Resource National Dex AG Viability Rankings [DLC I]

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bigtalk

Banned deucer.
:eternatus: A to A-
Can't believe this was nominated up. Eternatus is really not good at the moment, especially with almost every team having Necrozma-DM, Ho-Oh and Primal Groudon on them. It rarely ever has a dent on the match and shouldn't be used very frequently. It loses to so many common Pokemon, and doesn't do much back. There are Pokemon in the lower ranks I'd rather fit onto a team than this honestly. Eternatus is not that good.
This sounds like it was written by someone who has never used Eternatus. This mon checks Ho-Oh and (defensive) Dusk Mane, not the other way around. Life Orb sets can also 2HKO Primal Groudon and Arceus-Ground, usually the only 2 things on balance that can kill it, with Dyanmax Cannon. As for the "common Pokemon" that it loses to, I don't see any above A- other than Zacian-C, Primal Groudon, and Arceus-Ground.

Really, Eternatus is just dummy good because it exerts so much pressure on balance; against this sample team, for instance, you can literally lead off with it and 6-0 without ever having to switch out. I completely stand by my A+ nomination.
:sableye-mega: C to D
Stalls are starting to go without this due to its inability to effectively check common threats, Sableye-Mega just doesn't hold up.
I think this is still fairly effective in certain matchups. Being able to shut down support Dusk Mane (both Stealth Rock and Knock Off variants) is pretty substantial, imo, and without prior chip even a Dynamaxed Dusk Mane can't break through Mega Sableye. I don't think Magic Bounce is all that valuable anymore since Heavy-Duty Boots has lessened the need to keep away hazards this gen, but still, not D material.
0 Atk Necrozma-Dusk-Mane Max Steelspike vs. 248 HP / 252+ Def Sableye-Mega: 127-151 (41.9 - 49.8%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
Rest of the noms I basically agree with (or if not, then the reasoning behind them).
 
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Ktütverde

of course
is a Top Tiering Contributor Alumnusis a Former Smogon Metagame Tournament Circuit Champion
Problem with eternatus is, it doesn't check nothing. Ho-oh runs sacredfire and whirlwind so it's a fairly safe answer to eternatus especially once NDM has knocked the LO off (dont use metronome for real). Then, every team carries 1 or 2 grounds (zyg/pdon/arceus) and zacian. The remaining slots can include a dmax sweeper and ditto, so great, eternatus loses to the whole team. There's really no opportunities to switchin except ho-oh (burn/phazing) and NDM (knock off), and then you have to predict every turn not to let ground types/zacian switchin for free and KO you. Also zacian can even switch-in on LO-less flame, so eternatus just cannot thrive in this meta and definitely needs to be played very well. The ho-oh burn matters a LOT because it forces the recover quite often, and every time u are in recover range ur oppo will go berserk and send their zacian/pdon/w/e in... or not, so dynamax cannon if you wish, at your own risk.

Also tyranitar makes etern's day very very tough, but i dont see ttar being popular for long once they start getting bopped by focusblast yveltal.

Leave eternatus in A, i disagree with both A- and A+ noms, it's fine where it is imo. Thanks for reading
 

pichus

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gonna make one last post (before disappearing for a while) since the disrespect on my baby eternatus has been unreal. All the arguments made against eternatus are straight up false and fwiw I also do not agree that it should be promoted to A+ but you guys are really sleeping on this. I really think that this should be used more since its MUCH MUCH better in practice because it can freely make risky plays without worrying too much because it has decent bulk which means it doesnt instantly die to everything which attacks it, its fast and also gets recovery. I really dont think I can explain this really well since you wouldnt understand what I'm talking about unless youve actually used it or played vs it before but I wouldnt mind trying.

Can't believe this was nominated up. Eternatus is really not good at the moment, especially with almost every team having Necrozma-DM, Ho-Oh and Primal Groudon on them. It rarely ever has a dent on the match and shouldn't be used very frequently. It loses to so many common Pokemon, and doesn't do much back. There are Pokemon in the lower ranks I'd rather fit onto a team than this honestly. Eternatus is not that good.
I don't get how the prevalence of ndm hooh and don is bad for eternatus. It benefits eternatus if anything since neither of these mons can switch into it especially if it carries life orb. I'll go over these one by one,

Dusk Mane

252 SpA Life Orb Eternatus Flamethrower vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Prism Armor Necrozma-Dusk-Mane: 193-228 (48.4 - 57.2%) -- 45.3% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

0 Atk Necrozma-Dusk-Mane Sunsteel Strike vs. 0 HP / 4 Def Eternatus: 166-196 (39.4 - 46.5%) -- guaranteed 3HKO

252 SpA Eternatus Flamethrower vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Prism Armor Necrozma-Dusk-Mane: 148-175 (37.1 - 43.9%) -- 100% chance to 3HKO after Leftovers recovery (item knocked off)

Dusk mane has only 4 sunsteels vs eternatus and etern can recover those back easily. Flamethrower has much more PP than Morning Sun so you can just freely click Flamethrower and also get a burn (chance to burn is 10% and youre very likely to click flamethrower 10 times vs DM, Hooh Don teams). Even when you dont have the item, you can 2hko dusk mane after 20%ish chip. Now also keep in mind that keeping Dusk Mane healthy is REALLY important since it performs plenty of roles on the team and if the eternatus is paired with Xerneas/Zacian then youre gonna have a really hard time especially if you get burned or fail to knock off the life orb. Because of this clicking Knock off isnt also very safe most of the time, since youll be left with low HP and you cant switch into zac/xern after this. Eternatus forces Dusk Mane to click morning suns and at one point its eventually gonna run of pp (since flamethrower has 24 and morning sun has 8) which means it has to switch out. Therefore not a consistent check.

Ho-Oh

Eternatus cannot freely click dynamax cannon since it has only 8 pp but clicking sludge bomb is fine since Ho-Oh is literally the only target for sludge bomb and it doesnt mind if ndm hard switches into it, since you can just flamethrower and beat it and force ndm to switch out at one point as well. Its really easy to predict when the dusk mane is gonna switch out (usually around the 3rd or 4th morning sun, when the person realizes that 'oh no i dont think my ndm is helping aaaaaaa').

Now idk if people forgot about this but sacred fire and brave bird do absolutely 0 to eternatus so your only play is to click whirlwind. and uhh congrats you 'checked' it by phasing it out?? did we forget about the part where eternatus just casually switches into hooh whenever it clicks sacred fire/defog/toxic?? eternatus is not a set up sweeper, it doesnt care about being phased out. it can literally come in any time and pressure hooh again. it does not mind rocks damage since it has 16 recover pp.
Whenever one sees an eternatus they are likely to switch into hooh first since its the safest

252 SpA Life Orb Eternatus Sludge Bomb vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Ho-Oh: 142-169 (34.1 - 40.6%) -- 48.3% chance to 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
If ho-oh gets poisoned here it will need assistance from jesus christ himself to check etern
if not, its just gonna whirlwind you out. switch in vs hooh again later, click sludge again and you'll get a poison eventually
lets just say they hard switch into dusk mane on the sludge bomb. you can just flamethrower and while it does knock your LO off, you can continue to use flamethrower vs dm or sludge bomb vs hooh.

252 SpA Eternatus Sludge Bomb vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Ho-Oh: 109-130 (26.2 - 31.2%) -- 13% chance to 4HKO after Leftovers recovery
this is how the calc looks. so if they switch to hooh on one of the flamethrowers vs dm, you can spam sludge bomb till you get a poison. poison + 2 sludge bombs will do *atleast* 73% (26*2 from sludge bombs + 25% from 2 poisons) damage, which hooh cannot recover off even with 2 regenerators. While yes all of this is really based on predictions, it always favors eternatus more which I'll explain later

Groudon-Primal

everyone knows that don is easy af to chip, because its been used as a zacian check and as a rocks setter, same reasons as to why hooh and dm are being used, except they get recovery and don doesnt so its easier for eternatus to kill it

252 SpA Life Orb Eternatus Dynamax Cannon (100 BP) vs. 252 HP / 200 SpD Groudon-Primal: 204-242 (50.4 - 59.9%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
dont need to say much here, need light screen to switch in lol
sludge bomb/flamethrower + dmax cannon does minimum 72 which means youre rlly not switching into this

there wasnt any actual argument other than the prevalence of these 3 mons hurting etern. if youre willing to use some random B/lower rank trash then its totally up to you.

Problem with eternatus is, it doesn't check nothing. Ho-oh runs sacredfire and whirlwind so it's a fairly safe answer to eternatus especially once NDM has knocked the LO off (dont use metronome for real). Then, every team carries 1 or 2 grounds (zyg/pdon/arceus) and zacian. The remaining slots can include a dmax sweeper and ditto, so great, eternatus loses to the whole team. There's really no opportunities to switchin except ho-oh (burn/phazing) and NDM (knock off), and then you have to predict every turn not to let ground types/zacian switchin for free and KO you. Also zacian can even switch-in on LO-less flame, so eternatus just cannot thrive in this meta and definitely needs to be played very well. The ho-oh burn matters a LOT because it forces the recover quite often, and every time u are in recover range ur oppo will go berserk and send their zacian/pdon/w/e in... or not, so dynamax cannon if you wish, at your own risk.

Also tyranitar makes etern's day very very tough, but i dont see ttar being popular for long once they start getting bopped by focusblast yveltal.

Leave eternatus in A, i disagree with both A- and A+ noms, it's fine where it is imo. Thanks for reading
This is a nice post and I do agree with all your points actually but I still think your arguments are still a bit flawed.

Ho-oh runs sacredfire and whirlwind so it's a fairly safe answer to eternatus especially once NDM has knocked the LO off (dont use metronome for real).
already explained why this isnt true

Then, every team carries 1 or 2 grounds (zyg/pdon/arceus) and zacian. There's really no opportunities to switchin except ho-oh (burn/phazing) and NDM (knock off)
On the flip side, the first 4 mons you mentioned also cannot switch into eternatus. Its a really common understanding that the defensive mon is the one whos gonna switch into an offensive mon, not the other way around. the fact that it can switch into ndm and hooh and potentially beat them is actually VERY GOOD. Ho-Oh and DM are on almost every team, youre beating and switching into 2 of the top 3 defensive walls in the meta, not many offensive mons can do that .-.

then you have to predict every turn not to let ground types/zacian switchin for free and KO you.
No, its the other way around again.
Zacian is the one who should hesitate to switch into flamethrower. Eternatus has reliable recovery and can switch into plenty of mons and force them out. Most eternatus teams have solid counterplay to zacian so eternatus doesnt have to worry about 'letting zacian come into free'. Youre making it sound like everytime you see an eternatus, youd just casually hard zacian on that turn which is a huge risk since youre taking miniumum 75% from it. This means that you have to use your zacian even more carefully since you dont have a lot of HP left. again as I said, even if the eternatus does not get the predict right it can easily just switch out, come in later and try to get the predict right again.
Every relevant ground type is 2hko'd by eternatus.
The whole point of this is that youre the one whos taking the risk by switching into zacian/zygarde/groundceus/don.
If you get the prediction wrong, your VERY important defensive backbone is destroyed. (since eternatus does solid damage to mentioned things)
If I get the predict wrong, I can just straight up switch out and come back again later.
I can afford to take the risk because I have recovery and I have plenty of opportunities to switch in. But youre the one who doesnt have recovery (other than groundceus), so youre the one whos risking the existence of your pokemon by hard switching into this monster.
i wasnt rlly clear here so tldr is that the 'prediction game' which youre playing here is in favour of eternatus and not the mons youre using to switch into it.
Also heard something about ditto. Eternatus is VERY EASY to improof. You can scout the dittos move by switching to hooh and you also lock ditto into a move and they cant even dynamax, so its super easy to wall it.

again i dont think that eternatus is an A+ mon but I strongly believe that its the best out of the A rank mons and is viability wise closer to an A+ mon than an A- one. This is without a doubt the most underrated mon in national dex ag, but please dont use it because it always beats me thanks
 

Kate

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There's straight up wrong information in a lot of this and it's a big disservice to continue to allow this to float around without correcting the massive flaws here.
I think I'll start with the most blatant example of "literally just not calcing before posting"
Now idk if people forgot about this but sacred fire and brave bird do absolutely 0 to eternatus so your only play is to click whirlwind.
0 Atk Ho-Oh Brave Bird vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Eternatus: 169-201 (40.1 - 47.7%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
What are you even talking about? This does MORE than Dusk Mane, plus the fact that Etern is probably getting burned and lo chip makes it forced to spam recover in many situations.
252 SpA Life Orb Eternatus Sludge Bomb vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Ho-Oh: 142-169 (34.1 - 40.6%) -- 48.3% chance to 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
If ho-oh gets poisoned here it will need assistance from jesus christ himself to check etern
Here you do use the calc, but for some reason you invent some EVs for Ho-oh? You also didn't even bother to remove leftovers on Ho-oh, so either you wrote this in a rush or rly didn't care about accuracy.
252 SpA Life Orb Eternatus Sludge Bomb vs. 248 HP / 56 SpD Ho-Oh: 138-164 (33.2 - 39.5%) -- 100% chance to 3HKO
252 SpA Eternatus Sludge Bomb vs. 248 HP / 56 SpD Ho-Oh: 106-126 (25.5 - 30.3%) -- guaranteed 4HKO
sludge bomb/flamethrower + dmax cannon does minimum 72 which means youre rlly not switching into this
Ok... But if u click dmax ur also dead? Idk why this sentence is included here because all ur doing is proving Etern cant stay in.
252 SpA Life Orb Eternatus Flamethrower vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Prism Armor Necrozma-Dusk-Mane: 193-228 (48.4 - 57.2%) -- 45.3% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
Good calc but you also straight-up ignore any other possible set on DM, a lot of which beat Etern. Weakness policy, DD, TR, Spdef, even Ultra all beat it. Ik ur trying to say "it beats the common defense set" but not only is this unclear, you blanket this as "all Dm's are not a consistent check".
again i dont think that eternatus is an A+ mon but I strongly believe that its the best out of the A rank mons and is viability wise closer to an A+ mon than an A- one.
Then... why did you make this post? You corrected somewhat flawed arguments with even worse ones and generally muddled a thread by continuing to draw attention to a SINGULAR mon which almost definitely won't move anywhere in the VR update. You can say I'm being a hypocrite but I don't see anyone else coming and correcting this mess. Just make actually coherent arguments next time.
 
I made a fairly short and unintelligent post here trying to say something stupid that got deleted a couple minutes ago, so I'll go into the point I made in more detail.
-Necrozma-DM needs significant Attack investment (216 EVs with a boosting nature) to guarantee a 2HKO on Eternatus with Sunsteel Strike. BUT Photon Geyser requires no investment at all to do so.
0 Atk Necrozma-Dusk-Mane Photon Geyser vs. 0 HP / 4 Def Eternatus: 332-392 (78.8 - 93.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
Of course, Psychic is a pretty bad attacking type in the current metagame, but if your team is super weak to Eternatus the move might actually be worth considering. DM certainly hates Eternatus but it can still do some damage to it.
 

pichus

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I think I'll start with the most blatant example of "literally just not calcing before posting"

0 Atk Ho-Oh Brave Bird vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Eternatus: 169-201 (40.1 - 47.7%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
What are you even talking about? This does MORE than Dusk Mane, plus the fact that Etern is probably getting burned and lo chip makes it forced to spam recover in many situations.
You're right honestly, I actually had no idea that brave bird did that much

usage stats for Ho-Oh's movesets (1760 elo)
Sacred Fire 97.884%
Toxic 88.026%
Defog 67.202%
Brave Bird 49.991%
Whirlwind 48.934%

Half of the Ho-Ohs do not run Brave Bird and I love how you just went ahead and assumed the ideal scenario such that
- Eternatus is switching into Ho-Oh and not Ho-Oh switching into Eternatus
- Ho-Oh clicks sacred fire AND eternatus gets burned on the switch in
- The Ho-Oh gets max roll on every Brave Bird which 'forces' eternatus to recover
fwiw Ho-Oh has only 12 brave birds vs Eternatus, I dont see the problem with 'recover spamming'??? What do you have to save recover's PP for? As long as it keeps you healthy its totally okay lol, thats literally the point of recover genius. Please keep in mind that brave bird is 13ish recoil per turn so youre gonna switch out the hooh after using it 5/6 times and eternatus can come back again healthy. so guess whos the one switching out because they got pressured (not the perfect time for a pun but sorry I had to) big time and failed to check the mon it was supposed to?
- Ho-Oh isnt statused already (anyone who actually plays AG knows how often Ho-Oh gets Toxiced (namely by Don, Ho-Oh, Dusk Mane, Zygarde)

anyway, Brave Bird does do solid damage but not good enough so that it beats eternatus in a 1v1. Things wont be pretty if I begin to assume the perfect scenario for eternatus, like assuming that Ho-Oh is switching into eternatus and getting poisoned and high rolled.

Here you do use the calc, but for some reason you invent some EVs for Ho-oh? You also didn't even bother to remove leftovers on Ho-oh, so either you wrote this in a rush or rly didn't care about accuracy.
252 SpA Life Orb Eternatus Sludge Bomb vs. 248 HP / 56 SpD Ho-Oh: 138-164 (33.2 - 39.5%) -- 100% chance to 3HKO
252 SpA Eternatus Sludge Bomb vs. 248 HP / 56 SpD Ho-Oh: 106-126 (25.5 - 30.3%) -- guaranteed 4HKO
sigh.
Did you just decide to ignore my entire argument but point out that I forgot 52 spdef evs?
lets see how much difference that makes:
252 SpA Life Orb Eternatus Sludge Bomb vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Ho-Oh: 142-169 (34.1 - 40.6%) -- 48.3% chance to 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
252 SpA Life Orb Eternatus Sludge Bomb vs. 248 HP / 56 SpD Ho-Oh: 138-164 (33.2 - 39.5%) -- 100% chance to 3HKO
difference between minimum roll: 34.1 - 33.2 = 0.9%
difference between max roll: 40.6 - 39.5 = 1.1%

A difference of ONE percent HP and you completely disregard the fact that Ho-Oh STILL cannot switch into Sludge Bomb/Dmax cannon and still doesnt beat eternatus even in 1v1 scenarios. And ohmygod, I forgot to remove leftovers. That blunder makes me wanna re write my entire post. Using leftovers as the item completely changes the damage which ho-oh takes from eternatus, as i'll display here:
With Leftovers:
252 SpA Life Orb Eternatus Dynamax Cannon (100 BP) vs. 252 HP / 52 SpD Ho-Oh: 153-181 (36.7 - 43.5%) -- 98% chance to 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
Without Leftovers:
252 SpA Life Orb Eternatus Dynamax Cannon (100 BP) vs. 252 HP / 52 SpD Ho-Oh: 153-181 (36.7 - 43.5%) -- guaranteed 3HKO

I'm not sure if you know about this but, surprisingly enough when I'm calculating damage, it does not matter what item I'm using unless its a defensive/attack boosting item. Leftovers is default in the pokemon showdown calculator and I did not feel the need to change it to Heavy Duty Boots since it didnt alter the damage anyway. I just wanted to show how much ho-oh took from eternatus' attacks which I did.

Ok... But if u click dmax ur also dead? Idk why this sentence is included here because all ur doing is proving Etern cant stay in.
"everyone knows that don is easy af to chip, because its been used as a zacian check and as a rocks setter, same reasons as to why hooh and dm are being used, except they get recovery and don doesnt so its easier for eternatus to kill it "

Yes, my groudon is also at 100% health during every point of the battle but thankfully I do have the brain to not stay in if the somehow 100% hp don safely manages to switch into Eternatus. Because again, I can switch back my eternatus at some point but guess what? groudon cannot since it doesnt have recover. The point was to say that Groudon cannot be used as a consistent switch into eternatus even if it has taken minimal chip.

Good calc but you also straight-up ignore any other possible set on DM, a lot of which beat Etern. Weakness policy, DD, TR, Spdef, even Ultra all beat it. Ik ur trying to say "it beats the common defense set" but not only is this unclear, you blanket this as "all Dm's are not a consistent check".
No. I just decided to pick the most common set. The main set which is used by actually relevant players is Max Hp Max Defense, which allows it to check Zacian-Crowned. offensive variants are very rare to begin with (not bc they are bad, but defensive is just too good) weakness policy sets are automatically assumed to be TR or DD, idk why you had to make them sound like 3 different sets lol. And did you unironically say Ultra over there? please listen to what youre even saying LOL. specially defensive is a legit set yes, still does not change the fact that it cant beat eternatus:
252 SpA Life Orb Eternatus Flamethrower vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Prism Armor Necrozma-Dusk-Mane: 142-168 (35.6 - 42.2%) -- 88.5% chance to 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
252 SpA Eternatus Flamethrower vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Prism Armor Necrozma-Dusk-Mane: 109-129 (27.3 - 32.4%) -- 61.6% chance to 4HKO after Leftovers recovery
For the ninety fifth time today, Flamethrower has 3 times more pp than morning sun so NDM is eventually forced to switch out and thus cannot beat eternatus.
As for the TR DD sets, You got me there. Eternatus indeed doesnt beat those in a 1v1 scenario (since the mentioned dusk mane sets cannot switch into it). Now I'll give you a reminder that Eternatus is an offensive threat and not a defensive wall. Three of the top four defensive walls in AG also lose to Weakness Policy DDAnce set (Ho-Oh if it doesnt get burned or if the DM already set up, NDM cant do good damage and Groudon might get bopped by Dmax) so I'd say that losing to such a mon is totally acceptable, especially because you dont even let it set up for free

Then... why did you make this post? You corrected somewhat flawed arguments with even worse ones and generally muddled a thread by continuing to draw attention to a SINGULAR mon which almost definitely won't move anywhere in the VR update. You can say I'm being a hypocrite but I don't see anyone else coming and correcting this mess. Just make actually coherent arguments next time.
Uh, let me guess. This is a pokemon website and I literally run this tier so I'm allowed to post anything I want to unless its plain bs like the post you just made? I'm replying to 2 of my friends who I respect a lot and believe are both top 7 players this gen. I'm allowed to correct them if their opinion is outright wrong and again I cant force them to see things the way I see them, I can try to convince them by showing where theyre going wrong. This is promoting discussion in the thread which is the main point of a VR thread just incase you didnt know and I dont see how youre helping by nitpicking stuff like "HEY YOU FORGOT TO REMOVE LEFTOVERS FROM HO-OH" while straight up ignoring the actual arguments I made.
 
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Kate

Metamodernity
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? I'm not even gonna go over the blatant character attacks here, but like, what?
I'm not disagreeing with your argument. Did I ever say I found fault with your general points? I'm pointing out flaws in your points that either make your post muddled, unclear, or just wrong. Instead of admitting that hey, maybe I wasn't the clearest here, you take this as a personal attack or smth and choose to... attack me?
As you mention, you are the tier leader and as such, you have a responsibility to put facts in your post. Was some of what I said nitpicky and not completely accurate? Yes. Does that disclude everything I said, absolve your original post of fault, and make me a villian? No.
I'm allowed to correct them if their opinion is outright wrong
Excuse me for having an incorrect o p i n i o n. All you had to do was just say "hey, I don't agree with a lot of problems you found fault with". Instead you took the time to launch a personal attack to try and get people to ignore the actual problems with your post. Do you edit your post to include brave bird not doing zero? No. I like how you're so quick to vilify me and call me a meme and disregard my ability as a player because of a difference in opinion.
 

pichus

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I'm gonna reply to this for the sake of clarifying things since I dont wanna look like the meanie here even though I don't expect either of these posts to stay on this thread for long.
I'm not disagreeing with your argument. Did I ever say I found fault with your general points? I'm pointing out flaws in your points that either make your post muddled, unclear, or just wrong. Instead of admitting that hey, maybe I wasn't the clearest here, you take this as a personal attack or smth and choose to... attack me?
"There's straight up wrong information in a lot of this and it's a big disservice to continue to allow this to float around without correcting the massive flaws here. "
"You corrected somewhat flawed arguments with even worse ones and generally muddled a thread by continuing to draw attention to a SINGULAR mon which almost definitely won't move anywhere in the VR update."

English isnt my first language but I dont understand in what world this doesnt imply that youre not disagreeing with my argument. I'm gonna apologize for my tone in that post, I didnt intentionally want to hurt you in any way and I dont have any hard feelings towards you. But jeez just look at what you posted. Youre saying that I'm the one whos replying to arguments by making even worse ones which is just not true in any way. Yes youre allowed to suggest where my post went wrong too, even though I most definitely did not ask for a QC check, but you could too probably say something like "hey nice post, I do agree with the stuff you posted, but heres some really obvious mistakes you made which I think should be corrected since theres going to be people reading your post" and I wouldve been totally fine with it. Instead youre gonna point out stuff which absolutely doesnt make sense and towards the end youre questioning (in the rudest tone) why I had to made the post in the first place, acting like youre controlling this thread and I need your approval to post something. I fail to see how your post actually meant good and why it wasnt a super obvious call out attempt. Despite of that, all I tried to do is reply to all of points and justify what I said. You said my post wasnt 'accurate' because I had 52 less spdef evs and leftovers, neither of which made sense and I replied accordingly. I dont understand how you expect me to believe that your post was meant to be a friendly one if youre gonna say things like 'learn to make actually coherent arguments' just because I missed out on a few points. I removed the 'meme' part, since that was extremely rude and not even true immediately after I posted this since I just was extremely frustrated at the time. If you actually wanted to help me out you couldve PM'd me saying about this. Instead you decide to make a post and point out the most random things ever and made it look like I dont know what I'm talking about. seriously though, I do believe that youre one of the few actually good gen8 players but please dont act like I'm the one who started making personal attacks lol

Edit: tldr no hard feelings, im happy to fix any mistakes ive made but i wouldve preferred if you said it in a nicer tone and again mb for my own harsh tone but idk what you were expecting after making that post.
 
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Geysers

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I’m hesitant to step into this debate, but here goes. While most of Etern’s attention here seems to be focused on the offensive sets, I’d like to attempt to draw everyone’s attention to a lesser known, but potent set that Etern can run. Defensive Eterns are available in two different flavors — physical and special. In my opinion, physically defensive Etern is the stronger option, blanket-checking a reasonable portion of the meta, such as ho-oh, dusk mane, ferrothorn, and a handful of other common mons.
set:
Eternatus @ Black Sludge
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpA
Bold Nature
- Dragon Tail
- Recover
- Flamethrower
- Toxic

This set is alarmingly bulky, and is capable of effectively pp stalling most defensive mons. It also is capable of crippling some fatter stuff with toxic, and, in a pinch, functions as a zacian check.
+3 252+ Atk Zacian-Crowned Behemoth Blade (100 BP) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Eternatus: 408-481 (84.2 - 99.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Black Sludge recovery
+1 252+ Atk Zacian-Crowned Behemoth Blade (100 BP) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Eternatus: 246-289 (50.8 - 59.7%) -- 83.2% chance to 2HKO after Black Sludge recovery
In a situation where zac has already taken a lot of prior chip, etern can RK in the unlikely situation that your other zac checks have been sufficiently weakened.
4 SpA Eternatus Flamethrower vs. 4 HP / 0 SpD Zacian-Crowned: 158-188 (48.4 - 57.6%) -- 94.1% chance to 2HKO
Defensive Etern is a reasonably potent mon that provides handy utility for some balances. One additional benefit of using it over other physical walls is that it doesn’t autolose to goth, since it can phaze it out while taunted.

The other, and less useful flavor of defensive Etern is specially defensive. It sacrifices the ability to shut down a significant portion of the meta to more effectively beat ogre variants, running the same moves but with spdef investment.
252+ SpA Kyogre-Primal Ice Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Eternatus: 206-244 (42.5 - 50.4%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Black Sludge recovery
252+ SpA Kyogre Ice Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Eternatus: 180-212 (37.1 - 43.8%) -- 99.9% chance to 3HKO after Black Sludge recovery
252+ SpA Kyogre Water Spout (150 BP) vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Eternatus in Rain: 168-198 (34.7 - 40.9%) -- 58.6% chance to 3HKO after Black Sludge recovery
Specially defensive Etern can still serve as a physical wall in a pinch, absorbing hits from mons such as marshadow or NDM.

While neither of these sets is as strong as the lo or metronome ones, they’re still interesting, and can have useful niches.

To clarify, I think etern is good where it is. People seem very divided on it, and both sides raise compelling arguments. In light of this, etern should neither rise nor drop.
 

Ktütverde

of course
is a Top Tiering Contributor Alumnusis a Former Smogon Metagame Tournament Circuit Champion
Me I respect you both guys a lot and it saddens me to see the great misunderstanding going on above between you. The moment you started using irony and sarcasm and dismissing each other's points, there's nothing good that can come out of this, and I'm certainly not better informed about eternatus. I wish you could just apologize to each other even though the other seems to be wrong so we can move on, community is already small enough to afford this. If you think I'm wrong just blame me, I've had my fair share of problems of.. that kind in the past and I've sworn not to let meaningless clashes like this happen between otherwise clever people willing to contribute to their favorite tier. Peace frens
 
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Chloe

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NUPL Champion
Heyhey, time for another viability rankings update yay!

As pichus said, both Catalystic and Guardsweeper have been added to the ranking council so that's cool. Most of these are pretty straight forward but I'll write a summary of why these changes happened towards the end of the post. As always, we appreciate your nominations. We rely on your posts to keep this ranking updated, so ya thanks.

VR Update March 5 2020
Rises
:yveltal: S- to S
:necrozma-dusk-mane: A+ to S-
:ditto: A- to A
:ferrothorn: B to B+
:gothitelle: B- to B+
:marshadow: B- to B
:kyogre: C to B-

Drops
:xerneas: S to S-
:mewtwo: B+ to B
:arceus: (Normal) B+ to B
:vivillon: B+ to B
:kartana: B- to C
:deoxys-attack: B- to C
:thundurus-therian: B- to C
:arceus: (Fire) B- to UR
:kyurem-black: C to UR
:magearna: D to UR
:dugtrio: D to UR
:naganadel: D to UR
:wobbuffet: D to UR
:quagsire: C to UR
:shedinja: D to UR

Didn't Rise
:zacian-crowned: S- to S
:zygarde-complete: A+ to S-
:tyranitar: B+ to A-
:heatran: UR to D
:palkia: UR to D
:stakataka: UR to D

Didn't Drop
:arceus: (Dark) B- to C
:arceus: (Rock) B- to C
:sableye-mega: C to D
:zacian: C to D
:arceus: (Flying) D to UR
:arceus: (Poison) D to UR
:skarmory: D to UR

Did Nothing
:eternatus: A to A+/A-


SS Yveltal is more broken and twice as hard to prepare for than ORAS Darkrai. Perhaps an exageration; however, to anyone who's played this metagame, it's abundantly clear that Yveltal is "The Threat". Dynamax Yveltal has no certain switchins unless you opt for an entirely unviable set, its most reliable check being Tyranitar, which is removed by Focus Blast or Choice Band variants which are both incredibly justifiable. A well played Dynamax Yveltal will struggle to remove less than two Pokemon from a match, and post-Max Airstream setup be difficult to stop. This movement should be a surprise to no one.

Necrozma-DM is a requirement on every serious team due to the prominence of Dynamax Xerneas, of which it is virtually the only viable check. It also provides a good check for Zacian-Crowned, among a plethora of other things. Necrozma-DM is just a staple, of which it's difficult to describe the impact of, but hard not to notice. Ditto is a godsend in a tier that has such potent Dynamax sweepers. Its increase in viability is perhaps debatable, potentially justifying this rank at an earlier date. Ferrothorn, Marshadow and Choice Scarf Kyogre have all shown their usefulness as the metagame has progressed. Gothitelle disables common archetypes from functioning correctly, explained well by Pigeons' earlier post on the matter.

In terms of drops, the VR has been cleaned up a little, with many including us calling for the removal of useless Pokemon such as Naganadel and Quagsire. Of the most significant drops, Xerneas definitely stands out. Xerneas has trouble competing with Yveltal as a Dynamax sweeper, especially with Necrozma-Dusk-Mane seeing over 50% usage on ladder and even higher usage in tournaments. It's still incredibly potent of course, S- seems to fit it much better than ranking it at the same level as Yveltal however. Mewtwo has trouble making an impact due to much more prominent Dynamax users like the aforementioned Xerneas and Yveltal.

Arceus, Vivillon, Kartana and Deoxys-Attack were all initially overrated when the metagame started, but overtime metagame trends have pointed towards them falling off of the viability pedestals they once knew. Thundurus-Therian is very shaky at its role as an imposter-proof Max Airstream user, and is increasingly difficult to justify over Yveltal. The remainder of the Pokemon here wouldn't be used on any serious team. Arceus-Fire struggles with Close Combat from Zacian-Crowned after Stealth Rock, which makes its one entire role difficult to fulfil. A similar situation with Shedinja, with Crunch Zacian-C increasing in usage, it's too shaky of a check to really justify.

Kyurem-Black can't compete with Zekrom, which borderline outclasses it. Magearna can't check Xerneas or Yveltal so what is the point. Dugtrio is too weak and too slow to take out Zacian-Crowned, and really doesn't benefit from taking out anything else. It's too hard to justify Naganadel as a sweeper with so many better options available. Wobbuffet is just bad. Quagsire checks Zacian-Crowned very well but otherwise does nothing, and with options such as Necrozma-DM and Groudon-Primal available, it's rarely ever worth it.

I'll skim over some rejected nominations. Most of the council agreed that Zygarde-Complete isn't at the same level as Necrozma-DM and that its viability is much closer to those in A+. Tyranitar is too shaky an Yveltal check to be considered for A-. Heatran and Palkia aren't good enough. Stakataka seems cool under Trick Room, but first you'd need to make a stronger case that Trick Room is a viable playstyle, and additionally, why I or others should run this over TR Necrozma-DM. Arceus-Dark/Rock/Flying/Poison all have their own substantial niches within the metagame to consider remaining at their spots. Mega Sableye provides a strong enough role on Stall to keep C. Zacian-Base is also fine at C. Skarmory is still a very good spike setter, among providing other roles for teams such as walling Necrozma-DM/Ultra and phazing.

Eternatus was nominated for both A+ and A-, but the majority of the council agreed that it deserves A, with a few explicitly stating that it's the best Pokemon in the A rank. No action was taken on Eternatus.

Anyway, that wraps up another VR update. Thank you for all your posts and as always we look forward to all your future nominations!!!

Voting Sheet
 

Kate

Metamodernity
is a Tiering Contributoris a Past SCL Champion
RBTT Champion
I'd like to personally apologize to pichus and the rest of the thread for my behavior. I don't believe everything I said was wrong, but the time and place for it was not here, and for that, I'm sorry. For the sake of making this post relevant;

Groundceus A- to A
Completely disagreed with this moving down and I think it's only gotten better since then. I shouldn't have to say how ridiculously splashable this mon is, a lot of ppl ignore that when nomming shit and act surprised when the nom fails, me included. I can literally slap this on any team and it always does smth in a game. Consistent check to sooo many top tier threats, it's prone to getting overwhelmed but it's still the only mon in the game that can check pdon zacian zygod etern dm. My RMT featured SE support which allows it to beat ho-oh. IK y'all run Ho-oh as ur only switchin to this a lot, don't lie. SD sets are good antimeta shit that can win on preview vs some common builds.

MGar A to A-
It barely even traps anymore cuz Dynamax is such a horrible thing for it, common builds decimate it, it's hard to build around. A- fits it much more than A and anyone who says this is better than Etern, ditto, groundy be tripping. I don't expect people to agree with this but I literally never see this in tourns or ladder. Also if I'm nomming groundceus we can't just leave Lunala all by its lonesome.

:v4::v4::v4::v4:
 

Icemaster

Few will truly understand.
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RBTT Champion
It's time for some A- mons

:Kyogre-Primal: B+to A-
I've been meaning to nominate this up for a while, this is pretty much as good as last gen or better. Groudon-Primal typically runs Defense rather than max SpDef which is huge, Ferrothorn is less common and so it is just much easier for this to shred teams without the presence of Mega-Ray/Necrozma-Ultra. Only really Zacian and offensive dmaxes (yveltal) force it out - it is quite a major nuisance for many balances. It can even fit rest quite well as in a meta with fat zyg/defensive dusk/lunala/hooh and stuff everywhere, there is ample opportunity to rest. Speaking of which, Defensive Kyogre is usable too due to the drop in MRay and it abuses the core 4.

TL;DR: it's pretty much as good or better than it was last gen, VR should reflect this

:Necrozma-Ultra: B+ to A-
B+ is extremely harsh for this. While it is difficult to fit on non offensive teams (taking the dusk mane slot is tough, base mode as dawn wings is a bit disadvantageous), the breaking ability it has is extreme often forcing the foe to dynamax in order to stomach LTBTS or coverage backed by Neuroforce. As Scarf Ray has rightfully dropped in usage, you can also opt for adamant. It also has a slightly decent mu vs ditto, and isn't extremely difficult to improof (as without LTBTS or Dmax, ditto doesn't do much back). It goes really well with dmaxers like xerneas/yve where common counterplay is to use dmax back.
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1074738069-b9cmho7lcnnrf0spp0j2jbcj5wiy834pw Ultra came out turn 1 and gobbled this pretty standard balance. It was pretty much over once he had to dmax, as Xern could then win from whenever it could setup. Although, you do have to run a little awkward team to fit it.

Dawn Wings as a base:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1074742762-pfgaiax7kf3geuif3u0kyk729rbercqpw, cleaned at the end, it did defeat ditto btw
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1074744714-cfcjrgi5v6a010u2qmrs6zevpwlc350pw , necro did some heavy lifting and while I choked the end, it's clear how powerful unecro is.

What you do lose to is Lunala and Ditto once you're chipped, BUT you can muscle past a chipped or sleeping Zyg C with LTBTS.

+1 252+ Atk Necrozma-Ultra Earthquake vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Necrozma-Ultra: 222-262 (66.2 - 78.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO - Ditto won't be killing you unless you're quite chipped, and you could kill a chipped ditto.
+1 252+ Atk Necrozma-Ultra Earthquake vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Prism Armor Necrozma-Dusk-Mane: 198-234 (49.7 - 58.7%) -- 71.1% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery - keep in mind this is one of the mons you setup on
+1 252+ Atk Necrozma-Ultra Earthquake vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Groudon-Primal: 224-264 (55.4 - 65.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
+1 252+ Atk Necrozma-Ultra Light That Burns the Sky vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Zygarde-Complete: 408-481 (64.1 - 75.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
+1 252+ Atk Necrozma-Ultra Light That Burns the Sky vs. 252 HP / 240+ Def Arceus-Ground: 415-490 (93.4 - 110.3%) -- 62.5% chance to OHKO
melted

:Ferrothorn: B+ to A-
:ferrothorn: to B+
yes, anyone who has played vs this knows how annoying this can be. Almost every balance team struggles vs the standard Spikes + Knock off set and its really hard to defog vs this, even Ho-Oh doesnt like having its HDB knocked off. Also does a decent job at checking POgre and act as a switch in to passive mons. Is a great teammate for offensive threats like Yveltal, Zygarde, Zacian, Gengar, Eternatus and every other mon which benefits from Spike Stack. Definitely really underrated
^pretty much this, but I think ferrothorn warrants A-. Also slotting protect is really underrated, stalling dmax out is just op.
 
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Hi, some hopefully not awful VR nominations:


Arceus-Fairy C --> B-

I do feel that this Arceus forme is somewhat more splashable than its rank suggests. Being a support Arceus forme with a good matchup against DD Zygarde and Yveltal is quite useful for role compression while building and helps distinguish it from Tyranitar; this is further augmented by needing to only run one attacking move (unlike the predominant supportceus in the metagame in Arceus-Ground) which allows it to fulfill a number of other supportive roles as well. It also is a handy check to some other miscellaneous threats like mixed breaker/banded Rayquaza, Zekrom, and Tyranitar. The general decline in Mega Gengar usage recently helps it a lot as well, as with any support Arceus forme.

Of course, all of this is hampered by its extremely poor matchup against Zacian-C, Primal Groudon, Necrozma-DM, and Ho-Oh (unless it's running Refresh in Ho-Oh's case). Additionally, it still can't check Dynamaxed Life Orb Yveltal without dynamaxing itself, which is a bit unfortunate. However, in my opinion it still is much easier to build with relative to something like Mega Blastoise or Kartana, mostly because it does not need to strictly be built around like the aforementioned, but rather naturally fills a slot in certain teams that are in need of a Yveltal + Zygarde check in one. Additionally, the two Arceus formes in B-, Arceus-Dark and Arceus-Rock, are more difficult to fit in general - Arceus-Dark is mostly outclassed directly by fairyceus nowadays aside from having a better time pivoting into pdon/DM, for instance.

All in all, Arceus-Fairy isn't amazing by any stretch, but C is underrating it somewhat, so B- seems fair.


:blastoise-mega:
Blastoise-Mega C --> D

This one doesn't require much explanation - it is a shell smash sweeper that cannot break through either primal without prior chip and is KOed from full by 0 invest precipice blades at -1, and is generally going to take significant chip damage while setting up. Perhaps this could see some use on an outlandish build but realistically Blastoise is a nuisance to build with even on HO (offensive builds will typically run Mega Rayquaza or even MMY over this), so a drop is warranted.


:chansey:
Chansey C --> B-

While Chansey is somewhat difficult to build around on very standard balances, I would say that a rise is warranted due to, again, the drop in Mega Gengar usage recently in addition to its potential relative to other C rank pokemon. Being one of the very few hard counters to Geomancy Xerneas is really nice when building around certain esoteric sets, since one can pair Chansey with Lunala and for example free Necrozma-DM to use a DD or Ultra set. It can also pivot into Dynamaxed Yveltal to stall out a turn of dynamax, and if Yveltal's set has been scouted beforehand it can do this consistently throughout the game. As always it has nice utility in providing heal bell support which is great for many partners like mixed Groundceus, and can even provide Wish support on some specific teams.
Again, this is something that is not amazing but enables the use of certain other partners that are otherwise very difficult to fit, while providing decent defensive utility to pretty much any balance.


:zekrom:
Zekrom B+ --> B

This is something that is certainly quite usable and can put in work in specific matchups. The noted drop is more about how this feels out of place in its current position on the VR - it feels very similar to the dynamax abusers in B such as Mewtwo and ekiller, and not really on the level of Primal Kyogre / Ferrothorn / Tyranitar at all, the last three of which are all just a notch below being staples on balance. Most pokemon that abuse dynamax are directly outclassed by Xerneas/Yveltal to a degree and therefore can't realistically be ranked alongside something like Tyranitar in my opinon. Zekrom does distinguish itself in being able to clean late-game even after dynamax has been traded, but is hampered in having two common stops on balance in pdon and groundceus.

+1 252 Atk Teravolt Zekrom Outrage vs. 248 HP / 36+ Def Groudon-Primal: 193-228 (47.8 - 56.5%) -- 85.9% chance to 2HKO
+1 252 Atk Teravolt Zekrom Outrage vs. 248 HP / 240+ Def Arceus-Ground: 210-247 (47.4 - 55.7%) -- 78.5% chance to 2HKO
As you need Substitute or Haban Berry to handle Ditto, you don't really have the option of using Life Orb to improve these matchups either. Again, this is usable but suffers from being generally less potent as a dynamax wincon than Yveltal is, and therefore fits B rank much better.
 
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Guard

حرروا فلسطين
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OMPL Champion
Although there have been a fair amount of changes in the S-rank since the inauguration of this thread, I believe most of us will agree that the uppermost echelon of the metagame can be represented in a more correct fashion than what is insinuated by the current version of the VR. Hence, as a result of the constricted nature of this metagame with several Pokemon being head and shoulders above the rest, I believe these should all rise a subrank:
:sm/yveltal::sm/xerneas::sm/zygarde-complete:

Which means the ideal VR for the current metagame would look like the following:
S+
:yveltal: Yveltal

S
:xerneas: Xerneas

S-
:necrozma-dusk-mane: Necrozma-Dusk-Mane
:zacian-crowned: Zacian-Crowned
:zygarde-complete: Zygarde-Complete

First of all, Xerneas is much better than a ranking next to Zacian-C and Necrozma-DM might imply. Although it is much less splashable than both, this does not take away the fact that Xerneas is exponentially more influential, both in teambuilding and in practice. Even though current teambuilding has done a good job at somewhat keeping Xerneas from cleaning from the get go, Xerneas builds taking advantage of its disadvantages have been popping up more and more often. These builds tend to overpower Necrozma-DM/force the opponent's Dynamax with the likes of Swords Dance Zacian-C, Mega Mewtwo Y, Ultra Necrozma and Mega Rayquaza, which allows Xerneas to clean up in a very reliable manner. As a result, Xerneas is still much more overbearing to face than its rankmates and therefore still feels like an S rank threat, which logically should lead to it being ranked higher than both of them.

Yveltal at S+ is a direct consequence of Xerneas being ranked at S, since it is undoubtedly better than Xerneas and it would have been odd to rank them next to each other. Besides, the community already agrees that Yveltal is entirely on another level compared to everything else, so S+ only seems fitting in this case in order to still distinguish it from Xerneas, which is de facto an S rank threat, from whatever perspective you may look at it.

Zygarde-C, similarly to Zacian-C and Necrozma-DM, is an incredibly splashable threat on the vast majority of Balance/BO builds with its defensive Coil/Haze set, having near unmatched checking prowess and being the most reliable status absorber in the tier, while also proving to be quite the offensive threat itself if it opts for Coil. Therefore, it is a defensive glue that is often not replaceable with one slot only due to its sheer role compression. However, Zygarde-C is also able to forfeit some of its defensive qualities and run its flagship offensive Dragon Dance + Dragon Tail set. The sheer effectiveness of this set may not be forgotten when talking about Zygarde-C, as it is able to completely 6-0 the overmajority of teams sans Arceus and opposing Haze Zygarde-C, and often breaks through these regardless with appropriate team support and Dynamax. All things considered, Zygarde-C is quite clearly fit to rise to S-. The only reason it didn't last slate was the fact that it would have been very controversial to rank it next to Xerneas, which will not be an issue if Xerneas and Yveltal rise to S and S+ respectively.
 

Geysers

not round
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I'm going to take a moment, and list as many semi-reliable yveltal checks as I can think of, along with their speeds. Those of you who have played against me or seen me talking recently probably know where I'm going here.

Tyranitar - 158
Blissey - 146
Chansey - 136
Magearna - 166
Ho-oh - 216 / 218
Diancie - 136
Arceus-Fairy - 272
Arcesu-Dark - 272

Note that these all, with the lone exceptions of some support arcs, are exceptionally slow. Now, imagine that there existed a mon that could automatically kill almost any pokemon slower than it. Lo and behold, such a pokemon exists, and hits the admittedly mediocre speed of 249. This abysmal speed, while not optimal for sweeping, turns out to be sufficient for cleaning up yveltal checks and a plethora of other defensive mons.

Before I get to the actual nom, I'd like to present a set.

:yveltal:
Yveltal @ Black Glasses
Ability: Dark Aura
EVs: 252 Spa / 4 Spd / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
- Heat Wave
- Dark Pulse
- Oblivion Wing
- U-turn

This set utilizes black glasses to bluff a choice item, uturning out of potential yveltal checks to allow the user to bring in their magical yveltal-check-killer. While it does lack some firepower due to forgoing the Life Orb, it still has more than enough power to be an effective Dynamax abuser. Now, on to the magical yveltal-check-killer!


:dracovish:
Dracovish @ Choice Band
Ability: Strong Jaw
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Fishious Rend
- Outrage
- Earthquake
- Crunch

Presenting, the Vish! This abomination has enough firepower to ohko almost anything, barring Primal Groudons. It literally does 60 resisted to ferrothorn, and OHKOs non-defensive Primal Kyogres. It also has the firepower to ohko every single mon on the above list of yveltal checks, barring the support arceus formes, unless they switch in. While vish is slow, most yveltal checks and other defensive mons are slower, giving this thing plenty of opportunities to get kills.
252+ Atk Choice Band Strong Jaw Dracovish Fishious Rend (170 BP) vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Magearna: 471-555 (129.3 - 152.4%) -- guaranteed OHKO
252+ Atk Choice Band Strong Jaw Dracovish Fishious Rend (170 BP) vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Tyranitar: 984-1158 (243.5 - 286.6%) -- guaranteed OHKO
252+ Atk Choice Band Strong Jaw Dracovish Fishious Rend (170 BP) vs. 248 HP / 252+ Def Eviolite Chansey: 705-831 (100.2 - 118.2%) -- guaranteed OHKO
252+ Atk Choice Band Strong Jaw Dracovish Fishious Rend (170 BP) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Blissey: 966-1137 (135.2 - 159.2%) -- guaranteed OHKO
252+ Atk Choice Band Strong Jaw Dracovish Fishious Rend (170 BP) vs. 252 HP / 204+ Def Ho-Oh: 858-1010 (206.2 - 242.7%) -- guaranteed OHKO
252+ Atk Choice Band Strong Jaw Dracovish Fishious Rend (170 BP) vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Kyogre-Primal in Heavy Rain: 434-511 (107.4 - 126.4%) -- guaranteed OHKO
252+ Atk Choice Band Strong Jaw Dracovish Fishious Rend (170 BP) vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Ferrothorn: 210-248 (59.6 - 70.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ Atk Choice Band Strong Jaw Dracovish Fishious Rend (170 BP) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Zygarde: 336-396 (80 - 94.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ Atk Choice Band Strong Jaw Dracovish Fishious Rend (170 BP) vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Diancie: 746-878 (245.3 - 288.8%) -- guaranteed OHKO

As those calcs show, vish is an insanely powerful wallbreaker, capable of shredding some of the strongest walls in the metagame, as well as every yveltal check ever with its obscene firepower.
But wait, you say! Primal Groudon has an ability that renders this firepower useless! It can safely switch into Vish whenever it wants and generate free turns!
Wrong! 252+ Atk Choice Band Dracovish Earthquake vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Groudon-Primal: 144-170 (35.6 - 42%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
Groudon takes 35 to 40 on a well predicted switchin. It can't do that more than a few times without losing a significant amount of defensive utility. While it is true that vish can hand an opponent quite a few free turns, it's also true that it can more than make up for whatever free turns an opponent gets by killing or severely damaging a mon every time it comes in. When paired with the paralysis-spreading prowess of a Zygarde-Complete, Vish is capable of shredding offensive and defensive cores alike.
And now, a few replays to back it up. Unfortunately, some of the replays with the yveltal set are private, so I can't share them here.
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1073691442
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1073959250
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1080796698
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1080791541
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1077790417
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1077778480

In conclusion,
:dracovish:
VISH -> D / C

also I didn't spam sprites this time yay (I learned my lesson lol)
e: minor grammar fix and misc. explanation improvements & spleling fix
 
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Kate

Metamodernity
is a Tiering Contributoris a Past SCL Champion
RBTT Champion
Hola, here to comment on some stuff.

Icemaster made a post nomming Ultra back up to A-, but I honestly think this should've never dropped and still belongs in A. Balance is clearly the best style rn and Ultra feasts on common builds. DM, Ho-oh, Pdon get that shit outta here. All ya really gotta do is waste dmax, set up ddance (this is extraordinarily easy this gen, nothing throws out wisps anymore) and just win late game.

To segway here, many people don't like Ultra because ur taking the DM slot so u can't check xern, but imma just say it, xern is overrated af still. There is simply no way Dusk Mane is going to be able to check a xern team throughout the match while still being able to dmax and take max flares. But MDB, you may say, isn't this going against what you are arguing? Yes and no. Realistically if you are playing a competent player, Xern is claiming a kill no matter what. Dusk Mane isn't preventing this. Additionally, anybody worth a damn can outplay the shit out of Xern and waste its dmax p easily. Basically, you don't need Dusk Mane as your only way to Beat Xern, and this helps both Ultra and hurts Xern. If you seriously think "I can only beat xern with Dusk Mane" Then you are either entirely absent of the reality of the meta or an incompetent player. Tons of my builds just exclude DM and I never struggle with Xern. This shouldn't drop, but it is seriously a lot worse than Zygod, DM, and potentially Zacian. The former two play pivotal Defensive and Offensive roles, and I'll stand by the fact that a well played Zacian can win any MU.

Is Pogre A- worthy? It seemed to be a fair question last gen and holds true now. After using purely offensive Pogre, I have to conclude that it is way too MU based to be near the higher ranks. Defensive Pogre on the other hand is just downright fucking obnoxious. It's still p MU based but if u do get the MU you p much just win on preview barring hax. I do believe it deserves A-, but if it does get that, expect it to drop quickly, Ferro is everywhere now, and Power Whip should be p obligatory coverage rn.

Fuck yeah Ferro is A-, annoying ass mon. Hate it yet can't get enough of it.

I agree with all of Zayele s noms except for Chansey, this is way way too straining to build around and you're better off just using Dusk Mane or ttar to check the respective Dmax threat.

Dracovish sucks. Trick Room Sucks. New gen does not mean this weird E tier stuff got better. If someone were to actually give me like some tour replays that'd be gr8, but Dracovish isn't viable simply cuz it can put in work on paraspam. The fact that the entire team needs to be tailor made to help this thing out should be a sign. And please, can we all stop running Twave DM? Who came up with this? Why? What is this doing except giving its checks free turns?? I thought this thing would die off after gen 7 smh...

Quick one:
:vivillon: B --> C
This is awful. No one uses this. Ho cannot afford to run shitmons like this when it's already strained enough. Plus goggles zygarde being on half of teams ensures that it will do nothing.

Controversial opinions, yeah, but I think most ppl are tired of natdex's bs at this point, so who rly cares.
 
Hola, here to comment on some stuff.

Icemaster made a post nomming Ultra back up to A-, but I honestly think this should've never dropped and still belongs in A. Balance is clearly the best style rn and Ultra feasts on common builds. DM, Ho-oh, Pdon get that shit outta here. All ya really gotta do is waste dmax, set up ddance (this is extraordinarily easy this gen, nothing throws out wisps anymore) and just win late game.

To segway here, many people don't like Ultra because ur taking the DM slot so u can't check xern, but imma just say it, xern is overrated af still. There is simply no way Dusk Mane is going to be able to check a xern team throughout the match while still being able to dmax and take max flares. But MDB, you may say, isn't this going against what you are arguing? Yes and no. Realistically if you are playing a competent player, Xern is claiming a kill no matter what. Dusk Mane isn't preventing this. Additionally, anybody worth a damn can outplay the shit out of Xern and waste its dmax p easily. Basically, you don't need Dusk Mane as your only way to Beat Xern, and this helps both Ultra and hurts Xern. If you seriously think "I can only beat xern with Dusk Mane" Then you are either entirely absent of the reality of the meta or an incompetent player. Tons of my builds just exclude DM and I never struggle with Xern. This shouldn't drop, but it is seriously a lot worse than Zygod, DM, and potentially Zacian. The former two play pivotal Defensive and Offensive roles, and I'll stand by the fact that a well played Zacian can win any MU.

Is Pogre A- worthy? It seemed to be a fair question last gen and holds true now. After using purely offensive Pogre, I have to conclude that it is way too MU based to be near the higher ranks. Defensive Pogre on the other hand is just downright fucking obnoxious. It's still p MU based but if u do get the MU you p much just win on preview barring hax. I do believe it deserves A-, but if it does get that, expect it to drop quickly, Ferro is everywhere now, and Power Whip should be p obligatory coverage rn.

Fuck yeah Ferro is A-, annoying ass mon. Hate it yet can't get enough of it.

I agree with all of Zayele s noms except for Chansey, this is way way too straining to build around and you're better off just using Dusk Mane or ttar to check the respective Dmax threat.

Dracovish sucks. Trick Room Sucks. New gen does not mean this weird E tier stuff got better. If someone were to actually give me like some tour replays that'd be gr8, but Dracovish isn't viable simply cuz it can put in work on paraspam. The fact that the entire team needs to be tailor made to help this thing out should be a sign. And please, can we all stop running Twave DM? Who came up with this? Why? What is this doing except giving its checks free turns?? I thought this thing would die off after gen 7 smh...

Quick one:
:vivillon: B --> C
This is awful. No one uses this. Ho cannot afford to run shitmons like this when it's already strained enough. Plus goggles zygarde being on half of teams ensures that it will do nothing.

Controversial opinions, yeah, but I think most ppl are tired of natdex's bs at this point, so who rly cares.
Hi MDB, that's some decent points there. I finally know how to use sprites, yay! I would also like to add that what potentially makes Zygarge-Complete, Zacian-Crowned, and Necrozma-DM better than Xerneas right now is that they still have extremely solid roles outside of Dynamax. Xerneas can struggle to have offensive presence when its doesn't set up safely, eliminate/weaken certain foes, or only can set up Geomancy. Right now, there's lots of competition for the Dynamaxer on teambuilidng, and Xerneas (while still being great) is not as splashable.

I used to doubt the power of Yveltal during the early meta of Xerneas, just look at my previous posts. But after being open-minded, I ditched Geomancy Xerneas entirely for Yveltal for my team. Then I realized, "oh gosh, what an amazing difference"! Xerneas wastes a Dynamax slot that should be for Yveltal, in most cases. That's not even discounting the turn you leave WIDE open or 4MSS for Ditto, Primal Groudon, Zacian-Crowned, Necrozma-DM, Ferrothorn, Chansey, Protect counterplay, switching out, or gosh name something else (See Chloe's wonderful post in AG Metagame Thread for a more comphrensive list of Xerneas checks). Dynamax + Geomancy Xerneas has a linear role in this meta, and such there is easily linear counterplay that comes with it (and yes, as listed above not all reliable/viable checks to Xerneas is solely Necrozma-DM). Other than the Geomancy +Dynamax set, Xerneas really lacks other noteworthy roles, as Choice Specs, Choice Scarfs, or clerics is not as potent for now.

1584747816980.png
and
1584747829641.png
are S-tier worthy mons with plentiful roles without Dynamax. I mean we have Coil + Status + Rest, DD, and Defensive variants of
1584747955645.png
, and due to its insane bulk, most of the time it doesn't need to Dynamax to withstand powerful attacks. Heck, this thing can eat a STAB +1 and +2 Photon Geyser from Ultra-Necrozma and +1 DD Life Orb Mega-Rayquaza and STILL transform into Zygarde-Complete kinda okayish and retaliate with status, sub, etc. (see "calcs" for proof). The only thing it sucks against is Xerneas, Yveltal, Primal-Kygore, Mega-Gengar (sometimes) and the occasional Judgement + Ice Beam Arceus formes.
1584747829641.png
on the other hand, benefits more from Dynamaxing to absorb attacks as a anti-Xerneas defensive backbone and to sweep, but I personally think the biggest thing going for it right now is its unpredictability, which benefits DD Ultra Necrozma. You must scout for Weakness Policy + Dynamax, DD Necrozma-DM + Dynamax, Ultra Necrozma, Stealth Rocker, Physically Defensive, and Specially Defensive sets. If you are a smart player, you can easily mislead your opponent into thinking its something else, and get a free DD + Ultra Burst or kill. With Xerneas being less of a menace, Necrozma-DM can still check it and be Ultra-Necrozma.

Also,
1584750379730.png
could check Geomancy Xerneas, even when Dynamaxed.
1584750419343.png
has a decent chance at surviving a Max Lighting from a boosted Xerneas and OHKO with the effect of Behemoth Blade. Not saying it should be your definitive Xerneas check, especially if it has not been scouted for Hidden Power Fire or Ground, but its worth mentioning. Nearly every balance team and offensive team can appreciate
1584752189730.png
whittling down, 2HKOing, and OKHOing their checks and counters, and it does not need to Dynamax or set up to accomplish this unlike Xerneas. It may only have wallbreaker or all-out-attacker roles without Dynamax, but it sure lacks competition for that role because it is so good in what it wants from the start unlike Xerneas. I am not going to argue if Xerneas is better than Zacian-Crowned or vice versa, because I really haven't really thought out a sound arguement yet. Anyone else?

Xerneas is still great. But "broken on paper, easily played around in reality".

  • +2 252+ SpA Xerneas Max Lightning vs. 4 HP / 0 SpD Zacian-Crowned: 300-353 (92 - 108.2%) -- 50% chance to OHKO (outspeeds Zacian at +2 speed)
    • +1 252+ Atk Zacian-Crowned Behemoth Blade (200 BP) vs. 0 HP / 108 Def Dynamax Xerneas: 1226-1446 (155.9 - 183.9%) -- guaranteed OHKO
  • +1 252+ Atk Necrozma-Ultra Photon Geyser vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Zygarde: 204-241 (48.5 - 57.3%) -- 46.9% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
  • +1 252+ Atk Necrozma-Ultra Photon Geyser vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Zygarde-Complete: 204-241 (32 - 37.8%) -- 0.5% chance to 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
  • +2 252+ Atk Necrozma-Ultra Photon Geyser vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Zygarde-Complete: 273-322 (42.9 - 50.6%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery (do note that a +2 Necrozma Ultra will 2HKO Zygarde in its base form).
  • +1 252+ Atk Life Orb Rayquaza-Mega Dragon Ascent vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Zygarde-Complete: 339-399 (53.3 - 62.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery (can't switch in)
 
1584924030194.png
B- to B

I think regular Kyogre is also underated at the moment. It's really quite terrifying to face a scarf Ogre in the back knowing that you must play your Pdon perfectly not to get swept late game by Water Spout / Ice Beam or a Dynamax combo of the two. Kyogre draws in Pdon like a magnet, making for very easy doubles. If you're crazy you can run Groundium Dugtrio to zap Pdon. (you can also matchup fish and run multiple Ogres/Pogres/Dracovish to overwhelm your opponent, I have not yet seen a team with multiple Pdons)

In Gens following ORAS, an ever larger crop of things that can heavily chunk Pdon exist, which makes Kyogre ever more viable. Whether that's Close Combat Zacain-C, EQ Dusk Mane, it doesn't matter. If Pdon takes either of those moves, it can no longer switch into your Ice Beam. Pdon has 90 special defense. 90! that's it! You can break this thing. It doesn't have leftovers, it doesn't have recovery and can't Dynamax. 90 special defense is all that stands between you and spamming water spout.

While ferrothorn is quite useful in this tier I have only seen it a handful of times in many dozens of games. Quite a few teams I play with and play against can get decimated by Scarf Ogre. The overabundance of passive Ho-Ohs and Dusk Manes and the prominence of Arceus Ground as the only good support Arceus put a lot of builds in checkmate situations when Ogre is alive. It's head and shoulders above the stuff in B-.

Also here let me lament there is no Primal Rain weather move like Rain Dance, it would be so nice to flex on dumb Pdon users.


1584924959043.png
B to B-

It's not good. In a tier full of Dusk Manes running Knock Off and Toxic, (and toxic generally, it's all over this tier) I truly don't see this mon ever getting anything done. It can phase SD Ray if Multiscale is intact (which it could be, more people should run boots on this thing) but if you have any chip at all you just die. It's a huge momentum sap and can't status or phaze DynaGeoXern. DD Dragon Tail Zygarde actually uses it for setup fodder. The abundance of Boots Defog Ho-Oh also means that whirlwind fishing for Ho-Oh is not really a thing like in older gens. Whenever I see my opponent using Lugia I generally breath a sigh of relief because I feel like I am playing a 6-5. A mon that loses to the entire S rank really has no niche.
 
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bigtalk

Banned deucer.
My nominations:

:lunala: A- >> B+

There has been an increase in Yveltal / Tyranitar usage, and more Zacian-C are running Crunch. It's also a shaky check to basically everything (barring Ultra Necrozma / offensive Dusk Mane) so it's very much like Arceus-Water in that sense.

:amoonguss: D >> C

Checks what it's supposed to (including 2 top-tier threats) + has decent punish options for most of its switch-ins + I see it being used on serious teams, so I think a rise is fair.

Opinions on other nominations:

:arceus:(ground) A- >> A

Neutral on this moving up, but I disagree with the reasoning. Saying it's a consistent check to Zacian-C / Eternatus is misleading because it can't switch into them reliably, and support with Stone Edge is not that good imo since you need substantial chip on Ho-Oh before you can kill it.

:gengar-mega: A >> A-

I dunno how I feel about a drop. I think it's gotten less common, but that doesn't necessarily correlate with viability. It shouldn't matter that "Dynamax is such a horrible thing for it" because its whole purpose is to waste Dynamax so that one of its teammates can sweep. I suppose the increase in Yveltal usage hurts it though (Tyranitar not necessarily, since it should be running Focus Blast).

:kyogre-primal: B+ >> A-

Yes, defensive sets are super annoying and wall a bunch of Pokemon on fat teams, offensive sets are really good with proper prediction since people are running shakier water resists.

:necrozma-ultra: B+ >> A-

Agree. As others have mentioned, this is very threatening to balance / typically forces you to waste Dynamax, which can really open up the door for other sweepers. I would not put it in A though since it's very hard to build around outside of hyper offense.

:ferrothorn: B+ >> A-

Disagree, definitely does not need to go higher than B+. Has bad matchup against everything A and higher + a strong Kyogre check is really more of a luxury rather than a necessity in this meta, since Kyogre isn't the biggest threat out there. It's not splashable at all unless you are (:eyes:) a person who exclusively uses fat teams. Refer to my earlier post for more on this.

:arceus:(fairy) C >> B-

Neutral; good check to Zygarde, bad rocker, iffy check to Yveltal. Assuming your goal is to switch into Yveltal and beat it 1v1, you have to run a very spdef spread (244 / 176+ / 88), and your strategy is to:
  • switch in as they Dynamax and use Max Airstream
  • Dynamax yourself and use Max Guard
  • Max Starfall as they use Max Airstream on their last turn of Dynamax (this won't kill them)
  • Max Starfall again as they revert to normal and use Oblivion Wing
You don't have any chance to Recover during all of this, so that means you have to tank Max Airstream raw + Max Airstream while Dynamaxed + Oblivion Wing while Dynamaxed if you want to switch in safely. Calcs:
  • 252+ SpA Life Orb Yveltal Max Airstream vs. 244 HP / 176+ SpD Arceus-Fairy: 207-243 (46.8 - 54.9%) -- 67.6% chance to 2HKO
  • 252+ SpA Life Orb Yveltal Max Airstream vs. 244 HP / 176+ SpD Dynamax Arceus-Fairy: 207-243 (23.4 - 27.4%) -- 72.9% chance to 4HKO
  • 252+ SpA Life Orb Yveltal Oblivion Wing vs. 244 HP / 176+ SpD Dynamax Arceus-Fairy: 126-149 (14.2 - 16.8%) -- possible 6HKO

  • 0 SpA Pixie Plate Arceus-Fairy Max Starfall vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Dynamax Yveltal: 398-470 (50.6 - 59.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
If you add up all the high rolls, that comes out to just under 100%, meaning you have to be perfectly healthy to switch in safely.

:blastoise-mega: C >> D

Neutral because I have not seen / used this in months.

:chansey: C >> B-

Agree, it's a solid check to something (a top-tier threat at that), which cannot be said of any of the other mons in C. Even if it's very passive, it has access to some amazing and rare support options like Wish / Heal Bell.

:zekrom: B+ >> B

Sadly, I have to support this nomination. I argued with Zayele about this one for a while, but the fact of the matter is, you usually have to Dynamax in order to sweep effectively with this, so in that way it's similar to Mewtwo.

:xerneas: S- >> S

Disagree, I think it's usually hard to sweep with this given Dusk Mane / Ditto are on every other team and people are learning how to play around its Dynamax turns.

:zygarde-complete: A+ >> S-

Sure, although my opinion of it hasn't changed since the last update (I still think it's good). Dragon Dance sets have also made some nice showings in recent games, so there's probably something to be said for that.

:vivillon: B >> C

Sure, Whirlwind Ho-Oh means most balance teams already have a built-in way to deal with this unless it's lastmon.

:kyogre: B- >> B

Agree, Choice Scarf isn't terrible since teams are using shakier water resists. Having the flexibility to Dynamax is also great, letting you unexpectedly bulk attacks from Zacian-C / Mega Rayquaza or run sets like this. It's definitely better than stuff like Arceus-Dark and Arceus-Rock.

:lugia: B >> B-

Agree, I don't see a reason to use this over Lunala, plus there's been more Yveltal / Tyranitar usage.
 

Kate

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:amoonguss: D >> C

Checks what it's supposed to (including 2 top-tier threats) + has decent punish options for most of its switch-ins + I see it being used on serious teams, so I think a rise is fair.
I fail to understand this. After Xerneas you have to look to A- to see another thing amoong doesn't lose to. (offensive zygarde easily beats this and all the others are p explanatory). It's way of punishing switchins relies on predicts so if u don't get it it's just free momentum. It's also quite hard to build around, requiring a lot of support to make work. Doesn't rly make sense to use this as Dusk Mane is literally just better at checking xern. I don't really get what serious teams you've seen this on(Can't rly count ktut's g2 team vs pichus, anyone can see that team was not good) With Xern being less and less common I don't see any sort of draw for a pokemon that often just sacrifices momentum. C is just an absolute no, and is definitely one of the weaker D tiers. Can't say I haven't used it anymore.
 

Guard

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Although there have been a fair amount of changes in the S-rank since the inauguration of this thread, I believe most of us will agree that the uppermost echelon of the metagame can be represented in a more correct fashion than what is insinuated by the current version of the VR. Hence, as a result of the constricted nature of this metagame with several Pokemon being head and shoulders above the rest, I believe these should all rise a subrank:
:sm/yveltal::sm/xerneas::sm/zygarde-complete:

Which means the ideal VR for the current metagame would look like the following:
S+
:yveltal: Yveltal

S
:xerneas: Xerneas

S-
:necrozma-dusk-mane: Necrozma-Dusk-Mane
:zacian-crowned: Zacian-Crowned
:zygarde-complete: Zygarde-Complete

First of all, Xerneas is much better than a ranking next to Zacian-C and Necrozma-DM might imply. Although it is much less splashable than both, this does not take away the fact that Xerneas is exponentially more influential, both in teambuilding and in practice. Even though current teambuilding has done a good job at somewhat keeping Xerneas from cleaning from the get go, Xerneas builds taking advantage of its disadvantages have been popping up more and more often. These builds tend to overpower Necrozma-DM/force the opponent's Dynamax with the likes of Swords Dance Zacian-C, Mega Mewtwo Y, Ultra Necrozma and Mega Rayquaza, which allows Xerneas to clean up in a very reliable manner. As a result, Xerneas is still much more overbearing to face than its rankmates and therefore still feels like an S rank threat, which logically should lead to it being ranked higher than both of them.

Yveltal at S+ is a direct consequence of Xerneas being ranked at S, since it is undoubtedly better than Xerneas and it would have been odd to rank them next to each other. Besides, the community already agrees that Yveltal is entirely on another level compared to everything else, so S+ only seems fitting in this case in order to still distinguish it from Xerneas, which is de facto an S rank threat, from whatever perspective you may look at it.

Zygarde-C, similarly to Zacian-C and Necrozma-DM, is an incredibly splashable threat on the vast majority of Balance/BO builds with its defensive Coil/Haze set, having near unmatched checking prowess and being the most reliable status absorber in the tier, while also proving to be quite the offensive threat itself if it opts for Coil. Therefore, it is a defensive glue that is often not replaceable with one slot only due to its sheer role compression. However, Zygarde-C is also able to forfeit some of its defensive qualities and run its flagship offensive Dragon Dance + Dragon Tail set. The sheer effectiveness of this set may not be forgotten when talking about Zygarde-C, as it is able to completely 6-0 the overmajority of teams sans Arceus and opposing Haze Zygarde-C, and often breaks through these regardless with appropriate team support and Dynamax. All things considered, Zygarde-C is quite clearly fit to rise to S-. The only reason it didn't last slate was the fact that it would have been very controversial to rank it next to Xerneas, which will not be an issue if Xerneas and Yveltal rise to S and S+ respectively.
The metagame has evolved a fair bit after this post, so consider what is outlined below as an update to this post.

:sm/yveltal:

First of all, I am not as sure about ranking Yveltal separately from S as I was at the time. Make no mistake, Yveltal at S+ is still a very fair and warranted nomination. However, it is undeniable that the metagame has started to adapt to Yveltal, mainly with the rise of Specially Defensive Protect Ho-Oh. Contrarily though, Yveltal is also starting to adapt to this specific trend with the more and more common inclusion of Rock Slide in its moveset, ultimately making it even more threatening on the whole than it was in the first place. The metagame needs to be gauged in the upcoming weeks in order to see how Yveltal counterplay develops, and whether this counterplay restricts Yveltal sufficiently, before I am to finalize my vote on this.

:sm/zygarde-complete: A+ >>> S

Zygarde-C has been steadily improving throughout the generation, and it is finally at a point where an S ranking is worth considering. From a teambuilding perspective, its Dragon Dance set is one of the frontrunners when it comes to sheer influence on the defensive metagame. The amount of opportunities it gets to safely set up a Substitute and boost up is ridiculously large in the current metagame, where Necrozma-DM, Ho-Oh, Coil Zygarde and, in a lesser fashion, Ferrothorn, are immensely splashable staples. This ubiquity of setup opportunities, paired with its pseudo-immunity to phasing due to Dragon Tail, culminates to it being the most flexible setup sweeper in the tier by far, while also being outright impossible to check without dedicated countermeasures (i.e. Haze Zygarde and Ice Beam Arceus forms). An additionally important thing to note is the fact that unlike the remaining two members of the Aura trio, Zygarde often does not need Dynamax to run through a team, which gives its team a significant amount of breathing room against obscene wallbreakers such as Yveltal, Zacian-C, Band Mega Rayquaza and U-Necrozma, without necessarily compromising the wincon prowess. And last but probably least, the nature of phasing on a setup sweeper of this calibre may not be underestimated. Besides the fact that Dragon Tail proofs Zygarde against opposing Dragon Tail Zygarde and Whirlwind Ho-Oh, it also increases the amount of free turns Zygarde-C is able to create for itself, due to the very nature of phasing being random, which often forces Pokemon that are complete setup bait for Zygarde into battle.

While Dragon Dance is the main argument for Zygarde to be ranked at S, it is also worth noting that the defensive Haze set is more clutch than ever, as a direct consequence of Dragon Dance’s contemporary prominence as well as the increased success of Calm Mind Refresh Arceus forms, while Coil-Glare sets remain as good as ever.

This means that the contemporary S-ranks look either like this:
S+
:yveltal: Yveltal

S
:xerneas: Xerneas
:zygarde-complete: Zygarde-Complete

S-
:necrozma-dusk-mane: Necrozma-Dusk-Mane
:zacian-crowned: Zacian-Crowned
or like this:
S
:xerneas: Xerneas
:yveltal: Yveltal
:zygarde-complete: Zygarde-Complete

S-
:necrozma-dusk-mane: Necrozma-Dusk-Mane
:zacian-crowned: Zacian-Crowned

A few more nominations without much of an explanation:

:sm/arceus-ground: & :sm/arceus-water: to A and A- respectively

Both Arceus-Ground and Arceus-Water deserve the rise fair and square due to the renaissance of Supportceus in general because of Refresh and due to Zygarde's current griphold on the metagame, with Support Arceus formes being one of the very few reliable countermeasures.

:sm/tyranitar-mega: Slash alongside Tyranitar

Mega Tyranitar not having a rank is an oversight of the council, as the Mega-slot competition is unprecedentedly low and Mega Tyranitar has significantly more bulk and power than Tyranitar, while offering the same checking prowess.

Furthermore, I agree with :kyogre-primal:, :ferrothorn:, :necrozma-ultra:, and :amoonguss: rising, all of Zayele's nominations, and :lugia: and :vivillon: dropping. Disagree with the rest.
 
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pichus

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couple of nominations before we update the VR:

Gliscor: UR to B+

trapped (Gliscor) (F) @ Toxic Orb
Ability: Poison Heal
EVs: 248 HP / 232 SpD / 24 Spe (or an alternative spread for ladder: EVs: 248 HP / 68 SpD / 192 Spe)
Careful Nature
- Sand Tomb
- Roost
- Ice Fang / Toxic / Defog
- Taunt

shoutout to bigtalk for reminding me that this exists. I'm really surprised that none of us discovered this earlier since this was a viable mon last gen and this gen it is the literal definition of an anti meta pokemon. This can easily switch into any form of Zygarde, Ho-Oh, Dusk Mane and Groudon (minus Eruption and Fire Blast sets) and checks a variety of other common pokemons such as Ferrothorn, Tyranitar, Support Arceus lacking Ice Beam (this is uncommon but Toxic ReRe Ground, Fairyceus and Darkceus still see some usage) and even Eternatus if played right. On top of this, its a solid status absorber and also doesnt get trapped by Gothitelle. This mon functions in a simple way. Sand Tomb is used to trap grounded foes, mainly Groudon, Zygarde and Dusk Mane. Taunt ensures that they cant click their recovery move. Roost is for recovery and a variety of options can be used for the 4th slot. I personally like using Ice Fang which helps it check DD Zygarde and not give free switchins to Rayquaza. Toxic is not a super important move since the only relevant target is Ho-Oh which is really easy to status anyway. Defog can be used on stall teams or balance teams which desperately require a Defogger. From my experience, Ice Fang is superior to Toxic or Defog but any of these can be used depending on the requirement. It is EV'd in order to tank Overheats from Groudon, since you dont need Defense investment to beat support DM, Ho-Oh or Zyg. Physically defensive spread can be used to beat DD Zygarde and soft check Zacian and Band Yveltal. I'll drop a bunch of calcs to showcase how it beats the threats which I mentioned. I believe Gliscor is a really splashable pokemon since it hard checks the standard defensive backbone of this meta and provides excellent utility in general. Moreover, pairing it with the right teammates such as Xerneas, CM Waterceus and such is the way to go since they really benefit from the removal of Dusk Mane and Groudon respectively. I think ranking it anywhere below B+ is a crime since this actually does stuff and can fit easily on teams (cant say the same for most mons lower than B+).

Groudon Primal
0 SpA Groudon-Primal Overheat vs. 248 HP / 232+ SpD Gliscor in Harsh Sunshine: 262-310 (74.2 - 87.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Poison Heal
0 Atk Groudon-Primal Stone Edge vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Gliscor: 100-118 (28.3 - 33.4%) -- possible 5HKO after Poison Heal
Gliscor can freely switch into Overheat and Roost. If Groudon decides to stay in for whatever reason, you just Sand Tomb and Taunt to prevent Rest, Rocks or Roar.

Ho-Oh
0 Atk Ho-Oh Sacred Fire vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Gliscor: 111-132 (31.4 - 37.3%) -- 50.6% chance to 4HKO after Poison Heal
0 Atk Ho-Oh Brave Bird vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Gliscor: 135-159 (38.2 - 45%) -- 42.9% chance to 3HKO after Poison Heal

Zygarde
+1 216 Atk Zygarde Thousand Arrows vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Gliscor: 147-174 (41.6 - 49.2%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Poison Heal
0 Atk Gliscor Ice Fang vs. 12 HP / 36+ Def Zygarde: 136-164 (37.7 - 45.5%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
0 Atk Gliscor Ice Fang vs. 12 HP / 36+ Def Zygarde-Complete: 136-164 (23.6 - 28.4%) -- possible 5HKO after Leftovers recovery
This is a bit tricky so you have to play it well. Usually if you have a supportceus or Haze Zyg in the back, you can easily check it.

defensive does baby damage and fang + taunt ensures that it doesnt stay healthy when trapped by sand tomb.

Necrozma Dusk Mane
0 Atk Necrozma-Dusk-Mane Sunsteel Strike vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Gliscor: 132-156 (37.3 - 44.1%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after toxic damage
Glisc sand tombs, taunts and spams roost if it loses health.

Ferrothorn and TTar are self explanatory since they dont have any strong move. Taunt + Tomb shuts them down.

Zacian-C
+1 252+ Atk Zacian-Crowned Behemoth Blade (100 BP) vs. 248 HP / 252+ Def Gliscor: 204-240 (57.7 - 67.9%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Poison Heal
The trick is to switch into CC or Wild Charge, spam roost and eventually force him out.

Warning: please dont play aggressively with this if the orb isnt activated >_<. Gliscor really does not like having its Toxic Orb knocked off or getting burned. Its reallyy simple to do this so dont try to rush it.

Arceus-Poison: D to C

this
post basically but it also acts as a pivot to Eternatus and can act as an emergency Yveltal check and is a nice status spreader at the same time. Is a nice pick for teams which want to reserve DM for checking Zacian or those which use Unecro or DD DM. I think its underused and a rise to C is fair.

oh and I agree with everything Guardsweeper said in the above post ^
 

Iguana

formerly mc56556
Hello, all!

I don't spend much time here as I find the obsession over VR nominations rather strange myself, but I thought I would lend my voice to a few of these considerations.

Ferrothorn: B+ --> A-
I very much agree with Icemaster on this, and we've discussed this several times. Ferrothorn has a wide range of moves and sets that can thwart at least some of the meta. I have been seeing Primal Kyogre/Scarf Kyogre more often recently, and Ferrothorn still provides one of, if not the best, check to both. I could make an entire post on the functions of Knock Off Ferrthorn in the Gen 8 metagame. I've used it ever since day one of Galar Dex AG, and it puts in so much work. Personally, I think it's been to some degree overlooked because of the omnipresence of Knock Off NDM (which is also very good, as we all know). While Knock Off Ferro has been around in other tiers for some time now, it's just recently become relevant in AG because of the number of items that can be Knocked Off this Gen (as opposed to the previous Gen where Arceus formes with their Plates or Z-move items, Megas with their Mega-Evolve items, and Primals with their Orbs dominated the metagame). Protect, as Icemaster mentioned, is great for wasting Dynamax turns, and it takes advantage of already being a staple move of Ferrothorn's. And of course that coordinates well with Leech Seed for constant HP recovery. Gyro Ball with a Sassy nature (to increase Speed disparities) is something I like to use after my friend showed it to me last Gen. Bullet Seed is one of my favorite go-tos on Ferro right now because of its ability to hit Kyogre hard and also to break through Smeargle's Subs and paper-thin Defense (gotta have your anti-cancer measures, people). Spikes is one of Ferrothorn's most utilized moves, and it's helpful to wear down teams over long battles. There are plenty of more niche moveslot options as well: I've seen Thunder Wave, Stealth Rock (not the best Rocker, but it's interesting to consider), Toxic, and more. I could keep going, but the bottom line is yes, I think Ferrothorn's viability right now justifies a VR boost up to A-. MDB summed it up pretty well when he said about Ferrothorn: "hate it but can't get enough of it."

Lugia: B --> B-
I very much disagree with this. I think Lugia's viability has been largely overlooked in Nat Dex AG, and that's coming from a person who spent a great deal of time trying to get balance teams in SM AG with Lugia to work. NOW we have an absolute miracle to Lugia in the form of Heavy-Duty Boots. I've loved hearing about how people are tinkering with Lugia sets so far, ranging from options like Thunder-Wave, to Ice Beam, to Psychic, etc. Some are more gimmicky than others, but it is indicative of how Lugia doesn't need the standard Sub, Roost, Toxic, Whirlwind set of SM AG to function well in this meta. B is the proper VR ranking for Lugia at this time, and it should not be changed.

Groundceus: A- --> A
YES. I'm very glad to hear several others agree with this as well because Groundceus truly is one of the most viable Pokémon in Nat Dex AG at the moment. It is very splashable, and its ability to check and/or counter Primal Groudon, Ho-Oh (with Refresh or Stone Edge), Mray, Zacian-C (still is 2HKOd by Behemoth Blade, but with Will-O-Wisp as an option and other counterplay, it's still a decent check), Zygarde (depending on whether you're running Ice Beam or not, but still, it works) makes it frankly harder to justify not running it. I could go on and on about Groundceus' viability, but I'm already writing an analysis on it, so I won't duplicate my efforts. lol But, yeah, A rank for this for sure.

And, my own nomination!

Shedinja: UR --> D
Sorry I'm late to the party on this, but I really disagreed with taking Shedinja off the VR ranking. First of all, it isn't like it was sporting some absurdly high VR ranking in the first place; D ranking on a VR does not equate to something being spectacular in a metagame. If Heavy-Duty Boots is a miracle for Lugia as I mentioned above, it's an absolute Godsend for Shedina, as you no longer need to diligently Defog off hazards to even allow it to come into play. Shedinja completely walls non-Toxic Primal Kyogre and Zacian-C without the proper coverage. Now, some people are using Crunch on Zacian-C, so I'm not going to get hasty, but there is a balance to be struck with it this Gen. While Swords Dance has fallen a bit out of favor, I'm seeing Protect Zacian-C more often (really cool idea by the way to scout for what your opponent locks themself into with Ditto Impostering your Zacian-C), which limits coverage options. Think about what Zacian-C wants to be running in this meta: Behemoth Blade, Close Combat, Wild Charge, Crunch, Sub, Protect, and other moves from time to time as well like Play Rough and Swords Dance. Out of that whole list, exactly one move hits Shedinja, and the beauty is that you can scout with Protect. I really like running Toxic / Will-O-Wisp / Protect / Shadow Sneak on Shedinja. Dual status-inflicting means you can hit all sorts of Pokémon with statuses; Protect grants you the aforementioned ability to scout; and Shadow Sneak is helpful for a little bit of offense, if your position warrants it. Just a last side-note about Shedinja as well: You can be very sly and Imposterproof your own Zacian-C on a team by giving it no moves that can hit Shedinja so that if a Ditto comes in after you've KOd an opponent's Pokémon, you can switch to your Shedinja with no fear whatsoever.

Waterceus: B+ --> A-
I'll co-nominate this with Guardsweeper. I almost cannot overstate how viable I think Waterceus is in this meta. Bacon is the best at using this effectively on many of his teams, and I love seeing him wield it every time. CM/Refresh Waterceus is a really cool option on balance teams, and it is a threat to Ho-Oh if allowed to boost with Calm Mind for a turn or two. Ice Beam and Judgement are both options, and sometimes even the two in tandem can work (though, you'd be sacrificing the ability to add other important moves, but it's something to consider). Waterceus I would argue is the best Refresh user of the Supportceus formes, and it is a staple on it this Gen. Waterceus is also a good Defogger, as it is unthreatened by Primal Groudon with physically defensive bulk and Refresh to prevent Toxic from accruing damage. Wild Charge on Zacian-C with an Adamant nature does hit Waterceus hard, but it does not OHKO with a 252 HP / 242 Def / 16 Speed / Bold nature spread, which is the most common EV spread for physically defensive Supportceus formes this Gen. Overall, I strongly urge a VR boost for Waterceus to A-; this seems like the perfect ranking for it right now.

Speed Round!

Fairyceus: Good nom by Zayele, but I echo bigtalk's concerns about it being an iffy Yveltal check this Gen. Still, I have seen some good teams recently with Fairyceus on them, so it's probably worth a small VR bump.

Mega-Blastoise: I disagree with dropping it down on the VR. I still enjoy using Mega-Blastoise and make good use of it. You have to play and build intelligently around it to make use of it being a late-game sweeper. Think of what your opponent might use to check this and then force them to use those checks on other Pokémon. Also, Primal Groudon needs to choose between running largely Special Defense in EVs or Defense, and if it chooses the latter, it's weaker to Mega-Blastoise.

Mega-Tyranitar: Yes, strongly agree with the discussion around Mega-Ttar having a place on VR. As has been said/alluded to, the Mega-Evolve spot is not as exclusive/necessary this Gen, so it's not a big deal to upgrade Tyranitar to Mega-Tyranitar, especially considering some of the stat boosts.
 

Geysers

not round
is a Community Contributoris a Team Rater Alumnusis a Tiering Contributor Alumnusis a Contributor Alumnus
:ss/excadrill:

B—>C
Last gen, excadrill’s big niche was being one of the few suicide leads capable of setting up rocks versus MSab. This gen, virtually no-one uses msab, at 1.6% usage, dramatically reducing exca’s niche over faster suicide leads such as deo-s or aerodactyl. For perspective, at this time last year, msab had 2.6% usage, owing to the fact that stall was actually usable. Excadrill also has mediocre speed compared to most other suicide leads that are available, which somewhat hurts its viability, and renders it more taunt-weak than others. Granted, its ability to use rapid spin places it head and shoulders above the closest comparable suicide lead, aerodactyl, allowing it to remove hazards through taunt, hence why I’m not nomming it to D.

TL;DR - exca’s niche that made it good last gen barely exists anymore

opinions:
waterceus to a-: absolutely, very solid check to a lot of the meta
yes mega Ttar should be on the vr. It’s even more of a pain than regular ttar
mega blastoise: yeah drop it
ferro to a-: yes definitely ferro is great
groundceus to a: yeah sure
shed to D: yeah why was this dropped in the first place? Blanket checks most zac sets, which is pretty dang handy
lugia to b-: absolutely
poisonceus to c: nah it’s not really good
gligar to b+: how about b- / c? I’ve tried it and it seems pretty lackluster, idk why someone would use this on a serious team tbh
zyg to s: absolutely this thing is as meta-defining as ygod, without a doubt.
ultra rising: yeah it’s good
amoongus rising: hard no
ogre rising: yeah
vish to d: yeah whoever made this nom was smart, good mon, 100% support
 
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