Metagame SV OU Metagame Discussion v3

[DaddyBuzzwole]

Can't forget Manaphy either, though I totally agree with that list. Gholdengo especially, it's stupidly constricting.

On another note, how has everyone adjusted to building this gen? I've found the lack of good defensive steels to be rather painful even with increase of viable defensive fire and poison-types. Answering Clefable, Iron Valiant, and Enamorus always feels like a chore when teambuilding. Clefable especially; the pink blob simply refuses to die and unless you've got a sponge that can soak up Knock Off and status *cough Gholdengo cough* you're out of luck. Some exaggeration of course, but point being that teambuilding has gotten noticeably tighter this generation. Not to mention the boatload of bans we've received with more on the way.

i think the reason there are so few good defensive steels is because ou right now is centralized around two steel-types (gambit and ghold) so it's difficult to fit in a third steel-type on your team in any capacity because then you leave half your team wide open to the other most common pokemon in the tier, whose stabs both demolish steel. another reason is hazards—steel-types typically don't have much in the way of recovery, so defensive steels are usually vulnerable to getting chipped down and are thus forced to run boots instead of other items they'd prefer (like, for example, leftovers). it doesn't help that hazards are the reason for great tusk, destroyer of steels, being such a dominant force in the meta by merit of being the best hazard remover. also, something something eight fucking ground types

 

[KamenOH]

If Gholdengo is the thing holding the tier together then I think that speaks more to how broken the tier is, because a Pokemon whose ability literally shuts down any technique besides "hit me in the face" seems pretty conducive to the HO Hellhole everyone views the tier as, despite ostensibly being here for defensive utility. That's not holding the tier together, that's standing on top of the pile of bodies the game has turned into. Can't even Taunt the jerk without Mold Breaker so it's not even like it's playing the same slugfest restriction itself. All kinds of counterplay that works against Set-up or Utility Pokemon (yet people do believe is overcentralizing/unhealthy that it has to be relied on) doesn't even work: Nasty Plot is riskless even with Encore spam, Taunt can't stop recovery if you're faster but can't OHKO, and utility/set-up sets just "no u" Trick Attempts despite often employing it themselves. The last one is hilarious to me because between it and Defog interaction it somehow makes Gholdengo less busted to have Magic Bounce, which is already a candidate for one of the best Abilities in OU (divorced from who it ends up attached to).

Unless we deem a HO meta acceptable once the "2 Brain cells necessary" Mons are dealt with, Gholdengo feels like he'd have to go as well, because what will beat a Ghold team besides Beatdown on Ghold?

I mean, unless we deem a HO tilted meta OK, which we should ngl, there's an endless road of shit that would have to be banned. I mean,

This thread is complaining about Dragonite now? Lmao. Seems like we're spinning a roulette to choose a completely random pokemon to get mad at, who will it be next? I suggest uhh...[flipping coin] mandibuzz, it's just too OP because it can use tera dark to power up foul play

there's always gonna be shit someone thinks is too much, and if I know one thing, its that this thread loves to be riled up over the silliest of things.

Then again, Volc had defensive utility and the mods banned that, so...

 

[BolTingBlazie]

This is the metagame the community wanted.



Almost like there is a trend here? It’s stupidly easy for Dragonite to get 2 DDs. We used to be able to whack it with Ice moves, or send out a >80 base speed Scarfer to RK or Trick it. Now they just get slapped by +1 STAB Extremespeed.

Y’all wanted this.

I mean DLC2 is right around the corner, so tera will probably get banned then since a lot more people want it gone than they did back when we had the last suspect

All broken. Except string cheese man. He’s holding this tier together. Garganacl is in the corner with a bowl of popcorn.. waiting for these mons to get banned.

Cheese string man is too meta warping for this tier let's not kid ourselves about this, even if we were to ban tera this Mon would still be promoting unhealthy hazard spam dynamics that warp the meta around it, not to mention it destroys stall to boot. I think both it and Sneasler need the QB so we can go to wellspring.

For now we just gotta try to balance what we have as best as possible even if its impossible to do so in a month, and to do that Ghold 100% has to go and Sneasler should go with it.

Then we can work on suspecting Wellspring I guess

Basically we just gotta push through the DLC1 meta and then we can focus on trying to yeet tera out of here once we get the obvious brokens out of the tier in DLC2

 

[ianlazerbeem]

Yeah but stall isn’t even worth using now days

It is significantly worse due to the Gliscor ban making HO the only viable playstyle, sure, but this seems premature; I also doubt you have tried!

This thread is complaining about Dragonite now? Lmao. Seems like we're spinning a roulette to choose a completely random pokemon to get mad at, who will it be next? I suggest uhh...[flipping coin] mandibuzz, it's just too OP because it can use tera dark to power up foul play

Is that the problem, or is the problem a Certain Mechanic that makes setup sweepers absurdly powerful and makes trying to ban "the new strongest sweeper" a constant cycle & fools's errand? Does the removal of a powerful physically defensive Pokémon have anything to do with Dragonite rising up? Remember Dragonite was on the radar thanks to Tera since the dawn of Gen 9, the same initial-radar-than-forgot-about trajectory as Roaring Moon, not banned until a year later. It makes logical sense that gutting the tier (incl of every viable offensive ice type) has led to it being put in the spotlight

 

[Elec-ant1234]

Y’all wanted this.

nuh uh

to prevent this post from becoming a one liner, we've talked extensively about the select few mons that benefit from tera. Now have you considered the vast amount of mons that aren't broken with tera; this isn't some extremely broken mechanic that pushes every, single, mon over the edge that people are just being soft about because "generational mechanic"

 

[Finchinator]

Dragonite will not be on the tiering survey.

 

[Elec-ant1234]

Dragonite will not be on the tiering survey.

who could have seen that coming; now we have to complain about something new. and I'll go first by stating the fact that Meloetta in it's pirouette form has a higher chance of sleep w/ relic song than sneasler w/ dire claw, and has a similar speed tier. Meloetta promotes an RNG based metagame, please ban it.

 

[DaddyBuzzwole]

to prevent this post from becoming a one liner, we've talked extensively about the select few mons that benefit from tera. Now have you considered the vast amount of mons that aren't broken with tera; this isn't some extremely broken mechanic that pushes every, single, mon over the edge that people are just being soft about because "generational mechanic"

i take issue with the phrasing of this because every mon benefits from tera. there's no pokemon that doesn't appreciate the ability to change their defensive matchups, gain a free setup turn, get new stab, or boost their existing stab. the only thing i can think of that doesn't appreciate tera is ditto because its tera type stays the same no matter what it changes into so you could wind up turning into something that really doesn't want to be whatever tera type you're carrying, but even then, ditto can use tera to decent effectiveness sometimes

that being said, yes, the majority of pokemon are not broken with tera, and very few benefit to the point of being broken solely because of the mechanic

 

[CheesyBrie]

This thread is complaining about Dragonite now? Lmao. Seems like we're spinning a roulette to choose a completely random pokemon to get mad at, who will it be next? I suggest uhh...[flipping coin] mandibuzz, it's just too OP because it can use tera dark to power up foul play

I'll bite: Broken checks broken is the mantra of OU. Therefore, all pokemon in OU are inherently broken, and don't belong in any tier other than OU. No more drops to UU ever again, #LockUpOU.

Memes aside,
is strong. We all know this. I don't think this is any sort of outcry. I think it's an honest, correct opinion. Dragonite is clearly a powerful pokemon in this meta. It's currently hovering around "A tier" in the viability rankings for a reason. It had a 13.145% during the month of October, as the 15th most-used mon in the tier.
It's obviously strong, and everyone knows it. Would I say it's "broken"? Maybe, but there are easily far more problematic mons in the tier.
I won't waste time diving down that rabbit hole.
But it is interesting to observe that with so few checks and counters, maybe that's why the problem children are doubly viable.
The conventional Dragonite set is DD, Extreeeeemespeeeeed, EQ, and [filler].
If you want to beat Extremespam, you probably want something that resists or is immune to Extremespeed ( ) or have a higher priority move like Sucker Punch (). There's a mind game here, because also carries Earthquake for coverage on steel types. So what switches well into that? Well, obviously Flying types or air balloons who are immune ( ).
I'm obviously glossing over a tremendous amount in this analysis, BUT I think this brings us to an interesting point: why is carrying fire punch sometimes? It doesn't carry any innate STAB moves! One of the options was Ice Spinner, which was 4x answer to , but with that gone, it mostly serves as a super-effective terrain removal against . However, it has the freedom to run coverage for Air Balloon and , while also mantaining the coverage against the grass monkey and also to hit (not a reason, but a nice little detail).

None of this is me saying "Ugh, is actually the problem!!!"
I just think it's interesting to really analyze a pokemon that doesn't even want its stab.

 

[heileone]

I disagree with a lot of this post. First off, defensive walls can be pivots. CR slowking/glowking, U-turn corv, volt switch zapdos, etc etc. You can be nitpicky about defining walls or pivots but bottom line is that lots of defensive pokemon are also pivots. Also going by October 1825+ OU stats, most moltres actually do run U-turn.
View attachment 571512
Frankly I'm shocked the number is only 53% because U-turn is the only thing keeping Moltres from being completely free Heatran real-estate, which is a mon that has become much better and much more common with Rillaboom's buffs. I do not run Moltres without U-turn, period.

I was actually quite surprised to see the opposite. I havent seen much moltres but when I do it feels like its always running hurricane. Now I havent used much moltres in the past, so I decided to use it a little on a 1600s alt with U-turn or hurricane. Hurricane felt really nice in the dirge matchup, ceruledge matchup (ESPECIALLY this matchup), and tera fire gambit matchup but that might just be a function of the team I used being weak to those mons otherwise. I will say that when I faced heatran, I still felt like u-turn was a liability a lot of the time. A lot of heatrans are speed creeping gambit at 200 spd, and you cant go below that without severely compromising your gambit matchup. This means you have a fast u-turn and the only mon that heatran doesnt beat that I can think of that appreciates a magma storm is walking wake, which I didnt have on the team I used. And god forbid heatran comes in on a wisp or something, if you u-turn and they magma, most threats coming in to try to pressure it out are getting oneshot(unless its wake again).

And back to the main point, I didn't have much trouble with knock off on my moltres. If I knew I needed it for something, I didnt let it get knocked.

I also don't think Hurricane is actually that good to help with Zamazenta either. If it has stone edge for you, you're not beating it even with Hurricane. But if it doesn't have stone edge, then you didn't need Hurricane either! Really makes no difference. Also running Hurricane outside of rain is cringe but that's a discussion for another day.

Yea, Idk why I brought this up its a pretty bad argument.

The idea that kingambit only needs to come in once or twice a game is actually completely valid, but entirely dependent on teamstyle. If Kingambit is being used on an HO team, then yeah, chances are that you don't bring it in to eat random hits and instead preserve its health+tera to reverse sweep lategame after your team has softened up the opposition. Ideally your team has been built in mind to specifically pressure Kingambit answers, but teambuilding isn't easy this gen, so I don't doubt you've seen HO fail to do this a million times.

Would kingambit be nearly as strong on HO without tera? I honestly dont think so since it would be so predictable and slow. I suppose the ability to kill damn near everything with a sucker after an SD when its the last mon left is strong enough that it would probably still be used, but it would have a much harder time getting that SD. I think it would be much more at home on BO and balance where they can use it as an nice role compression soft switch in to ghost/steel/dragon moves + setup sweeper + revenge killer.

My stance on Kingambit is, as you can imagine, that it's a mon broken purely due to tera and it would be completely manageable without it. Hopefully we can ban it through suspect in dlc2, but that is also a discussion for another day.

I agree.

 

[ianlazerbeem]

i take issue with the phrasing of this because every mon benefits from tera. there's no pokemon that doesn't appreciate the ability to change their defensive matchups, gain a free setup turn, get new stab, or boost their existing stab. the only thing i can think of that doesn't appreciate tera is ditto because its tera type stays the same no matter what it changes into so you could wind up turning into something that really doesn't want to be whatever tera type you're carrying, but even then, ditto can use tera to decent effectiveness sometimes

that being said, yes, the majority of pokemon are not broken with tera, and very few benefit to the point of being broken solely because of the mechanic

I'm of the opinion that the first bolded portion makes the second a bit of an analytical mistake. I don't think there's a way to look at Tera in a vacuum without being in reference to a particular Pokémon's traits, and that there are enough Pokémon in OU with a powerful enough type, stat block, and toolkit, that Tera brings us to the unfortunate chaotic "broken checks broken" state that OU is currently on. I think the angle of "Tera and Tera alone" is insufficient as an analytical framework for analyzing the health of the Tera meta. Would Regieleki be broken with Tera if it didn't have 200 speed? Roaring Moon wasn't banworthy for most of the year but the loss of its counterplay made it so - but both times the tera flying acrobatics set was the most broken application of the Pokémon. I don't think "but tera is not the one singular reason this Pokémon was banned" is necessarily a good way to draw conclusions about Tera's effects on the tier - like you said, it brings most Pokémon to absurd power levels, and if a Pokémon is banned for this, another seriously powerful Tera benefactor loses a piece of counterplay.

 

[Elec-ant1234]

That is, in fact, daddy buzzwole's post with a few things highlighted, which might I add summerizes my thoughts on tera pretty well. It's a skillfull mechanic that allows for greater flexibility, rewards skill both in-battle and in the builder, and isn't completely busted with risk reward built into the mechanic (ghost types losing e-speed immunity and such)

 

[Magcargo]

I see a lot of calls to ban Dengo currently, but based on talks I've had with some players better than me, Dengo is worse rn than its been for quite some time. Gliscor's ban has had a cascade of impacts which largely improve Pokemon that Dengo has issues with. Cinderace, Great Tusk, Ting-Lu, Samurott, and Moltres are Pokemon that have been improved significantly by Gliscor's banned, and other Pokemon such as Garganacl, Sandy Shocks and Landorus-T have also been improved as well, all of which Dengo will need to commit extensive resources to beat. Lets not forget that Sneasler has been diving headfirst into tech to beat Ghold and G-Terrain teams in general match-up quite well against Ghold.

Meanwhile, G-Terrain teams are completely taking over the ladder and Sneasler is going crazier than ever. For the health of our metagame, our number 1 priority should be targeting Sneasler.

 

[Welcome to mars]

I see a lot of calls to ban Dengo currently, but based on talks I've had with some players better than me, Dengo is worse rn than its been for quite some time. Gliscor's ban has had a cascade of impacts which largely improve Pokemon that Dengo has issues with. Cinderace, Great Tusk, Ting-Lu, Samurott, and Moltres are Pokemon that have been improved significantly by Gliscor's banned, and other Pokemon such as Garganacl, Sandy Shocks and Landorus-T have also been improved as well, all of which Dengo will need to commit extensive resources to beat. Lets not forget that Sneasler has been diving headfirst into tech to beat Ghold and G-Terrain teams in general match-up quite well against Ghold.

Meanwhile, G-Terrain teams are completely taking over the ladder and Sneasler is going crazier than ever. For the health of our metagame, our number 1 priority should be targeting Sneasler.

sticky web still has the tier in a chokehold though, im not saying gholds unphased by one of his disciples catching a stray, but sticky web having a setter that isn’t a crappy zu “wall”, a literal meme mon or a wannabe lando thats sniped by stealth rock is one the main reasons people like me don’t think gholdengos good for the development of the tier, id be interested to see what others think though

Dragonite will not be on the tiering survey.

midladder is safe

 

[RaikouLover]

That is, in fact, daddy buzzwole's post with a few things highlighted, which might I add summerizes my thoughts on tera pretty well. It's a skillfull mechanic that allows for greater flexibility, rewards skill both in-battle and in the builder, and isn't completely busted with risk reward built into the mechanic (ghost types losing e-speed immunity and such)

Tera = skillful? Hahahaha

Look at the amount of HO cheese on the ladder with people using early game Teras to bypass checks. This is the meta people wished for.

What is flexible and skillful about Manaphy laughing in face of Rillaboom? Or about Dragonite setting up on Dragapult? Or how about Garganacl walling Water Pokémon?

Yeah, real skillful metagame we have.

 

[kosecant]

Tera = skillful? Hahahaha

Look at the amount of HO cheese on the ladder with people using early game Teras to bypass checks. This is the meta people wished for.

What is flexible and skillful about Manaphy laughing in face of Rillaboom? Or about Dragonite setting up on Dragapult? Or how about Garganacl walling Water Pokémon?

Yeah, real skillful metagame we have.

Bro why are you here. You hardly ever contribute anything to the discussion besides “Tera bad”. Go take some time and touch some grass if you have so much time to complain about the tier you seem to hate so much.

 

[RaikouLover]

Bro why are you here. You hardly ever contribute anything to the discussion besides “Tera bad”. Go take some time and touch some grass if you have so much time to complain about the tier you seem to hate so much.

My bad for pointing out the uncomfortable truth. 19 bans yet still wondering why it is such a poor metagame based on OU survey results. I’ll try to stick to what makes people feel warm and fuzzy.

 

[Elec-ant1234]

on another topic, I severely doubt that tera is the source of all problems. the OU metagame is HO tilted based on a variety of factors. Tera is not the sole enabler, nor will the tier magically become better overnight if we were to ban tera.

I would also like to point out that you seem convinced that you're telling the "truth" and that we just want to keep things all nice and tidy and "fuzzy". Please at least improve your argument other than saying "I'm right and you all are wrong".

 

[veti]

My bad for pointing out the uncomfortable truth. 19 bans yet still wondering why it is such a poor metagame based on OU survey results. I’ll try to stick to what makes people feel warm and fuzzy.

How many of those pokemon wouldn't be banned? There's Volcarona which is a brainless MU fish sweeper and Regieleki that would be unviable.

 

[Elec-ant1234]

How many of those pokemon wouldn't be banned? There's Volcarona which is a brainless MU fish sweeper and Regieleki that would be unviable.

Just taking a gander at the Ubers builder and remembering from memory and experience, around 5-6, those being Espathra, Ursaluna (tera was brought up as a factor that made it that much harder to counter), Magerna (iirc tera made it super hard to revenge kill and made it super snowbally, and Regileki. Volcarona is honestly a maybe on whether or not it would be let back in, and I'm not sure if Annihlhape would be let back, despite tera helping it (extra rage fist taking turn)

 

[viivian]

How many of those pokemon wouldn't be banned? There's Volcarona which is a brainless MU fish sweeper and Regieleki that would be unviable.

espathra, volcarona, regieleki. you could retest annihilape and roaring moon but i seriously doubt thatll go over well. everything else was banned for simply being fundamentally overpowered

Just taking a gander at the Ubers builder and remembering from memory and experience, around 5-6, those being Espathra, Ursaluna (tera was brought up as a factor that made it that much harder to counter), Magerna (iirc tera made it super hard to revenge kill and made it super snowbally, and Regileki. Volcarona is honestly a maybe on whether or not it would be let back in, and I'm not sure if Annihlhape would be let back, despite tera helping it (extra rage fist taking turn)

retesting bloodmoon ursaluna or magearna in OU would be a fools errand. tera contributed to their bans but it is not the sole reason why they got banned

 

[heileone]

How many of those pokemon wouldn't be banned? There's Volcarona which is a brainless MU fish sweeper and Regieleki that would be unviable.

Probably roaring moon also. Its defensive typing is sooo bad without tera. Maybe ursaluna bm. Maybe ogerpon fire also, without the ability to get a free +1 attack its not as potent of a wall breaker.
Edit: actually now that I think about it ogerpon fire has an insane defensive and offensive typing that guy is still probably broken.

 

[Magcargo]

Probably roaring moon also. Its defensive typing is sooo bad without tera. Maybe ursaluna bm. Maybe ogerpon fire also, without the ability to get a free +1 attack its not as potent of a wall breaker.

Tbh I don't think Volcarona deserved to get banned even with Tera. We could use its help rn to deal with Rillaboom. Even Tera Haters I've talked to don't feel Volcarona should've been banned, especially in the way it was.

EDIT: I quoted the wrong post.

 

[heileone]

Tbh I don't think Volcarona deserved to get banned even with Tera. We could use its help rn to deal with Rillaboom. Even Tera Haters I've talked to don't feel Volcarona should've been banned, especially in the way it was.

Volc with tera was just so frustrating to deal with. The defensive sets that would use tera to get free wisps and qds with morning sun as healing were so frustrating. IIRC heatran wasnt in the game at that time though so maybe volc is more manageable but it was so matchup fishy and annoying Id rather it never came back. Rilla will get taken care of when his broken friend goes on vacation to ubers.

 

[veti]

IIRC heatran wasnt in the game at that time though so maybe volc is more manageable but it was so matchup fishy and annoying Id rather it never came back.

Volcarona got banned in the HOME metagame, when Heatran existed. But it got tera blasted (volc would still be unhealthy without tera blast imo, would force Heatran on a ton of teams and makes the tier more uncompetitive due to flame body)