Resource National Dex AG Viability Rankings [DLC I]

[bigtalk]

My nominations



First of all, I want to make it clear that I think this should stay in B+. However, I would like to use this opportunity to talk about the new Fairium Z set that I recently discovered: https://pokepast.es/0eed734b8d24f258

What's the point of this item? 1) You take reduced damage from Knock Off, and 2) in addition to lowering the foe's Attack by two stages, Z-Charm raises your Defense by one. These benefits enable Gothitelle to switch into its main target, defensive Dusk Mane, much more reliably; with the current set, Dusk Mane cannot be trapped reliably, as it will force Gothitelle out if it uses Knock Off on the switch, then Dynamaxes and uses Max Darkness. Here's how the sequence will go:

lefties calcs

• Gothitelle switches in
• 0 Atk Necrozma-Dusk-Mane Knock Off (97.5 BP) vs. 248 HP / 160+ Def Gothitelle: 168-198 (48.9 - 57.7%) -- 96.1% chance to 2HKO
• Gothitelle uses Charm
• -2 0 Atk Necrozma-Dusk-Mane Max Darkness vs. 248 HP / 160+ Def Gothitelle: 104-124 (30.3 - 36.1%) -- 43.5% chance to 3HKO
• Gothitelle uses Rest
• -2 Max Darkness again
• 0 sleep turns burnt
• -2 Max Darkness again
• 1 sleep turn burnt
• -2 0 Atk Necrozma-Dusk-Mane Sunsteel Strike vs. 248 HP / 160+ Def Gothitelle: 66-78 (19.2 - 22.7%) -- possible 5HKO
• 2 sleep turns burnt
• -2 Sunsteel Strike again

Gothitelle has to eat two -2 Max Darknesses + two -2 Sunsteel Strikes before waking up. The minimum rolls for these are 30% and 20%, meaning it'll always die. If Stealth Rock is up, it may even die after just the first two hits.

Now, here are the calcs for the Fairium Z set:

fairium calcs

- You switch in
- 0 Atk Necrozma-Dusk-Mane Knock Off vs. 248 HP / 56+ Def Gothitelle: 124-148 (36.1 - 43.1%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
- You use Z-Charm
- -2 0 Atk Necrozma-Dusk-Mane Max Darkness vs. +1 248 HP / 56+ Def Gothitelle: 78-92 (22.7 - 26.8%) -- 25% chance to 4HKO
- You use Charm
- -4 0 Atk Necrozma-Dusk-Mane Max Darkness vs. +1 248 HP / 56+ Def Gothitelle: 52-62 (15.1 - 18%) -- possible 6HKO

As you can see, Gothitelle survives Dusk Mane's hits very comfortably now, and can even afford to get a second Charm off before using Rest. It can switch in even if it's taken 1 or 2 rounds of Stealth Rock. (Technically, it's still not a 100% reliable switch-in since Dusk Mane can break through if it goes straight for Max Darkness on the switch, but this is a pretty rare scenario.) Because this set gives us so much more leeway verus Dusk Mane, another benefit is that we can get away with running more Speed investment (217/219) to trap other defensive Pokemon, such as Ho-Oh lacking Whirlwind and Zygarde after transformation.

However, all of this only applies if Gothitelle's primary target is Dusk Mane. If your goal is to trap supportceus instead, then Gothitelle should still be running Leftovers with no Speed investment, since it needs as much special bulk as possible to do so reliably.

...Anyways, with all that said, I don't think Gothitelle should rise since it's complete deadweight against a particular archetype (offense) so it's inconsistent & a matchup fish. Even against balance / bulky offense teams, it's not an autowin since opponents can take advantage of it by doubling to a scary breaker like Yveltal. Finally, it can't run enough bulk to trap Dusk Mane / supportceus at the same time, so it has to pick which targets it wants to trap.

B >> B-
This is garbage in gen 8 and shouldn't be ranked above a competent breaker like mmy

B- >> B
Echoing what Zayele said a couple of slates ago, this just adds so much flexibility in teambuilding for balance. For example, it's actually possible to build a decent fat team w/o Dusk Mane by pairing this with Primal Groudon or Quagsire, since they collectively cover both Zacian / Xerneas. Not to mention cleric support is also extremely rare and valuable in this meta.

B- >> UR
Still don't see how this isn't completely outclassed by defensive Lunala, which by itself is a set of questionable value.

D >> C
This is a very good breaker on Sticky Web teams that is capable of breaking through all of the usual pdon checks w/ dmax. Here's the set I've been using: https://pokepast.es/8ec3f0348c76815f

offensive calcs

w/o dmax:

• +2 252 Atk Life Orb Groudon Precipice Blades vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Zygarde: 356-421 (84.7 - 100.2%) -- 6.3% chance to OHKO after Leftovers recovery
• +2 252 Atk Life Orb Groudon Stone Edge vs. 0 HP / 4 Def Rayquaza-Mega in Strong Winds: 313-369 (89.1 - 105.1%) -- 31.3% chance to OHKO (they'll die after lo damage)
• +2 252 Atk Life Orb Groudon Stone Edge vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Dynamax Yveltal: 658-775 (83.7 - 98.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
• +2 252 Atk Life Orb Groudon Precipice Blades vs. 252 HP / 240+ Def Arceus-Ground or Arceus-Water: 363-426 (81.7 - 95.9%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
• 252 Atk Life Orb Groudon Stone Edge vs. 252 HP / 204+ Def Ho-Oh: 510-603 (122.5 - 144.9%) -- guaranteed OHKO (prevents defog easily)

with dmax:

• +2 252 Atk Life Orb Groudon Max Quake vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Zygarde: 417-491 (99.2 - 116.9%) -- 93.8% chance to OHKO after Leftovers recovery
• +2 252 Atk Life Orb Groudon Max Rockfall vs. 0 HP / 4 Def Rayquaza-Mega in Strong Winds: 346-407 (98.5 - 115.9%) -- 87.5% chance to OHKO
• +2 252 Atk Life Orb Groudon Max Rockfall vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Dynamax(!!) Yveltal: 723-853 (91.9 - 108.5%) -- 50% chance to OHKO (even if you get a min roll, they'll die the same turn to sand + lo damage)
• +2 252 Atk Life Orb Groudon Max Quake vs. 252 HP / 240+ Def Arceus-Ground or Arceus-Water: 422-499 (95 - 112.3%) -- 68.8% chance to OHKO

defensive calcs

• 252+ Atk Life Orb Rayquaza-Mega Dragon Ascent vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Groudon: 266-316 (78 - 92.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO (if it tries to switch in, don will always survive a +0 hit and KO it back with +2 edge)
• 0 SpA Arceus-Ground Ice Beam vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Groudon: 166-196 (48.6 - 57.4%) -- 94.1% chance to 2HKO
• 0 SpA Splash Plate Arceus-Water Judgment vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Groudon in Sun: 164-194 (48 - 56.8%) -- 85.5% chance to 2HKO

Unlike some of the other mons in D rank, it has actual bulk & forces switches, so it's very easy for it to find setup opportunities. As the above calcs show, it's also far from deadweight even if you opt not to Dynamax. Basically, it's a better SD Groundceus that's able to run Life Orb + has a free slot for rocks; the only (minor) drawbacks are that it needs to Dynamax to deal with Zygarde / Mega Rayquaza due to the lack of Ice Beam / lower Speed, or some prior chip in the former's case. However, I am only nominating it to C since it does rely a lot on Sticky Web to sweep, plus like most setup mons it's vulnerable to Ditto (although it can be improofed with Mega Rayquaza fairly easily).

(electric) UR >> D
This is a good Calm Mind sweeper on Sticky Web teams that can pressure Ho-Oh from using Defog & has a great matchup against threats to Sticky Web, like Yveltal and Mega Rayquaza. It's also statistically proven to have a higher freeze chance.

Thoughts on other nominations

B >> B+ / B >> C
Disagree with both, this should stay where it is

D >> UR
Disagree, I've never used this myself but its Water/Ground/Ice coverage cucks a lot of the sample teams + speed-boosting Water-type sweeper seems like a valid niche that Kyogre can't claim, without Dynamaxing at least. Also it can set up on pdon / groundceus with Air Balloon.

D >> UR
Agree, being countered by Ho-Oh is yuck. Although I think its matchup versus Ditto is better than ice implied, there are just much better things to use dmax on.

D >> UR Sure

(flying) D >> C Yes

C >> D Sure

UR >> D No

UR >> D No

A- >> A
No, although I have been using this on more of my teams, its a 100% solid check to nothing and invites in dangerous breakers like Eternatus, has serious 4MSS, etc etc. Forgoing Ice Beam for Toxic is something that it does because it's forced to, not because "it can." If this were to rise, it should be because of the Calm Mind set.

B+ >> A- No (as I explained earlier)

A- >> B+ Yes (I made this nom last slate)

B+ >> B
No, webs is very good and destroys a lot of balances, you just have to teambuild carefully (improof everything + put stone edge / taunt on everything)

B- >> C
Nope, this makes hyper offense teams a lot more consistent: provides dual screens support + keeps hazards on the field w/ taunt + prevents ditto from reverse sweeping with prank twave + anti-leads all other ho leads except for drill. If anything it should raise

B- >> C Yes

 

[Bread Sandwich]

Hi guys thought I might actually make a post that I put some effort in to so I am just going to give my opinions on the nominations so far

> > S-
Disagree but I can understand why, this pokemon is very strong and although yveltal is overall better that doesn't mean that you are wasting a dynamax slot, xerneas still forces most teams to use a dynamax in order to beat it even when it doesn't dynamax and that creates huge momentum, also the fact that almost every team is forced to run dm just to beat this and zacian is enough to justify it being s.

B >> B+ / B >> C
in my opinion this should actually drop, Hyper Offense is usually pretty underwhelming this gen and without webs it isn't very consistent

B- >> C
I am kinda neutral on this one but leaning towards drop , all though it is a very good screens setter and has access to prankster taunt the teams I have built with it have ended up not being very consistent so I feel like it should drop.

B- >> C
This thing is outclassed by offensive smeargle lol

B+ >> B
I strongly disagree with this, webs is a very strong playstyle that beats most balance teams, Swords dance rayquaza and Arceus-Ghost beat most teams with ease with webs up and not to mention all the other strong sweepers that get benefits from webs.

B+ >>> A-
No, This thing is good but I don't think that it is better than the rest of the pokemon in b+

Remove D-rank:
Strong no on this one, although most d tier mons are very stupid and it needs to be cleaned out.

C >> D
yeah this thing is overhyped, it really isn't that good. There are better xern checks such as necrozma dusk mane and arc-poison so I see no real reason to use it

B- >> B
Agree, this mon is able to check both xerneas and special attacking life orb yveltal so I think it deserves to rise

D >> UR
Yes this mon sucks, I have nothing else to say really

D to UR
Agree, I much as I hate to say this, this mon is hard to set up and loses to common dynamaxers so yeah I think it should be unranked

D >> C
Strongly Agree, This mon gets very good sets such as Double Dance and SD Max Airsteam so I think it deserves to move to C

D >> UR
Agree, this mon is garbage

C >> D
Agree, this mon is too hard to set up and its selling point of being an impostor proof dynamax sweeper just isn't ture

UR >> D
No, This mon garbage

A- >> B
Yes, This mon isn't really as good as advertised, once shadow shield brakes or this is statuses it struggles to check most of the physical sweepers it is supposed to check

UR >> D
This mon is bad and it was nommed as a joke

B- >> UR
Disagree, Although it is outclassed by lunala in most regards lugia is still bulkier and isn't as helpless when multiscale is broken so it gives it a definitive niche over lunala.

B >> B-
Agree, Marshadow simply isn't good

(Flying) D >> C
Agree, Although whirlwind ho-oh and zacian give it trouble it still manages to distinguish itself a niche as an impostor proof max airstream sweeper

(electric) UR >> D
Strongly Agree, This pokemon is able to beat most of the metagame aside from groudon and chansey, it is impostor proof because it takes very little damage from ice beam and judgement and its defensive variant can switch in to zacian unlike other defensive arc forms. although it is quite weak to status moves I think it deserves a spot in D rank

UR >> D
Agree, This mon is a solid suicide lead with a unique niche over the other suicide leads in the tier

My Nominations

A- >> B+
Mega-Gengar Really struggles to do its job as a trapper, the fact that you can simply just dynamax to escape the encore trap kinda makes it useless and I don't really see this pokemon as better than its fellow A- Ranked mons

UR >> D
I really don't get why this dropped off of VR in the first place, Quagsire is a very solid pokemon and is able to check strong prevent pokemon such as zacian, zygarde, and dragon dance necrozma dm and well as sd groundceus, stockpile also gives it the ability to boost its defenses in case it needs to check another mon that will come out or if you need to beat a threat that you can check while dynamaxed. Also the chansey + Quagsire core on stall checks a very large portion of the metagame so I think that it deserves to be ranked

 

[mistermath]

I'd like to make a nomination:
UR > > B- C

I believe umbreon is a highly underused pokemon in AG. The basis for this nomination is that it blanket checks almost every special attacker in AG, and even counters most strong special wallbreakers and sweepers in specific situations.
Here's the set I'm running:

I get nommed C (Umbreon) @ Leftovers
Ability: Synchronize
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SpD / 4 Spe
Calm Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Wish
- Protect
- Yawn
- Heal Bell
It allows Umbreon to fulfill the roles of both a special wall and a support, such that it is not completely useless when facing a strong physical attacker.
The plan is to get Umbreon in against a special attacker and take a hit while using yawn, forcing the opponent to switch out without killing Umbreon due to the threat of protect.

Calcs for when Umbreon checks

252+ SpA Kyogre-Primal Water Spout (150 BP) vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Umbreon in Heavy Rain: 310-366 (78.6 - 92.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ SpA Kyogre-Primal Origin Pulse vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Umbreon in Heavy Rain: 229-270 (58.1 - 68.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ SpA Kyogre Water Spout (150 BP) vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Umbreon in Rain: 271-319 (68.7 - 80.9%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ SpA Choice Specs Kyogre Origin Pulse vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Umbreon in Heavy Rain: 297-351 (75.3 - 89%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ SpA Life Orb Yveltal Max Airstream vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Umbreon: 185-218 (46.9 - 55.3%) -- 15.6% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ SpA Life Orb Yveltal Max Flare vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Umbreon in Sun: 185-218 (46.9 - 55.3%) -- 16.8% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
+2 252+ SpA Life Orb Yveltal Oblivion Wing vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Umbreon: 226-266 (57.3 - 67.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ SpA Fairy Aura Xerneas Moonblast vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Umbreon: 272-324 (69 - 82.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

Calcs for when Umbreon counters

252+ SpA Life Orb Eternatus Dynamax Cannon vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Umbreon: 153-181 (38.8 - 45.9%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ SpA Life Orb Eternatus Sludge Bomb vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Umbreon: 136-161 (34.5 - 40.8%) -- 61.2% chance to 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ SpA Life Orb Yveltal Oblivion Wing vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Umbreon: 113-134 (28.6 - 34%) -- 98.8% chance to 4HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ SpA Life Orb Dark Aura Yveltal Dark Pulse vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Umbreon: 74-88 (18.7 - 22.3%) -- possible 6HKO after Leftovers recovery
4 Atk Life Orb Yveltal Steel Wing vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Umbreon: 77-91 (19.5 - 23%) -- possible 6HKO after Leftovers recovery
+1 252+ SpA Kyogre-Primal Ice Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Umbreon: 124-147 (31.4 - 37.3%) -- guaranteed 4HKO after Leftovers recovery
+1 252+ SpA Kyogre-Primal Thunder vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Umbreon: 152-179 (38.5 - 45.4%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
252 SpA Earth Plate Arceus-Ground Judgement vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Umbreon: 135-159 (34.2 - 40.3%) -- 40.6% chance to 3HKO after Leftovers recovery

Also notable is its synchronize ability, which makes it very annoying for support arcs and zygarde.

Of course, umbreon is far from perfect. Of all the special attackers in the AG meta, its most notable loss is to xerneas, which ohkoes it with a boosted super-effective moonblast (note that xerneas doesn't ohko when not boosted). The listed set also lacks physical durability, and does little else besides sacrifice itself against powerful physical breakers like m-ray and zacian.

Therefore, I nominate umbreon to B- C.

edit: https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1108724233
certainly not a perfect game, but umbreon played a crucial role in walling dmaxed darkceus, m-ray, and specially offensive necrozma-ultra. Also, it forced many switches with yawn, racking up SR damage, and heal belled away two toxics.

edit: https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1108845286
great game, demonstrated how important umbreon can be in holding a team together. Also demonstrated that umbreon is very similar to chansey in function, albiet with some slight differences (yawn/wish vs. twave/confide, being able to check some physical attackers vs. being able to check all special attackers)

edit: hit rank 7 with an umbreon balance team. I'm not a good player, so if it isn't the player that is good, it has to be the team that is good. Therefore umbreon must be good.

edit: After gauging the opinions of others, I'm willing to tone this nomination down to a C. I agree that B- might be a bit too high for a mon whose niches over chansey are that it deals with knock off better and has yawn/foul play.

 

[Ktütverde]

I'd like to make a big post about some underused and great sets, not so much to have them ranked higher, but mostly because I think this is the best thread to do so, since we don't have a "creative sets" threat in AG, and meta discussion isn't a very interesting place from what I've seen.
If you think this post is too wild for a VR post, I also want to add that this is a nomination of 1 subrank up for every mon in my post (yeah, I hope it makes some sense).
Warning: long post. Scroll down, and read the parts you are interested in if you are lazy.


1°) The Next Most Broken Thing: T-killer

T-killer (Eternatus) @ Firium Z
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 188 HP / 80 SpA / 196 SpD / 44 Spe
Calm Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Toxic Spikes
- Flamethrower
- Toxic
- Recover

Why it was made
So obviously, I'll start with that set I made quite a while ago and called T-killer. T because there are two 'T's in Eternatus and because it is totally based on T-spikes. So T-killer.

It seemed kinda.. weird on paper, but it's really, really, oh man, Really Good. I know from my experience in OU that ToxicSpikes (toxapex) are ridiculously good against unprepared teams. And the thing about AG, is that literally everything is either grounded or steel-type, so Toxic-Spikes+Flamethrower is insane. But that's only the beginning. Eternatus also walls to death and beyond the only common defogger, Ho-Oh. Eternatus has pressure, so it can keep Tspikes up vs 2 defoggers (since they virtually have only as much defog PP as one defogger, and Tspikes has more PP than defog). With Toxic, it also ppstalls Ho-Oh and Chansey, walls non-dynamax Yveltal, but the main point is to pressure Ho-Oh extremely well.


The spread
1) outspeeds timid Pogre/jolly Pdon/so obviously modest Yveltal too.
2) enough SpA to OHKO zacian with Z-flame
3) enough SpD to avoid 2hko from full from Timid Pogre's Icebeam/Modest Yveltal's Dark Pulse


What it does to the AG meta
This eternatus can pretty much take on most balances on its own. Thanks to the Z-crystal, duskmane cant cripple etern with Knock. Zacian isn't a check anymore, since etern is bulky enough with the HP investment to live a behemoth blade if healthy enough and OHKO with Inferno Overdrive. But the only thing it needs to do, is switching-in on something it counters (defensive Duskmane, Ho-oh, waterceus/fairyceus, chansey, ferrothorn...), clicking Tspikes, and watching all the opposing grounded mons getting poisoned and unable to properly check Etern's teammates. Arceus-G/W have refresh, but they still take -12% upon switching in, and waste a precious turn using refresh. Zygarde is put on a timer and forced to Rest. Same for pdon. Kyogre becomes useless (kinda). Chansey struggles a lot. Also once the opponent has wasted its Dmax on Yveltal, you can safely go T-killer and ppwall it. So you see that T-killer checks half of the tier, and pressures the other half with its Tspikes+Toxic. Only Megaray is an actual threat for etern and its team.

A replay (vs Chloe , thanks for the game!) that just showcases the effectiveness of T-killer (turn10 onwards):

Open!

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1103029878-wffrzmly29h193nua1s9f4f5xe631qxpw

The calcs that make T-killer even more useful defensively

Crucial Calcs

+1 252+ Atk Zacian-Crowned Behemoth Blade vs. 188 HP / 0 Def Eternatus: 343-405 (73.2 - 86.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock
80 SpA Eternatus Inferno Overdrive (175 BP) vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Zacian-Crowned: 326-384 (100.3 - 118.1%) -- guaranteed OHKO

252 SpA Kyogre-Primal Ice Beam vs. 188 HP / 196+ SpD Eternatus: 196-232 (41.8 - 49.5%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
252+ SpA Life Orb Dark Aura Yveltal Dark Pulse vs. 188 HP / 196+ SpD Eternatus: 196-231 (41.8 - 49.3%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
4 Atk Life Orb Dark Aura Yveltal Knock Off vs. 188 HP / 0 Def Eternatus: 160-188 (34.1 - 40.1%) -- guaranteed 3HKO

Teambuilding with T-killer
I've never had so much success with a single mon before. This eternatus has literally no drawbacks, except: opposing defog Gliscor, opposing Eternatus, and Mray (it really takes advantage of it ngl). You can find room for it in most teams, since it provides your team with a safe Yveltal switch-in (post dmax), safe Ho-Oh counter, and because the Tspikes are extremely rewarding. I've made billions of team with T-killer, the possibilities are kinda limitless. Some examples:
1) Tspikes+DD Zygarde: Xerneas/defensive Arceus no longer beat Zygarde
2) Tspikes+Pdon: defensive Zygarde cant take on offensive Pdon anymore
3) Tspikes+Special sweeper: poisoned Chansey vs yveltal/CM pogre/Xerneas? guess who wins
4) Tspikes+Ditto? Sweepers quickly fall in Ditto's KO range
5) Tspikes+Defensive Walls? Opposing wallbreakers struggle to break past, since poison whittles away at them and walls just spam recovery moves
6) Tspikes+Ghost? Very effective vs smeargle webs.


This is long.... isn't it? (Nah it's cool, amirite)
It isn't every day that I come up with something really effective, actually it almost never happens. I'm gonna be honest with you, I really love T-killer, it just makes building so much fun and less frustrating. I've been patient, but after winning AGLT mostly thanks to it, I think it's time I make this huge post. I've been using T-killer in a LOT of teams to the point where it could be called addiction, since it's super spammable, makes the games so much easier, and can't be prepped for unless you bring your own etern (really underused mon so I don't worry about it), defog gliscor (with taunt and sand tomb, if not etern just stalls it too), or defensive Mega Diancie. I just think T-killer is something reeeaally effective, hence my long post to explain it and hype it up!!


Teammates
Now some Teammates I strongly recommend:
1) Lugia: beats Arceus-Ground, Zygarde, Pdon and Mray, ie, everything that can switch-in for free on T-killer. T-killer kills balance, Lugia+tspikes kills offense.
2) Zygarde-C: mostly defensive. It walls Pdon and some Mray sets, and can just spam dtail so as to spread T-poison. SubDD isn't that great as a Tspikes abuser (i've tried it a lot) simply because, while you sub or DD, ho-oh comes out and just defogs. But you can play smart and spam dtail from turn1 and hope arceus/haze zygarde gets poisoned. Also not all teams have HoOh (:doubt:).
3) Zacian-C: nothing stands in its way anymore, except Duskmane (which isnt that reliable vs Crunch/SD sets). Poisoned Groundy/Zyg/pdon cant handle zacian, no way. It also compliments Etern well as an Yveltal check and Mewtwo check.
4) Ho-Oh: another yveltal check, whirlwind works great with T-killer/
5) As I said before, everything loves Tspikes, so be wild around using T-killer!


Things to watch out for
I will repeat stuff I've already said, but since it's a long post I hope it will help you understand my main points without having to scroll up and down in search of what I said. As I said, T-killer isn't always 100% reliable. First problem is opposing Eternatus, but Etern is really uncommon right now. If both are T-Killers, it's fine, neutral MU. If oppo is offensive, it's more of a problem since you can't touch it, while it absorbs your Tspikes and KOes you. Then there's Smeargle lead, with taunt+rapidspin. You can't lead Tkiller vs this. Then there is Gliscor with Defog+Sand Tomb and Taunt (guillotine isn't that scary, loses 2 pp every time it misses, and god knows it misses all the hits). Finally, in the list of full counters, Mega Diancie (With rest), completely shuts down T-killer (Bacon brought it specifically for T-killer against me!). And as I said too, Mray only fears Toxic and can start DDing or whatever and sweep your team.

T-killer variants
The only thing T-killer really needs is Tspikes+Flame+Recover. It works best as posted above, but in some cases you can use variants. Sludgebomb>Toxic still poisons Ho-Oh and beats MDiancie, but having Toxic (that never misses because Etern is Poison-type) is better to instantly cripple a Pdon trying to switchin on you for example. Dynamax Cannon with Max Speed is usable too so as to be Mray-proof and still pack some punch vs Zygarde mainly, but it makes T-killer overly reliant on PPstall to beat Ho-Oh.

In a nutshell
1) AG teams are extremely weak to the combination of T-spikes+Flamethrower. With Pressure and an immunity to Toxic, T-killer can PPstall up to 2 defoggers on its own.
2) T-killer checks a large portion of the tier: it walls and beats, directly or via PPstall, Duskmane, Ho-Oh, Ferro, Chansey, Water/Fairy/Dark Arceus, and checks Kyogre, Pogre, Yveltal (post Dmax).
3) It isn't checked by Zacian easily, since Z-Flamethrower OHKOs it, whereas Behemoth Blade can't KO after rocks
4) Almost every AG pokemon appreciates T-spikes support, since it greatly cripples both Balance and Offense.
5) Massive offensive pressure can lead to KOs being scored before Tpoison claims KOs.
6) 100% checks exist: Rapidspin+Taunt Smeargle, Mega Diancie, Taunt+SandTomb Defog Gliscor, Eternatus.


Okay, I'm done with the T-killer talk. I hope you enjoyed it, or at least that my explanations justify this post being so long. Some sets you should also try if you haven't yet with the Correct spreads (and that should rise one subrank up):


1°)Bis) DragoniumZ Eternatus

Eternatus @ Dragonium Z
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Modest / Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Dynamax Cannon
- Flamethrower
- Sludge Bomb
- Recover

More than LifeOrb, I like Z on etern. OHKOes offensive Pdon, 2hkoes Pogre after one regular Dynamax Cannon. Modest is also solid (shoutout BananaLaddersPS ) since I can't think of a reason for using Jolly Mray. Also you want Etern to be your Ferro and defensive Duskmane switchin, so a Z-crystal is great not to be crippled at all by Knock off.


2°) Gliscor

Gliscor @ Toxic Orb
Ability: Poison Heal
EVs: 244 HP / 252 SpD / 12 Spe
Careful Nature
- Defog
- Sand Tomb
- Taunt / Guillotine
- Roost

Stall isn't viable, but very fat balances are, and Gliscor shines there, since it's a defogger immune to toxic, that walls Pdon/duskmane/ferro/zygarde/chansey etc, and stallbreaks like nothing else (icebeam arceus formes are annoying tho). With taunt it can also keep hazards away even though they have more PP than defog. I know pichus and Thimo love guillotine, and it makes a lot of sense AND makes you feel like you are abusing the lack of OHKO clause (feels so good ngl), but I personally like taunt more since Guillotine becomes infinite PP on opposing ditto and you just autolose vs that, and I usually hit max 2 guillotines per match, sometimes less, so taunt seems more reliable to me. A solid mon in fat balance that deserve some love. It also beats T-killer dawg

244 HP+252 Spd is bulkier than the other way around, and 244 gives u a Poison Heal number.


3°) Lugia

Lugia @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Multiscale
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Def / 8 SpD
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Thunder Wave
- Ice Beam
- Whirlwind
- Roost

Clearly better than Lunala as a multiscaler, simply because it walls Pdon and Mray, unlike Lunala which is significantly less bulky. Also the ground immunity is very good. T-wave is mostly because Toxic isnt going to do anything to Lugia switchins (steel types, stuff with Rest). It also makes it a really cool Zacian/mray/unecro check. Icebeam, nobody uses it, but why? You've got here the best Zygarde counter ever, so USE icebeam (if you don't, Zygarde trolls you with sub+faster Dragontail). Whirlwind works well with all kinds of entry hazards, forces mray out (but you don't need to unless it is SD) as well most sweepers like SD pdon (yeah toxic sounds cool, but pdon just outspeeds you so better whirlwind it), DD necrozma(ultra or not), SD arceus....


4°) Chansey (the right spread)

Chansey (F) @ Eviolite
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Def / 252 SpD
Calm Nature
- Seismic Toss / Confide
- Thunder Wave / Toxic
- Stealth Rock / Aromatherapy / Wish / Confide
- Soft-Boiled

I'm posting this because the official analysis has a wrong spread (don't run HP, it only slightly increases your special bulk, whereas max defense literally DOUBLES your defense stat with the eviolite). Also I don't understand why everyone has confide on this, I rarely need it (CM arceus p much don't exist, and water is walled by Pdon/Etern..) and makes Chansey way too passive. Toss+Twave is a tried and true combo that pressures everything, and you still beat Xerneas with this especially with Zacian or Dusk in the back in case it geomancies again and never misses because of para). Imo confide should only be used in very fat teams, but even in those I find myself using Twave and Toss more, it's just effective at pressuring stuff like Yveltal, Zacian etc.


THE END. hope you liked it!

-ktut

 

[J1mm1P]

Just wanted to talk about this and Eternatus.
Umbreon has good bulk and its access to Wish gives it a niche over bulkier mons such as Lugia. Unlike Chansey it can take many physical hits while passing Wishes and can force the opponent out with Yawn, something which is really good against setup sweepers not named Xerneas. It also has access to reliable and instant recovery in Moonlight, Taunt to ruin Grimmsnarl, Chansey, and opposing Umbreon, can cripple opponents with Toxic, heal its teammates from status with Heal Bell. It even has some other options in Swagger and Foul Play. It does struggle against Xerneas and Tkiller, though.
Speaking of Tkiller...

This might just be one of the most versatile mons in AG, despite its horrible movepool. It mostly plays defensive, however the offensive set can pop up at any moment and destroy you. Probably the best set is the aforementioned Tkiller (s/o Ktütverde), which sets up TSpikes while pressuring Ho-Oh with Toxic. TSpikes are really good in AG (I doubt Tpex would be ranked if it didn't have the move), and combined with Flamethrower and Firium Z to get rid of Steel types, and Recover, Tkiller is really good and demolishes unprepared teams.
So to B- and to A+ (yes to both).

 

[mistermath]

I thought I'd give some thoughts on the mons I have some experience with.


B >> B-
Absolutely not. Sashadow continues to be a looming menace every time you see marshadow, regardless of whether or not it's actually running that set. Scarf marshadow outspeeds and turns on mons like necrozma-ultra and zacian-c.

B- >> B
Yes. I think this is a good change to make in conjunction with the addition of to the viability list. Even though stall doesn't really have much of an impact in the meta, chansey continues to wall a significant portion of the metagame on balance teams that appreciate the ability to check/counter mons like yveltal, xerneas, eternatus, etc.

B- >> UR
What??? Lugia got a huge buff in the form of HBD and is now a far more reliable check to mons like mray. Lunala's significantly worse, in fact - it lacks the stats needed to reliably check anything, and has a horrid typing that leaves it quad-weak to dark and ghost types. Should stay where it is.

D >> UR
Lmao get this thing off of here. "But it can dmax" is not a justification for being on the tier list.

D >> UR
See kartana.

(Water)A- >> A
I think it's significantly outclassed by arceus-ground. While it's good and there are some teams that prefer to have a more bulky supportceus with toxic that can threaten ho-oh, more teams like the ground-type judgement for top mons like ndm and groudon. Stay at A-.

A- >> B+
I'd actually drop it further because this has little business being as high as it is, seeing as its most hyped-up set is worse than lugia.

 

[Geysers]

I might as well go ahead and provide my thoughts on some noms here.
—> S-
Yes please. This mon is just too easy to check with chansey or NDM.
—> C
Yeah, this is pretty bad right now because HO doesn’t do very well.
viv whatever its name is —> C
Quite frankly, I’d advocate for dropping this to D. I’ve seen 0 usage of it, and everyone has goggles zyg or whirlwind ho-oh so it can’t do much.
—> B
Absolutely not. Anyone who’s advocating for this hasn’t felt the pain of a goddamn shell smash power trip smeargle, or lost to smashpass because of a nasty 3 turn sleep.
—> A-
Yeah. Every balance right now loses to this thing depending on which set it’s running. It’s an absolute pain in the ass to play around, even with a team that can manage it.
—> D
YES. This thing is incredibly linear, checking one mon, and being utter deadweight against the whole rest of the meta. It should never be used on a serious team and is strictly outclasses by Chansey. There’s literally no reason I’d ever use this. Having Amoonguss on the VR is somewhat akin to having Magnemite on the VR last gen. Magnemite was bad but it beat ray well and didn’t do much else, so it never got ranked. Similarly, Amoonguss beats xern well and can’t do jack against any other good mon. Unrank this ASAP.
All the D —> UR noms: Agree, these mons are only usable because of dynamax, and they’re outclassed by stuff like Yveltal.
—> D
I’ve seen this mentioned a few times in the AG chat, but it’s just bad. It has no recovery and is chipped really easily.
—> C
This mon is very scary, but it struggles to break through common pokemon like Zygarde, groundceus, and waterceus. It’s definitely much better than the other dynamax crud in D, but it’s still not *that* great. I’m on the fence here, but leaning rise, I guess.
—> B+
Yeah, this thing is pretty underwhelming.
—> UR / B
Raise it. This thing is quite a pain to play against with anything offensive, and it’s pretty annoying as a para spreader too.
—> B-
Yes, this thing is really bad, and only the sash set’s even decent, and it gets neutered by rocks, so it’s pretty bad.
—> C
I guess? I haven’t really used this enough to have an educated opinion, but it seems cool on paper,
—> D
Yes, this thing should be ranked. Boltbeam is really cool, and having para immunity is nice as well.
—> A+
Absolutely. This mon is reaaaally good right now and a lot of balances are unprepared.
—> somewhere above where it is rn
Hard no. It might just be personal bias, but gliscor has been incredibly underwhelming every time I’ve seen it. It struggles to break through a lot of common stuff that it’s supposed to beat.
—> B-
This is cool on paper, and I’ve seen it do good work, but B- seems a bit high for it. I’d support C though.

 

[pichus]

going to make a few very controversial nominations


Eternatus to A+
starting with the most obvious one, this has been the best mon in A rank since the first VR slate, in my eyes atleast, and has been in the spotlight lately thanks to Ktütverde's newly found success with the tspikes/zmove sets. everyone hates facing fast strong special attackers and eternatus being very bulky makes it a solid option on even bulky balances since its almost never a liability on defense. this can comfortably switch into and threaten the most common defensive core atm, ho-oh + dusk mane and has pretty much 0 consistent checks except chansey and ttar, which can actually be beaten, if played smartly or given enough support (spike stack/other teammates). as ktut said it comes with almost no drawbacks and i think this mon is criminally underrated/underused. the current vr doesnt reflect its viability very well and a rise to A+ rank seems reasonable.



Gliscor to B+
im gonna jump on the 'council is corrupt' train and call them out for voting on this to drop without actually using it. jokes aside, i'm actually very annoyed that this dropped to B rank. B rank has borderline useless mons, namely ekiller, deoxys, marshadow and mewtwo which you'd almost always struggle to build around. gliscor on the other hand is an extremely splashable pokemon since it can single handedly check the common balance core, ho-oh + dusk mane + ferrothorn/pdon while at the same time providing solid utility (defog or rocks). admittedly, this is horrible vs hyper offense but its a very rare playstyle to begin with and tbf you can make a similar case for a few big bad mons in the meta rn. other than the standard sand tomb taunt, another set which is increasingly being used a lot is the sd pass set. i do not approve any baton pass related mons but truth be told, this is a very consistent baton passer since you can taunt haze zygarde/ww ho-oh/leech ferro before passing your boosts, ensuring that you can comfortable pass boosts to the receiver without it taking much damage while not relying on evasion, sleep turns and such. i believe this is easily the 2nd best pokemon in the B ranks/lower combined (behind kyogre and maybe smeargle). one more thing which id like to point out is that gliscor has been used in several tour games and has proven to be very effective in most of them. gliscor probably has the best tour win rate in gen8 which really says a lot. i will be attaching some replays to support my argument.

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1087476045 SEASONAL GRAND FINALS, gliscor basically 6-0d
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1082956834 SEASONAL WINNERS FINALS, gliscor basically 6-0d
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1109905729 ssnl r4, gliscor passes boosts to the sweeper.
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1109850818 ssnl r4, poor baby got critted and chansey lacked confide. but it does showcase how good of a defogger/team support it is.
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1090776277 aglt r1
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1090773945 aglt r1
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1098992383-l0x6mwnwq0or0z1d9u8urglo6priyfspw aglt quarter finals
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1108820973-8y9lh9o2mgu5u7rwafjb6deek3o0tedpw AGLT FINALS

there are def a lot more, ill ask other people to get some for me. but ive said enough to prove my point, B rank is sheer disrespect to such a consistent pokemon and i urge the rest of the council to reconsider gliscor's place on the vr.


Xerneas to S-
im still v mixed on this one. its kinda like, i agree with every argument on this thread about xern (whether its for S- or S) and I just really cant make up my mind about it. im not sure how to feel about the nominations yet so ill just type what i personally think of this xerneas situation. as i said, im not 100% sure if xern should stay or drop but what i do know for sure is that its fellow s rank mon zygarde is borderline broken atm. its almost like last gen when unecro and zyg were in the same rank and zyg had to drop solely because unecro was too good (i dont think zyg was any less broken but this is the explaination i heard from 5/7 of the council members who voted on it) and i think xern finds itself in this situation too now. so my starting argument has to be that zygarde has set the criteria for an S rank mon really, really high and I dont think xern fits over there anymore. and to clarify, yes I do realize that xerneas and zyg are very different offensive mons. but honestly at this point im kinda just struggling to fit xern on teams? and if i ever accomplish this, i really just end up replacing the xern with yveltal or zygarde. this is by no means supposed to imply that yveltal and zygarde outclass xerneas but i really just feel like xerneas is much more trickier to fit on teams compared to the other big bad boys of ag (zyg, yveltal, zacian and ndm) and from my experience, these 4 just give better and consistent results while being easier to use. its no secret that xerneas is suffering from overprep atm because of which people hesitate to use this on their own teams. to support this argument, you can have a look at the recent ssnl and aglt replays. tours usage isnt the best indicator of viability but it shows that top players prefer using zyg/yveltal/zacian/dm and even eternatus over xerneas which really does reflect the fact that this isnt the go-to sweeper anymore because the aforementioned 5 mons are just straight up just better options, atm atleast. all 5 of these are much easier to fit in my experience and have actually been able to threaten teams. again, i dont feel very strongly about this since its mostly from personal experiences but its also hard to deny the fact that people have been consistently picking other sweepers over this. this really shows that xerneas has lost its shine and i trust that S- is a more accurate rank for Xerneas atm.


Zacian-Crowned to S

"??????????" the main reason why im doing this is because we need a fairy type in S rank to keep a check on zygarde. that out of the way, ive accidentally discovered this disgusting zacian crowned set which lets it murder physically defensive necrozma dusk mane on the switch in and doesnt require 200 mons to improof. if youve been living under a rock and still havent seen this,

Zacian-Crowned @ Rusted Sword
Ability: Intrepid Sword
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Assurance
- Close Combat
- Behemoth Blade
- Wild Charge

+1 252+ Atk Zacian-Crowned Assurance vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Prism Armor Necrozma-Dusk-Mane: 240-283 (60.3 - 71.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

rocks are up, necrozma tries to switch in and gg. to elaborate, you have basically 0 reason to not click assurance every time rocks are up since everything will take double damage. its like clicking cc except it hits ndm for super effective damage. i mean, do i really have to say anything else? just start using quag on every team already, this thing is invincible now

 

[Ktütverde]

Hey again, I'll be writing this as a complement to pichus post, because I totally agree on 90% of it (great post fren!), and want to provide a lot more of information so that you reader have full knowledge of what tf is Gliscor doing ranked so high in the AG VR. I'm also a Gliscor addict so that helps I suppose. (Last time I wrote 5 lines on it).

Regular Defog Gliscor

Gliscor @ Toxic Orb
Ability: Poison Heal
EVs: 244 HP / 252 SpD / 12 Spe
Careful Nature
- Defog
- Taunt
- Sand Tomb
- Roost


So I wanted to delay a detailed post about Gliscor from my part, but Pichus decided to post all my replays where I'm using Gliscor, so I guess I have to react to this. First, I want Gliscor to rise to B+ because it is stronger than everything below. Read pichus post if you want some evidence to back it up, including many replays). But I also want to make clear that Gliscor isn't that great. It is just good. Even though I seem to be using gliscor or Eternatus in all my teams, I'm not a fanatic, okay?

About Regular Defog Gliscor

Why is gliscor good?
- It is the best AG defogger by far: taunt+defog prevents rockers from keeping rocks up via ppstall (rocks have more PP than defog, that's why you often see duskmanes staying in vs hooh since, even though it gets burned, it always wins the Rocks vs Defog war).
-It is a safe switchin and counter to many defensive Pokemons: duskmane, ferro, pdon, zygarde, chansey, hooh.
-It can stallbreak very well vs certain teams
-Its design is super cool and makes it look devilish and stronger than it is
tl;dr: Gliscor has a fantastic balance MU, since it can always keep rocks off the field, and wall many defensive Pokemon.
-If you watch my replays, you will see that: Gliscor always prevents rocks from going up unless I want them to in order to bring a breaker in instead; Gliscor switches in and out forever with no problem; Gliscor wins or should win but doesnt because of haxx (vs Bacon it should have won the g1 once arceus ground ran out of icebeams but it got critted; gliscor should have walled CM HProck arceus ground vs bigtalk g1 but got critted too).

Now, why isn't Gliscor that great?
-Gliscor is useless vs offense, and when I say useless, it means useless. You are playing with 5 mons literally. And even though Sample teams make the AG meta look like full balance, it isn't the case. HO is extremely potent since ditto has become a rarer sight. HO is incredibly uncreative, Mray+zacian+pdon+duskmane+dmaxer+webs is the way to go, but super hard to handle. Gliscor is so awful vs offense, it's ridiculous. If you have a defensive zygarde or groundceus, you can handle up to 3 mons (mray/pdon/duskmane). Gliscor doesnt do shit vs that. Gliscor is a free switchin for Mray, yveltal, kyogre, even zacian lol (sandtomb does 0). Sometime mray switches in on gliscor, SDs and it is game over unless you have ditto or lugia in the back or a fairyceus with dynamax left.
-Gliscor is sometimes a momentum sucker against balance. Oppo has an icebeam user: groundceus? a lugia? well u can just defog and wall some stuff, but arent gonna pressure anything. Guillotine helps against that, but it often misses too much, and u'd rather click defog or roost than guillotine 90% of the time.
-The really big issue with gliscor is how it lets Mray/yveltal/zacian in for free p much, and god knows those happen to be the deadliest wallbreaker/sweepers.

I'm a bit sad to be writing this "gliscor isnt that great" paragraph, especially when Pichus used many replays of mine to back up the gliscor nomination. Just consider this post as a "gliscor to B+ yeah absolutely, A- no" which Pichus agrees with too. Don't get me wrong, Gliscor makes a lot of things very well, but the downsides are quite catastrophic at times. Just keep in my mind that defensive zygarde/groundceus are extremely useful Pokemons and that replacing them by gliscor should only be done in specific teams that already have stuff for checking zygarde/mray/offensive pdon/DD duskmane etc.

SDpass Gliscor

Now, I really didn't want to be sharing this now, cuz I only have 2 replays that showcase it working extremely well, and one of them is that AGLT final that ended very weirdly, but well Pichus posted it, so I suppose I don't have to feel ashamed for talking about it, since I know she wouldn't ever do that if that was the case. So the set we're going to look at now is:

Gliscor @ Toxic Orb
Ability: Poison Heal
EVs: 244 HP / 248 SpD / 16 Spe
Calm Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Swords Dance
- Taunt
- Baton Pass
- Roost / Substitute


Spread: to outspeed regular Gliscor before it taunts as well as Haze zygarde. More evs are perfectly fine too, this is just a default spread. Variant: minimum speed to underspeed as many things as possible before batonpassing.
Moves: Taunt for Whirlwind/Status moves (to protect the receiver ofc)/opposing Taunt. Sub for Dragontail/scouting for switchins like Kyogre so you can batonpass instead of SD the next turn and still gain momentum. SD+pass obvious.

Description

Mini-analysis

Intro
I'm not gonna claim it or anything, but since I've seen nobody else using it, and that I won 2 games with it this last week in quite a spectacular manner, I suppose it is fair I talk about it.
The first time I built with it was with Scarf Dracovish, because I wanted to make a surprise to BananaLaddersPS (the biggest Vish fan). I mean SD pass into scarf vish is hotter than Pdon's sunlight. It is also total horseshit because Pdon is quite a thing, waterceus too. It turns out that Rayquaza just switches in on gliscor and KOs before u pass anything.
Then I tried to make a Grimmsnarl team, but I had no idea how to get rid of HoOh since it just spams sacred fire vs grimm and doesnt let you setup anything after screens go up because of the burns. So I thought: let's go gliscor since it allows stuff to indirectly setup on hooh via SD+pass gliscor. It won me the AGLT finals in a similar manner: my Duskmane could indirectly setup on ferrothorn via gliscor's SD+taunt.

How to use it
First, you can pair it with a physical attacker that doesn't have a setup option: my favorite one is dynamax Max airstream HoOh. Scarf Dracovish is another cool example.
Then you can pair it with a Pokemon that simply doesn't have SD: so dragondance users make for great candidates, so they virtually have both DD and SD.
Finally, the real tech is pairing SDpass Gliscor with a sweeper that needs one extra turn than usual after setting up. Let me rephrase this. Normally, a sweeper (named X) will always live the same scenario: while it uses SD (for example), the opponent will be sending out its check to X. So when the sweeper starts attacking, the opposing mon will be already ready for it. That's why some sweepers fail to work: how can you sweep with DD duskmane if the oppo sends haze zygarde while you are clicking DD? How can Kartana do anything if HoOh is sent out during the SD? Well SDpass Gliscor solves the issue, and on top of that, it passes extra boosts. If the opponent goes HoOh, you just taunt it with gliscor, ppstall the sacred fires, and go duskmane/kartana for instance. But the oppo isnt dumb, they'll be going say Arceus with Icebeam (which you live), and even though it will render Gliscor useless for the rest of the game, the SD passed will affect the game's outcome quite significantly since the receiver will have an extra turn before the check is sent out, and that check will have to deal with a +3 or +4 sweeper X instead of +1/+2.

Drawbacks
Pretty much needs screens to be able to pass an SD without being OHKOed by dynamax yveltal/rayquaza/max hailstorm arceus..
Hard to justify over Defog Gliscor.

I have two teams with it; I'll share them in the bazaar (+other teams including T-killer, so that all my talk gets backed up by some concrete stuff).
Trailer (guess the sets if you haven't seen the matches):

Now that you have made a guess, the replays (and sorry, bacon, so sorry again for betraying you over that gentleman's agreement to no BP):

SDpass Gliscor sweeps

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1108820973-8y9lh9o2mgu5u7rwafjb6deek3o0tedpw
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1109905729

Assurance Zacian-C

Ngl, Pichus is sniping everyone today. So I've faced that set in AGLT finals (bacon g1), and in a private game vs Pigeons and Pichus. I never had the slightest knowing that Assurance wasn't a Payback with +10 in power, and I think many other people too: I've always read (I must be blind): power doubles if damaged this turn. But actually it is "if target damaged this turn" LOL. So basically, if Duskmane takes rocks damage, assurance does 120, so 50% more than Crunch. Does it need more explanations? I don't think so. Pigeons told me he knew how assurance worked from Doubles OU, and I suppose Pichus/Bacon/someone else? figured that out recently too funnily enough, but I just wanna say I feel super dumb for discovering this now thanks to them. I suppose many ppl still are living under a rock as Pichus said, because I haven't seen Assurance being used over crunch ever since I started playing Natdex AG, which is like a massive LOL.

WARNING: Assurance isn't a +10 power Payback.
Look at this hilarious bewilderment during my AGLT finals g1 vs Bacon after he uses Assurance:

I discovered how Assurance worked while playing like a dumbass vs Pigeons, and I got 6-0ed by it since I only had duskmane for Zacian (yeah I make weird teams at time). But the point is, Zacian has always been broken imo: it just happens to look less broken because People have been spamming Zacian counterteams on purpose (ie Duskmane+Pdon+zygarde+PhysDef HoOh+ditto). However!! Nowadays we as a community have settled on using minimal counterplay to zacian: We all use duskmane, but Zygarde and Pdon have become rarer, the former replaced by Refresh Groundceus (as a pdon/mray check mostly), the latter by Chansey (as a Pogre/xern check), and HoOhs are often Spdef, so they can't force zacian out (you can actually send zacian on a toxic/defog and just OHKO with wildcharge. But this is over, Assurance Zacian doesn't care at all about Duskmane, so teambuilding will become more restrictive. After discovering Assurance Zacian, I spent 5minutes telling Pigeons this set just broke the AG tier.

I find Zacian even more stupid now, since Duskmane doesnt check it anymore. Fortunately we still have Full def ZygardeC and Pdon, but they have to be played ridiculously carefully now.

Counterplay to Assurance Zacian
Counterplay to Assurance Zacian-C (look at the third, isn't it cool!!!):
-full def Zygarde-C: glare+1K arrows+rest+Haze/coil - this set requires glare in case zacian is SD, and haze to cancel the boosts (from smeargle too notably)
-full def Pdon: Precipice blades+LavaPlume+RestTalk - Dual stab is required so sleeptalk has a 2/3 chance of OHKOing zacian. Walled by HoOh but that's nothing compared with being unable to beat Zacian when asleep. If you toxic HoOh, pdon beats it too.
-Dusk-mane+Defog Gliscor: YES, now you have a GOOD reason to use Gliscor: keeping rocks away so that assurance doesn't work
-Duskmane+Mega Sableye: yeah msab isn't that good but it does its job at keeping rocks away (and fucks up with all smeargle sets).

Happy new Zacian tier!
Peace,

-Ktut

PS: I haven't said it yet, but as you can guess I'm not an English or American native, so forgive my writing mistakes
PS: drop Xerneas yes please, who even uses this anymore since Chansey has become the wave.
PS2: I'll post the BP gliscor+Scarf Vish team too Ben :]

 

[Kate]

- It is the best AG defogger by far: taunt+defog prevents rockers from keeping rocks up via ppstall (rocks have more PP than defog, that's why you often see duskmanes staying in vs hooh since, even though it gets burned, it always wins the Rocks vs Defog war).

eh hem, just like to say that heatran is the best rocker because of that combo, as it forces Ho-oh out eh hem Heatran to D anyone?

 

[HanSoloIndie]

going to make a few very controversial nominations


Eternatus to A+
starting with the most obvious one, this has been the best mon in A rank since the first VR slate, in my eyes atleast, and has been in the spotlight lately thanks to Ktütverde's newly found success with the tspikes/zmove sets. everyone hates facing fast strong special attackers and eternatus being very bulky makes it a solid option on even bulky balances since its almost never a liability on defense. this can comfortably switch into and threaten the most common defensive core atm, ho-oh + dusk mane and has pretty much 0 consistent checks except chansey and ttar, which can actually be beaten, if played smartly or given enough support (spike stack/other teammates). as ktut said it comes with almost no drawbacks and i think this mon is criminally underrated/underused. the current vr doesnt reflect its viability very well and a rise to A+ rank seems reasonable.



Gliscor to B+
im gonna jump on the 'council is corrupt' train and call them out for voting on this to drop without actually using it. jokes aside, i'm actually very annoyed that this dropped to B rank. B rank has borderline useless mons, namely ekiller, deoxys, marshadow and mewtwo which you'd almost always struggle to build around. gliscor on the other hand is an extremely splashable pokemon since it can single handedly check the common balance core, ho-oh + dusk mane + ferrothorn/pdon while at the same time providing solid utility (defog or rocks). admittedly, this is horrible vs hyper offense but its a very rare playstyle to begin with and tbf you can make a similar case for a few big bad mons in the meta rn. other than the standard sand tomb taunt, another set which is increasingly being used a lot is the sd pass set. i do not approve any baton pass related mons but truth be told, this is a very consistent baton passer since you can taunt haze zygarde/ww ho-oh/leech ferro before passing your boosts, ensuring that you can comfortable pass boosts to the receiver without it taking much damage while not relying on evasion, sleep turns and such. i believe this is easily the 2nd best pokemon in the B ranks/lower combined (behind kyogre and maybe smeargle). one more thing which id like to point out is that gliscor has been used in several tour games and has proven to be very effective in most of them. gliscor probably has the best tour win rate in gen8 which really says a lot. i will be attaching some replays to support my argument.

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1087476045 SEASONAL GRAND FINALS, gliscor basically 6-0d
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1082956834 SEASONAL WINNERS FINALS, gliscor basically 6-0d
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1109905729 ssnl r4, gliscor passes boosts to the sweeper.
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1109850818 ssnl r4, poor baby got critted and chansey lacked confide. but it does showcase how good of a defogger/team support it is.
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1090776277 aglt r1
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1090773945 aglt r1
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1098992383-l0x6mwnwq0or0z1d9u8urglo6priyfspw aglt quarter finals
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1108820973-8y9lh9o2mgu5u7rwafjb6deek3o0tedpw AGLT FINALS

there are def a lot more, ill ask other people to get some for me. but ive said enough to prove my point, B rank is sheer disrespect to such a consistent pokemon and i urge the rest of the council to reconsider gliscor's place on the vr.


Xerneas to S-
im still v mixed on this one. its kinda like, i agree with every argument on this thread about xern (whether its for S- or S) and I just really cant make up my mind about it. im not sure how to feel about the nominations yet so ill just type what i personally think of this xerneas situation. as i said, im not 100% sure if xern should stay or drop but what i do know for sure is that its fellow s rank mon zygarde is borderline broken atm. its almost like last gen when unecro and zyg were in the same rank and zyg had to drop solely because unecro was too good (i dont think zyg was any less broken but this is the explaination i heard from 5/7 of the council members who voted on it) and i think xern finds itself in this situation too now. so my starting argument has to be that zygarde has set the criteria for an S rank mon really, really high and I dont think xern fits over there anymore. and to clarify, yes I do realize that xerneas and zyg are very different offensive mons. but honestly at this point im kinda just struggling to fit xern on teams? and if i ever accomplish this, i really just end up replacing the xern with yveltal or zygarde. this is by no means supposed to imply that yveltal and zygarde outclass xerneas but i really just feel like xerneas is much more trickier to fit on teams compared to the other big bad boys of ag (zyg, yveltal, zacian and ndm) and from my experience, these 4 just give better and consistent results while being easier to use. its no secret that xerneas is suffering from overprep atm because of which people hesitate to use this on their own teams. to support this argument, you can have a look at the recent ssnl and aglt replays. tours usage isnt the best indicator of viability but it shows that top players prefer using zyg/yveltal/zacian/dm and even eternatus over xerneas which really does reflect the fact that this isnt the go-to sweeper anymore because the aforementioned 5 mons are just straight up just better options, atm atleast. all 5 of these are much easier to fit in my experience and have actually been able to threaten teams. again, i dont feel very strongly about this since its mostly from personal experiences but its also hard to deny the fact that people have been consistently picking other sweepers over this. this really shows that xerneas has lost its shine and i trust that S- is a more accurate rank for Xerneas atm.


Zacian-Crowned to S

"??????????" the main reason why im doing this is because we need a fairy type in S rank to keep a check on zygarde. that out of the way, ive accidentally discovered this disgusting zacian crowned set which lets it murder physically defensive necrozma dusk mane on the switch in and doesnt require 200 mons to improof. if youve been living under a rock and still havent seen this,

Zacian-Crowned @ Rusted Sword
Ability: Intrepid Sword
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Assurance
- Close Combat
- Behemoth Blade
- Wild Charge

+1 252+ Atk Zacian-Crowned Assurance vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Prism Armor Necrozma-Dusk-Mane: 240-283 (60.3 - 71.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

rocks are up, necrozma tries to switch in and gg. to elaborate, you have basically 0 reason to not click assurance every time rocks are up since everything will take double damage. its like clicking cc except it hits ndm for super effective damage. i mean, do i really have to say anything else? just start using quag on every team already, this thing is invincible now

Also, Zacian-Crowned has something else that Xerneas doesn't: consistently pressuring the opponent throughout the match. Here's some replays of Zacian-Crowned in action. You could successfully argue that sending out Geo-Xerneas invites more pressure towards you:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1111005954
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1111030815
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1111075231
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen8nationaldexag-1111075231
Here's the rest of my replays, but I couldn't save them correctly, so download the files and open in browser: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1o-MVN1Rz14_Zdemtms8oTluD0HHDgqMu

Despite my intital bad start and loss in the first game, notice how Zacian-Crowned exerts enormous pressure at the opponent/at me of the immediate threat of chipping a wall or 2HKOing a valuable teammate. Xerneas can not do that, as it must use Geomancy to become a wincon while Zacian-Crowned itself can be a win-con. I think the opportunity cost is more expensive towards Xerneas, as without Dynamax, it becomes nothing more than a special-Fairy sweeper that counters Zygarde (and not boosted Yveltal) and not much else (other sets like Choice specs/scarf/cleric are the days of old and suboptimal). Zacian-C is easier to slap on a team in the likes of Zygarde, NDM, and Yveltal, and while sharing similiar checks to Xerneas, it has a slimer selection of checks and counters than Xerneas. Hence why I also nominate Zacian-Crowned for S and Xerneas for S-.

And yes, Assurance Zacian-Crowned is a seriously viable set. As long as you know how to maintain rocks, NDM will certainly get 2HKO'd upon switch-in. On the other hand, with the prevalence of Defog, I feel torn between Crunch and Assurance, but both will put a dent in Zacian-C's best check.

 

[J1mm1P]

Before I do anything, I want to make it clear that to B-, not B+. I have already nommed this yet everyone pretends like I didn't do anything lol.

(Water) to A-
No. This has 4MSS and is kind of outclassed by Arceus-G. CM sets are cool I guess, but I don't think this should rise.

to A-
Yes. I think this is really good right now, especially since it can trap Necrozma-DM. It does struggle against offense, but that's a rare playstyle.

to B
No. Webs is good and SmashPass is really annoying to deal with. The rise of Tkiller also helps this since Smeargle does great against it.

to C
No. Just because HO is a bad playstyle doesn't necessarily mean that this sucks. It has Dualscreens and Taunt, as well as Prankster TWave, which helps against Ditto.

to C/D
Yes to dropping it to C. I think this is kind of bad especially because of the rise of Safety Goggles Zygarde-C. I think D is a bit too harsh for it and it definitely isn't outclassed by offensive Smeargle.

to B+
Yes. The defensive set is outclassed by Lugia other than having WoW+Hex, and offensive sets aren't enough for it to be an A- mon.

to B
Yes. This thing is increadibly bulky, and effectively walls most of the meta.

to B-
Yes.

This thing is really bad, and only the sash set’s even decent, and it gets neutered by rocks, so it’s pretty bad.

^Pretty much this, I just think Marsh is really bad.

to UR/B
Yes to raising it to B. This thing does its job at paraspreading really well, and it's much bulkier than Lunala so that gives Lugia a definitive niche over it.

to C
Yes. This mon is really scary, but it struggles to beat mons like Zygarde-C. I still think this is better than D, the fact that it mostly outclasses SD Arceus-G says enough.

to S-
Yes. This mon has too many checks in Necrozma-DM, Chansey, Arceus-P, Pdon, and Ho-Oh, all of which are extremely common (apart from Arceus-P).

to B+
Yes. Xerneas dropping doesn't help this, and just Dynamaxing breaks the Encore trap.

to D
Yes. This mon is really annoying and good at spreading burns. Zacian-C raising is good for it, since it can burn it with Scald and Recover spam.

to B+
Yes. Gliscor is more easy to build a team around than other mons in the rank such as Ekiller and Mewtwo. It is also really bulky and the SD BP set is pretty good.

to D/UR
Yes to dropping it to UR. I don't know how this isn't completely outclassed by Chansey.

to S
Yes. Thanks pichus for making this already busted mon even more busted with that Assurance set. Seriously! I just can't stress enough how broken this thing is now.

to D
No. This is largely outclassed by Necrozma-DM and is 4x weak to Ground which makes it useless against common mons like Arceus-G and Pdon.

 

[Kate]

No. This is largely outclassed by Necrozma-DM and is 4x weak to Ground which makes it useless against common mons like Arceus-G and Pdon.

Don't have a problem with u not supporting this but all this is blatantly false lol. Besides setting rocks Heatran and DM have incredibly different roles, and being 4x weak to a type is not a reason to be bad. Zygarde is in S rank lol.

 

[mistermath]

Don't have a problem with u not supporting this but all this is blatantly false lol. Besides setting rocks Heatran and DM have incredibly different roles, and being 4x weak to a type is not a reason to be bad. Zygarde is in S rank lol.

Yeah, heatran can go to D. That I support, it beats non-rock move pdon and support ho-oh.
And fine, I guess can go to C instead of B-. Willing to concede that.

 

[WolfishOne]

The the biggest debate and main discussion in Natdex AG viability rankings right now, colorized
View attachment 244942

Pretty accurate
VS

 

[mistermath]

The the biggest debate and main discussion in Natdex AG viability rankings right now, colorized
View attachment 244942

I'd like to note that zacian-c 2hkoes eternatus, regardless. Behemoth blade does more than assurance to eternatus, even on the switch.

 

[J1mm1P]

Although I strongly agree that Xerneas should drop to S-, I want to make it clear that it shouldn't drop any further. Necrozma-DM is the most popular Pokemon right now, but Xerneas is still capable of sweeping an entire team, especially if the opponent has already Dynamaxed. What I do not understand however, is how everyone is spamming Zacian-C and Xerneas counterplay like Ho-Oh+Pdon+NDM+Ditto, yet Zacian-C should rise and Xerneas should drop? While no one has nommed Xerneas to lower than S-, I still feel quite confident that after the next VR update, someone will nom it to A+ and everyone will agree on it. Also stop shitposting, I don't see how filling the VR with useless and unnecessary memes is any good.

 

[pichus]

vr update ~

roughly 30 nominations and plenty of big changes in this slate, i'll focus more on the relevant noms but i'll try to give a brief explanation for all of them.

rises
(electric): ur to d
b- to b
d to c
ur to d
b to b+
s- to s
b- to b

zacian-crowned rising shouldnt be a surprise to anyone. with rocks up and assurance on its set, zacian-c can now eliminate necrozma dm on the switch in which means that our go-to zacian-c switch in doesnt really beat it anymore. this has a huge impact on the metagame since nearly everyone used dusk mane to check it and it is now capable of breaking it with ease. as a result, we unanimously felt that a raise was reasonable and we've also re-ranked quagsire since it hard counters the aforementioned threat. lugia also rises by a rank since it does a fine job at checking zacian-c and mixed life orb / dragon dance rayquaza, which are both increasing in usage now. gliscor has proven to be a splashable choice on balanced teams and an extremely consistent pokemon in big tour games and so it jumps back to b+. regular groudon is a very underrated double dancer, doesnt rely on dynamax to sweep teams, can run items and doesnt need dynamax to boost speed which gives it a slight edge over sd groundceus. arceus electric is a reasonable cm arceus forme, utilizing boltbeam coverage that threatens the majority of the metagame – in particular common defoggers such as ho-oh and gliscor. it is also not as easily revenge killed by zacian-c as some other cm arceus formes. its safe to say that chansey is the staple specially defensive wall in ag and b- just sounds a bit too low for something which checks plenty of big threats and provides solid utility at the same time.

drops

s to s-
a- to b+
c to d
d to ur
d to ur
c to d
a- to b+
b- to c
b- to c
b to b-

genesect, kartana, thundurus therian and marshadow are all really good dynamax users, but the fact that they are nearly 100% reliant on dynamax to function is a bit of a setback. theyre hard to fit on teams and dont have any significant tour performances or ladder runs. moreover its just really hard to justify using these over yveltal or zygarde. vivillon kind of just died in usage and meta revolving around zacian and ho-oh doesnt rly help its case. grimmsnarl does help HO have a better matchup vs ditto builds but we simply feel that b- is just a bit too high. amoonguss was a really close call. dont get us wrong, its still just as good as before but chansey being much much more splashable and easy to build around is really bad for the mushroom. its no secret that lunala is just not as good as before, it fails to check the big threats in the meta and lugia is simply just better atm. specs/cm z sets havent been used enough and a- really just seems unreasonable for lunala. gengar also lost its shine, at this point its honestly much easier to fit gothitelle over this. encore sets have great potential but fail to work in practice and gengar honestly just feels like a wasted slot in most matchups. xerneas is massively suffering from overprep since theres a dusk mane + ho-oh on pretty much every team. it faces competition from yveltal, zygarde and most importantly, zacian-c since these 2 have almost the same checks. its still one of the best mons in the meta but we really dont think that this fits in S rank anymore.

rejected

d to ur
b to b+/c
(flying) d to c
ur to d
(water) a- to a
b+ to a-
b+ to b
ur to d
ur to d/b-/c
a to a+

most of these are super obvious but ill still go over all of them. omastar is a very good shell smasher and gets nearly perfect coverage. it can sweep teams without using dynamax and can threaten common pokemons like zygarde, ho-oh and groundceus even without shell smash boosts. deoxys hasnt gotten any better or worse, dialga and umbreon nominations were just meh, lycanroc is definitely usable but not something which id consistently use over deoxys or exca. flyingceus is def one of the few actually usable cm arceus but its still just really hard to fit on teams and again you can just use yveltal instead. gothitelle and arceus-water are 2 really good pokemons in the current meta. gothitelle is just really hard to fit on teams which holds it back from getting promoted to a- rank. arceus-water's roles just overlap with arceus ground which hurts it a bit, since the latter is simply just better at the moment. smeargle hasnt rly gotten worse to warrant a drop. eternatus is really really good but we agreed that its not as splashable as ho-oh or don, or as destructive as rayquaza and hence it stays in A rank.

this should sum up the 5th update. the vr atm looks more accurate than ever, but obviously feel free to discuss any possible changes or anything you disagree with.

here is the voting spreadsheet

before i end this post, id like to raise a discussion point. the council is really set on ranking the S / A ranks viability wise. basically, instead of ranking them alphabetically, we plan on making a mini VR in the subranks instead because we feel that this would make the VR much more accurate. we're sure that people have really mixed views on this, which is why we decided to bring it up here before just magically dropping on you all. since this a big change, we'd encourage everyone to give their views/link their own versions of the VR. heres mine for example :

viability rankings

S Rank
S+


S



S-



A Rank
A+




A

A-

thank you all for reading.

 

[WrathoftheLeopard]

S+ Rank


Yveltal (Nothing can switch into this depending on the set. Literally shreds through teams.)

S Rank


Zacian-Crowned (Zacian’s newfound toy in Assurance makes it harder than ever to switch into, and it’s amazing speed tier allows it to outspeed the majority of the unboosted meta.)

Zygarde-Complete (Checks potent physical attackers such as Swords Dance Primal Groudon, non Play Rough Zacian Crowned and Dragon Dance Mega Rayquaza. Alternatively, it can threaten teams itself utilising Substitute, Dragon Dance and its amazing bulk.)

S- Rank


Necrozma-Dusk-Mane (Very splashable Pokemon that provides important utility moves such as Toxic and Knock Off.)

Xerneas (Can threaten to sweep teams at a moment’s notice but does not appreciate how common Dusk Mane and Ho-Oh are as well as the fact that finding the right time to use Geomancy can be tricky.)

A+ Rank


Ho-Oh (Extremely splashable Pokemon, the best defogger in the tier, can stall out some of the scariest Dynamax abusers thanks to Protect, and can spread status through Toxic and Sacred Fire

Rayquaza-Mega (This Pokemon has multiple viable sets that offer breaking potential. Defensive builds can be pressured a lot by this)

Groudon-Primal (Great Stealth Rock setter, great switch in to Zacian Crowned with the rise of Assurance and can also effectively threaten teams with Swords Dance paired with the near unresisted coverage combination of Ground and Rock-type moves.

A Rank


Arceus-Ground (This thing just provides so much with its Judgment / Ice Beam / Recover / Refresh set, including beating Dragon Dance Zygarde, checking Primal Groudon and checking Eternatus. It can even effectively run a Swords Dance set.)

Eternatus (Not really prepares for that much, and can easily spread status via Toxic and Toxic Spikes.)

Ditto

A- Rank


Ferrothorn (Offers Spikes, a Kyogre Check, an Arceus Ground Check, Knock Off and Toxic. What’s not to like?)

Kyogre-Primal (Can effortlessly dismantle the common Zygarde + Ho-Oh defensive cores, Dusk Mane and Arceus Ground. Doesn’t appreciate Specially Defensive Primal Groudon switching in or Ferrothorn but that doesn’t stop it from being an impressive wall breaker.)

Arceus-Water (It can threaten Ho-Oh with Judgement, but otherwise lacks the edge that Arceus Ground has.)

Necrozma-Ultra (Good wincon with little to no competition for the Z Crystal. It really hates the prevalence of Physically Defensive Dusk Mane though.)

 

[J1mm1P]

VR

S Rank
S+

S


S-



A Rank
A+



A
(Ground)


A-


(Water)

 

[Kate]

S Rank
S+


S

(I'd lean this more towards S-, it's not on par with Zacian and the meta is adapting more to it)

S-

(S- is probably an overstatement, A+ fits it better but I'll be respectful)

A Rank
A+
(Ray consistently threatens all builds, gives HO some semblance of viability, and has a plethora of sets that can deal with its limited number of checks. This is the best A+ Pokemon by a slim margin)
(arguably the most splashable mon in the tier right there with DM, it's the glue that holds teams together but is heavily prepped for. Still fantastic)


A

(Just a case of the meta not quite adapting to its presence, the diff between it and arc ground is minimal though)

A-
(Easily the best A- mon, it's insanely good, checks half the meta and cripples the rest)

(Underused still, extremely good wincon that can catch teams off guard)

(Good, but lacks the edge that makes groundceus so good. It can let in a lot of metagame titans for free and it suffers because of it)

(Kinda bad, imo outclassed by regular ogre and A- is kind of pushing it here for me)

 

[HanSoloIndie]

On the ongoing discussion, here's my opinions:
S+ Rank

(do I really need to explain? I nickname it "Sephiroth" for a reason)
S Rank

(honestly, I could swap the two and it would still be accurate. Zygarde checks Zacian-C without Play Rough and Zacian 2HKOes with Behemoth Blade/ OHKOes with Play Rough. One is the best walls and status spreaders, and the other is gosh darn too good at its job of wall breaking)
S- Rank

(more versatile than Xerneas and slappable onto teams. DD sets, Weakness Policy, Defensive sets, Stealth Rocker, etc, you name it)

(extremely dangerous with Dynamancy set and still influences the meta, but is definitely the least out of the S-mons)
A+ Rank

(best defogger in the tier with Heavy-Duty Boots and one of the best switch-ins to Dynamxers, but is extremely vulnerable to knock-off, repeated-switchins, and status)

(threatens switch-outs with DD + Life Orb sets, but is concerned with

(non-Draco Meteor),

,

, and

)

(one of the best rockers and checks two S-mons one top of it, but due to many of its sets investing more in HP/Def/SpDef, it is also easily passive in certain circumstances)
A Rank

+

(similar to

, but suffers from being prone to

and not being able to consistently wall

's Behemoth Blades/CC. It makes this up by having a decent speed tier for a defensive mon)

(stops Dynamax crap and

; very threatening if somewhat exploitable reverse-sweeper)

(has the great T-Killer + Firium sets, but has very polarizing match-ups, especially against the higher ranked mons)
A- Rank

(Great hazard-setter, but suffers from

,

, and

's popularity and defog)

(One the better special-sweepers with Calm-Mind and/or Water-Spout , but suffers being outclassed by

,

and its speed tier.

+

(similar to

+

and can check

and

, but loses to

(boosted Thunder),

, and most importantly,

hitting it supereffectively with Wild-Charge)

(One of the best DD sweepers, but suffers from

's popularity as a Dynamaxer, being overshadowed by

,

not being OHKOed by a +1 Earthquake, and being limited to hyper offense)

And I am genuinely sorry about the confusion for the meme I posted earlier, I deleted it. It was all meant in good fun and spirit, but I understand.

 

[Geysers]

VR

S+

S
this thing is utterly broken still. It provides a blanket check to almost every physical attacker in the meta and can still run incredibly potent offensive sets.
this is less scary because it can’t similtaneously beat all of its checks. If it runs assurance, it has to give up cc, play rough, or wild charge, each of which prevents it from beating extremely common pokemon.
S-
is incredibly splashable and vital on basically any balance despite assurance Zacian-C existing
is overprepped to death and the omnipresence of chansey hurts it a ton.
A+
is an insane wall breaker with SD and can threaten any of its few checks by running different sets.
is absurdly splashable and helps balance hold together super well, but is worse than Ray because it’s so much easier to manage.
is pretty strong defensively but can turn into setup bait for a reasonable number of threats and relies on rest for recovery, which gives more setup turns to things.
A
is just stupidly good as a soft check to most of the meta’s threatening breakers and sweepers, while still providing useful team utility.
is incredibly solid still and can power through almost all of its “checks” with modest dragonium z sets
does ditto stuff, but isn’t as all-around useful as the above 2
A-
is absolutely amazing as a blanket check to a significant portion of the meta, and spike stack is still incredibly good.
super scary with dd sets and hard to check, even with a ditto.
mostly outclassed by groundceus but still quite solid
why is this in A- again? It struggles to succeed in a meta where chansey / pdon / ferro is on almost every team. I honestly think this should probably be dropped.

 

[J1mm1P]

VR

S Rank
S+

S


S-



A Rank
A+



A
(Ground)


A-


(Water)

Didn’t explain why I think the S/A Ranks should look like this, but I will rn:
Do I even need to explain?
This is much better than Zacian-C, even with the new Assurance set, as it’s harder to prep for. It can even beat Zacian-C 1v1, and isn’t Ditto weak.
See Zygarde-C.
Is still extremely splashable even with Zacian-C running Assurance/Crunch more, with Knock Off it removes important items such as Ho-Oh’s HDB and Chansey’s Eviolite.
Lol who even uses this anymore, I think it still belongs in S- but Xerneas checks/counters are even more common now.
Is the best AG Defogger by far, I find me slapping this on every team all the time. Also the ability to totally counter Arceus-G is huge.
Is the best AG SR setter and beats the aforementioned Ho-Oh, but it is lower because of its weakness to Zygarde-C and Arceus-G.
While most teams underprep for MRay, HO (the playstyle where it is used the most) kinda sucks rn, and it is difficult to build around on non-offensive teams. It’s also weak to Supportceus, which is really bad since they are incredibly common.
(Ground) Might as well nom this to A+, this mon is really really good, and definitely near Ho-Oh and Pdon.
This has gotten much better with the new TSpikes/Z sets, but idt Etern is anywhere close to Arceus-G.
If HO is pretty bad and uncommon, so is this.
‘‘Outclassed by regular Ogre’’ Are you kidding me? This is clearly better than Kyogre, simply because Ogre has to rely on Water Spout, Choice Specs leaves it weak to most other mons because it’s too slow, and Choice Scarf is easily countered by Ferrothorn. While Pogre has most of the same weaknesses as regular Ogre, it can actually switch moves, which is huge and improves the Pdon/Ferrothorn matchup.
This mon is annoying and I don’t think I need to explain how. It also provides Spikes, but Idt this is better than Pogre because of Pdon/Ho-Oh.
(Water)

Mostly outclassed by groundceus but still quite solid.

^
See MRay.

 

[Ropalme1914]

VR

S Rank
S+


S


Zygarde still is more scary because, while versatile, every set it uses still can work with the same effectiveness regardless, be it offensive variants or defensive ones. Zacian can beat most of its checks now, but still is set dependant on some matchups, which puts it below Zygarde imo

S-


Necrozma is basically mandatory on half of the builds lol of course Xerneas is scary, but while everyone is preparing for Xerneas, Necrozma is used to prepare against many of the scariest threats.

A Rank

A+



Nothing is safe from Mega Ray. You guess wrong the set and it already takes out one Pokémon from your team. Ho-Oh could be argued for the top spot too, it's similar to Dusk Mane in splashability and provides incredible utility, but the way you can deal with it at least is more consistent than Mega Ray. Pdon is great and checks some of the biggest mons on the tier, but it having to be more defensive than you are used to makes it not compete for the top spot here.

A



I think everyone already explained this one and seems to be pretty much agreed upon.

A-




Kyogre still is good, not outclassed by base at all. Waterceus also is good, but most teams see more benefits from Ground imo.