Announcement Jirachi Has Been Banned From SwSh 1v1

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Ginger Princess

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it's not its time yet
Jirachi in the SwSh 1v1 metagame began doing what it had always done in generations prior - running Choice Scarf and haxxing opponents to death. In Generation 8, Jirachi's Choice Scarf set lost Heart Stamp, which was a bummer hax-wise, but gained far more overall, due to not only its overall power level when compared to the rest of the metagame being much stronger than in previous generations, but also its propensity to use Trick with great success, beating the Stall sets that once plagued and hardcountered Jirachi. Alongside this, developed later on in the post-Home metagame, during 1v1 PL, is the infamous and reliable stall Jirachi set, using Iron Defense, Amnesia or Calm Mind, and Stored Power to beat threats it would otherwise only inconsistently win against, like Banded Avalugg and Shell Smash Cloyster, while also maintaining a large amount of the matchups Scarf Jirachi held. The power decreep also allowed Jirachi to run tech more noticeable in generations like DPP and BW, like Calm Mind 3 attacks, to great affect.

Essentially, Jirachi's hax tactics are only amplified by the metagames shrunken ability to eat hits and hit hard in return, alongside the viability of Trick. With the power decreep, Jirachi also can run sets previously considered outclassed or unviable, and still beating large swaths of the metagame, thanks to its 100 Base stat-line and huge, diverse movepool. With a 3-1 vote, with one abstention, alongside general community support found here, Jirachi is quickbanned from the 1v1 metagame.

Tagging The Immortal or Kris for implementation.

Jirachi is a Pokemon that has both overpowered and uncompetitive qualities. The effectiveness of its various sets and obscene matchup spread make it a genuinely fearsome threat that is difficult to build against. The uncompetitive qualities stem from its RNG nature and general unpredictability. While I might be convinced that it would no longer be broken post-DLC (which I think it still would be), that does not change its uncompetitive nature. 1v1 will have a lot of work to do from a tiering perspective after the DLC drops, and adding a Jirachi suspect that is guaranteed to return a ban vote would slow down the development of our metagame.


Jirachi has been proven to be both uncompetitive and broken. Its simple ability to hax through Pokemon it shouldn't be winning against is without parallel bar Togekiss, which is held back significantly by its lower speed, bulk, and less useful typing. While this alone is problematic, Jirachi is a highly tailorable Pokemon with many different viable sets beyond Scarf, all of which exhibit very high levels of viability and can have quite different matchups from one another. This not only makes teambuilding against Jirachi difficult but often forces players to guess which set Jirachi is at team preview. This, alongside its RNG abuse, makes it especially dangerous for players to pick Pokemon that don't beat Jirachi at preview, granting the Jirachi user a significant advantage on top of an already extremely good Pokemon, and paired with its versatility, places a high opportunity cost on not using Jirachi.


Jirachi was a completely centralizing force within the 1v1 metagame. Though it only discovered non-Choice Scarf sets during 1v1PL, the effectiveness of sets like its Rest Stall set, alongside other techs such as Air Balloon and Shuca Berry, made Jirachi capable of dealing with everything besides the most specifically equipped to handle it. Choice Scarf is traditionally associated with degeneracy and flinch spam, only using hax to win; thats why in Gen 7, it was gimmicky and usually ineffectual or outclassed. However, Gen 8's lack of comparative power and bulk makes it so, instead of requiring 2-5 flinches on average to secure a win, Jirachi needs much less. Additionally, even breaking through the hax isn't a guaranteed victory, as the lack of Z moves, legendaries, or Mega Evolved power means an OHKO is unlikely. And because of the lack of Z moves and Mega Evolutions, Jirachi's access to Trick and Rest allows it to beat back the stall Pokemon that once threatened it, shutting them down instantly. The Stall set had the qualities to turn unreliable, semiconsistent or inconsistent matchups into hyperreliable ones, with Jirachi often luring in Pokemon who would stand slightly better odds at breaking through Scarf Jirachi's hax, thanks to their natural bulk, only to find them unable to break through the boosted defenses of a 100/100/100 bulk Pokemon, with reliable recover in Rest that once again gave it great odds against Stall Pokemon, even able to beat Dark-types without Taunt would could not sufficiently damage Jirachi after their defenses were boosted, eventually dying to Struggle. Predicting the sets is slightly easier in tournament, as no decent player will rely on a hax based strategy to get tour wins, but on ladder predicting is a pure 50/50, with both sets being exteremely viable. Essentially, Jirachi only gained access to higher relative power and better techs in the generational shift, so for now it needs to go.


While I don't personally see quickban material in Jirachi, I see similar elements to Mimikyu in it, with regards to what checks and counters it across either or both of its sets. I do think it's a bit soon after the Mimikyu ban to say for sure that the meta has or will mold in favor of Jirachi, but since a lot of things are against Jirachi between metagame development being time sensitive, much more public outcry for a ban than Mimikyu had, and more or less all of what Mimikyu had going for it being compacted down into (basically) 2 sets rather than 3, I'd be fine with a quickban.


I've never felt like Jirachi was particularly deserving of a quickban, and recent metagame shifts haven't really changed that. I will say that after the stall set surfaced I started taking Jirachi seriously as a threat beyond the years-old "ew flinch chance" concerns, but I still think its checks are plentiful and it doesn't have a high enough luck factor to where I'd take it seriously enough to want it gone with really high priority
 
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