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Resource Scarlet and Violet RU Indigo Disk Viability Rankings
- Thread starter Ampha
- Start date
B+ -> A- I think that Ape is extremely viable in the current meta, and also extremely easy to slot on to teams with very little opportunity cost. It works great as a Special Attacker, Physical Attacker, Choice User, and is also the best mixed attacker in the tier now that Hoopa is gone. It matches up extremely well into a vast majority or the tiers staples. Hippo doesn’t want to come in on a potential Grass Knot, Moltres doesn’t want to get bodied by a Stone Edge, and everything else doesn’t love strong STAB CCs or FBs x 3. This is all without mentioning Blaze, which can tear through checks if the moment is right. Adding on to all of this, Ape has incredible supportive utility for teams as well. Switcheroo and U-Turn allow you to easily gain momentum in a match. Finally, Ape also has priority too, in conclusion, Monke Good.
A- -> A Empo is by far the best bulky water in the tier right now, and is also in contention for being our best special wall. Empo provides very solid bulk to a team, along with so much utility, and can very easily overcome its own checks with moveset variations. Does Volc wall your Empo set, just switch out one of your moves for Knock and now Volc is set on a timer. The sheer amount of utility it provides is reason enough to put it in A rank with Fezandipiti, both of which are excellent defensively. However, Empo doesn’t have to be a passive option, as it can easily run Roost + 3 Attacks and become a decent breaker as well, putting pressure on unprepared teams. Empo fits a ton of compression into one of the best type combinations in the game, and I think is far and above a great candidate for a solid A ranking.Side Note, both of these benefit heavily from tera, which isn’t much of a surprise as essentially everything does, but definitely something to consider.
Alright, pre week 1 RUPL VR noms. Rules are the same as usual, i sing praise or take a fat shit over some of the mons and say why their good or bad, if you disagree i'm right your wrong + my dad could beat up your dad. First though, the new drops, namely Jirachi and Barraskewda.
-> A / A+
Jirachi dropping caused quite the fanfair, and for good reason. We finally have a high-end steel that doesn't lose to a fucking gardevoir not named empoleon, and that was quite a treat. Unfortunately, it's not quite as good as i was hoping, but it's still excellent. Wish passing is an amazing boon, CM sets are very good, coverage with thunder/grass knot/ aura sphere gives CM sets good depth vs things like hippo cobal and moltres. Meteor beam sets can be run when you want to pretend your a necrozma and snipe rotom heats out of the sky. Iron head scarf sets.. are shit. Helmets are everywhere and contact punishers like moltres also are a common presence, I wouldn't run scarf on jirachi i'd rather run almost anything else on it. More niche sets like Doom Desire, encore, its a fantastic steel on Rain alongside Forretress since it both pivots, lays them up and gets the accuracy boost on thunder for the juicy 60% para rate. Speed tier is good, soft checks leaves with a dice roll and god holding your hand for a slam para, checks enam-t quite nicely, but also brings about the Covert Cloak Covenant, with members like Fezandipiti, Cress and more spearheading the faction. Overall, very solid, very good mon.
-> A-
Barraskewda dropping was met with less joy than Jirachi and that's a crazy thing to say. "Rain is gonna be so annoying!" they said. "It'll be broken!" they said. Well... they were wrong.. kinda. It's excellent on rain, but thankfully the tier already has a good amount of anti-rain tools like Hippo weather wars, tera gotchas like rhyperior, moltres and fezandipiti, and natural rain checks like Volcanion, suicune and Wo-chien. What barraskewda does besides this, is imo, more valuable. Absolutely foddering the core of Cyclizar/Hippo/Molt like its a full course meal. This thing is very solid on Bulky Offenses and Offense, the downside is well, it's about as durable as a wet sock, and it's defensive utility amounts to being a soft check to opposing rain by just outspeeding their swift swimmers with jolly and picking your nose for every other scenario. It comes in on jack shit safely without balls of titanium but my god when it comes in it does the lords work. Empoleon teams wants to die, Noivern teams arent safe from catching an ice fang, amoonguss and okidogi risk psychic fang, and slowbro risks catching a crunch. Solid anchor.
Now for the others.
B+ -> A+
Rhyperior has taken off like no tommorow with it's traits being extremely compatible with the overall meta. It's arguably a top 3 rocker in the tier, it's an amazing partner for pokemon like Cobalion because it means your cobalion doesn't have to run rocks itself, which opens it up a ton for other shit it wants like taunt, volt switch, cm etc. That isn't all though, it's bar none the best 1 for 1 merchant in the entire tier, rhyperior with tera can practically trade itself for anything it wants, and it's power means it can beat ALOT of things with just edgequake. Despite appearances, Rhyperior can actually obliterate every ground type in the tier not named flygon. It eats hippowdons for breakfast, Swampert is liable to get smashed by a +2 quake even with max max def it takes 65%, Gastrodon straight dies to a +2 EQ. Palossand takes over 55% from a +2 quake, and all of these pokemon are slower with a meager bit of investment. AND this damage is achieved by just running adamant and a whopping Sixteen (16) attack evs. Uninvested Krook fucking dies to a quake after spikes WITH intimidate, and who cares about flygon he sucks. It's got set variety too, megahorn can melt wo-chiens and leaves, Heat crash can handle those 2 while also smashing chesnaught into dust. Rock polish exists so that's a fun unexplored meme, fuck it forget heat crash you can run SR temper flare and just, choose to OHKO chesnaught from full with a 150bp temper flare. If all this wasn't enough, with tera it can reverse thundurus-t, anything on rain and i do mean anything. And rock/ground provides useful boosts vs moltres naturally as a nice counter since wisp moltres fucking blows. And to top ALL of this off, it's a proud leader of the Custap Club. It's performance in RULT playoffs sees it at 8th in usage, it's almost never dead weight and always brings high returns on it's offers. If not A+, then A.
C -> B-
Now this may seem like a large jump, especially for a mon practically unused in every previous RU. However, palossand has a distinct amount of tricks up it's sleeve that lets it have it's own specific archetype. It's the tiers best spin blocker vs the best spinner and most common mon in the tier, Cyclizar. Palossand spike stack is an archetype that has seen a decent amount of use in RULT, and in ssnl where even if it doesn't win, it shows just how good palossand is at forcing options down for the opponent. Usually paired with Deo-D, it forms an excellent hazards core to keep hazards up, while also not being dead weight itself. It's got reliable recovery in shore up, being the only ground besides hippowdon and gastrodon to have recovery. It's the only ghost with recovery that isn't trash ass pain split, and that's a big thing. Tier shifts have helped it too, since it does quite well into Jirachi, Zarude and Hoopa-U's ban helped it alot, and it's clicks with Scorching Sands&Hex does the job quite well. It's a one trick pony, but I think it has a large enough niche and tournament presence, above even things like Gatr and Conk, to put it up to B-
B- -> C+
Put it next to Ninetales.
B -> B+ / A-
Noivern has seen a return to form with the realization that it's traits are quite good in the meta still. It's a dragon faster than Cyclizar, which is already a huge boon for it already. It's a check to a good amount of pokemon, such as Volcanion, Infernape, and can revenge kill a plehtora of mons like Thundurus-T, Cobalion and more. It scored solid usage in RULT, outplacing pokemon like Gengar, and tying with Reuniclus. I'd argue it's a more splashable salamence, which trades raw stats for a better speed tier, and access to U-turn. I think it might be straight up better than mence, but it seems people still aren't ready for that conversation. What I will say, is Specs Boomburst Noivern is still a decent set this thing can pilot, Jirachi and Rhyperior be damned. It's got set variety with options like Taunt, super fang, hurricane, and switcheroo memes. It's a good for any team that doesn't need Cyclizar's specific talents, namely spinning and emergency checking ghosts and thundy-t. It's undersold at B, and I think many will agree with me on this.
A- -> B+
This thing is so fucking fraudulent man LMAO. This thing is bad as a dragon dancer, stonewalled by hippowdon and now Rhyperior can check it on a bucketload of squads, it's weak stabs suck for it, and it's a momentum drain alot of the time. Of course it's not bad, mixed draco sets are good at sniping hippo and it can run away with games if you let it, but are we really calling this thing A- material? It's side-grade noivern in alot of scenarios, and Noivern is a far bigger team player than mence is. You can make an argument that specs sets or extremely agressive special sets are good, but to me they are momentum drains, and again, bring less for a team than Noivern does. Sure, a DD mence will always be scary if your caught lacking on your checks, but there's alot of mons that fuck with each specific mence set that it can feel like a burden more than you'd like it to be, especially from a pokemon like Salamence. This one may be more biased than the rest but alot of my building, i'd usually prefer to slap a noivern on that a salamence on, and I really think that matters a lot.
UR -> C / C+
This thing has managed to carve out a niche as a setup sweeper with some valuable defensive utility. For the latter, it's resume includes being a check to Iron Leaves, unconditionally. This is already a large claim considering how annoying it is and most mons require to burn tera against it, but this thing doesn't. It's 4x fighting resist allows it to check things like choice locked Terrakion, call out CC conkeldurrs, and IDBP cobalion. What it does is function as a snowballing psychic type. A niche not truly unique, but Tinted lens Esper wing gives it the benefit of being a speed boosting snowballing psychic type, able to setup on and abuse non roar empoleon, eats knock from cyclizar with ease, and mops other things like Moltres. Esper Wing allows for a variety of setup opportunities other psychic types can't reach for, and the unique defensive utility is praiseworthy. For those who strictly follow the "requires a replay for all UR to ranked noms, yeah yeah here's a replay for you.
B -> B+ / A-
Everything people thought mew would be, is what Cresselia is like i swear. CM is so diabolically good, and the annoyance by hippowdon is alleviated by superior bulk, generally good recovery with some caveats, and an actual non-worthless ability !! CM snowballs against a surprising amount of teams, setting up on a ton of common things like Cyc, Cobal without taunt, Moltres, no ww hippo (which is becoming more common since ppl realized letting in the best birds in the tier for free blows), fezandipiti (with covert cloak), Noivern, special mence, and far more. It's tera is quite diverse aswell, with me personally fancying tera Electric, as it resists jirachi iron head, while still being immune to EQ. And boosting an optional pick over moonblast, aka tbolt. In exchange for admitting you'll never kill a Krookodile or wo-chien worth a shit unless you lay up a tspike, you nail Empoleon, Jirachi, and bisharp for more reliable damage. This thing runs away with SO many games, it's so good. Please give it a whirl, I swear you'll be well inbursed for the time.
A- -> B / B+
Fraud. I regret calling this mon busted as fuck and complaining about it's unban this is budget necrozma on it's best days. I've seen takes of "oh its busted" "if people use this thing it's nuts!" yeah IF people use it. Nobody uses this thing and wowie I wonder why. This thing has competition out the ass, and even with mew's variety, every other psychic has a draw to use it over this. H-Braviary has it's speed boosting schtick and iron leaves checking niche, Cresselia has levitate cm and absurd obesity to snowball, Reuniclus has magic guard, Jirachi has a steel typing and more utility thats worth a damn (no , Necrozma has dragon dance and meteor beam, paired with far better stats for the job it tries to do. And mew has jack of all trades, master of fucking nothing, shit it's not even a veteran it's a novice in a stolen uniform. When you use it it's probably decent but like, it's not A- material even with that being said. DD sets are weak as shit and bad versions of Necrozma, NP sets are bad versions of a hero called azelf with a smidge of twave support, and you can probably curate a set that performs something better or unique to the others but it's fucking mew that's not impressive. Like gee you sure showed me with your sub bulk up throat chop leech life tera bug mew. Maybe once it gets off its ass and hopefully does something worth a damn during RUPL I'll rescind my statement but for now it's among the 3 heavenly frauds alongside salamence and the rats. If i want a spikes HO lead im using froslass or custap forretress you can't change my mind.
Jirachi dropping caused quite the fanfair, and for good reason. We finally have a high-end steel that doesn't lose to a fucking gardevoir not named empoleon, and that was quite a treat. Unfortunately, it's not quite as good as i was hoping, but it's still excellent. Wish passing is an amazing boon, CM sets are very good, coverage with thunder/grass knot/ aura sphere gives CM sets good depth vs things like hippo cobal and moltres. Meteor beam sets can be run when you want to pretend your a necrozma and snipe rotom heats out of the sky. Iron head scarf sets.. are shit. Helmets are everywhere and contact punishers like moltres also are a common presence, I wouldn't run scarf on jirachi i'd rather run almost anything else on it. More niche sets like Doom Desire, encore, its a fantastic steel on Rain alongside Forretress since it both pivots, lays them up and gets the accuracy boost on thunder for the juicy 60% para rate. Speed tier is good, soft checks leaves with a dice roll and god holding your hand for a slam para, checks enam-t quite nicely, but also brings about the Covert Cloak Covenant, with members like Fezandipiti, Cress and more spearheading the faction. Overall, very solid, very good mon.
Barraskewda dropping was met with less joy than Jirachi and that's a crazy thing to say. "Rain is gonna be so annoying!" they said. "It'll be broken!" they said. Well... they were wrong.. kinda. It's excellent on rain, but thankfully the tier already has a good amount of anti-rain tools like Hippo weather wars, tera gotchas like rhyperior, moltres and fezandipiti, and natural rain checks like Volcanion, suicune and Wo-chien. What barraskewda does besides this, is imo, more valuable. Absolutely foddering the core of Cyclizar/Hippo/Molt like its a full course meal. This thing is very solid on Bulky Offenses and Offense, the downside is well, it's about as durable as a wet sock, and it's defensive utility amounts to being a soft check to opposing rain by just outspeeding their swift swimmers with jolly and picking your nose for every other scenario. It comes in on jack shit safely without balls of titanium but my god when it comes in it does the lords work. Empoleon teams wants to die, Noivern teams arent safe from catching an ice fang, amoonguss and okidogi risk psychic fang, and slowbro risks catching a crunch. Solid anchor.
Now for the others.
Rhyperior has taken off like no tommorow with it's traits being extremely compatible with the overall meta. It's arguably a top 3 rocker in the tier, it's an amazing partner for pokemon like Cobalion because it means your cobalion doesn't have to run rocks itself, which opens it up a ton for other shit it wants like taunt, volt switch, cm etc. That isn't all though, it's bar none the best 1 for 1 merchant in the entire tier, rhyperior with tera can practically trade itself for anything it wants, and it's power means it can beat ALOT of things with just edgequake. Despite appearances, Rhyperior can actually obliterate every ground type in the tier not named flygon. It eats hippowdons for breakfast, Swampert is liable to get smashed by a +2 quake even with max max def it takes 65%, Gastrodon straight dies to a +2 EQ. Palossand takes over 55% from a +2 quake, and all of these pokemon are slower with a meager bit of investment. AND this damage is achieved by just running adamant and a whopping Sixteen (16) attack evs. Uninvested Krook fucking dies to a quake after spikes WITH intimidate, and who cares about flygon he sucks. It's got set variety too, megahorn can melt wo-chiens and leaves, Heat crash can handle those 2 while also smashing chesnaught into dust. Rock polish exists so that's a fun unexplored meme, fuck it forget heat crash you can run SR temper flare and just, choose to OHKO chesnaught from full with a 150bp temper flare. If all this wasn't enough, with tera it can reverse thundurus-t, anything on rain and i do mean anything. And rock/ground provides useful boosts vs moltres naturally as a nice counter since wisp moltres fucking blows. And to top ALL of this off, it's a proud leader of the Custap Club. It's performance in RULT playoffs sees it at 8th in usage, it's almost never dead weight and always brings high returns on it's offers. If not A+, then A.
Now this may seem like a large jump, especially for a mon practically unused in every previous RU. However, palossand has a distinct amount of tricks up it's sleeve that lets it have it's own specific archetype. It's the tiers best spin blocker vs the best spinner and most common mon in the tier, Cyclizar. Palossand spike stack is an archetype that has seen a decent amount of use in RULT, and in ssnl where even if it doesn't win, it shows just how good palossand is at forcing options down for the opponent. Usually paired with Deo-D, it forms an excellent hazards core to keep hazards up, while also not being dead weight itself. It's got reliable recovery in shore up, being the only ground besides hippowdon and gastrodon to have recovery. It's the only ghost with recovery that isn't trash ass pain split, and that's a big thing. Tier shifts have helped it too, since it does quite well into Jirachi, Zarude and Hoopa-U's ban helped it alot, and it's clicks with Scorching Sands&Hex does the job quite well. It's a one trick pony, but I think it has a large enough niche and tournament presence, above even things like Gatr and Conk, to put it up to B-
Put it next to Ninetales.
Noivern has seen a return to form with the realization that it's traits are quite good in the meta still. It's a dragon faster than Cyclizar, which is already a huge boon for it already. It's a check to a good amount of pokemon, such as Volcanion, Infernape, and can revenge kill a plehtora of mons like Thundurus-T, Cobalion and more. It scored solid usage in RULT, outplacing pokemon like Gengar, and tying with Reuniclus. I'd argue it's a more splashable salamence, which trades raw stats for a better speed tier, and access to U-turn. I think it might be straight up better than mence, but it seems people still aren't ready for that conversation. What I will say, is Specs Boomburst Noivern is still a decent set this thing can pilot, Jirachi and Rhyperior be damned. It's got set variety with options like Taunt, super fang, hurricane, and switcheroo memes. It's a good for any team that doesn't need Cyclizar's specific talents, namely spinning and emergency checking ghosts and thundy-t. It's undersold at B, and I think many will agree with me on this.
This thing is so fucking fraudulent man LMAO. This thing is bad as a dragon dancer, stonewalled by hippowdon and now Rhyperior can check it on a bucketload of squads, it's weak stabs suck for it, and it's a momentum drain alot of the time. Of course it's not bad, mixed draco sets are good at sniping hippo and it can run away with games if you let it, but are we really calling this thing A- material? It's side-grade noivern in alot of scenarios, and Noivern is a far bigger team player than mence is. You can make an argument that specs sets or extremely agressive special sets are good, but to me they are momentum drains, and again, bring less for a team than Noivern does. Sure, a DD mence will always be scary if your caught lacking on your checks, but there's alot of mons that fuck with each specific mence set that it can feel like a burden more than you'd like it to be, especially from a pokemon like Salamence. This one may be more biased than the rest but alot of my building, i'd usually prefer to slap a noivern on that a salamence on, and I really think that matters a lot.
This thing has managed to carve out a niche as a setup sweeper with some valuable defensive utility. For the latter, it's resume includes being a check to Iron Leaves, unconditionally. This is already a large claim considering how annoying it is and most mons require to burn tera against it, but this thing doesn't. It's 4x fighting resist allows it to check things like choice locked Terrakion, call out CC conkeldurrs, and IDBP cobalion. What it does is function as a snowballing psychic type. A niche not truly unique, but Tinted lens Esper wing gives it the benefit of being a speed boosting snowballing psychic type, able to setup on and abuse non roar empoleon, eats knock from cyclizar with ease, and mops other things like Moltres. Esper Wing allows for a variety of setup opportunities other psychic types can't reach for, and the unique defensive utility is praiseworthy. For those who strictly follow the "requires a replay for all UR to ranked noms, yeah yeah here's a replay for you.
Everything people thought mew would be, is what Cresselia is like i swear. CM is so diabolically good, and the annoyance by hippowdon is alleviated by superior bulk, generally good recovery with some caveats, and an actual non-worthless ability !! CM snowballs against a surprising amount of teams, setting up on a ton of common things like Cyc, Cobal without taunt, Moltres, no ww hippo (which is becoming more common since ppl realized letting in the best birds in the tier for free blows), fezandipiti (with covert cloak), Noivern, special mence, and far more. It's tera is quite diverse aswell, with me personally fancying tera Electric, as it resists jirachi iron head, while still being immune to EQ. And boosting an optional pick over moonblast, aka tbolt. In exchange for admitting you'll never kill a Krookodile or wo-chien worth a shit unless you lay up a tspike, you nail Empoleon, Jirachi, and bisharp for more reliable damage. This thing runs away with SO many games, it's so good. Please give it a whirl, I swear you'll be well inbursed for the time.
Fraud. I regret calling this mon busted as fuck and complaining about it's unban this is budget necrozma on it's best days. I've seen takes of "oh its busted" "if people use this thing it's nuts!" yeah IF people use it. Nobody uses this thing and wowie I wonder why. This thing has competition out the ass, and even with mew's variety, every other psychic has a draw to use it over this. H-Braviary has it's speed boosting schtick and iron leaves checking niche, Cresselia has levitate cm and absurd obesity to snowball, Reuniclus has magic guard, Jirachi has a steel typing and more utility thats worth a damn (no , Necrozma has dragon dance and meteor beam, paired with far better stats for the job it tries to do. And mew has jack of all trades, master of fucking nothing, shit it's not even a veteran it's a novice in a stolen uniform. When you use it it's probably decent but like, it's not A- material even with that being said. DD sets are weak as shit and bad versions of Necrozma, NP sets are bad versions of a hero called azelf with a smidge of twave support, and you can probably curate a set that performs something better or unique to the others but it's fucking mew that's not impressive. Like gee you sure showed me with your sub bulk up throat chop leech life tera bug mew. Maybe once it gets off its ass and hopefully does something worth a damn during RUPL I'll rescind my statement but for now it's among the 3 heavenly frauds alongside salamence and the rats. If i want a spikes HO lead im using froslass or custap forretress you can't change my mind.
Agree with most of the points above (except salamence, that is decent), but I do want to nominate a few mons to rise/fall.
-> C/C+
Not a huge jump but imo, lucario is super underrated rn. The main sets of course are sd+e-speed, choice band and np, which in itself are great sets, however lucario can mix and match its moves to an extreme degree. It can go bulk up+special move (my favourite one), agility+3A and bullet punch+sd. There is more that I am most likely missing, but lucario is a swiss army knife of coverage, the only thing holding it back is competition as a steel+fighting type from cobalion. However, access to priority and more coverage brings it a valuable niche in the tier.
-> B+/A-
Been using gyarados lately, and I know this may seem weird, but I think its a really, really good mon in the tier. The set I have personally been liking is dd, t-wave and 2A. Most people switch in a counter for gyarados because they expect it to start dd'ing, but t-wave means that something like id deo-d, or some other mon like grass types, actually get insanely crippled by t-wave. From here, it can either switch to a teammate or start a sweep with the defensive answer crippled. It also has nice defensive utility for the tier with it being able to soft check a lot of physical attackers and its good natural bulk helping it in a lot of matchups. Cobalion can only use volt switch against it since stone edge is weakened (not even a 2hit ko at -1) and it resists its stab moves. This is amazing for playing around cobalion. E-quake at +1 2hit kos id cobalion if they switch into it and if not, then gyarados can t-wave. Taunt is another option, but I find t-wave is superior. Overall, a really amazing mon in the tier.
-> C/C+
Not going to talk about this one for long, but inteleon is basically a special version of barra with a little less speed but a lot more power. Specs scald's absolutely shalack most things in the tier and can provide team support with burns. Meanwhile, it can flip turn out of bad matchups (or u-turn, but imma stick with my water move, thank you very much) which still does good damage (it can 4hit ko physically defensive moltres lmao) which is good for chip. Once the opponent is weared down, it can click its powerful special moves to obliterate the enemy. Should try it out, its really good.
-> B/B-
I'm sorry, but breloom is not the stuff rn. It's power is amazing, but it doesn't have enough traits in other areas to account for this. Poison heal is an amzing ability (as gliscor has shown) but breloom doesn't have the longevity to abuse it. But that's not the main reason why you use breloom, its for technician boosted moves with cb or sd. Outside of mach punch, breloom isn't too threatening. Again, its bulk is mediocre, but its speed really holds it back. Grass+fighting is good offensively, but bad defensively, so it not going first hurts it a lot. Even something like specially defensive empoleon surf (though I doubt it would be able to use surf, but this is just to show how bad it is defensively) has a chance to 3hit ko. Cyclizar rapid spin most of the time 4hit kos. RAPID SPIN, you know, the move that is used to remove hazards, i.e. it's main use is not to do damage. Breloom should have an amazing matchup against cyclizar, but it has to be careful coming in. This mon has one thing, and that's power, but when it is countered by most flying types not named enam-t because they outspeed it, resist its stabs and destroy it, you know its bad. The only reason why its not nominated for lower is cb mach punch, that's a really good tool. At least chesnaught has good stats and utility movepool.
-> B+/B-
Slither wing on paper is really amazing mon. Great bulk, amazing power and unique moves no other fighting type has, such as morning sun, flare blitz (infernape has it, but others don't), will-o-wisp and priority in first impression. However, in practice, slither wing is outclassed by most other fighting types. This is mainly because there secondary typings are better than slither wing's, who has to use bug stab. Hitting psychic types is nice, but most of the other fighting types have ways around them. Cobalion can volt switch out of the matchup, terrakion hits them hard with rock stab, mienshao has knock off or u-turn for them, okidogi is threatened more by them but also has knock off, gapdos has flying stab and infernape has fire stab. Since none of them are lacking in power (cobalion has id+bp for power), that means that they strictly ouclass it in most ways. It's speed stat also holds it back, due to bug+fighting being awful defensively and other fightings being faster, besides okidogi who has lots of other good traits. That leaves the utility, which if you are going to be using a will-o-wisp recovery mon, use moltres. It doesn't have much besides first impression that other mons can't replicate, and a downgrade in viability is fair.
-> C/C+Not a huge jump but imo, lucario is super underrated rn. The main sets of course are sd+e-speed, choice band and np, which in itself are great sets, however lucario can mix and match its moves to an extreme degree. It can go bulk up+special move (my favourite one), agility+3A and bullet punch+sd. There is more that I am most likely missing, but lucario is a swiss army knife of coverage, the only thing holding it back is competition as a steel+fighting type from cobalion. However, access to priority and more coverage brings it a valuable niche in the tier.
-> B+/A-Been using gyarados lately, and I know this may seem weird, but I think its a really, really good mon in the tier. The set I have personally been liking is dd, t-wave and 2A. Most people switch in a counter for gyarados because they expect it to start dd'ing, but t-wave means that something like id deo-d, or some other mon like grass types, actually get insanely crippled by t-wave. From here, it can either switch to a teammate or start a sweep with the defensive answer crippled. It also has nice defensive utility for the tier with it being able to soft check a lot of physical attackers and its good natural bulk helping it in a lot of matchups. Cobalion can only use volt switch against it since stone edge is weakened (not even a 2hit ko at -1) and it resists its stab moves. This is amazing for playing around cobalion. E-quake at +1 2hit kos id cobalion if they switch into it and if not, then gyarados can t-wave. Taunt is another option, but I find t-wave is superior. Overall, a really amazing mon in the tier.
-> C/C+Not going to talk about this one for long, but inteleon is basically a special version of barra with a little less speed but a lot more power. Specs scald's absolutely shalack most things in the tier and can provide team support with burns. Meanwhile, it can flip turn out of bad matchups (or u-turn, but imma stick with my water move, thank you very much) which still does good damage (it can 4hit ko physically defensive moltres lmao) which is good for chip. Once the opponent is weared down, it can click its powerful special moves to obliterate the enemy. Should try it out, its really good.
-> B/B-I'm sorry, but breloom is not the stuff rn. It's power is amazing, but it doesn't have enough traits in other areas to account for this. Poison heal is an amzing ability (as gliscor has shown) but breloom doesn't have the longevity to abuse it. But that's not the main reason why you use breloom, its for technician boosted moves with cb or sd. Outside of mach punch, breloom isn't too threatening. Again, its bulk is mediocre, but its speed really holds it back. Grass+fighting is good offensively, but bad defensively, so it not going first hurts it a lot. Even something like specially defensive empoleon surf (though I doubt it would be able to use surf, but this is just to show how bad it is defensively) has a chance to 3hit ko. Cyclizar rapid spin most of the time 4hit kos. RAPID SPIN, you know, the move that is used to remove hazards, i.e. it's main use is not to do damage. Breloom should have an amazing matchup against cyclizar, but it has to be careful coming in. This mon has one thing, and that's power, but when it is countered by most flying types not named enam-t because they outspeed it, resist its stabs and destroy it, you know its bad. The only reason why its not nominated for lower is cb mach punch, that's a really good tool. At least chesnaught has good stats and utility movepool.
-> B+/B-Slither wing on paper is really amazing mon. Great bulk, amazing power and unique moves no other fighting type has, such as morning sun, flare blitz (infernape has it, but others don't), will-o-wisp and priority in first impression. However, in practice, slither wing is outclassed by most other fighting types. This is mainly because there secondary typings are better than slither wing's, who has to use bug stab. Hitting psychic types is nice, but most of the other fighting types have ways around them. Cobalion can volt switch out of the matchup, terrakion hits them hard with rock stab, mienshao has knock off or u-turn for them, okidogi is threatened more by them but also has knock off, gapdos has flying stab and infernape has fire stab. Since none of them are lacking in power (cobalion has id+bp for power), that means that they strictly ouclass it in most ways. It's speed stat also holds it back, due to bug+fighting being awful defensively and other fightings being faster, besides okidogi who has lots of other good traits. That leaves the utility, which if you are going to be using a will-o-wisp recovery mon, use moltres. It doesn't have much besides first impression that other mons can't replicate, and a downgrade in viability is fair.
: C -> B-/BThis might seem like a huge rise but hear me out. Diancie is a naturally good defensive pokemon with its ability to check top tier mons like Moltres, Thundurus-T, Zoroark-Hisui, Salamence and Cyclizar in Particular. Speaking of cyclizar Diancie as a hazard setter haa a great matchup into cyclizar which is very important.
A common sentiment is why not Hippowdon instead? The answer is for the following reasons:
Diancie for one doesnt necessarily need to compete ith hippo. Infact hippo can be a great partner as it checks major nuisances like revavroom and cobalion.
Diancie being able to reliably set up stealth rocks means ur hippo can forgo sr and be able to run both roar and stone edge. However it can also run Spikes if u have a stealth rock hippowdon. Both of them form a beautiful core with each other.
Diancie loves hippo not only because of their amazing defensive profile together but also because of benefiting immensly from hippowdon's Sand. The bulk is so good. For instance Offensive Empoleon's Surf is a roll to two shot with surf to standard specially defensive Diancie. Specs zoroark's shadow ball is a 5 hit ko.
Another beautiful aspect of Diancie is its signature move Diamond Storm. Diamobd Storm turns several iffy matchups like Powerwhip cyclizar into easy exchanges. Power whip goes from a 3 hit ko to a 6 hit ko aswell as completly shifting its cobalion matchup. (Iron head is a roll to 3 hit ko at +2..admittingly a very likely roll but a +2 body press does almost double the damagd back and forces a tera.)
Defensive Diancie is also really versataile. For instance if cobalion thinking it will get free Iron defense will get hammered by an Encore. If they predict encore and taunt a Diancie it will get Moon blasted to its face which heavily dents cobalion compared to its fairy type competition fezandipity. (Moonblast is very likely to 3 shot).
However these are defensive Diancie's traits.
Lets go to offensive Diancie next.
The best offensive Diancie set imo is OTR diancie with a simple set of meteor beam moonlast trick room and earth power with any desired tera (preferably ground or steel for baloon revavroom)
Though a bit weak uninvested once its fully invested Diancie becomes an absolute beast once it gets its setup going.
+1 252+ SpA Diancie Meteor Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Hippowdon: 118-140 (28 - 33.3%) -- 0.1% chance to 3HKO
+1 252+ SpA Diancie Moonblast vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Hippowdon: 189-223 (45 - 53%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
With slight chip specially defensive hippowdon drops (or u r tera fairy for that insane +1 moonblast calcs (vroom still isnt switching in either way so its a fine-ish trade))
Also hippo has to be roar to beat dian which has became a lot less common lately in favour of stone edge which is great for Dian.
OTR completly flips offense matchup massively. Its calcs on paper arent as interesting but u will feel the effect of these calcs in practice more.
Diamond storm CM diancie is also very decent aswell. Though its annoyed that it has to run tera poison(more common)/steel for fezandipity and okidogi more. If u cm as a cobalion switches in u r very likely to win the exchange because of how much d kiss heal.
Because of all the points mentioned above I think Diancie should rise to B-/B. Its leagues better than mons like Foretress, H-Typhlosion,and Tentacruel who resides its rank rn. Its frankly insulting.
Its even better than mons residing above it like incineroat, base thundurus, Venusaur, Floatzel, munkidori and even Registeel. Its better than almost every B- mon except for maybe Yanmega who should rise itself anyway.
Hell I would say its better than mons like Glowbro and Raikou.
Yes it has issues like lack of reliable recovery outside of leftovers and maybe draining kiss on cm sets aswell as at times passivity issues which is why I am not nominating it any higher for now.
https://tiermaker.com/create/viability-ranking-rarelyused-march-2024-17069371
Not an opinion but i think this template will be nice for the community
Not an opinion but i think this template will be nice for the community
Also not an opinion, but I think it would be a good idea to keep track of, on the main VR post, when it was last updated so that new players know just how old the VR is. I'm pretty sure that other VRs do that and not everyone knows to look at the bottom right of the post, so I think it would just be a good quality of life thing.