DPPt In-Game Tier List Thread v2

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I think wanting both return and rock polish is not bad at all by A tier standards. Kadabra wants grass knot and shadow ball. Gyarados wants dive, which is not a TM but is more expensive than many TMs. Azelf wants shadow ball, flamethrower, and psychic. Do you think return and rock polish are more expensive than the TMs that A tier things want? Aren't A tier things supposed to be bad for a chunk of the game, and things that aren't bad for such a chunk go in S tier? Kadabra is similarly bad against Team Galactic and worse against a few gym leaders, like Roark and Fantina. Giratina is bad against Bertha and Cynthia, which is a big chunk when you can use Giratina in only 6 or 7 major battles. I did consider Maylene. I just didn't mention her because I thought we all agreed that she's an easy win for Torterra. I already explained my results with Flint in page 4 of this thread. Both of us agree that Torterra can win battles by using curse and synthesis. However, you think these strategies are a lot more annoying than simply using the strongest attack move, and this should count against Torterra. I think being able to win with these strategies is a perfectly good reason to put Torterra in a higher tier. Is this a good enough summary of our disagreement? If yes, am I the only person who thinks we should be allowed to use 1/2 healing moves or use a stat boosting move more than twice in one battle?
I’m just gonna stop arguing at this point and say I agree to disagree, with all due respect to you sumwun. It’s just going to go in circles.

Thanks for addressing some of my points, I just think any further analyzing back-and-forth will be kind of splitting hairs.
 
I really should have posted this before Ryota finished his/her/their/its run with a Torterra. Better late than never, I guess. Anyways, this is what happened when I used a Torterra a few months ago. Now that at least 3 people have used Torterra and say it should be B tier, I think it's time to read Drumstick's, Moonlight's, and Ryota's logs and attempt to figure out why we got such different results.

Gardenia: I was able to get more consistent sweeps because I used return instead of bite. Because Gardenia's Turtwig wastes so many turns using reflect and sunny day, it's pretty easy to set up 4 to 6 curses and 2HKO her Turtwig before Grotle loses half of its HP. Additionally, giving Grotle an Oran berry lowers the chance of needing a super potion.

Jupiter: This is where return really matters. While her Skuntank resists both razor leaf and bite, Grotle's +2 return 3HKOs Skuntank. Zubat's wing attack is super effective, but it is still too weak to stop Grotle from setting up and sweeping.

Fantina: Rawst berry allows Grotle to set up on her Duskull. Yes her Mismagius can use confuse ray. Yes Grotle still needs luck to sweep. However, most other A tier things can just barely touch her Mismagius regardless of how lucky they get, so I still consider this a relatively good matchup for Grotle.

Rival (209): Even though wing attack is super effective, his Staravia still uses 2 or 3 double teams before attacking. Grotle can easily use curse during these turns, and wing attack is no longer a threat when Staravia actually starts using it. Grotle can continue cursing until return is a guaranteed OHKO, so endeavor isn't a problem either. Even if a teammate needs return more than Grotle does, Grotle can use secret power, which is still an upgrade over bite and also neutrally effective against Monferno.

Rival (Pastoria): Again, Torterra can use return to defeat Staravia without losing much of its own HP.

Wake: A Sitrus berry lets Torterra survive one ice fang from Floatzel, OHKO Floatzel with wood hammer, and survive the recoil. Of course, Torterra can then easily take out Quagsire. Similarly to Fantina, Wake is a difficult opponent even for A tier Pokemon. Being able to consistently defeat 2 of his Pokemon, including Floatzel, is a very strong performance.

Volkner: You don't need rock polish to sweep this one. Jolteon effectively can't touch Torterra, so Torterra can easily set up 6 curses and use synthesis to heal the tiny bit of damage from iron tail. Raichu gets to use one signal beam before earthquake OHKOs it. At +5 or +6 physical defense, Volkner's 2 physical attackers can't do much, so Torterra can heal itself again and continue sweeping.

Rival (League): Torterra can't solo, but it can still use curse and synthesis to defeat both Staraptor and Heracross.

Bertha: Whiscash is easy setup bait. Even when sandstorm is making synthesis less effective, it is still more than enough to heal all the damage that Bertha can do to a Torterra with +6 physical defense. Wood hammer recoil isn't an issue because earthquake OHKOs everything except Gliscor.

Flint: Torterra needs rock polish to completely sweep but can take out 3 Pokemon without rock polish.

Lucian: Bronzong does not force Torterra to switch out if Torterra uses swords dance, as +2 wood hammer is a 2HKO. Torterra outspeeds Bronzong and can use synthesis after taking some recoil from the first wood hammer. After Bronzong, Torterra can defeat either Alakazam or Gallade. It's not a solo, but taking out 4 of his Pokemon is still pretty good.

Although there were a bunch of things I did differently with my Torterra, return and synthesis are definitely the most important. Return makes Torterra better at sweeping Gardenia and a few rival battles and completely turns the tables against Jupiter, while synthesis lets Torterra very reliably solo Volkner and Bertha and also heal a lot of damage in the last rival battle and against Lucian. With synthesis, the second half of the game is not nearly as bad as Drumstick described it.

Another issue that all of Drumstick, Moonlight, and Ryota mentioned is 4MSS. According to my logs, this sequence of moves is already enough to sweep many of the major battles.
razor leaf -> wood hammer
bite -> earthquake
curse
return -> synthesis
There are only 3 times when Torterra really wants another move: Aaron (swords dance and stone edge), Flint (rock polish), and Lucian (either swords dance or rock polish). You could still argue that Torterra has the worse 4MSS compared to the A tier things that people aren't trying to drop, but they have other minor issues that Torterra doesn't have. Being affected by 4MSS in 3 battles just doesn't seem like a very big problem.

I hope this post was enough to show what I did differently and how that caused a stronger and more consistent performance from my Torterra. So what do you think? Are these valid strategies that Drumstick, Moonlight, and Ryota overlooked, or did I set my standards too low?

Additionally, there are some other recently proposed updates that were almost completely ignored. Is Ikazuchi going to make these updates or no?

Magnemite from C to B
Croagunk from D to C

Wurmple (Dustox) from E to D
Buneary from D to C
Nosepass from E to C

Rotom from C to B
I see +6, I write off a test. Straight up. Ain't nobody got time for that.

People have said in the past self-healing moves generally shouldn't be considered for in-game over items, and on top of that, Synthesis only has a grand total of 5 PP.
I see the point, but if we turn our noses at people using Full Restores, recovery moves inherently get more value. Not something you should spam, of course, but I'm not writing it off.

-Turtwig guzzles TMs like crazy. Even if they aren't particularly big ones, you want Return, Rock Polish, Razor Leaf, Wood Hammer, Earthquake. Bite / Crunch all throughout the game as moves, even if some are learned naturally.
Out of these, only Return and Polish are TMs...

I think wanting both return and rock polish is not bad at all by A tier standards. Kadabra wants grass knot and shadow ball. Gyarados wants dive, which is not a TM but is more expensive than many TMs. Azelf wants shadow ball, flamethrower, and psychic. Do you think return and rock polish are more expensive than the TMs that A tier things want?
Definitely not, but the return ain't the same.

Realistically speaking, only Return is really contested, not a lot of things learn Polish and if you're picking 2 things that learn it, odds are you're stacking weaknesses and screwing up teambuilding in general.

Both of us agree that Torterra can win battles by using curse and synthesis. However, you think these strategies are a lot more annoying than simply using the strongest attack move, and this should count against Torterra. I think being able to win with these strategies is a perfectly good reason to put Torterra in a higher tier. Is this a good enough summary of our disagreement? If yes, am I the only person who thinks we should be allowed to use 1/2 healing moves or use a stat boosting move more than twice in one battle?
There's nothing inherently wrong with using different ways to achieve the same objective.

However, it's safe to say that if you go over +2 with any boosting moves, of course performances will get inflated. Boosting Curse to +6 and healing for a sweep is something you save for dire Nuzlocke matchups, not general efficiency.


I'm not going to start taking points off things for not clicking the highest BP move available at all times, but overall, if you're not dealing damage for 2+ turns in a row, something ain't right.
 
Out of these, only Return and Polish are TMs...
My reaction in your native language:
https://64.media.tumblr.com/bef62552c4207ecfd935166477916c1d/tumblr_nbv7xfSE4x1tlawr7o1_500.gif

You quoted me without reading carefully enough. It was worded weirdly but I literally acknowledged most of those moves were natural.

"-Turtwig guzzles TMs like crazy. Even if they aren't particularly big ones, you want Return, Rock Polish, Razor Leaf, Wood Hammer, Earthquake. Bite / Crunch all throughout the game as moves, even if some are learned naturally."

I hate beating a deader-than-dead horse after I said agree to disagree, but this is why Infernape excels where Torterra and Empoleon do not. Infernape you give it the Flamethrower TM and it is off to the races. The other starters use generally unorthodox TMs that become mostly useless the second they hit their final forms. Grass Knot for Empoleon is basically pointless aside from Wake specifically. Pluck, while uncontested, is fairly niche (really only helps with one and a half mons with Gardenia and Maylene). I don't see why I'd give Grotle Return when Skuntank can crit past a Curse Grotle anyway and Gardenia isn't difficult to find coverage for- you don't really use it when you get Wood Hammer and Earthquake. Polish I'll concede is generally useful, but I think using Swords Dance and Rock Polish on the same mon in any capacity is frankly ridiculous, even if only for one matchup.

I see the point, but if we turn our noses at people using Full Restores, recovery moves inherently get more value. Not something you should spam, of course, but I'm not writing it off.
I don't think we've ever turned our noses at using Full Restores and Hyper Potions and the like, the only time it raises eyebrows is when we do it more than once or twice.

DHR has decried self-healing moves in in-game lists:

1636945061359.png


He said it again in SM.

Screen Shot 2021-11-14 at 10.07.23 PM.png


Even a moldy post from BW2 said strictly self-healing moves were inferior to items more or less, though Giga Drain and Leech Seed I agree can have some value, particularly the former:

Screen Shot 2021-11-14 at 10.03.23 PM.png


So yes. I don't understand why self-healing moves are suddenly viewed favorably over other attacking moves unless a Pokemon has room to run them due to a shallow movepool (see: Oricorio running Roost early on in USUM). And Torterra is already strapped for moveslots as it is.
 
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"-Turtwig guzzles TMs like crazy. Even if they aren't particularly big ones, you want Return, Rock Polish, Razor Leaf, Wood Hammer, Earthquake. Bite / Crunch all throughout the game as moves, even if some are learned naturally."
Yeah, my point was that the information you said was incorrect. Turtwig does not guzzle TMs like crazy, and the ones it appreciates are nigh uncontested and only learned by Torterra anyway like Rock Polish.

I don't see why I'd give Grotle Return
Same reason you'd give it to anyone that isn't a Normal-type, a high BP neutral move. It's not the best user of it, but it's faaaar from the worst. Grass is not the best neutral type in the game, it makes sense that some people would give Return to their starter.

I don't think we've ever turned our noses at using Full Restores and Hyper Potions and the like, the only time it raises eyebrows is when we do it more than once or twice.
If that is the case, then this is fair, recovery moves are absolutely irrelevant.

It really depends on what one thinks about the usage of items mid-battle, and since that is subjective and there are no guidelines in this thread's rules about that, I'll leave it to the posters' discretion.

DHR has decried self-healing moves in in-game lists:
As everyone and their mother, including the fetus, know, I couldn't care less about what DHR has to say.
 

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As everyone and their mother, including the fetus, know, I couldn't care less about what DHR has to say.
I think you should extrapolate on this more. I'm not sure where this relationship with me soured to be honest. You took a few digs as you vanished from the OI Server too, and I don't really understand where the animosity has come from. I'm all ears to find out what's happened dude.

People have been trying to help you complete this list, and while I get some of your counter points, you shouldn't just be throwing stuff out without even reading it or taking it on board. That's just part of Leadership.

I've had a few users contact me over your current attitude, and it doesn't look good to me. If you want to talk to me privately, you're more than welcome to.
 
I think you should extrapolate on this more. I'm not sure where this relationship with me soured to be honest. You took a few digs as you vanished from the OI Server too, and I don't really understand where the animosity has come from. I'm all ears to find out what's happened dude.

People have been trying to help you complete this list, and while I get some of your counter points, you shouldn't just be throwing stuff out without even reading it or taking it on board. That's just part of Leadership.

I've had a few users contact me over your current attitude, and it doesn't look good to me. If you want to talk to me privately, you're more than welcome to.
I may have been a bit too harsh on a lot of people, including you tbh. So I apologize.

As for why I got a grudge against you, it was because of your moderation in the GSC thread. I believe we all know exactly what I'm talking about.

Now, despite the fact that Drums claimed that I didn't read his post, which is obviously not true, I'm just trying to bridge the gap here.
I got one guy telling me Torterra should be A because of +6 Curse sweeps which obviously aren't something that any IGTL thread would acknowledge. Then I got the other thread leaders basically running all sorts of zany schemes to get sweeps even though they're unintuitive. Some of these didn't make it to the thread, but I suppose the animosity remained. These lists are semi-casual, so I had to cater to that style of play.

Frankly, I've stated more than once that I failed to properly take care of this list as I should, and that I should be removed from it. I acknowledge that most of the friction and lack of leadership needed to get this ship sailing is my fault, especially because of how abrasive I am and how due to IRL things I don't have the time to get things right.

I've got no issue admitting that all the issues that this thread had are solely my fault alone.

Before things potentially get even worse, as most people in this thread can't see eye to eye, and there's clearly a lack of leadership, close this thread.
 
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