After a very long time, the machinery of the future and one of our recent threats in our radar. The National Dex UU Council has decided to Suspect Test Iron Hands.
Suspect Reasoning:
While Iron Hands has had quite a bit of a volatile presence in the history of the tier, this hasn’t prevented it from being in the mind of the community in regards to its healthiness in the tier. Even during the days of Thundurus-Therian and Latios, it was always a strong part of the metagame that hadn’t quite gotten the status of “Problematic”. This isn’t the case anymore, as now those previously oppressive threats have left the tier, there’s nothing that’s stopping Iron Hands from taking over as a centralizing part of the metagame. Its amazing bulk, typing and power are on full display, leaving us with the decision to start a Suspect.
Iron Hands has been mostly straight forward with its Swords Dance and Choice Band sets, not seeing much of a change this entire time, but the way it interacted with the tier both in teambuilding and in battle has been on a constant change. Its titanic bulk and good resistances give it an insane matchup spread of Pokemon it can both switch in to and beat; from the offensive side it’s capable of dealing with massive threats like M-Tyranitar, Zapdos-G, Iron Moth, Greninja, Aegislash, Scizor, Zeraora, Magnezone or Thundurus-I and some defensive staples like Celesteela, Skarmory and sometimes even Ting-Lu.
From that point it can use its bulk to setup and proceed to threaten them with really good stabs and coverage that’s only properly handled by M-Venusaur, Hippowdon and the really niche Sinistcha while making it harder for most of the soft defensive checks like Clefable, M-Latias or Amoonguss or go for an immediate assault with Choice Band that nothing truly likes to take on, especially with other passive damage like hazards and sandstorm and can completely negate some of the counterplay for Swords Dance sets.
Despite all of this, Iron Hands does have its number of issues. Its low speed means Iron Hands has to take multiple hits during a match alongside hazards, making revenge killing it with things that usually don’t wanna face it at full health like Excadrill, Enamorus and the newly introduced Iron Boulder more easy. The recent meta trends don’t really help it either; its main defensive answers are also quite common as M-Venusaur, Hippowdon and Skeledirge have gotten better while the older ones like Clefable and M-Latias still roam around, the influence of M-Venusaur, Celesteela and Ting-Lu also brought attention to things like Alakazam, M-Gardevoir and Victini which Iron Hands isn’t quite fond of. Lastly, despite how threatening it can be, Swords Dance sets really want to set up in order to get the progress they want so they need careful positioning while Choice Band has to play around resists while having to be forced out after taking something down. These problems are certainly notable but it doesn’t deter Iron Hands from being one of best pokemon around, capable of trading with nearly anything and succeeding in most cases.
Suspect Test Information
- Reading this is mandatory to participate in the suspect test. The voting requirements are a minimum GXE of 79 with at least 40 games played. In addition, you may play 1 less game for every 0.2 GXE you have above 79 GXE, down to a minimum of 20 games at a GXE of 83. Also, needing more than 40 games to reach 79 GXE will suffice.
GXE | minimum games |
79 | 40 |
79.2 | 39 |
79.4 | 38 |
79.6 | 37 |
79.8 | 36 |
80 | 35 |
80.2 | 34 |
80.4 | 33 |
80.6 | 32 |
80.8 | 31 |
81 | 30 |
81.2 | 29 |
81.4 | 28 |
81.6 | 27 |
81.8 | 26 |
82 | 25 |
82.2 | 24 |
82.4 | 23 |
82.6 | 22 |
82.8 | 21 |
83 | 20 |
- You must use a fresh account that begins with the given prefix for this suspect test. That prefix is NDUU9HANDS. For example, I could sign up and qualify with the name NDUU9HANDS lupla.
- You may not impersonate or mock another user with your account name. If there is any slight hesitation, you're probably better off picking a different name. We reserve the right to null your voting requisites if you are found impersonating or mocking another user with your account name. Moderator discretion will be applied.
- If you are found trying to manipulate voting requisites in any way, you will be met with a harsh infraction. Manipulating voting requisites ranges from faking your screenshot to asking another user to forfeit.
- The Pokemon that's being suspect tested, Iron Hands, will be allowed on the National Dex UU ladder for the next two weeks so that we can properly assess its position in the metagame.
The suspect test will last for 2 weeks, until April 29th 11:59 PM GMT -3. Tagging dhelmise and Marty to implement this on the ladder whenever possible! Thank you for the support.