soon as long as things don't shift too drastically, and hopefully put out a community survey sometime in the future. Until then that's all I have for now, thanks!
Votes:

Vote	Byleth	drphdbj	Fc	in the hills	RESULT
Magearna​	BAN​	BAN​	BAN​	BAN​	BAN (4-0)​
Tapu Lele​	BAN​	BAN​	DNB​	ABS​	BAN (2-1-1)​
Thunderous Kick​	RESTRICT​	RESTRICT​	RESTRICT​	RESTRICT​	RESTRICT (4-0)​

Tagging Kris and Marty to implement

 

[pannu]

Hi sorry for a bit of a low effort post but a certain ban has stood out to me as weird and i dont rlly understand why its still banned?



Magnet Pull,I assume it was banned because it used to enable tons of brokers like Tapu Lele, Magearna, Kartana, and Tapu Bulu, but with them gone there are significantly less "brokens" to abuse the removal of the opposing teams Steel-types. I think that Magnet Pull would be a neat addition to the meta and more importantly i think it shud b unbanned bcus like theres no reason for it to be banned anymore.

 

[100%NoobJuice]

hey so is sylveon still good?

 

[Fissure]

hey so is sylveon still good?

I'd say the vr got it right putting it at B+. Pixie boomburst hits hard, it has access to great normal moves like glare, court change, healing moves like milk drink, and rapid spin for more speed. Sylveon is just in an awkward spot where if you go defensive, it loses out on breaking power and has a pretty mid speed tier so you are gonna get pivoted on and out speed quite frequently. If you go with a speed invested set, then you aren't tanking hits as easily and you realistically eat a hit, ko a mon, and then get revenged or you are forced to switch (you do not want to get into a switching game with hazards up; sylveon will get chipped since really only defensive sets run boots and if you are offensive, the hazard damage you take will all but ensure you get ko'd by something as simple as a dragon ascent from tornadus-t or something similar). Modest is ideal, but modest +1 speed ties you with positive speed nature base 100s which is fine but i'm not trying to win a speed tie out here. Timid +1 puts you 1 point slower than positive base 115s which is great, but going timid makes you miss ideal rolls against things like seismitoad and corviknight (depending on your item and their ev spread). With lele and magearna gone, it is now the go to special fairy imo. The meta has a lot of fast and strong mons that can easily 2hko sylveon, but there are also a good number of slow mons that can't do much back to you and you can 2hko roll them or get easy guaranteed 3hkos...play it right and sylveon can take you far.

ITH talked about Sylveon briefly recently and gave this set...

Sylveon @ Pixie Plate
Ability: Pixilate
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
- Boomburst
- Rapid Spin
- Glare
- Soft-Boiled
This one is less of an existing metagame trend but rather one that I am pushing and expect will take off some in the future. Offensive Sylveon is very potent right now and Pixie Plate boosted Boomburst does insane damage to even resists or special walls. The main issue I've had with Sylveon in DLC2 (which has primarily only been defensive sets) is how it played- trying to use Sylveon primarily for the purpose of keeping hazards off the field makes it much more difficult for Sylveon to gain progress against teams and leads it to getting easily chipped by things like hazards, Rocky Helmet, or pivoting moves from hazard setters. With Offensive Sylveon, I find that it's a lot easier to play it more aggressively, and threaten huge chunks of damage or paralysis on switchins.
Calcs:
252+ SpA Pixie Plate Pixilate Sylveon Boomburst vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Slowking: 145-172 (36.8 - 43.6%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
252+ SpA Pixie Plate Pixilate Sylveon Boomburst vs. 248 HP / 0 SpD Corviknight: 184-217 (46.1 - 54.3%) -- 57.8% chance to 2HKO
252+ SpA Pixie Plate Pixilate Sylveon Boomburst vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Ferrothorn: 141-167 (40 - 47.4%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ SpA Pixie Plate Pixilate Sylveon Boomburst vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Seismitoad: 406-478 (98 - 115.4%) -- 87.5% chance to OHKO

Because of your post, I went to see what actually "good" set I'd use other than the one I posted in the stabmons discord channel a few days back, and I went with this one.


Sylveon @ Choice Specs
Ability: Pixilate
EVs: 40 HP / 252 SpA / 216 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Boomburst
- Heal Bell
- Court Change
- Glare

It hits the benchmark speed i need of being faster than 4 speed ev invested rotom-w/h and also being faster than adamant crawdaunt. I couldn't find any other mons where going max speed would matter besides someone running 212 speed adamant ttar but that isn't a set. Boomburst is the only move I need and transform sounded like it could be funny. Glare is always good for speed control and cc as my hazard removal of choice.
252+ SpA Choice Specs Pixilate Sylveon Boomburst vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Ferrothorn: 176-207 (50 - 58.8%) -- 74.2% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery.
EDIT: Heal bell over transform is probably better.

Also free magnet pull

 

[Keyacom]

I heard Gen 8 OMs are to become National Dex-based. This could allow for these:
This can become one of the best wallbreakers due to its access to Gunk Shot and Megahorn.
And this is a real Boomburst abuser.
It can now charge at opponents with its Brave Birds. Because Drill Peck was its only good Flying-type attack. Combined with a Scope Lens and a usage of Focus Energy, Sniper does the job.
Oh boy, it gets Gunk Shot now. Under sun, it can also use Solar Blade.
Bolt Strike, Volt Tackle, Plasma Fists...
Gets Darkest Lariat.
Like many Psychic-types, it gets Psystrike.
and many other Water-type attackers now have Surging Strikes and Crabhammer.
Now, it has Power Gem.
It's much better considering its access to Blue Flare and Fiery Wrath.
Technician Storm Throw is one of the best moves. I can see its potential after the restriction on Thunderous Kick.
Just got better because it got Sunsteel Strike.
Now even better because it has Photon Geyser.
Pixilated Boomburst makes it a wallbreaker so potent that...
Finally gets Gunk Shot!
Both now get Poltergeist, which is awesome.
All have access to Steam Eruption.
It surely has waited for Pyro Ball.
Diamond Storm is all it wants for a 95%-accurate STAB.
Now actually good because it has Aeroblast.
and many more Flying-type physical attackers can utilize Beak Blast instead of Brave Bird or Dragon Ascent to remove the drawbacks, and also to spread burns.
It can now use Fiery Wrath, like many other Dark-type special attackers.
BAN THIS THING. IT CAN LEARN ALL MOVES. IT'S ESSENTIALLY SMEARGLE BUT MUCH, MUCH BETTER.
It finally gets Close Combat.
Power Whip makes them much better.
Parasect but better. It gets Megahorn and Power Whip.
It has honestly waited for Steam Eruption - and Aeroblast.
Now it gets Flip Turn - the thing it wanted.
Either it can be physically viable with Bolt Strike/Volt Tackle/Plasma Fists, or specially viable with Parabolic Charge.
Boomburst and Psystrike sounds like a really strong attacking combo.
Psystrike and a good Fire-type move.
Fiery Wrath and Steam Eruption are fine wallbreaking options.
Potential as a defensive mon? Gets Rapid Spin and Glare.
Either Fiery Wrath/Psystrike or Hyperspace Fury/Photon Geyser are the best for it.
Now it gets Tail Slap if you're going to run Skill Link on it. Tail Slap's effective power surpasses that of Return.
Arguably, this is Oricorio's best style due to STAB Moongeist Beam.
Diamond Storm and Brave Bird/Power Gem and Aeroblast are both viable options.
BAN, LIKE IN GEN 7. It abused its Ability for free phazing through the team with Whirlwind.

Improvements for existing mons:
Offensive Grass-types can wallbreak with Seed Flare if they want it over Giga Drain.
Defensive Flying-types can use Beak Blast to spread burns.
Dark-types enjoy the return of Pursuit and Punishment.
Fighting-type physical attackers honestly wanted the return of Jump Kick if they wanted to play it safe with accuracy or keeping their stats at par.
Slow, but strong Ice-types now get Ice Hammer.
Psycho Boost with Contrary sounds fun.

It took me some time to create this post, but I think it gives you so much information.

 

[Nitro Indigo]

I've noticed that Nidoking is listed as a physical wallbreaker on the resources thread, but what moves does it gain that take advantage of Sheer Force? The only one I can think of is Gunk Shot.

 

[in the hills]

I've noticed that Nidoking is listed as a physical wallbreaker on the resources thread, but what moves does it gain that take advantage of Sheer Force? The only one I can think of is Gunk Shot.

Good question! Physical Nidoking had a very brief stint in an earlier metagame with the Coil set seen here:
Nidoking (M) @ Life Orb
Ability: Sheer Force
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpA / 252 Spe
Naive / Jolly Nature
- Shell Side Arm / Gunk Shot
- Fire Punch
- Coil
- Shore Up
This set has notable issues in losing out to common bulky waters like Toxapex and Seismitoad, but it's still a pretty fun idea to catch Pokemon off guard. That being said, Nidoking isn't really a Pokemon that needs a wow factor to be a terrifying breaker, as the standard "mixed" breaking set breaks through almost the entire meta as is.
Nidoking (M) @ Life Orb
Ability: Sheer Force
EVs: 4 Atk / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Naive Nature
- Shell Side Arm
- Earth Power
- Flamethrower
- Substitute / Spikes / Shore Up
This set is much more potent against the current metagame, and if you can fit it on a team that can get it in safely, it's a great way to nab at least one kill. Shell Side Arm is a crazy good tech for Nidoking as it makes any specially bulky switchins like AV Slowking or Blissey fall with ease.

Nidoking in general may be very scary but it is not an easy Pokemon to fit on teams at all due to its mid Speed tier and not many solid resists. If you can fit it and pilot it well though, I'd argue it's one of the better breakers in the tier. Definitely recommend trying out either set, though the standard set is probably always the go to these days.

 

[Nitro Indigo]

Thanks. Also on the resources thread, Porygon2 is listed as a special wallbreaker twice.

 

[in the hills]

Sample Teams - Submissions are OPEN!​

That's right! We're in the process of updating our resources, so get your sample team submissions in! We'd appreciate posts here on the thread but we'll take submissions from just about anywhere. Thanks!

Other Updates
As I mentioned before, we are updating our resources, so expect a VR update within the next week or so. The metagame has been really solid throughout OMPL and it's been really nice to have some stability and see everyone enjoy the meta. One topic that has been brought up to me a few times is potential tiering action on No Retreat. No Retreat has been on our radar for quite a while now and it still is a very threatening move with popular users like Terrakion, Buzzwole, and Urshifu-RS. The move certainly isn't perfect, with the issue of being trapped, which can leave you prone to revenge killers or walls, but in a lot of matchups it's pretty easy to just click and sweep, as seen a few times throughout OMPL. The council is certainly open to discussing tiering action on No Retreat and would love to hear some thoughts from everyone else.

One last update- Dr. Phd. BJ has stepped down from the council. Everyone be sure to thank BJ for all of the hard work and support!

 

[Dusk Mage Necrozma]

New to this: would Diamond Storm Body Press Terrakion be any good? I like the concept and it can combo it with No Retreat.

Terrakion @ Chesto Berry
Ability: Justified
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Def
Adamant Nature
- Diamond Storm
- Body Press
- No Retreat
- Rest

Terrakion @ Leftovers
Ability: Justified
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Def
Adamant Nature
- Diamond Storm
- Body Press
- No Retreat
- Earthquake

 

[LBDC]

One topic that has been brought up to me a few times is potential tiering action on No Retreat. No Retreat has been on our radar for quite a while now and it still is a very threatening move with popular users like Terrakion, Buzzwole, and Urshifu-RS. The move certainly isn't perfect, with the issue of being trapped, which can leave you prone to revenge killers or walls, but in a lot of matchups it's pretty easy to just click and sweep, as seen a few times throughout OMPL. The council is certainly open to discussing tiering action on No Retreat and would love to hear some thoughts from everyone else.

I'm unconvinced that No Retreat is broken, and I think I'd like to see more evidence before more action is taken. It has a fair amount of drawback. These include: no switching means you can't put the pressure on your oppo with the threat of setup / also means if you don't sweep you're just stuck for no reason / aand it is also limited to the few Fighting-types. Talking of this, I'm actually suspecting that abusers themselves are broken / create the feeling of being broken, thanks to the combination of No Retreat and the other sets. I mean, Terrak is super strong even without No Retreat with Band or SD (smth that ppl should play more btw) and Urshifu-RS can be Pads, No Retreat or Final Gambit. Buzzwole admittedly doesn't have other offensive option; however No Retreat Buzzwole has been less used than it has been in the past, as we see but more defensive set thought this OMPL. E: To clarify, I don't mean that CB do not exists , but rather than No Retreat buzz has been fading out in favor of other sets. Now, I do see why you'd want to ban No Retreat, since, yes, sometimes it get a really good MU. However, I'd suggest to leave more time to make the metagame prepare adequately, and if it is still too dominant then we could revisit it in one or two months maybe?

Now a sample submission (ExcaZolt) (clink on sprites):

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I built this for the W3 of the OMPL, against TPP. It is a example of sand team. It is based around supporting Dracozolt and Excadrill to sweep; Tyranitar provide SR support and the sand so Sand Rush activate. I chose a offensive set to maximize damage against various target such as Celesteela, Sylveon, and Toxapex. 76 EV in Speed make sure it outspeed Corvikight (IIRC). Rotom-Heat was pick to have a Ferrothorn check. With Thunder Cage + Apple Acid, it also wear down adversity so ExcaZolt can sweep later. Buzzwole and Gastrodon is a good defensive core, dealing with various target like Heatran, Nidoking (for Gastrondon) and Tyranitar (for Buzzwole).

This team admittedly require pro-active plays against some Pokémon such as Aerodactyl or even Thundurus-T. Try to have the momentum as much as possible. Be wary of hazard wars since your entry hazard removal is only Excadrill, that doesn't have any heal.

Overall, a team I'm kinda proud of :")