If you were, for some reason, wanting to use a dedicated Fighting-type in OU (read: not just using Poliwrath to set up Amnesia), is there much reason to use Hitmonlee or Primeape over Machamp? Hitmonlee can boost its ATK with Meditate (and already has a really good 120 ATK) and has better stabs while Primeape has the best speed tier of any fighter (tying Jynx iirc) and has Thunderbolt/Thunder for Starmie
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Resource RBY Simple Questions & Simple Answers Thread
- Thread starter phoopes
- Start date
How come Horn Drill/Fissure/Gullotine is banned but freeze fishing is considered a completely legitimate strategy?
Because you can't remove Freeze without banning every single viable Ice-type move. OHKO moves don't benefit the meta in any way.
Yes you can remove freeze without bans just adjusting freeze clause so pokemon are unable to be frozen would work. And to be frank neither of these things benefit the meta in any way.
Trying to hit something with one of these moves is legitimately kind of a lot of work because the users of these moves aren't great
- Tauros, Kangaskhan and Pinsir have huge 4MSS if you try to cram Horn Drill/Fissure/Gullotine into their movesets.
- Charizard, Nidoking, Arbok, Dragonite and Rapidash have really weak typings that cause them to have a hard time trying to pull off Horn Drill.
- Seaking sucks ass and needs an Agility boost to pull off Horn Drill.
- Every other candidate is too slow to use it without support (remember, the move fails if the target is faster than you)
On the other hand, Chansey and Snorlax only really need a defensive boost and they can try over and over until the 16 PP runs out.
Ignoring the fact that modding freeze out of the game is obviously silly, freeze does actually benefit the meta since it punishes people who play too passively around Chansey / IBeam Snorlax. Obviously getting frozen t1 sucks but having your whole gameplan revolve around fishing for a freeze is suboptimal and less consistent than going for standard plays with paralysis.
Though Pokemon that use Ice moves are usually split into two categories. Snorlax and Chansey, the two Pokemon who are some of the most common Pokemon in the tier, use Ice Beam, and everything else that uses an Ice move uses Blizzard. How come? Well, Ice Beam is better for trying to actually freeze, because these two can afford the time to repeatedly try. The Snorlax strategydex entry literally recommends Ice Beam specifically to attempt a freeze. Anything that wants to actually make progress with an Ice move uses Blizzard. Chansey and Lax only care about freezing, that's the way they make progress with their Ice moves, TehTayTeh even literally says this:
This doesn't really apply to Rest users like Snorlax as much. Also, Chansey is typically attempted to be kept unparalyzed so you can freeze it.
I never said that they should be unbanned, this is a massive strawman. It's just to illustrate that Freeze is borderline a OHKO strategy and nobody really talks about it.
This is straight up just not true lmao. Just because paralyzing Chansey immediately is sometimes bad doesn't mean keeping it unparalyzed for the rest of the game is optimal. A paralyzed Chansey is incredibly prone to physical attackers like Snorlax and Rhydon and switching them in on a predicted Softboiled/whatever is one of the best ways to force progress. No good player is keeping their unparalyzed Chansey in against a paralyzed Chansey spamming Ice Beam, they're going to switch into one of their own paralyzed Psychics or pivot into their Snorlax or Rhydon.
A paralyzed Chansey basically never wants to click Ice Beam against an unparalyzed Snorlax for obvious reasons. Ice Beam Snorlax has many poor matchups in Cloyster and Gengar. It's very easy to play around freeze fishing if you aren't playing passive.
We don't talk about modding out Freeze because it's a mechanic inherent to the game (and it's already limited with Freeze clause which imo is fine.) It's very easy to ban moves, not unavoidable mechanics. Freeze isn't uncompetitive enough to warrant banning.
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Again, I literally never said that this was something I wanted to do
Here is your simple answer to your simple question.
OHKO moves have been from standard play since the creation of smogon with the idea that they are luck based moves with an insane variance (of doing nothing or taking out a mon) and any skill they add is negated by that insane luck.
Freeze clause was created as a measure to prevent games from spiraling out of control but keep the effect of freeze moves.
OHKO moves stay banned as the consensus is they add nothing but dumb luck and freeze remains because banning ice moves is out of the question and removing the freeze status entirely doesn't sit well with many players as well its traditional at this point to play with freeze and without OHKO.
Is Duggy ever used in OU? It being a fast sweeper with an immunity to Thunder Wave is an interesting prospect, and with its general Electric immunity it isn't completely devoid of defensive utility
It's viable, but needs huge support. Electric immunity only really works for Jolteon, cause Zapdos hits hard with Drill Peck and Dugtrio is very frail.
In terms of Ground Mons, my order of viability would be Rhydon>>Golem>Sandslash>>Dugtrio>Nidoking=Nidoqueen>>Onix>>>>>>>>>>>>Marowak
Certainly the mole is not the worst due to high crit rate, but it's still a niche Mon, one to build a team around of, not one who you can randomly throw in a team, like Rhydon.
Not really the focal point of this, but I heard Nidoqueen was (marginally) better than Nidoking because it can take one more hit from Tauros? Idr being able to find a calc where the extra EQ damage matters, I might be wrong
Are there any downsides to the Chansey switch turn 1 trick, other than it being useless against sleep leads?
Has anyone tried using 4 attacks exeggutor?
This is something that I just thought about randomly and I wondered if anyone had experimented with it.
normally eggy runs sleep power and maybe stun spore but I find exeggutor has a hard time getting sleep off without being extremely aggressive and never clicking twave.
With hyper beam and double-edge/mega drain it can secure ko's vs paralyzed or slower mons at high percentages.
Maybe dropping sleep isn't worth it or maybe the threat of it alone is enough to make this set work idk which is why I asked.
This is something that I just thought about randomly and I wondered if anyone had experimented with it.
normally eggy runs sleep power and maybe stun spore but I find exeggutor has a hard time getting sleep off without being extremely aggressive and never clicking twave.
With hyper beam and double-edge/mega drain it can secure ko's vs paralyzed or slower mons at high percentages.
Maybe dropping sleep isn't worth it or maybe the threat of it alone is enough to make this set work idk which is why I asked.
You're definitely misplaying because eggy easily sleeps something if you dont give the opponent a free sleepblocker, eggy can dedge through zam and jynx
there was a triple threat tournament about a year ago
Maybe that'd be better to post in a vent thread or something, but why do I fail at RB Ubers?
In 2018 I played up to #7 in the ladder winning match after a match, successfully used niche mons like Electrode of all things. I quit because if my exams.In 2022 (maybe 2021) I played very successfully too. I wasn't much interested, so I stopped my rank at ~#15. I know it's not equal to being a top player, but it was something.
This year I returned with my best knowlege and I can't get past low ladder novices who use, like, Confuse Ray.
I now longer use niche mons, I even addet Exeggutor to my team (I hate Tauros and Exeggutor). I run basically all the standard sets like Swords Dance... wait, no, this is not "rank my team", you got the idea.
I always struggle with 4 move syndrom and 6 pokemon syndrom. Every time I get caught off guard, cos that time I needed a fast paralysis spreader, this time I need Ice moves to deal with Wrap Dragonite, and that other time there was freakin Slowbro, and I better have Gänger to Thunderbolt the cap out of it which can also help with Dragonite. I have no idea why their Mew or Exeggutor is a beast that needs to be stopeed at all costs, even wasting my precious Lovely Kiss, basically sacrificing Jynx, while my Mew, or Snorlax, or Tauros or whatever is a joke that can only slightly delay switching Mewtwo in.
Whatever I do, my opponents simply do it better.
Why did everyone become so strong?
It can't be because of the new mechanics discovered since 2018. Not paralysing Normals with Body Slam - I never really planned that paralysis anyways, except when teambuilding choosing between Earthquake and Body Slam on Mew.
It might be that this year I play since day 1, and all the previous years I played in last couple weeks, when, as my hypothesis states, all the experienced players had lost their interest and bottom feeders like me get high ranks.
I also noticed I have to wait less for battles, so maybe the tier got more popular and skill level naturally went higher?
In 2018 I played up to #7 in the ladder winning match after a match, successfully used niche mons like Electrode of all things. I quit because if my exams.In 2022 (maybe 2021) I played very successfully too. I wasn't much interested, so I stopped my rank at ~#15. I know it's not equal to being a top player, but it was something.
This year I returned with my best knowlege and I can't get past low ladder novices who use, like, Confuse Ray.
I now longer use niche mons, I even addet Exeggutor to my team (I hate Tauros and Exeggutor). I run basically all the standard sets like Swords Dance... wait, no, this is not "rank my team", you got the idea.
I always struggle with 4 move syndrom and 6 pokemon syndrom. Every time I get caught off guard, cos that time I needed a fast paralysis spreader, this time I need Ice moves to deal with Wrap Dragonite, and that other time there was freakin Slowbro, and I better have Gänger to Thunderbolt the cap out of it which can also help with Dragonite. I have no idea why their Mew or Exeggutor is a beast that needs to be stopeed at all costs, even wasting my precious Lovely Kiss, basically sacrificing Jynx, while my Mew, or Snorlax, or Tauros or whatever is a joke that can only slightly delay switching Mewtwo in.
Whatever I do, my opponents simply do it better.
Why did everyone become so strong?
It can't be because of the new mechanics discovered since 2018. Not paralysing Normals with Body Slam - I never really planned that paralysis anyways, except when teambuilding choosing between Earthquake and Body Slam on Mew.
It might be that this year I play since day 1, and all the previous years I played in last couple weeks, when, as my hypothesis states, all the experienced players had lost their interest and bottom feeders like me get high ranks.
I also noticed I have to wait less for battles, so maybe the tier got more popular and skill level naturally went higher?
Attachments
I'm not really qualified to give ubers advice, but I want to address your hypothesis.
Yeah, I think the average skill level has skyrocketed in recent years. The depth of high quality RBY players in all tiers is pretty vast (even if the ceiling is similar, I don't want to get into modern greats vs 10yrs ago greats). There's tons of resources available, tournaments are frequent, and the discord is quite active. The combination of these makes idea sharing easy and common, which develops the meta quickly and leads to rapid skill development.
This is visible in the elos. Your screenshot shows your #7 with an elo of 1233. Today, a 1233 elo would be 83rd. So add in meta development, your rust, and a more motivated player base, it makes sense your not having the immediate success you were used to.
I have one replay against you, and there's a few plays and decisions that I would point out as areas of improvement in another forum.
If you want to get better, I have two thoughts:
1) watch high level replays. here's some links to the last three rounds of the ubers tournament in the winter. Note how the players handle their pieces. when do they bring their big hitters in, how do they protect them, how are they closing out games? Also note their team comps - jynx struggles in ubers, although it's not unusable.
https://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/rby-ubers-tournament-ii-round-4.3716579/
https://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/rby-ubers-tournament-ii-round-5.3716968/
https://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/rby-ubers-tournament-ii-finals-won-by-evuelf.3717361/
2) join the discord. link is somewhere around here. There's plenty of people who would love to go through replays with you and point out mistakes and help you improve. Cool crew in that discord, and I don't think I've ever asked for advice and never gotten something useful.
Thanks, you made it perfectly clear! The players got stronger!
I've always been way more successful in Uber tier (Gen 1 and Gen 7) than in any OU or lower, and I actually had that hypothesis that I play against mostly unexperienced players years ago.
My choice of Jynx was dictated by previous ecperience. Neither in 2018, nor that last time I couldn't counter Mewtwo successfully with Slowbro. But I pretty much always could do it with Jynx, so that once I get past Chansey I simply win the stall MvM or Self-Destruct on Lovely Kissed opponent's Mewtwo and do MvC stall war. I'm actually surprised to learn Jynx struggles in Ubers, I genuinely thougt I was using mainstream teams
"I have one replay against you, and there's a few plays and decisions that I would point out as areas of improvement in another forum" - I'd appreciate that a lot!
(I hope it's a recent replay, cos only in the last couple of days I started to kinda get some idea about obvious mistakes I do like miscalculations, forgetting that freeze clause is a thing, not being able to use Cloyster correctly)
Btw, you think playing Gen 1 OU, the only permanently available Gen 1 format, can help to grow better at Ubers? In my previous experience Ubers was a completely different metagame, where Snorlax > Tauros, coverage was overrated, and all the matches came down to stall wars, hence I was thinking of giving Confusion to Mewtwo because how PP was much more important back then (surprised Confusion isn't even a selectable option despite being accessable by catching a lv7 Mewtwo using Ditto glitch)
UPD: Really wish tradebacks were the official format, cos Gengar with Ice Punch would be SO HELPFUL against Dragonite which will soon replace Arceus as my least favorite pokemon if I don't come up with a reliable way to counter it.
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I had a few questions on my mind:
- Some dinosaur-ass website (I don't remember the name, it was (something, maybe a color) Heights) claims it deduced the Pokemon damage formula just by testing hundreds of scenarios. Is there any documentation into this? Because iirc the formula they gave was correct
- How did it take so long for comp players to realize Body Slam didn't paralyze normals, if this was (supposedly, my only source is a Youtube comment) already common knowledge to RBY speedrunners?
- Some dinosaur-ass website (I don't remember the name, it was (something, maybe a color) Heights) claims it deduced the Pokemon damage formula just by testing hundreds of scenarios. Is there any documentation into this? Because iirc the formula they gave was correct
- How did it take so long for comp players to realize Body Slam didn't paralyze normals, if this was (supposedly, my only source is a Youtube comment) already common knowledge to RBY speedrunners?
Azureheights was hosted on the miami university maths department website, so my guess is they were pretty good on the maths side of things. You might be able to track down some of the people involved if you really wanted to ask them.
There is a lot of stuff that just works differently in cart battles as opposed to in-game. Also, as far as I'm aware, pokemon speedrunning wasnt that big of a thing for all that long before the discovery was made. Like, not compared to online competitive pokemon at any rate.
There is a lot of stuff that just works differently in cart battles as opposed to in-game. Also, as far as I'm aware, pokemon speedrunning wasnt that big of a thing for all that long before the discovery was made. Like, not compared to online competitive pokemon at any rate.