After the sudden release of Pokemon Home in early February, several new Pokemon were released onto the 1v1 metagame. Some of the most notable ones, who were quickly banned from the 1v1 metagame, were Marshadow, Kyurem-Black, and Melmetal, the former two having proven their extraordinary abilities to hold sway over metagame development in the previous generation, the latter showing its insane power granted through just one main set within a day of its release. Necrozma, on the other hand, started off the metagame with a simple but incredibly effective Choice Specs set, which was incredibly threatening with initial power, but was quickly adapted for with the advent of Dark-types, especially Incineroar, and offshoots of commonly used Pokemon, like bulky Choice Band Mimikyu. The singular Choice Specs set was already one that could be built differently to cover some checks of Necrozma, like running Hyper Voice to beat Whimsicott and Cinderace. However, very quickly it was discovered that old and new sets of Necrozma, specifically Stored Power and Weakness Policy Necrozma, could be used to similar or equal viability as the Choice Specs set, and each covered their own respective parts of the metagame, with Weakness Policy + Calm Mind in particular being used to potentially harass the Dark-type threats that could be used to beat Necrozma. Other offshoots, like Choice Scarf and Dragon Dance, also were developed to beat specific Necrozma answers, like Choice Band Dracovish and Scrafty.
The common trait shared among all of these sets was that they were all exceptionally powerful when compared to the rest of the available metagame, thanks to Necrozma's base stats and access to moves with obscene base power. With no Mega Evolutions, Z-Moves, and much of the legendaries missing from Gen 8, Necrozma's once-slightly above average stats now shine as some of the best in the game, with both relative speed, bulk, and power. Necrozma could run sets that would be considered unviable in the previous generation, like Choice Scarf, and succeed with them, thanks to the lack of opposition in the metagame.
With a unanimous Quickban Vote of 5-0, Necrozma will be banned from the 1v1 metagame. Concerning 1v1 PL, Necrozma will remain allowed for Week 2, but banned from Week 3 and onward, according to Quantum Tesseract.
However, this decision only comes with the assumption that, if and when the release of Pokemon through DLC raises the overall power level of the metagame (say, after more legendaries are released), Necrozma will be resuspected, as presumably the power Necrozma currently exhibits could no longer be exceptional nor overwhelming. Several of the council members, myself included, did not think it would be right to Quickban Necrozma without this guarantee.
Tagging The Immortal for implementation.
Necrozma as a Pokemon is undeniably currently the best. Its variation in sets and overall splashability, aided by excellent mixed coverage stats, Mold Breaker in a move, recovery, coverage, and setup, means that the metagame revolves around what beats it, and what beats what beats it. That's not necessarily a bad thing - look at the Charizard megas in ORAS and USUM - but Necrozma's ability to adapt to beat all of its counters, with sets like Weakness Policy, Choice Scarf, and physical Dragon Dance/Swords Dance, creates a Pokemon that is simply to brutal for the current metagame. This differentiates it from other Pokemon that could 'beat its counters', as its extreme relative power level for Gen 8 standards puts most other Pokemon, who do not exhibit simultaneously Legendary-like bulk and Porygon-Z-like power, to shame, which means that these sets that could be considered niche or unviable in a more power crept metagame have to be taken into consideration when building, as they can be used to great success on basically any team.
I am hesitant in thinking that a Quick Ban was necessarily the proper choice of action, however. It is hard for me to consider Necrozma as equatable in power to Sableye or Melmetal, who could shut down the entire metagame with one set or less. I have decided to vote for the quickban regardless on the grounds that it will assuredly be resuspected (probably after DLC 2, given the return of the legendaries), and that any attempt at a proper suspect test currently will just put strain on teambuilders involved in PL and would most likely create a result not representative of the general public, one way or the other.
I am hesitant in thinking that a Quick Ban was necessarily the proper choice of action, however. It is hard for me to consider Necrozma as equatable in power to Sableye or Melmetal, who could shut down the entire metagame with one set or less. I have decided to vote for the quickban regardless on the grounds that it will assuredly be resuspected (probably after DLC 2, given the return of the legendaries), and that any attempt at a proper suspect test currently will just put strain on teambuilders involved in PL and would most likely create a result not representative of the general public, one way or the other.
Necrozma broke the meta. Not only was it an excellent culmination of offense and defense, it wasn't limited to just a single, counterable set, either. Much like Mew before it, the coverage of Necrozma's main sets were all conducive to a Pokemon that just couldn't be predicted nor countered reliably without either using niche sets to beat it or having to know what set the opponent is running. While Mew did the same between its Choice and Imprison sets, Necrozma's sets had a much lesser opportunity cost behind all of them that allowed almost each set to retain the main bulk of advantageous matchups of one another while only altering some edge cases that one set beats while others do not. This, to me, indicated that Necrozma simply had to go; no suspect needed.
(Mez agreed with Rosa)
Necrozma's warped 1v1 around itself in an unhealthy way. Necrozma has many attributes that would enable any Pokemon to succeed in 1v1 (Sturdy/Disguise bypass, 160 BP STAB nuke, Prism Armor, high BST, deep special movepool), and those attributes together created a Pokemon that is far too powerful for 1v1. The number of true counters to Necrozma is miniscule, and different sets of Necrozma are often times very difficult to distinguish on preview. Because of this, Necrozma centralized teambuilding around itself and anything that could reliably beat it.
Necrozma with only a very small handful of Pokemon that could be considered counters which is a red flag to say the least. As a nail in the coffin, Necrozma warps the metagame around itself to an unhealthy extent. Pokemon like Mimikyu and Crustle have been using upwards of 200 EVs in places where they usually would never allocate them just to check Necrozma’s most popular sets even if they both still lost to Scarf and Dragon Dance. These traits combined make Necrozma an irredeemably broken Pokemon in the current meta and while I believe it’s in need of a resuspect after the next DLC, I feel that it’s best to remove Necrozma as quickly as possible with PL going on.
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