Metagame SV OU Metagame Discussion v4 [Volcarona Banned]

[veti]

Competitive: 7
Enjoyment: 5
Hypnosis spam is extremely unfun.

Sleep: 5
Banning it will make the meta healthier, more competitive and more cart accurate, all at the same time.

Tera: 1
I was ban tera during the first month of SV but since then I have grown to love what it does for both playing and teambuilding, tera feels very freeing and skill expressive to me and I'd be very sad if it was banned.

3, I feel that the ice typing and hazard weaknesses or being forced into boots holds Kyurem back but Kyurem definitely does deserve a suspect test

3, feels like too much of an autowin matchup into so many styles because of how hard it is to prevent it from setting up due to natural bulk, great defensive typing, recovery and burn immunity.

3, it's manageable but I don't like how limited the counterplay is

3, Archaludon is broken, eq and focus energy variants invalidate defensive teams while all offensive variants force two for one trades vs offense. Defensive Archaludon is super bad though please stop using dtail and rocks and shit for your own good.

1, extremely easy decision and idt they should even be on the survey at all. Banning Gholdengo solves absolutely nothing about hazards and Kingambit is manageable due to it's very limited timeframe of having 4/5 fallen.

1, maybe 2, potentially might be problematic in the future once people run more plot sets but it's fine rn.

 

[ianlazerbeem]

Happy Saturday to all survey fillers. Here are my votes:

Enjoyment - 6. A bit less "new drop novelty" but overall pretty pleased with how the meta has settled

Competitiveness - 4. A few cheese and fishy elements lower this, sleep being #1, but rain is also dominating in a way I'm not super comfortable with, some of those teams have very alarming power, and overall cheese strats like psyterrain are making a resurgence... balance is good, quite reliable, but a lot can go wrong quick and hax

Tera - yes and yes. I don't really think anything should be done right NOW - we need to wait until more people get fed up with the mechanic, maybe even with half measures like Tera blast. We need to get to a point where it's clear individual Pokémon aren't just the problem. But I will not let my vote manufacture consent for Tera action being taken off the table entirely, so I voted yes and yes. The second question is very deliberately worded with the "needs to be banned" phrasing, to force undecideds to vote no, creating an about 80-20 result that can be pointed to and labeled "look, almost nobody supports a ban on Tera" when the question is worded in such a way that someone on the fence would vote yes and only someone firmly committed and 100% sure on full ban would vote no.

- 5. Needs action! Bulk type and power are all an issue. Although Dragon Dance sets aren't great specs is clearly very powerful and is practically guaranteed progress that many teams can't really do anything about

- 4. emotionally Packing Heat is like a 3 but as the results are skewed towards no action to polarizing mons I am voting 4. Dragon Dance with that bulk and MORNING SUN is a bit much, the type makes counterplay fishy and earthquake access without Tera gives this Mon a pretty absurd kit, deserves suspect

- 4. Perhaps closer to 3 but if we all put 3 no action will come. Rain is very alarming and this being part of the core and this Pokémon is 100% free progress, almost always takes a Mon or two while racking up boosts, and the Archaludon threat allows Pokémon like Barraskewda to spin all over the enemy team. Very restricting for stall as well, forcing Clodsire, would love to use mons other than him! Please suspect!

- 5 always and forever. We stand with big stall.

- 1. Has not been an issue since July

- 1. No reason for this to be on survey at this point, fits well into lead situations and offense is somewhat potent but comfortably fits on the tier. Nothing crazier than Polteageist, or Indeedee, or Armarouge on Psyterrain, he's just part of the crew. Alolatales sidegrade

Write in - Damp Rock. 7 turns of Archaludon and/or Skewda is just too many. Weather speed boosting abilities were another write in. They all are contributors to speed tiers being wack, lilligant sleep spam, free massive damage with skewda (but skewda is not the problem as it's just a little better than legion and then Floatzel and then Golduck) ETC until you have 5-priority teams like the rain one that is very cheap. Heat rock may deserve a look later but not while rain is how it is.

 

[Xufactor]

Finally with responses to the survey people are not demonizing each other as during the sleep discussion.

 

[Mikegengsta]

I don’t see HowView attachment 594863 is remotely problematic even still, in fact it has gotten more and more tame in my opinion as time has progressed. Yes its bulky and can potentially sweep you but it has to weaken a team considerably before going for the sweep. It can trade well into everything, but then the opponent can likely respond to it in time afterwards, even with morning sun. Morning Sun’s low PP can also sometimes be a detriment to the DD sets against defensive teams, and it struggles vs unaware pokemon like dondozo. If you are running booster energy, you must run strong anti-hazard measures such as hatterene or multiple spinners, limiting usefulness. If you do not employ these measures, it gets shredded by rocks and can no longer sweep or trade effectively. HDB is the better item on it and is a great fit but it can lack power without a boost from its ability. It has ways to get around all types of counterplay, but it cannot get past every avenue of counterplay all at once, therefore I find it to be NOT broken at all. I find that View attachment 594865 is the much bigger problem here. Much more unpredictable and hard to stop after one turn than something like Gouging Fire or even Roaring Moon, who still has similar answers on most of its sets for the most part even if STAB Knock Off is insane. Kyurem can be physically or specially oriented, making it way more dangerous, not to mention the HDB are also excellent on top of specs and DD. If you guess the set wrong you auto lose most of the time. The other things on this list dont have this problem, therefore I find Kyurem to be banworthy and i think everything else is fince except maybe roaring moon but im not 100% sure about that.

Agreed

 

[BolTingBlazie]

I don’t see HowView attachment 594863 is remotely problematic even still, in fact it has gotten more and more tame in my opinion as time has progressed. Yes its bulky and can potentially sweep you but it has to weaken a team considerably before going for the sweep. It can trade well into everything, but then the opponent can likely respond to it in time afterwards, even with morning sun. Morning Sun’s low PP can also sometimes be a detriment to the DD sets against defensive teams, and it struggles vs unaware pokemon like dondozo. If you are running booster energy, you must run strong anti-hazard measures such as hatterene or multiple spinners, limiting usefulness. If you do not employ these measures, it gets shredded by rocks and can no longer sweep or trade effectively. HDB is the better item on it and is a great fit but it can lack power without a boost from its ability. It has ways to get around all types of counterplay, but it cannot get past every avenue of counterplay all at once, therefore I find it to be NOT broken at all. I find that View attachment 594865 is the much bigger problem here. Much more unpredictable and hard to stop after one turn than something like Gouging Fire or even Roaring Moon, who still has similar answers on most of its sets for the most part even if STAB Knock Off is insane. Kyurem can be physically or specially oriented, making it way more dangerous, not to mention the HDB are also excellent on top of specs and DD. If you guess the set wrong you auto lose most of the time. The other things on this list dont have this problem, therefore I find Kyurem to be banworthy and i think everything else is fince except maybe roaring moon but im not 100% sure about that.

Yeah the fact that Gouging Fire has to choose it's checks and counters is what keeps it fine for me

 

[ianlazerbeem]

Yeah the fact that Gouging Fire has to choose it's checks and counters is what keeps it fine for me

This is just untrue, EQ + Fire Stab hits pretty much everything, and if "struggling against Dondozo" means a Pokémon isn't banworthy then we had better free Sneasler. Boots being the only real set is not a problem because hazard immunity is great, and booster isn't great sure but we are rating brokenness on the best sets not the worst ones. Its ability gives it a massive boost in the sun, so we should be evaluating boots and the occasional choiced sets in the sun, not subpar sets where gouging isn't supported by its team. We can look at the context and see that rain is overall more dominant and makes maintaining sun pressure a little difficult, but Sun is a very match up fishy playstyle right now and gouging fire specifically is very potent with very little counterplay in the sun, certainly moreso than walking wake.

 

[Divine Retribution]

Wasn't the fact hat it could choose its checks and bypass pretty much any of them even if it couldn't beat them all at the same time part of the reason why we banned Magearna? Doesn't seem like great logic to me.

What separates Gouging Fire from other wallbreakers for me is the fact that its sets aren't even bad against the match-up it doesn't just flat out demolish. If you run Choice Band Sun, Stall just fucking loses, but you're still bulky enough and just fast enough that you can probably nab a kill or two against offense, especially if you can position it well. Similarly, DD doesn't just 6-0 fat the way CB does, but if you can weaken their bulky Water, it still does a ton of work, and a DD mon having reliable recovery means it can fish for multiple set-up opportunities throughout the match, which puts a ton of pressure on stall teams to play optimally and reserve their bulky Waters or whatever for it.

All in all this Pokemon just does too much, and the CB Sun set has basically no defensive counterplay except maybe like Tera Grass Heatran. I lean pretty heavily towards the side of it being broken.

 

[Will of Fire]

The SV OU tiering survey is up: https://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/sv-ou-tiering-surveys.3711911/page-2#post-9942563

Please fill it out this weekend. Thanks!

Good job with this last survey. I was just wondering, how are they going to convince the community on the sleep matter? Picking between darkrai in particular as the issue or sleep moves as a all won't be that easy. Then you solved the problem with a genius and very commendable maneuver: not including darkrai at all. So the council of the people can direct the vote as they wish when they want it and here not giving the chance to the playerbase to pick between multiple options is fair and honest, again only big applauses. Futile to say that you're all a bunch of big hypocrites.

If darkrai was not unbanned now you probably would have not even considered to upgrade the sleep clause. It is the major offender, denying that is delusional. Yes, we had sleep interactions before during the gen that could be considered "silly"(red card guss, valiant with hypnosis), then again despite this gen was born a trash can and remained like that until now, sleep was still manageable compared to many other broken things around(and if the problem was that urgent to address to begin with you had plenty of time during the generation to use surveys and talk more about it).
The other mons with sleep moves are not even close to what darkrai can do, not only it can increase its already high SpA faster in one turn with nplot, the rng machine gets even worse when it can spam dark pulse to flinch the already slept mon in the attempt to make it lose more turns if it wants to stay in attempting to wake up and go for another round of hypnosis if needed. And you can abuse of it not just in lead even if most of the times you see it played that way, as long as you keep the sash and you position it well it can attempt doing the dumb tricks more than once and the teams more defensively orientend can do even less to prevent it other than dodging the sleep moves.

Valiant is the only one that can do similar stuff but the timing it uses has to be more calculated since coming in means it's burning the booster energy and as darkrai does, it can put mons to sleep and make progress by itself. The other sleep mons more than being annoying on their own, they can help the powercreepped friends to take advantage of the free turns. I don't disagree on getting rid of sleep but you couldn't pick a worst timing to discuss on it when this metagame is in such a sorry state( even refusing to apply the kokoloko method that could maybe help now but many of you had the courage to say without shame that this metagame is a lot playable and balanced) and if you were a bit coherent you should have given the opportunity to the community to pick between sleep moves and darkrai at least but nope.

And regarding the darkrai unban and how it happened (good players don't fish so we could not find out in time that hypnosis sets on darkrai could be problematic, right xavgb? ), I don't know what kind of good players you know because eventually I see good players playing their odds in game while clicking ice beam multiple times if needed to freeze a target, I see them clicking innacurate moves like triple axel or focus blast if they can win by clicking them, so why it has to be different with darkrai clicking hypnosis? We're still talking of a strong mon that can generate free turns for itself and for the 5 mons behind. Good players explore all the options they have available to win, if you did not consider the possibility of it being broken in your internal tests and by the small sample of games played in oupl it's because of your superficial approach if anything(maybe not yours in particular since you still displayed more knowledge of the game and interest than other council members but if you believe tera should be banned and not part of a metagame that wants to be competitive, you should be more vocal about it just as you were lately with sleep moves).

So, dear coucil of the people, I hope for you now that your political campaign to upgrade sleep clause will succeed at least because otherwise it will be another waste of time for everyone and you will keep going in circles and I wish that your future political campaign including tera won't be manipulated as much to have the uncompetitive results you prefer just like it happened last time.

 

[ianlazerbeem]

Wasn't the fact hat it could choose its checks and bypass pretty much any of them even if it couldn't beat them all at the same time part of the reason why we banned Magearna? Doesn't seem like great logic to me.

What separates Gouging Fire from other wallbreakers for me is the fact that its sets aren't even bad against the match-up it doesn't just flat out demolish. If you run Choice Band Sun, Stall just fucking loses, but you're still bulky enough and just fast enough that you can probably nab a kill or two against offense, especially if you can position it well. Similarly, DD doesn't just 6-0 fat the way CB does, but if you can weaken their bulky Water, it still does a ton of work, and a DD mon having reliable recovery means it can fish for multiple set-up opportunities throughout the match, which puts a ton of pressure on stall teams to play optimally and reserve their bulky Waters or whatever for it.

All in all this Pokemon just does too much, and the CB Sun set has basically no defensive counterplay except maybe like Tera Grass Heatran. I lean pretty heavily towards the side of it being broken.

Well said. How is "it can pick and choose its own counterplay" a reason to ban Volcarona and "it has to pick and choose its counterplay" a reason NOT to ban gouging?

 

[Xufactor]

Well said. How is "it can pick and choose its own counterplay" a reason to ban Volcarona and "it has to pick and choose its counterplay" a reason NOT to ban gouging?

Neither of these are reasons for or against bans. They’re supposed to counter other arguments.

 

[El Cero]

Speaking of Volcarona, I truly do think this mon has to go in a Tera meta.

It shreds basically any form of balance/stall with the right Tera Type and has basically zero counters outside of HO.

The only hard counter for defensive teams is Unaware SPD Clod which has its own problems, as SPD Dirge loses to Tera ground, so does Gouging fire and tran. With Morning sun, it has reliable recovery especially with the prevalence of sun teams.

Giga drain let's it beat Blissey/water types and rain teams. Tera water let's it beat Gliscor and bulky ground types.

Wisp + quiver dance makes it immune to most type of attackers.

Steel + Poison allows it to beat being toxiced and so on.

I just think this mon should not exist in a meta that included Tera.

 

[sg pokemon]

Enjoyment: 7 (good meta diversity, wasn't sure between 7 or 8)
Competitiveness: 6 (well it's as competitive as a gen with tera/powercreeping threats can be, ig)
Sleep: 5 (it was mostly a matter of time until darkrai made this a problem...but hey at least there will be no more inaccuracy with cart mechanics ig! Sad that yawn will most likely be included but it is what it is, such collateral isn't always avoidable)
Tera: no 2x (tbh mons like gambit, roaring moon and volc do make arguably overbearing use of the mechanic, but the amount of diversity/interesting strats that can be had with it are also many and quite fun; wasn't too sure on this tbh)
4 (no option for 3.5 sadly, chose the higher one because it's certainly very strong, although it would be sad to see it leave since we finally got back some form of specially offensive ice type breaker, something absent from here ever since )
4 (also no option for 3.5, giving it free turns can be fatal though)
4 (this one is a firm rating don't worry)
3 (electro shot is a truly fucked move if I'm being totally honest here, but at least low spdef/speed help keep it in check even if it can be devastating once it gets going)
3 (potent as always but like, there's bigger fish to fry right now most likely)
4 (realistically speaking I'm being somewhat lenient/nice with this and this stupid 50/50s endgame shit arguably deserves an outright 5, but using a more logical viewpoint, it gets the same rating as for the same reasons: both mons can use their already stupid bulk possibly enhanced by tera to just outright end games once minimal conditions are met. "Encore/wisp/even trick" are only gonna get you so far when considering all the possible variables)
1 (meh)

 

[Heatranator]

Alright, time for my survey results.

Enjoyment/Competitiveness: 7
The metagame is both quite enjoyable and quite competitive right now, though I do think things like kyurem and moon need to go, they aren't nearly as bad as other pressing mons during other Gen 9 metagames.

Sleep: 4
I'm still not fully convinced that sleep is the issue, I believe that we should suspect Darkrai first and then see where sleep goes to next, but I am starting to get convinced. It is a problem that has being going on for generations, while also being a complex ban which we should strive to not implement. If sleep stays, I won't be upset, and if it goes, I'm not going to be complaining. Also so we can finally not keep getting brainrot from the back and forth discussion on sleep.

Tera: Yes and No
While I do think that tera needs to be looked at down the line, now is definetely not the time. It somehow is quite managable right now, though something that used to be a problem so shortly ago as a mechanic (no, gliscor is not broken because it was banworthy during DLC1) should be looked at. An outright ban however may not be in the cards and a restriction may be better, though I am willing to bite the bullet and ban it entirely if that is needed.

Kyurem: 5
Kyurem is a load of bs in this tier and I have seen only one person give it a 3, so I don't think this is an unpopular opinion. With just freeze dry, draco meteor and earth power, this mon can destroy any team. Kyurem may be hazard weak, but that doesn't matter when it only needs one or two turns to destroy a team. Plus, it is both decently fast for a mon with its power and bulky, meaning it can be hard to revenge kill. I've had to use heatran with tera flying and steel beam to try and make the biggest chances to ko it. And that's just talking about the specs set. So yeah, all that bs, plus it can mix you up with the counters. This mon has gotta go.

Gouging fire: 3
I just don't see this mon being broken right now, it just seems like a very great mon in the tier. While it can get out of hand, it needs to get set up first to truly threaten the opposing team which can be thwarted if it is phazed out, meaning it loses it's booster energy boost. Then it has to decide between whether it wants to choose e-quake or morning sun. If it chooses e-quake, then it has lots of longevity problems. If it chooses morning sun, some mons can wall the fire + dragon combo easily. Plus, with the hazards weakness, it can't come in to often otherwise it has to spend a turn healing or just setting up. The difference between this and kyurem is that while they are both hazard weak, fire has to setup to get going, while kyurem doesn't. I've heard about the mythical band set, though I have never seen it in action, and while it may have destructive power, it has to get predicts right to see the greatest sucess. Overall, this seems like a great mon with exploitable traits.

Roaring moon: 5
Nothing has changed for this mon, it still clicks dragon dance then knock off or acrobatics and wins games. With suprising bulk and great speed + progress making, this mon can destroy any team with just a little bit of support. I honestly can't explain it any more than "brrr, knock off and acrobatics go brrr", because it just does that, it is mindless and needs to go. Not much can survive it's hits, and when you do, the team is so crippled that the rest of the team will have an easy time cleaning up. TLDR, knock off is cancer on this mon.

Archaludon: 2
You good guys? I mean, it can potentially trade, and it can sweep teams in the right scenario, but ain't that like half the tier? Arch is a great mon, but it isn't the fastest mon and has a cripilling sp.Defense stat that can be hit really hard to kill it. Plus, it is both outsped and weak to both of tusk's stab moves. It has to sacrifice too much to patch up its weaknesses, and they still are glaring despite those measures. Just use special attacks, I don't get the hype.

Ghold/Gambit: 3
I'll be lumping these two together because my reasoning is the same. While they are not nearly as problematic as they were during DLC1 meta and before, I think suspects of them should be done down the line. They both can still be bullshit mons that warp the metagame around them, but we should look at the more pressing issues on this list (note, not Archaludon, seriously what are you people smoking?).

Deoxys-Speed: 1
Lol, despite having to deal with multiple screen Deo-S' in a row, this mon ain't broken in the slightest. If your struggling against any Deo-S set, you have bigger problems in your teambuilding process.

That's all folks.

 

[Xufactor]

Hp Percentage displays are also not on cart. You want to get rid of that and sleep clause?

This is a trap question designed to invalidate the opinion of anyone who answers it in your eyes: either we commit all the way for the sake of cart accuracy and agree to get rid of a QoL change that people would be upset about removing, turning public opinion against us, or we pick and choose what we want to be cart accurate about, undermining the argument. It’s bait, which is a jerk thing to do.

We should be able to hear opposing points without assuming bad intentions. “Trap” questions are designed to trick you even if you have a good argument. answering no doesn’t fall into a trap. People shouldn’t be afraid of their argument undermined by simple questions, unless their argument is weak to begin with.

 

[Divine Retribution]

I've heard about the mythical band set, though I have never seen it in action, and while it may have destructive power, it has to get predicts right to see the greatest sucess.

252+ Atk Choice Band Protosynthesis Tera Fire Gouging Fire Raging Fury vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Dondozo in Sun: 252-297 (50 - 58.9%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

I'm sorry, what are you predicting exactly? Unless your opponent has a Heatran, you're clicking exactly 1 move and whatever is in front of you is dying.

 

[Heatranator]

252+ Atk Choice Band Protosynthesis Tera Fire Gouging Fire Raging Fury vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Dondozo in Sun: 252-297 (50 - 58.9%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

I'm sorry, what are you predicting exactly? Unless your opponent has a Heatran, you're clicking exactly 1 move and whatever is in front of you is dying.

Yeah, I haven't really seen it at all, so I don't really have the knowledge to fully assert what it while be defeating. Though if we keep Gouging fire in the tier, Heatran usage will rise, and that is a benefit to me. /jk

 

[RyukTheDarkrai]

Sleep: 4/5. I do not believe sleep is overpowered. I do not think sleep is broken. I think sleep is uncompetitive. No other status condition in the game gives you upwards of 3 free turns to do as you please. It's a struggle to burn sleep turns as you're either going to be used as potentially guaranteed setup fodder with bulkier Pokemon or it's going to be downright impossible to with more fragile, offensive Pokemon. Our only Electric Terrain setter is the crap Pincurchin, not a single Type is immune to Hypnosis and running Sleep Talk isn't an option because you could wake up earlier than anticipated and waste a turn with it.

Goodnight, sweet prince.

Tera: Yes, ban. Terastalization is fundamentally broken because it allows the impossible to become possible. Your Water Type answer no longer answers Water Types because they either get muscled through or they Tera Grassed on. Or how about setup sweepers switching into Choice locked mons, Terastalizing against something they would 100% die against and basically win the game from there? A lot of Pokemon who are suspect worthy are largely worthy because of Tera.

1/5. With the additions brought on by the Indigo Disk, especially Temper Flare on Great Tusk, I find that Gholdengo's far more reasonable in today's meta. It hits hard, it provides a lot of utility to its team, but it's slow and lacks the strength to OHKO things without a boost. I think this is the healthiest Gholdengo has been, more focus placed onto its Type combo than Good as Gold.

2/5. Speedeoxys rules the lead meta with an iron fist and can come across as oppressive, but its complete and utter lack of defensive utility largely holds it back. Lead sets are essentially playing the game 5v6 and other leads or Pokemon have the power to pop it before it gets away with too much. I find offensive sets to be inferior to their tempo-setting counterparts.

2/5. My thoughts on Gen 5's legendary Dragon waver. It's hard to defensively answer for true, but its held back in a hazard latent meta as it absolutely despises Stealth Rock, has a terrible Defensive Type combo and desperately needs free turns lest it get popped by a faster mon or just flat out walled.

3/5. It's a chore and a half to deal with this guy on bulkier teams. Between Stamina, the Assault Vest, Electro Shot and a great Type combo, Archaludon can get out of hand very quickly. Its mundane Speed tier is what I think holds it back, notably against more offensive teams, but the amount of pressure it can apply to defensive builds is honestly ridiculous.

3/5. Roaring Moon loathes priority, hates hazards and is easy to defensively Tera against because of its poor physical bulk, but a single turn can sometimes be all it needs to run away with games. Unlike Iron Boulder, Roaring Moon doesn't need to get off a Dragon Dance to bust through walls.

5/5. Imagine if you took Chi-Yu and Roaring Moon, bundled them up into a ball and then gave it bulk equal to that of Toxapex. That is Gouging Fire. The Choice Band set claims a life everytime it comes in, Dragon Dance sets accumulate boosts supremely quickly when combined with Tera and Morning Sun, but its sheer bulk without being slow as balls is really what ruins Gouging Fire. I love seeing things drop to Tera Fire Raging Furys, it's very cathartic, but it's not healthy in the least.

5/5. What more is there to be said about Kingambit? Forces 50/50 gambles that are entirely within its favor, is monstrously bulky and defines the endgame of matches like nothing else we've seen. It's a Tera hog for certain, but I don't really think that's a negative when you're absolutely busted with Tera in tow.

He's back to his old tricks and while he's easier to deal with thanks to the ludicrous power provided by the current meta, Gliscor would absolutely benefit from a lot of these Pokemon going, way more than it'd have any right to (with the exception of Gholdengo).

 

[BolTingBlazie]

Alright, time for my survey results.

Enjoyment/Competitiveness: 7
The metagame is both quite enjoyable and quite competitive right now, though I do think things like kyurem and moon need to go, they aren't nearly as bad as other pressing mons during other Gen 9 metagames.

Sleep: 4
I'm still not fully convinced that sleep is the issue, I believe that we should suspect Darkrai first and then see where sleep goes to next, but I am starting to get convinced. It is a problem that has being going on for generations, while also being a complex ban which we should strive to not implement. If sleep stays, I won't be upset, and if it goes, I'm not going to be complaining. Also so we can finally not keep getting brainrot from the back and forth discussion on sleep.

Tera: Yes and No
While I do think that tera needs to be looked at down the line, now is definetely not the time. It somehow is quite managable right now, though something that used to be a problem so shortly ago as a mechanic (no, gliscor is not broken because it was banworthy during DLC1) should be looked at. An outright ban however may not be in the cards and a restriction may be better, though I am willing to bite the bullet and ban it entirely if that is needed.

Kyurem: 5
Kyurem is a load of bs in this tier and I have seen only one person give it a 3, so I don't think this is an unpopular opinion. With just freeze dry, draco meteor and earth power, this mon can destroy any team. Kyurem may be hazard weak, but that doesn't matter when it only needs one or two turns to destroy a team. Plus, it is both decently fast for a mon with its power and bulky, meaning it can be hard to revenge kill. I've had to use heatran with tera flying and steel beam to try and make the biggest chances to ko it. And that's just talking about the specs set. So yeah, all that bs, plus it can mix you up with the counters. This mon has gotta go.

Gouging fire: 3
I just don't see this mon being broken right now, it just seems like a very great mon in the tier. While it can get out of hand, it needs to get set up first to truly threaten the opposing team which can be thwarted if it is phazed out, meaning it loses it's booster energy boost. Then it has to decide between whether it wants to choose e-quake or morning sun. If it chooses e-quake, then it has lots of longevity problems. If it chooses morning sun, some mons can wall the fire + dragon combo easily. Plus, with the hazards weakness, it can't come in to often otherwise it has to spend a turn healing or just setting up. The difference between this and kyurem is that while they are both hazard weak, fire has to setup to get going, while kyurem doesn't. I've heard about the mythical band set, though I have never seen it in action, and while it may have destructive power, it has to get predicts right to see the greatest sucess. Overall, this seems like a great mon with exploitable traits.

Roaring moon: 5
Nothing has changed for this mon, it still clicks dragon dance then knock off or acrobatics and wins games. With suprising bulk and great speed + progress making, this mon can destroy any team with just a little bit of support. I honestly can't explain it any more than "brrr, knock off and acrobatics go brrr", because it just does that, it is mindless and needs to go. Not much can survive it's hits, and when you do, the team is so crippled that the rest of the team will have an easy time cleaning up. TLDR, knock off is cancer on this mon.

Archaludon: 2
You good guys? I mean, it can potentially trade, and it can sweep teams in the right scenario, but ain't that like half the tier? Arch is a great mon, but it isn't the fastest mon and has a cripilling sp.Defense stat that can be hit really hard to kill it. Plus, it is both outsped and weak to both of tusk's stab moves. It has to sacrifice too much to patch up its weaknesses, and they still are glaring despite those measures. Just use special attacks, I don't get the hype.

Ghold/Gambit: 3
I'll be lumping these two together because my reasoning is the same. While they are not nearly as problematic as they were during DLC1 meta and before, I think suspects of them should be done down the line. They both can still be bullshit mons that warp the metagame around them, but we should look at the more pressing issues on this list (note, not Archaludon, seriously what are you people smoking?).

Deoxys-Speed: 1
Lol, despite having to deal with multiple screen Deo-S' in a row, this mon ain't broken in the slightest. If your struggling against any Deo-S set, you have bigger problems in your teambuilding process.

That's all folks.

I share the sentiment on G-fire, in order to achieve the dumb damage numbers it has to set up or run choice band and that makes it prone to knock off + hazard chip, as well as it usually wearing itself down because it likes running flare blitz more often. Plus in order to 2hko dondozo a decent amount of setup is required? 4MSS can also really hold it back as it can't always fit morning sun and burning bulwark if it wants to run quake and ddance. Also band definitely gives it some speed issues for sure since that locks it out of clicking ddance

 

[Ibaragi]

Enjoyment/Competitive: 7, not much to add here; gave it the same last time and not much has changed. I don't consider Sleep relevant for these scores, since it's not common enough to harm my enjoyment, and is wildly uncompetitive but not "broken".

Sleep: 5
We've spent 30+ Pages talking about this between multiple threads, probably well over 50 if we dig deeper in the archives. Said my piece a while back, no need to repeat it a thousand times.

Tera: NO restriction, NO ban
Honestly, was starting to lean towards Tera Preview or some other restriction during DLC1, but DLC2 feels stable enough where such drastic measure is unnecesary. Would be open to consider that restrictions are good for the meta, but the survey specifically asked if I felt they were necessary, to which I have to say "neither necessary nor particularly desirable", personally.

Kyurem: 4 (4.5)
Gave it a 4 to both differentiate it from previous broken mons that were much worse and maintain that Sleep is prioritary. I think it deserves to get banned, but more through a Suspect than a Quickban. Still think it's the top of the list in terms of individual mons, and should be the first mon we suspect past this point.

Gouging Fire: 4
Roaring Moon: 4
Not so sold out on these 2 being full-on broken, but 100% would support a suspect. I wanted to give them a 3, honestly, but more on my doubts
on these two at the end of the post.

Archaludon: 2
It's only "broken" in rain, which makes it support reliant by definition. It snowballs quickly with high bulk and firepower, but it's not invincible like a certain Bear from DLC1 and is easily outsped by other mons. The fact that most of our premier fast attackers that could attempt to get rid of it are physical and/or Dragons, though, does work greatly in its favor. Still not convinced.

Gholdengo: 3*
I don't think Gholdengo deserves even a 3 anymore, but I would love to give it a symbolic 4~5 to insist in my take that something has to be done about hazards. 3 is a compromise between my actual opinion of Gholdengo individually and my wish to see action on Hazards.

Kingambit: 2
Still not fond of Supreme Overlord, and can understand why people hate playing the Sucker Punch game with their life on the line, but I don't think he's even problematic anymore. Wouldn't be opposed to a suspect if it garners enough hatred, but I'd convincingly vote No Ban on it, which makes it a 2 for me.

Deoxys-S: 2
Honestly, hate this thing. It's too good at all the things it does... but it also feels not good enough. At least not for a ban, anyway. Objectively I give it a 2, but know that it hurts me to give it any less than a 3; council could pull a Volcarona on it and I wouldn't mind in the slightest.


Other Things: Booster Energy and Drought
My problem with giving Gouging Fire and Roaring Moon a score higher than 3 is these two things. MAYBE those two are the only "fully broken" parts of these, but I feel Booster Energy and Drought both deserve consideration of their own. I assume that tiering policies will just say to stick to Roaring Moon and Gouging Fire for now, so I don't expect anything from saying this. But I still think that Sun has too many abusers right now and that Booster Energy is the biggest responsible for this gen's feel of Power Creep, specially for Speed, and would prefer both gone over their main abusers. Gave Gourging Fire and Roaring Moon a 4 in the end because "something" should be done about them (after Sleep and Kyurem), but not convinced that checking them is the best answer here.
Also, added Drizzle/Archaludon in the comment, but honestly was mostly just out of how Drizzle/Drought have usually been tested/banned together; if Archaludon manages to actually break Rain, I'd support more going Archaludon than Drizzle in that case.

 

[Rekka's Backend]

I honestly hate the fact that so many of the newly introduced dragons feel so obscenely strong. I've been unfortunate enough to be on the receiving end of enough Gouging Fire's that its making me consider throwing on a Flash Fire mon just to try and bait them into smashing their mouse on it. Not even Moushold can save me... Moushold... Help...

 

[kd458]

DLC2 Survey 2 Votes

Figured I'd drop another survey post, again wanted to give some reasoning to my votes and again have enjoyed reading the insights of other voters - some of the discussion / points made in this thread give me a headache though so no promises I'll engage in any of it outside just posting this lmao, have included some of my scores from the last survey too just for comparison.

Enjoyment: 7 (from 8)
This metagame is still really fun, some of the bigger threats are definitely hard to build around right now and it's not fun to play against certain strategies (which are brought up later in this survey) but I do generally enjoy OU in its current state and it's still so much better than the DLC1 metagame.

Competitiveness: 6 (from 7)
I've dropped competitiveness a little, most playstyles are very much usable but bulky offense is still struggling while there are definitely some uncompetitive elements in the tier. Teams do still require skill and I like that balance is still so good despite certain balance breakers being a little hard to build around - this is again a massive improvement from DLC1.

: No Action
My position on Tera right now is that it's fine, certain Pokemon feel overtuned with it but I generally really enjoy it as a mechanic and would much sooner see Pokemon that are broken due to Tera be removed rather than the entire mechanic itself, it's not a blanket game-breaking mechanic and it adds a lot of nuance to certain interactions when it's not just "yay I picked the right extremely niche Volc tera in the builder I win off MU!"

Sleep: 5
I don't have much more to say about sleep than I already have done in the Policy Review thread - read more here for a full analysis of sleep in OU, some objective research with points on either side of the debate and my personal opinions. I started as a "Ban Darkrai and keep sleep" proponent but the more I look into this and give it more thought, the more I am in favour of a sleep move ban.

: 4 (from 3)
I mentioned that this was between a 3 and a 4 in the last survey but I think that it's earned a solid spot at 4. Again, Choice Specs sets don't even feel like the worst to deal with despite being near impossible to switch into due to their massive hazard weakness and reliance on good team support, but it's the Boots sets that really push it towards the edge while DD can be an unexpected (though manageable) threat. I don't think this is a balance destroyer by itself in the same way that some other players I've discussed this mon with do, but the way this fishes for Freezes is unhealthy and it's not a particularly fun presence in OU right now - a suspect would be nice but I wouldn't be too mad to see a quickban depending on survey results.

: 2 (from 2)
Again it's really threatening on sun and honestly it's a little more unwallable and unkillable than I gave it credit for, but the hazard weakness on Booster variants and relatively low power of Boots along with struggling to fit both Morning Sun and adequate coverage feels limiting. Definitely worth keeping an eye on, it's mostly okay right now but I wouldn't be surprised if this felt busted in a different meta.

: 3 (from 5)
I still don't love it and stand by saying that nothing came back in DLC2 that actually counters this guy, but I've warmed up to it a little as Taunt has declined a little in popularity due to non-EQ having pretty terrible matchups into any team with Kingambit and particularly Raging Bolt. This is still a mon that has limited defensive value on DD sets and I debated scoring it higher due to Taunt RM still feeling like it dropped into the tier with 0 safe balance counterplay, but I think it's not too ridiculous and I've actually enjoyed using it as a rare offensive pivot with reliable recovery that switches into Heatran which is awesome.

: 4 (new!)
This is actually a disgusting Pokemon, I don't think it's as broken as Kyurem but it carries rain next to Skewda and I don't think any Pokemon aside from Unaware Clodsire can actually switch in, comfortably 1v1 AV sets and come out alive without needing to Tera. Of course it needs the rain up to do this and defensive Arch is completely fine, but people seem to not know what they're talking about when it comes to this mon - anyone suggesting to just use a strong special attacker needs to do some calcs as the standard AV Archaludon set lives Specs Draco from Wake and OHKOs back, while you literally need Choice Band or Booster Attack for offensive Tusk to safely kill it with Headlong if they don't Tera. This thing will always force a trade if you aren't using a stall-ish build with a dedicated answer (basically just Clodsire and pray they aren't EQ); unless you're running a team where you can throw away a mon at any point when necessary, Archaludon with the rain up feels like the second coming of Ursaluna-Bloodmoon.

: 1 (from 3)
Ghold is in a weird spot right now where hazard stack balance often tends to drop it and it's forced to run HDB on these structures to actually have any longevity in the long game. It's a good balance breaker itself and loads well into bulkier teams, and of course some removal in Corviknight could maybe come back if it got banned, but I don't see Gholdengo as a problem at all right now and I think it's far from an issue that needs to be solved.

: 1 (from 2)
For the first time in SVOU, I would rate Kingambit as low as a 1 in the current metagame. Skarmory exists as a fantastic and splashable answer on balance, some of the bulkier offensive threats like Raging Bolt and Gouging Fire can live even a boosted hit and trade it off unless it has Black Glasses / Tera Dark / Fallen 5 and it doesn't run away with games as much as it felt like it used to. It's an S tier threat but it actually feels pretty balanced and I don't think any ideas of taking it out of the tier are worth merit.

: 1 (from 2)
If anyone has given this a 3 or higher can you please drop an explanation as to why? Sash hazards is an okay lead that does not feel broken at all and will often leave you down 5 vs 6 into some of the relatively common boots spam teams on ladder right now, screens is just fine and it isn't even an objective improvement to Ninetales-A, offensive sets need Life Orb to actually pack a punch and even then its offensive stats pale in comparison to some of the other, much scarier offensive mons in OU right now with its best offensive niche being as a mixed breaker that spreads Knock Off over any Nasty Plot variants imo. The guessing game can be a little annoying, but I don't think that this is broken at all.

Write-ins:

: 2 to 3 (from 4)
Volc really isn't broken, it's just really cheap and easily the best user of Tera right now. It feels near impossible to pack an answer to every possible variant of this mon outside of using Unaware with a neutral Tera into Volc's common Tera Blasts on every team. You have Toxic Slowking-G + mixed Dragapult? Sub Tera Fairy, gg. Stone Edge Ting-Lu + full SpDef Skeledirge? They're Bug Buzz + Tera Blast Ground, better keep Tera for Dirge and also pray that they don't predict and get the roll where super effective into neutral Tera Blast kills as you switch Dirge in! This isn't broken, it mainly just feels unskilled and uncompetitive and unfun to build around, and I'd give it a 2 or a 3 if it was listed in this survey.

: 2 to 3 (from 4)
Honestly I don't think that Bolt is too pressing of an issue, but it's very strong and can wear through switch-ins fast while being limited by a lack of reliable recovery and weakness to hazards if you opt to run Booster Energy or Leftovers. I mainly listed this as, to me, it's much harder of a presence to safely plan for and build with in mind than Kingambit, Gholdengo and Deo-S, and I personally see it as more deserving of a spot on the survey than all three of these Pokemon.

 

[TCTphantom]

Survey responeses

Enjoyment: 8. I stand by this being probably the second best or outright best meta we have had in Scarlet and Violet. Home was a great meta, sure, but this meta is pretty fun and diverse. Can you prepare for everything? No, but thats just how mons works. I will always have a hole on my team that I have to do the best to account for. I don't think the tier feels nearly as impossible to handle everything as it did in DLC1 or as centralized as it did in the twilight days of DLC 1. This is a pretty great meta, with just a few concerns.

Competitiveness: 7. Most of the time, the better battler wins... except with sleep. Yeah, if the tier did not have sleep, this would have gotten my highest mark of the generation for competitiveness. But sleep just adds so much rng to the game. I hate how I can cheese past better players with Hypnosis Hex Valiant or Hisuian Lilligant Sun. I hate when it happens to me as well. Its just not a fun aspect.

Which is a shame since I do think this is a pretty skill testing meta. It feels like you can't just auto pilot specific cores and grind ladder points, or brute force things as much with absurd mons. Diverse tiers are great because they reward good team building and good pilots. Its fun building my team to handle ladder as well as possible. Its fun being rewarded for keeping an eye on metagame trends. Its way more skill testing to play balance right now than to play during the GlowTingZap core days of DLC1.

Sleep: Easy 5 for me. I have talked about sleep and I do not expect to sway any thoughts and minds from their current positions. The most I can say is picture if sleep was introduced in Gen IX, and we did not have to make an artificial mod for sleep clause already. Sleep would be seen as a horrendous cheese option and just get axed faster than Palafin was. The only thing keeping sleep in the tier is a 20 year old compromise from people who long since stopped playing the game. Our tiering philosophy has long since moved past things like Sleep Clause.

Tera: I voted no for both fields. I just do not feel Tera is that much of a priority. It feels fine and I like the depth it adds to the game. Maybe you could sway me on acting on Tera Blast, but for now that's what I feel.

I would give this a 4, since this is easily the main candidate for a suspect test out of the slated mons. I am not sold I would vote ban, since I do kinda appreciate Kyurem in the tier. Yes, its a dumb balance breaker and is back breaking for the archetype. But, thats kind of its job. Its supposed to make balance sweat. The issue is its so efficient at its job. Balance effectively has to do double duty prepping for Kyurem. Your checks that beat the special sets (be they boots or specs) will lose to the Dragon Dance sets. That is something worth keeping an eye on for sure. It is undeniably a top mon that is a centralizing force in the meta, but I have kinda grown to accept that. Balance, even with Kyurem in the tier is very solid. I think its just a bit too good at making progress, otherwise I would have given it a 3.

Gouging Fire did get a 3 from me, if only because I would rather evaluate Kyurem first before we tackle Fire. Gouging Fire is absurdly strong as a set up sweeper. It is easily the best mon on Sun right now, due to the devastating wall breaking power it brings to the archetype. Outside of Dondozo, reliable switch ins to DD Gouging Fire in the sun are slim to none. It trades super efficiently since its pretty fat and Morning Sun only exasperates it. It still has the issues of mandating Boots and being very team reliant though. You can't just shove a DD Fire onto any team: it needs sun and Sun teams have a specific structure. I think it is a top mon, but I am against testing it for now...

I gave Roaring Moon a 2. Its obviously one of the best wincons in the tier, and is extremely scary, but I find it kinda fine? It feels like it has a harder time making progress than it should on paper due to its frailty. I think its obviously a top mon and one of the best wincons in the tier, but we have more pressing concerns. Its a strong win con, but I feel like the tier benefits from its presence. Yes, it makes a lot of progress, but I find that it is surprisingly manageable (partially due to Gambit and Tusk being as solid as they are). I think the concerns with Moon are due to it being a symptom of the meta, not the cause of the issues. Balance struggles to prep for it, but that's at least partially due to other breakers pressuring balance a lot. Also, dunking on glowking alone makes Moon good for the tier.

I originally gave this a 1, but a lot of the arguments against Arch have made me weigh it as a 2 personally. Arch just makes so much progress on its own. Its really fat and can muscle through a good chunk of the tier, carrying the entire archetype. It just trades into everything pretty well. Sun and Snow teams are a headache for it only due to them cutting into its ability to snowball as hard as it can.

Long live the king. 2. Gambit is amazing and arguably the best mon in the tier. It has a strong defensive profile that helps with handling other threats. It is one of the best wincons in the entire tier. Its kinda finern though? Skarm gives Balance an amazing check/counter to it, we have more checks to it. Its just easier to handle in the past. Sure, losing to Tera shenanigans feels bad, but I do not think Gambit is nearly as much of a priority right now as anything above it.

I still hate Ghold, but its fine right now. 2. I kinda doubt that banning Gholdengo would outright fix our hazard game. Sure, Corv becomes a better defogger I guess, but that really doesn't move the needle. Maybe people run Iron Treads more, but again what does that do? Hazards are dumb because we have like a dozen good hazard setters and our only exceptional counterplay is bootspam or Tusk. Ghold exasperates the issue but it is not the issue itself. Even if I hate the string cheese, I think putting aside my bias of finding him annoying in battle is for the best. He's fine...for now.

Remember when we all were afraid of this post Terapagos ban? Good times, good times. Turns out, Deoxys Speed has settled nicely into the metagame. Its lead sets, while strong, are not doing anything to push the needle super hard compared to the Hamurotts or Glimmoras of the world. The offensive sets, I really like in the metagame at large. They are a fun sidegrade to Pult. You get different coverage, nasty plot, and even more insane revenge killing possibilities in exchange for defensive utility and a better typing. It has settled nicely into the meta and I think it is far from an issue right now. Easy 1, super cool mon im glad I was wrong on.


Write ins: I did not write in anything to be broken, but please Finch or anyone bring back the Gods Among Us tour. I swear if we have to go through another 25 pages of Urshifu R discussion I will be sad. Heck, I would run the tour myself or help run it if it would make discussion on here better. I don't want us to have thread derailment talking about dropping ubers, and it would be a nice containment method.

 

[Real Pikachu]

I think if sleep gets banned inevitably so does Para. It's the same shit, and only in the saltiest parts of gen 8 did I ever want T-wave to legitimately be banned. Hard do not want to be banned.

I cannot fathom possibly thinking Sleep is more broken than Tera.

 

[1LDK]

Enjoy: 6, personal reasons
comp: 7, feels okay

Sleep: 3, I'll be honest, and this is probably a huge hot take, I don't give a fuck about sleep, I genuinely believe the sleep argument came out of fucking nowhere, and I also have no arguments to say "nah let's keep sleep" I have been trying out sleep and most of the time it misses, and when it hits either I generally cannot make full use of it, I have done some nasty wins with sleep of course, but those are the minimal. If we get a suspect test tho, I would like to see Dreams by Fleetwood Mac or Distant Dreamer by duffy as the songs

Tera: No action at all, you can adapt and play around and with tera.

4, this thing has no fucking walls on non stall if you predict correctly, and if you bluff it even better. You can out offense it, but it's hard to do

4, Ctrl c + Ctrl v kyurem

2, overrated as fuck, cannot have all the coverage, so there's always something that can contain it

3, this one is the hardest to rank, because I genuinely have no fucking idea what to do with this. Sometimes is legit unkillable as a defensive boost farmer + rain forcing down electro shot spams down everyone's throats, other times it just explodes on contact with fighting or strong fire / ground coverage. I have been on both sides, it is annoying, but I think we can hold it for now

4, never stop pushing

1, who the fuck still complains about gambit in 2024, DNB won, wait 2 more years for another one

2, people are using the offensive sets more, which means they are using the hazards sets less, which means when i see a deo on my screen I smile in cuteness because this fucking guy thinks he is doing shit in my sight

anything else: Nah

are you good at the game: no, which means my opinion will not matter

I also have a list of possible songs for suspects and will probably do a tier list of suspect tests based on their songs at the end of the gen
now give me hahas

 

[CobsonYaoi]

I think if sleep gets banned inevitably so does Para. It's the same shit, and only in the saltiest parts of gen 8 did I ever want T-wave to legitimately be banned. Hard do not want to be banned.

I cannot fathom possibly thinking Sleep is more broken than Tera.

If that was true there would've been a Paralysis Clause set in place since Gen 5. Get your slippery slope arguments out of here.