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Why (Suspect Reasoning):
Kyurem has solidified its presence as an offensive behemoth with nearly perfect coverage, boasting both physical and special sets that are headache-inducing in the teambuilder. It's no surprise that a Pokemon with an Ice-type is strong offensively, but the transition to gen 8 gave Kyurem newfound access to moves like Icicle Spear, Freeze Dry, and Dragon Dance; so, finding defensive counterplay to its coverage (Focus Blast, Earth Power) is a chore for many teams. Kyurem's respectable 125/90/90 bulk in conjunction with 130/130 offensive stats means that even though its 95 base speed is hardly the fastest in the tier, it has the bulk and power to switch in repeatedly and pressure opposing teams and even Pokemon who resist its powerful attacks. In terms of abilities, it tends to run either Sheer Force Life Orb (SFLO) or special sets and Skill Link on physical sets—and the fact that the two differ so much in execution but are both daunting can lead to disaster if an opponent guesses wrong. Despite this, it's not as if Kyurem is a perfect offensive threat. Its less than ideal speed tier and weakness to Stealth Rock are both massive drawbacks that can prevent it from breaking consistently and effectively. Irrespective of said flaws, Kyurem's presence creates a counterplay conundrum that leaves most teams almost inevitably weak to its moves.
Kyurem's SFLO set is especially daunting because of the immediate damage amplification to its STAB moves. It will always carry Ice Beam and Freeze Dry, with the last two slots being filled out by some combination of Earth Power, Focus Blast, and Roost. The gameplan with SFLO Kyurem is generally to find ways to pivot into it versus slower/defensive Pokemon as many times as possible. This can be done defensively with partners like Corviknight and Blissey, or offensively in a plethora of ways with partners like Victini and Barraskewda being particularly effective. That being said, it's not as if Kyurem requires VoltTurners to get kills. Even pivots like Tapu Fini and Garchomp enable Kyurem by inviting in other slower, bulkier Pokemon (e.g. opposing Tapu Finis and Swamperts)—typically easy pickings for a Kyurem to switch into. As for its physical Skill Link set, Kyurem mainly runs Icicle Spear, Dragon Dance, and Roost with Freeze Dry or Scale Shot filling out the last slot and either opts for King's Rock or Never-Melt Ice in the item slot. A rather straightforward set, the goal is to either set up on Pokemon that are threatened out or unable to kill Kyurem.
The dichotomy between Physical Kyurem and Special Kyurem presents unique challenges in the teambuilder and actual battle setting. Principally, attempts to handle Kyurem defensively involve the use of special walls like Blissey/Chansey and Assault Vest + Regenerator (RegenVest) users with a resistance to Ice such as Jirachi and Scizor—or in some cases, Silvally-Electric. The problem? In nearly single one of those cases, Kyurem has the potential to net a kill anyway: Focus Blast can 2HKO both Blissey and Chansey unless they run extremely specific (and arguably unviable) EV spreads, while Jirachi and Silvally-Electric both risk the 2HKO from Earth Power in similar fashion. With Stealth Rock in the equation, the rolls only become even more in Kyurem's favor. Even should-be tailor-made checks like Delta Stream Corviknight and Moltres either lose to Focus Blast in the case of the former, still nearly face a 2HKO in the case of the latter, or just lose outright if Kyurem is physical. Where it used to be fairly acceptable to deal with special Kyurem using Ice resists, the addition of Freeze Dry to its movepool means it can now deal with would-be Ice resists like Tapu Fini and Toxapex extremely easily, even if it's running a physical set. As if that isn't enough of a chore, if Kyurem really does turn out to be physical instead, switching to one of those specially defensive Pokemon can spell trouble as +1 or +2 Attack-boosted Icicle Spears are no joke—and neither is an effective 41% chance to flinch if it's running a King's Rock. Even Physically Defensive Pokemon like Slowbro (which can face a 2HKO from mixed with Freeze Dry), Dauntless Shield Mew and Intimidate Corviknight fear the flinch, while still others find themselves unable to revenge kill a Kyurem with 1, 2, or perhaps even 3 speed boosts. The strain of trying to prep for Kyurem extends so far up that even in the World Cup of Other Metagame Finals of AAA, the players chose agreeing not to bring Kyurem over trying to prepare for its sets.
The above serves as insight into why Kyurem is certainly suspect-worthy in AAA, but it is by no means an infallible breaker. Kyurem often runs a Neutral Speed Nature to maximize its damage output, but this leaves it at a relatively slow 289 unboosted speed, with 317 being its maximum. Even with its decent bulk, faster offensive threats like Victini, Blacephalon, Terrakion, Noivern, and Archeops if it can land a Head Smash have no problem killing it off in a 1v1. Additionally, Kyurem's glaring weakness to Stealth Rock more or less demands exceptional hazard control support in order to avoid being dismantled on switchin. Kyurem is also susceptible to switching into pivot moves like Flip Turn, U-Turn, and Teleport on turns where it tries to exert offensive pressure. These obstacles can make it hard for Kyurem to find viable opportunities to come in, but make no mistake—barring Volcarona, which resists the majority of SFLO Kyurem's coverage but loses to physical sets anyway, none of the aforementioned offensive threats can risk repeated switchins to any of Kyurem's coverage. Undoubtedly, Kyurem's ability to overcome its relatively slow speed tier and break down virtually every viable switchin behooves the AAA council to place it under examination for a suspect test.
How (Suspect Details):
During a Suspect test, each player must climb the ladder until they've acquired the GXE necessary to participate in the voting. Primarily, everyone that participates needs to make an alt account following these guidelines:
Every game must be played on the official Pokemon Showdown! site and on a new account (creation date no earlier than today, January 24) with "KAAA [Nick]"--for example, I could create one called "KAAA LUCK" to ladder with.
To qualify for voting, your alt must play a minimum of 25 games, and you must have a minimum GXE of 75.
Kyurem will be allowed on the ladder during the suspect
The suspect test will go for two weeks and end on Sunday, February 7th (11:59 pm CST)
Upon meeting requirements to vote, post the proof in this thread. Feel free to also use this thread as a means to disseminate topical opinions regarding whether or not Kyurem should be banned.
It is mandatory to provide proof of ownership of the alt account as well. (Post a picture of your reqs with your smogon name featured)
With that all of that being said, it's time to break the ice on this suspect! As usual, the actual voting will take place in the Blind Voting Forum, so posting anything other than proof of reqs and discussion isn't necessary.
This was a lovely suspect experience, I might actually start considering trying more of these out, if they're all so pleasant!
Shout outs to The Number Man for both of the teams I used (and for being really sweet!!)
I'm obviously not very well versed in AAA, and the fact that I did not once encounter Kyurem in my ladder run did not help my forming of an educated opinion. I do understand that the chance of Kyurem's sets having two entirely different arrays of checks and counters can make it potentially risky to play against.
In any case, I shall read everyone's posts with care and form an opinion through the contributions of more experienced players :))
Shout out to Archeops for being incapable of landing a Head Smash in the three games I dared to use it
Most of my thoughts on Kyurem are already in the suspect post, to keep it concise: It's too strong and the vast majority of its "checks" have the potential to just lose if it's physical and they're spdef, or if it's special and they're physdef. Even with how Kyurem can sometimes demand a lot of team support, those obstacles often aren't enough to keep it from absolutely destroying teams. The speed tier issue is actually a good argument considering how relatively slow 95 base speed is, but realistically if a mon can only be beaten offensively because it destroys all of its defensive answers, it's probably not a good look for its place in the meta.
Resident Camomons Meteorologist here bringing a weather report proof that I am qualified to vote for this Kyurem suspect test.
There are hints of counterplay that deals with Kyurem well; however, with that it mind, it takes at least two Pokemon (in my team, there are three) to deal with Kyurem fine, but still fears switching in on a correct move that would exert lots of pressure against those Pokemon. Kyurem's sheer wallbreaking abilities make it one of the most restricting forces when it comes to building an AAA team - this is grounds for a ban.
The special sets are fine, but honestly even if you have an aswer playing against the ddance set is hell. You bring in your Tapu Fini, or Dauntless Mew, or delta stream corv, and they ddance, and you're just left to pray they dont get enough flinches to win. For checks that rely on damage, like non wisp mew and iron head corv, it's even worse, as they can often find another pokemon on your team to roost against and try again until they get lucky. Putting the special sets on the same mon, when you need to stop the physical set asap because it can beat almost all its counters after a boost? no.
I hesitated a lot before arriving at a definitive opinion on the issue of Kyurem's ban. Thinkerino showed in his introduction post how dangerous the SFLO set is and how difficult it is to counter it both in game and in the teambuilder. He also showed very well how the physical set, although less dangerous than the special set, is also a great threat, and above all makes facing Kyurem even more unpleasant ; and introduces a luck factor in the fact of guessing its set correctly. In spite of this, I intend to vote against the ban, and this for 2 reasons that have been briefly evoked, but not developed enough to my liking.
1) Kyurem's strength is slightly overstated
- Kyurem's physical set, which is certainly not the most powerful, but which is one of the reasons put forward for the ban, is in my opinion quite weak. It is easily stopable with a potent physical wall such as Mew, Doublade, and even Water types against which Freeze Dry is not enough, such as Toxapex and Tapu Fini. It also inflicts insufficient damage to Steel types such as Cobalion, Heatran or Genesect, which can easily be used as soft checks and take two hits or more, even at +1. It finds its best chances against teams relying on Swampert as a physical wall, which it can ohko with Freeze Dry, but even then it rarely finds its way.
- Kyurem's special set is the one that made me hesitate to vote Ban, as it is indeed extremely dangerous and difficult to get around. However I think its strength is overestimated as well, because it often has a hard time overcoming the special walls. If it finds itself facing a Snorlax or a Blissey, which represent a large portion of the metagame, not only must it correctly predict the opponent two turns in a row, but it must also hit two Focus Blasts in a row in the - least rare - case where the opponent switches to his Normal type and stays the next turn ; which corresponds to about one chance out of two. Who would want to base their chances of victory on a coin toss ? In the case of Blissey, it is crucial to hit both Focus Blasts, otherwise it Teleports and takes the momentum, or even cancels all the progress made if it's Regenerator. In the case of Snorlax, Facade has a good chance of 2hko, and it recovers far too much HP in case of miss to hope to defeat him. Not only all this, but in addition a game of predictions is created each time, where it is necessary to predict the opponent several times in a row to be able to ko a mon. Moreover other special walls like RegenVest Silvally, Jirachi, or full SpDef Corviknight and bulky Volcarona are very effective to stop Kyurem, and it will very rarely be able to defeat them unless Rocks + several correct predictions.
2) Kyurem's weaknesses are underestimated
- Weakness to Stealth Rock. Rocks are omnipresent in the current metagame, because their user often has Regenerator (Garchomp, Swampert, Terrakion, Blissey), making clicking this move very safe in most cases. Moreover Magic Bounce isn't seen much (although still a heavy threat, and annoying), which means that the Rocks are very often on both sides of the field - just look at the WCoOMs games to be convinced of this. But when the Rocks are on the field, Kyurem becomes, if not practically unusable, at least cruelly restricted in its movements. This can be remedied by a good user of Defog one might say, but using Defog often also means giving up having the Rocks on the other side of the field, which is often one of the necessary conditions for Kyurem's breakthrough. All of this means that Kyurem finds in practice few opportunities to do its business, which, coupled with what I said earlier, makes it less dangerous than one might think.
- It is extremely hard to build with, and imposes constraints on the overall quality of the team. "If Kyurem is weak at the Rocks, why not use it with a Magic Bouncer, to avoid the problem?" This brings us to the next problem : Kyurem does nothing but break. It doesn't provide any immunity, it doesn't check any threats reliably, it's not fast enough to act as a speed control, it doesn't provide momentum. One of the reasons Magic Bounce is not played much at the moment (probably the main one) is that it uses a whole slot in the builder, in a metagame where role compression is the first concern of any builder, and where a wall with Magic Bounce will do a much worse job than a wall with Dauntless Shield or Regenerator or Poison Heal etc. because of the overall power of the breakers. Using two whole slots with pokémons that don't fulfill any of the classic roles, or badly, (hazards or removal + wall or speed + momentum) is literally suicide. Using only one slot for this (using Kyurem) is already much more feasible, but still poses big problems for the rest of the build. Usually, breakers also act as speed control, but this is not the case for Kyurem, which means that building with it is like trading the power it brings for freedom in the builder; and this is very much felt when you give it a try.
- Its lack of speed. This was already dealt with in the previous paragraph and Thinkerino's post, but Kyurem's low speed means it cannot be used as a revenge killer, and loses 1v1 against most breakers (which are usually able to ohko it) ; meaning it can only try breaking when facing a wall, preferably one that it can ohko (a good portion of them I must say). That only participates to restrict the opportunities it gets for breaking, in addition to the teambuilding problem.
This whole essay doesn't intent to show how bad Kyurem is, as I still believe it's a potent breaker. I just wanted to bring more attention to Kyurem's weaknesses and why it's not banworthy in my eyes. A ban wouldn't bother me as Kyurem isn't an essential presence either, but I hope I convinced some people.
Something important I want to add is that I don't think it's as restricting when looking to check it in the builder as some people say it is ; and more often than not I end up having a good matchup against it while not having it in the list of main threats I need to be careful about. And I don't have it in my list of main aaa threats because it's not even close to overcentralizing right now. I know no one said it was, but the use of Kyurem is very low compared to how strong people say it is ; and that is because of the reasons I stated here.
If you want to suspect "low use + extremely dangerous on paper" mon I think Genesect should be looked at. There are also the "high use + extremely dangerous" Garchomp and Balephalon obviously.
edit : ban King's Rock if the dd set flinching is the problem, this item is ridiculous anyway
I hesitated a lot before arriving at a definitive opinion on the issue of Kyurem's ban. Thinkerino showed in his introduction post how dangerous the SFLO set is and how difficult it is to counter it both in game and in the teambuilder. He also showed very well how the physical set, although less dangerous than the special set, is also a great threat, and above all makes facing Kyurem even more unpleasant ; and introduces a luck factor in the fact of guessing its set correctly. In spite of this, I intend to vote against the ban, and this for 2 reasons that have been briefly evoked, but not developed enough to my liking.
1) Kyurem's strength is slightly overstated
- Kyurem's physical set, which is certainly not the most powerful, but which is one of the reasons put forward for the ban, is in my opinion quite weak. It is easily stopable with a potent physical wall such as Mew, Doublade, and even Water types against which Freeze Dry is not enough, such as Toxapex and Tapu Fini. It also inflicts insufficient damage to Steel types such as Cobalion, Heatran or Genesect, which can easily be used as soft checks and take two hits or more, even at +1. It finds its best chances against teams relying on Swampert as a physical wall, which it can ohko with Freeze Dry, but even then it rarely finds its way.
- Kyurem's special set is the one that made me hesitate to vote Ban, as it is indeed extremely dangerous and difficult to get around. However I think its strength is overestimated as well, because it often has a hard time overcoming the special walls. If it finds itself facing a Snorlax or a Blissey, which represent a large portion of the metagame, not only must it correctly predict the opponent two turns in a row, but it must also hit two Focus Blasts in a row in the - least rare - case where the opponent switches to his Normal type and stays the next turn ; which corresponds to about one chance out of two. Who would want to base their chances of victory on a coin toss ? In the case of Blissey, it is crucial to hit both Focus Blasts, otherwise it Teleports and takes the momentum, or even cancels all the progress made if it's Regenerator. In the case of Snorlax, Facade has a good chance of 2hko, and it recovers far too much HP in case of miss to hope to defeat him. Not only all this, but in addition a game of predictions is created each time, where it is necessary to predict the opponent several times in a row to be able to ko a mon. Moreover other special walls like RegenVest Silvally, Jirachi, or full SpDef Corviknight and bulky Volcarona are very effective to stop Kyurem, and it will very rarely be able to defeat them unless Rocks + several correct predictions.
2) Kyurem's weaknesses are underestimated
- Weakness to Stealth Rock. Rocks are omnipresent in the current metagame, because their user often has Regenerator (Garchomp, Swampert, Terrakion, Blissey), making clicking this move very safe in most cases. Moreover Magic Bounce isn't seen much (although still a heavy threat, and annoying), which means that the Rocks are very often on both sides of the field - just look at the WCoOMs games to be convinced of this. But when the Rocks are on the field, Kyurem becomes, if not practically unusable, at least cruelly restricted in its movements. This can be remedied by a good user of Defog one might say, but using Defog often also means giving up having the Rocks on the other side of the field, which is often one of the necessary conditions for Kyurem's breakthrough. All of this means that Kyurem finds in practice few opportunities to do its business, which, coupled with what I said earlier, makes it less dangerous than one might think.
- It is extremely hard to build with, and imposes constraints on the overall quality of the team. "If Kyurem is weak at the Rocks, why not use it with a Magic Bouncer, to avoid the problem?" This brings us to the next problem : Kyurem does nothing but break. It doesn't provide any immunity, it doesn't check any threats reliably, it's not fast enough to act as a speed control, it doesn't provide momentum. One of the reasons Magic Bounce is not played much at the moment (probably the main one) is that it uses a whole slot in the builder, in a metagame where role compression is the first concern of any builder, and where a wall with Magic Bounce will do a much worse job than a wall with Dauntless Shield or Regenerator or Poison Heal etc. because of the overall power of the breakers. Using two whole slots with pokémons that don't fulfill any of the classic roles, or badly, (hazards or removal + wall or speed + momentum) is literally suicide. Using only one slot for this (using Kyurem) is already much more feasible, but still poses big problems for the rest of the build. Usually, breakers also act as speed control, but this is not the case for Kyurem, which means that building with it is like trading the power it brings for freedom in the builder; and this is very much felt when you give it a try.
- Its lack of speed. This was already dealt with in the previous paragraph and Thinkerino's post, but Kyurem's low speed means it cannot be used as a revenge killer, and loses 1v1 against most breakers (which are usually able to ohko it) ; meaning it can only try breaking when facing a wall, preferably one that it can ohko (a good portion of them I must say). That only participates to restrict the opportunities it gets for breaking, in addition to the teambuilding problem.
This whole essay doesn't intent to show how bad Kyurem is, as I still believe it's a potent breaker. I just wanted to bring more attention to Kyurem's weaknesses and why it's not banworthy in my eyes. A ban wouldn't bother me as Kyurem isn't an essential presence either, but I hope I convinced some people.
Something important I want to add is that I don't think it's as restricting when looking to check it in the builder as some people say it is ; and more often than not I end up having a good matchup against it while not having it in the list of main threats I need to be careful about. And I don't have it in my list of main aaa threats because it's not even close to overcentralizing right now. I know no one said it was, but the use of Kyurem is very low compared to how strong people say it is ; and that is because of the reasons I stated here.
If you want to suspect "low use + extremely dangerous on paper" mon I think Genesect should be looked at. There are also the "high use + extremely dangerous" Garchomp and Balephalon obviously.
edit : ban King's Rock if the dd set flinching is the problem, this item is ridiculous anyway
I think you did a great job of supporting your argument that Kyurem might not be as good as people think it is, but I don't think it's clear exactly why you believe that should be taken as a reason not to ban. When examining the actual context of your examples, it seems as though you aren't giving Kyurem nearly enough credit in many of them.
I'm probably going to be mentioning King's Rock a lot here, so let me preface this by saying that I personally don't consider King's Rock to be a banworthy item right now. Annoying? Certainly. Frustrating? Definitely Centralizing? Meta-defining? Consistent? Not quite...
I consider Kyurem to be an enabler of King's Rock rather than the other way around. Icicle Spear has zero immunities and takes advantage of how strong ice is as an offensive typing, dealing neutral damage to quite a few types and absolutely demolishing those that it's super effective against. You don't see any other Skill Link + Scale Shot Dragon-type pokemon contaminating the meta—neither do you see Skill LInk + anything really causing problems. Realistically, it's just Kyurem that boasts a King's Rock set that's viable enough to consistently give teams problems, and I've yet to see anything to dispute that. Plus, it's not as if being able to flinch in particular would make a Kyurem suspect/potential ban any less relevant, so don't be misled by that line of argumentation. In the event that King's Rock as an item proves to be an issue due to over centralization or whatever the case may be, then it can be considered for a potential ban/suspect test of its own.
1. Kyurem's strength isn't overstated at all
Before anything, I think it's important to note something of significance: just because your physical wall beats physical Kyurem doesn't mean you're prepared for one—it could just be special and plow through your team anyway, with the same going for a case of special checks to deal with the SFLO set. As we'll see when context is given to some of the scenarios where certain Pokemon purportedly "check" Kyurem, few if any of them possess both the viability and the reliability to actually be called "answers".
That said, it's by no means easy to consistently compress roles enough to be reliably prepared to deal with either type of Kyurem on a regular basis. If your solution to Kyurem is to nearly always beat it offensively, then that's a concession to the point that hardly anything can handle it defensively. If something can viably beat [nearly] all of its checks, then it isn't balanced.
- Kyurem's physical set, which is certainly not the most powerful, but which is one of the reasons put forward for the ban, is in my opinion quite weak. It is easily stopable with a potent physical wall such as Mew, Doublade, and even Water types against which Freeze Dry is not enough, such as Toxapex and Tapu Fini. It also inflicts insufficient damage to Steel types such as Cobalion, Heatran or Genesect, which can easily be used as soft checks and take two hits or more, even at +1. It finds its best chances against teams relying on Swampert as a physical wall, which it can ohko with Freeze Dry, but even then it rarely finds its way.
I don't see how a 99.6% (or just plain guaranteed!) chance to 2HKO Mew makes Kyurem "easily stop[p]able". In most cases, the Mew would be switching in as Kyurem clicks Dragon Dance. Why is this significant? Well, Body Press can't OHKO:
+1 252+ Def Mew Body Press vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Kyurem: 262-310 (67 - 79.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
What does this mean? Kyurem doesn't fear an OHKO from Mew and can proceed to just click Icicle Spear twice, killing it dead. If the Mew player decides to click anything other than Body Press (Skill Swap, Teleport, Recovery), they run the risk of just getting cooked (or in this case frozen to death) by Icicle Spear anyway.
Let's also not forget that King's Rock boosted Icicle Spear has a 41% chance to flinch:
252+ Atk Kyurem Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. +1 252 HP / 160+ Def Mew: 125-150 (30.9 - 37.1%) -- approx. 73.4% chance to 3HKO
252+ Atk Kyurem Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. +1 252 HP / 252+ Def Mew: 110-135 (27.2 - 33.4%) -- approx. 0% chance to 3HKO
+1 252+ Atk Kyurem Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. +1 252 HP / 160+ Def Mew: 180-215 (44.5 - 53.2%) -- approx. 11.3% chance to 2HKO
+1 252+ Atk Kyurem Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. +1 252 HP / 252+ Def Mew: 165-200 (40.8 - 49.5%) -- approx. 3HKO
Now, while +0 Spear admittedly isn't doing a whole lot to Dauntless Shield Mew, the point there is the flinch chance more than anything; secondly, there's always the more likely tendency that the Kyurem user clicks Dragon Dance expecting Mew to come in.
As for Doublade, it's totally fair to use that as an answer to physical Kyurem since damage even at +1 is negligible:
+1 252+ Atk Kyurem Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Eviolite Doublade: 80-95 (24.8 - 29.5%) -- approx. 100% chance to 4HKO
+1 252+ Atk Never-Melt Ice Kyurem Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Eviolite Doublade: 95-115 (29.5 - 35.7%) -- approx. 11.7% chance to 3HKO
But once again, let's not forget that King's Rock boosted Icicle Spear has a 41% chance to flinch. Now, I can see how these points can easily be misconstrued as grounds to argue that King's Rock should be banned instead of Kyurem, but attempts of that nature would just be missing the big picture here: Dshield Mew is definitely not a Skill Link Kyurem answer, and a meta where Doublade is on every team just so it can lose to special Kyurem [carrying Earth Power] anyway isn't exactly appealing—and no, I don't consider Levitate Doublade to be a relevant set in this context.
4 SpA Kyurem Freeze-Dry vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Tapu Fini: 152-180 (44.1 - 52.3%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Poison Heal
4 SpA Never-Melt Ice Kyurem Freeze-Dry vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Tapu Fini: 182-216 (52.9 - 62.7%) -- 71.1% chance to 2HKO after Poison Heal
+1 252+ Atk Kyurem Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Tapu Fini: 110-135 (31.9 - 39.2%) -- approx. 87.6% chance to 4HKO after Poison Heal
+1 252+ Atk Never-Melt Ice Kyurem Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Tapu Fini: 135-160 (39.2 - 46.5%) -- approx. 85.4% chance to 3HKO after Poison Heal
+2 252+ Atk Kyurem Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Tapu Fini: 145-175 (42.1 - 50.8%) -- approx. 3HKO after Poison Heal
+2 252+ Atk Never-Melt Ice Kyurem Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Tapu Fini: 180-210 (52.3 - 61%) -- approx. 57% chance to 2HKO after Poison Heal
4 SpA Kyurem Freeze-Dry vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Toxapex: 140-168 (46 - 55.2%) -- 9.4% chance to 2HKO after Black Sludge recovery
4 SpA Never-Melt Ice Kyurem Freeze-Dry vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Toxapex: 168-200 (55.2 - 65.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Black Sludge recovery
I wouldn't call dealing >50% with an uninvested attack "not enough" damage. If a Regenerator Tapu Fini switches into that Freeze Dry, it 100% dies to the next one. If the Tapu Fini is Poison Heal, then it actually covers physical Kyurem decently well (especially if it has Knock Off), but has a hard time balancing between attempts to recover HP with Protect and using its attacking/utility moves (Moonblast, Knock Off)—all the while Kyurem is either fishing for 41% flinch or risking another Dragon Dance. And I honestly don't even know why Toxapex is being brought up as a Kyurem answer considering 1. It really isn't seeing much use right now (in part because of Kyurem, but for other reasons such as losing momentum and not handling other prominent threats) 2. spamming Prankster Recover because attacking means it might die to another Freeze Dry isn't a counter and 3. like Fini, It just dies if the Kyurem happens to special anyway. In theory Toxapex should be able to Haze stall Dragon Dance attempts and eventually Gastro Acid or fish for a Scald burn to stop the physical attacks, but none of those things actually prevent Freeze-Dry from being a threat to it. Oh, obligatory King's Rock plug on the potential Icicle Spear (and perhaps even Freeze-Dry!) flinch[es] here.
So, Cobalion actually takes +1 Icicle Spear pretty well, although the flinch chance is always there. Genesect, on the other hand? It gets absolutely dismantled, and mind the fact that Iron Head without any damage amplification isn't even serving an OHKO to Kyurem:
252 Atk Genesect Iron Head vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Kyurem: 270-320 (69 - 81.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
This means the Genesect just dies the next turn unless it's scarfed.
+1 252+ Atk Kyurem Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Heatran: 80-95 (24.7 - 29.4%) -- approx. possible 5HKO after Leftovers recovery
+1 252+ Atk Never-Melt Ice Kyurem Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Heatran: 95-115 (29.4 - 35.6%) -- approx. 100% chance to 4HKO after Leftovers recovery
(Not going to say much on the Heatran calcs because it admittedly eats attacks fairly comfortably, but can still be flinched down with a bit of luck. Also, Leftovers being its only means of reliable recovery isn't exactly the most reliable.)
- Kyurem's special set is the one that made me hesitate to vote Ban, as it is indeed extremely dangerous and difficult to get around. However I think its strength is overestimated as well, because it often has a hard time overcoming the special walls. If it finds itself facing a Snorlax or a Blissey, which represent a large portion of the metagame, not only must it correctly predict the opponent two turns in a row, but it must also hit two Focus Blasts in a row in the - least rare - case where the opponent switches to his Normal type and stays the next turn ; which corresponds to about one chance out of two. Who would want to base their chances of victory on a coin toss ? In the case of Blissey, it is crucial to hit both Focus Blasts, otherwise it Teleports and takes the momentum, or even cancels all the progress made if it's Regenerator. In the case of Snorlax, Facade has a good chance of 2hko, and it recovers far too much HP in case of miss to hope to defeat him. Not only all this, but in addition a game of predictions is created each time, where it is necessary to predict the opponent several times in a row to be able to ko a mon. Moreover other special walls like RegenVest Silvally, Jirachi, or full SpDef Corviknight and bulky Volcarona are very effective to stop Kyurem, and it will very rarely be able to defeat them unless Rocks + several correct predictions.
0 Atk Snorlax Facade (140 BP) vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Kyurem: 178-211 (45.5 - 53.9%) -- 46.9% chance to 2HKO
252+ SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Kyurem Focus Blast vs. 248 HP / 252+ SpD Snorlax: 328-387 (62.7 - 73.9%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Poison Heal
252+ SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Kyurem Focus Blast vs. 4 HP / 252 SpD Blissey: 309-367 (47.3 - 56.2%) -- 82.4% chance to 2HKO
It should go without saying that if your primary solution to beating Focus Blast Kyurem has to be "Well, they can't always hit", then that's probably not healthy regardless of overestimations regarding its reliability. It's also worth noting that in the case of Blissey, it isn't a coin toss at all. Blissey's best move(s) to hit a SFLO Kyurem with are Seismic Toss [and Skill Swap]—not exactly threatening in any way. Focus Blast has a 70% chance to land, not 50%. In the case of Snorlax, if the Kyurem user really expects a Protect at any point as it tries to kill off the Snorlax, they can just Roost and go for another Focus Blast right after—completely nullifying the 2HKO chance of Facade.
252+ SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Kyurem Earth Power vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Jirachi: 177-208 (43.8 - 51.4%) -- 6.6% chance to 2HKO
0 Atk Jirachi Iron Head OR Flash Cannon vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Kyurem: 188-224 (48 - 57.2%) -- 92.6% chance to 2HKO
252+ SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Kyurem Earth Power vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Silvally-Electric: 182-216 (46.1 - 54.8%) -- 58.2% chance to 2HKO
252+ SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Kyurem Ice Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Corviknight: 220-259 (55 - 64.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Kyurem Focus Blast vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Corviknight: 195-230 (48.7 - 57.5%) -- 50% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Kyurem Ice Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Corviknight: 146-173 (36.5 - 43.2%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
252+ SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Kyurem Focus Blast vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Corviknight: 130-153 (32.5 - 38.2%) -- 97.9% chance to 3HKO
252+ SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Kyurem Earth Power vs. 248 HP / 0 SpD Volcarona: 175-207 (46.9 - 55.4%) -- 73.4% chance to 2HKO
So, Jirachi is actually able to boast a really good chance of avoiding a 2HKO while threatening a potential one back, and its typing gives it a relatively decent matchup versus physical Kyurem as well. But even at that, this is just one singular Pokemon that is by no means splashable onto teams. As for Corviknight, it isn't effective Kyurem counterplay in the slightest, facing a 2HKO roll no matter what ability it runs, and if it has an Assault Vest...well, let's just say the thought of running regenvest Corviknight only to lose to physical anyway isn't exactly reassuring. Silvally-Electric can admittedly fish for a Poison Fang poison, but could just die to a 2HKO in the process or not get the poison at all, meaning it gets even lower on HP for practically nothing in return. Volcarona is actually pretty cool as a Kyurem answer (especially if it dares to run Mystical Fire), but it can't do anything versus physical regardless:
A common basis of reasoning I use here is that most things that can switch into an attack from Kyurem set don't exactly capitalize on it once they're in, meaning they inevitably lose to subsequent attacks from special sets or become setup fodder for physical ones. I consider the existence of two completely different (physical vs. special) but totally viable Kyurem sets more than enough of a problem on its own. As we've just observed by actually looking at the calcs and probable scenarios, most if not all Pokemon that can sort of deal with one set are dismantled by the other, meaning that Kyurem legitimately has the means to break down just about every defensive core it runs into—so claiming that its strength is overstated but using examples of pokemon that it can very feasibly plow right through is contradictory.
- Weakness to Stealth Rock. Rocks are omnipresent in the current metagame, because their user often has Regenerator (Garchomp, Swampert, Terrakion, Blissey), making clicking this move very safe in most cases. Moreover Magic Bounce isn't seen much (although still a heavy threat, and annoying), which means that the Rocks are very often on both sides of the field - just look at the WCoOMs games to be convinced of this. But when the Rocks are on the field, Kyurem becomes, if not practically unusable, at least cruelly restricted in its movements. This can be remedied by a good user of Defog one might say, but using Defog often also means giving up having the Rocks on the other side of the field, which is often one of the necessary conditions for Kyurem's breakthrough. All of this means that Kyurem finds in practice few opportunities to do its business, which, coupled with what I said earlier, makes it less dangerous than one might think.
- It is extremely hard to build with, and imposes constraints on the overall quality of the team. "If Kyurem is weak at the Rocks, why not use it with a Magic Bouncer, to avoid the problem?" This brings us to the next problem : Kyurem does nothing but break. It doesn't provide any immunity, it doesn't check any threats reliably, it's not fast enough to act as a speed control, it doesn't provide momentum. One of the reasons Magic Bounce is not played much at the moment (probably the main one) is that it uses a whole slot in the builder, in a metagame where role compression is the first concern of any builder, and where a wall with Magic Bounce will do a much worse job than a wall with Dauntless Shield or Regenerator or Poison Heal etc. because of the overall power of the breakers. Using two whole slots with pokémons that don't fulfill any of the classic roles, or badly, (hazards or removal + wall or speed + momentum) is literally suicide. Using only one slot for this (using Kyurem) is already much more feasible, but still poses big problems for the rest of the build. Usually, breakers also act as speed control, but this is not the case for Kyurem, which means that building with it is like trading the power it brings for freedom in the builder; and this is very much felt when you give it a try.
- Its lack of speed. This was already dealt with in the previous paragraph and Thinkerino's post, but Kyurem's low speed means it cannot be used as a revenge killer, and loses 1v1 against most breakers (which are usually able to ohko it) ; meaning it can only try breaking when facing a wall, preferably one that it can ohko (a good portion of them I must say). That only participates to restrict the opportunities it gets for breaking, in addition to the teambuilding problem.
I actually don't disagree with these points at base (obviously, since I brought them up in the original suspect post), but there are still a few things to note:
First, team support is certainly a viable way to remedy Kyurem's weakness to Stealth Rock. Racool used a team that capitalized on offensive pressure and pivoting in order to deter opposing teams from ever trying to put up hazards, meaning that the field was virtually almost always clear of them. In the same way, one can use hazard pressure of their own to bait opposing teams into trying to send out hazard removal, the vast majority of which is just Kyurem lunch. Also, 3/4 of the Stealth Rock users mentioned here (Garchomp, Swampert, Blissey) are potentially all slower than Kyurem and face destruction from either the physical or special set, meaning that they can be taken advantage of if they try to put up hazards as it switches in.
Next, Kyurem more than makes up for how annoying it can be to fit into teams with how easily it dismantles opposing ones. More often than not in discussion about Kyurem, I find that people resort to listing nothing but offensive threats as their Kyurem counterplay, but consider this: Unless you're running 6 Pokemon faster than Kyurem on every team, it will always have something to be faster than and threaten. Next, how are those threats getting in? Barely any of them can even risk switching into Kyurem's coverage (Victini, I guess?), and still more of them lose if it Dragon Dances (+1 Attack, +1 Speed). Also, the very nature of discussion centered around relying on offense to deal with something points to the significance of the lack of defensive counterplay, in my opinion. At the very least, in Kyurem's case it suffocates the teambuilder by discouraging the use of defensive Pokemon that would otherwise serve various roles without Kyurem in the tier.
Not going to discuss speed too much since I've gone into this in the OP already, but let's not forget that Dragon Dance boosts speed—not just attack—and the amount of things both slower and faster than itself that [particularly a special attacking] Kyurem can absolutely shred is enough of a boon to excuse its relatively middling speed tier.
Hopefully, this post elucidates why Kyurem might not be overrated or overestimated at all.
I think you did a great job of supporting your argument that Kyurem might not be as good as people think it is, but I don't think it's clear exactly why you believe that should be taken as a reason not to ban. When examining the actual context of your examples, it seems as though you aren't giving Kyurem nearly enough credit in many of them.
I'm probably going to be mentioning King's Rock a lot here, so let me preface this by saying that I personally don't consider King's Rock to be a banworthy item right now. Annoying? Certainly. Frustrating? Definitely Centralizing? Meta-defining? Consistent? Not quite...
I consider Kyurem to be an enabler of King's Rock rather than the other way around. Icicle Spear has zero immunities and takes advantage of how strong ice is as an offensive typing, dealing neutral damage to quite a few types and absolutely demolishing those that it's super effective against. You don't see any other Skill Link + Scale Shot Dragon-type pokemon contaminating the meta—neither do you see Skill LInk + anything really causing problems. Realistically, it's just Kyurem that boasts a King's Rock set that's viable enough to consistently give teams problems, and I've yet to see anything to dispute that. Plus, it's not as if being able to flinch in particular would make a Kyurem suspect/potential ban any less relevant, so don't be misled by that line of argumentation. In the event that King's Rock as an item proves to be an issue due to over centralization or whatever the case may be, then it can be considered for a potential ban/suspect test of its own.
1. Kyurem's strength isn't overstated at all
Before anything, I think it's important to note something of significance: just because your physical wall beats physical Kyurem doesn't mean you're prepared for one—it could just be special and plow through your team anyway, with the same going for a case of special checks to deal with the SFLO set. As we'll see when context is given to some of the scenarios where certain Pokemon purportedly "check" Kyurem, few if any of them possess both the viability and the reliability to actually be called "answers".
That said, it's by no means easy to consistently compress roles enough to be reliably prepared to deal with either type of Kyurem on a regular basis. If your solution to Kyurem is to nearly always beat it offensively, then that's a concession to the point that hardly anything can handle it defensively. If something can viably beat [nearly] all of its checks, then it isn't balanced.
I don't see how a 99.6% (or just plain guaranteed!) chance to 2HKO Mew makes Kyurem "easily stop[p]able". In most cases, the Mew would be switching in as Kyurem clicks Dragon Dance. Why is this significant? Well, Body Press can't OHKO:
+1 252+ Def Mew Body Press vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Kyurem: 262-310 (67 - 79.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
What does this mean? Kyurem doesn't fear an OHKO from Mew and can proceed to just click Icicle Spear twice, killing it dead. If the Mew player decides to click anything other than Body Press (Skill Swap, Teleport, Recovery), they run the risk of just getting cooked (or in this case frozen to death) by Icicle Spear anyway.
Let's also not forget that King's Rock boosted Icicle Spear has a 41% chance to flinch:
252+ Atk Kyurem Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. +1 252 HP / 160+ Def Mew: 125-150 (30.9 - 37.1%) -- approx. 73.4% chance to 3HKO
252+ Atk Kyurem Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. +1 252 HP / 252+ Def Mew: 110-135 (27.2 - 33.4%) -- approx. 0% chance to 3HKO
+1 252+ Atk Kyurem Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. +1 252 HP / 160+ Def Mew: 180-215 (44.5 - 53.2%) -- approx. 11.3% chance to 2HKO
+1 252+ Atk Kyurem Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. +1 252 HP / 252+ Def Mew: 165-200 (40.8 - 49.5%) -- approx. 3HKO
Now, while +0 Spear admittedly isn't doing a whole lot to Dauntless Shield Mew, the point there is the flinch chance more than anything; secondly, there's always the more likely tendency that the Kyurem user clicks Dragon Dance expecting Mew to come in.
As for Doublade, it's totally fair to use that as an answer to physical Kyurem since damage even at +1 is negligible:
+1 252+ Atk Kyurem Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Eviolite Doublade: 80-95 (24.8 - 29.5%) -- approx. 100% chance to 4HKO
+1 252+ Atk Never-Melt Ice Kyurem Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Eviolite Doublade: 95-115 (29.5 - 35.7%) -- approx. 11.7% chance to 3HKO
But once again, let's not forget that King's Rock boosted Icicle Spear has a 41% chance to flinch. Now, I can see how these points can easily be misconstrued as grounds to argue that King's Rock should be banned instead of Kyurem, but attempts of that nature would just be missing the big picture here: Dshield Mew is definitely not a Skill Link Kyurem answer, and a meta where Doublade is on every team just so it can lose to special Kyurem [carrying Earth Power] anyway isn't exactly appealing—and no, I don't consider Levitate Doublade to be a relevant set in this context.
4 SpA Kyurem Freeze-Dry vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Tapu Fini: 152-180 (44.1 - 52.3%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Poison Heal
4 SpA Never-Melt Ice Kyurem Freeze-Dry vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Tapu Fini: 182-216 (52.9 - 62.7%) -- 71.1% chance to 2HKO after Poison Heal
+1 252+ Atk Kyurem Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Tapu Fini: 110-135 (31.9 - 39.2%) -- approx. 87.6% chance to 4HKO after Poison Heal
+1 252+ Atk Never-Melt Ice Kyurem Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Tapu Fini: 135-160 (39.2 - 46.5%) -- approx. 85.4% chance to 3HKO after Poison Heal
+2 252+ Atk Kyurem Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Tapu Fini: 145-175 (42.1 - 50.8%) -- approx. 3HKO after Poison Heal
+2 252+ Atk Never-Melt Ice Kyurem Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Tapu Fini: 180-210 (52.3 - 61%) -- approx. 57% chance to 2HKO after Poison Heal
4 SpA Kyurem Freeze-Dry vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Toxapex: 140-168 (46 - 55.2%) -- 9.4% chance to 2HKO after Black Sludge recovery
4 SpA Never-Melt Ice Kyurem Freeze-Dry vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Toxapex: 168-200 (55.2 - 65.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Black Sludge recovery
I wouldn't call dealing >50% with an uninvested attack "not enough" damage. If a Regenerator Tapu Fini switches into that Freeze Dry, it 100% dies to the next one. If the Tapu Fini is Poison Heal, then it actually covers physical Kyurem decently well (especially if it has Knock Off), but has a hard time balancing between attempts to recover HP with Protect and using its attacking/utility moves (Moonblast, Knock Off)—all the while Kyurem is either fishing for 41% flinch or risking another Dragon Dance. And I honestly don't even know why Toxapex is being brought up as a Kyurem answer considering 1. It really isn't seeing much use right now (in part because of Kyurem, but for other reasons such as losing momentum and not handling other prominent threats) 2. spamming Prankster Recover because attacking means it might die to another Freeze Dry isn't a counter and 3. like Fini, It just dies if the Kyurem happens to special anyway. In theory Toxapex should be able to Haze stall Dragon Dance attempts and eventually Gastro Acid or fish for a Scald burn to stop the physical attacks, but none of those things actually prevent Freeze-Dry from being a threat to it. Oh, obligatory King's Rock plug on the potential Icicle Spear (and perhaps even Freeze-Dry!) flinch[es] here.
So, Cobalion actually takes +1 Icicle Spear pretty well, although the flinch chance is always there. Genesect, on the other hand? It gets absolutely dismantled, and mind the fact that Iron Head without any damage amplification isn't even serving an OHKO to Kyurem:
252 Atk Genesect Iron Head vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Kyurem: 270-320 (69 - 81.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
This means the Genesect just dies the next turn unless it's scarfed.
+1 252+ Atk Kyurem Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Heatran: 80-95 (24.7 - 29.4%) -- approx. possible 5HKO after Leftovers recovery
+1 252+ Atk Never-Melt Ice Kyurem Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Heatran: 95-115 (29.4 - 35.6%) -- approx. 100% chance to 4HKO after Leftovers recovery
(Not going to say much on the Heatran calcs because it admittedly eats attacks fairly comfortably, but can still be flinched down with a bit of luck. Also, Leftovers being its only means of reliable recovery isn't exactly the most reliable.)
0 Atk Snorlax Facade (140 BP) vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Kyurem: 178-211 (45.5 - 53.9%) -- 46.9% chance to 2HKO
252+ SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Kyurem Focus Blast vs. 248 HP / 252+ SpD Snorlax: 328-387 (62.7 - 73.9%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Poison Heal
252+ SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Kyurem Focus Blast vs. 4 HP / 252 SpD Blissey: 309-367 (47.3 - 56.2%) -- 82.4% chance to 2HKO
It should go without saying that if your primary solution to beating Focus Blast Kyurem has to be "Well, they can't always hit", then that's probably not healthy regardless of overestimations regarding its reliability. It's also worth noting that in the case of Blissey, it isn't a coin toss at all. Blissey's best move(s) to hit a SFLO Kyurem with are Seismic Toss [and Skill Swap]—not exactly threatening in any way. Focus Blast has a 70% chance to land, not 50%. In the case of Snorlax, if the Kyurem user really expects a Protect at any point as it tries to kill off the Snorlax, they can just Roost and go for another Focus Blast right after—completely nullifying the 2HKO chance of Facade.
252+ SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Kyurem Earth Power vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Jirachi: 177-208 (43.8 - 51.4%) -- 6.6% chance to 2HKO
0 Atk Jirachi Iron Head OR Flash Cannon vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Kyurem: 188-224 (48 - 57.2%) -- 92.6% chance to 2HKO
252+ SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Kyurem Earth Power vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Silvally-Electric: 182-216 (46.1 - 54.8%) -- 58.2% chance to 2HKO
252+ SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Kyurem Ice Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Corviknight: 220-259 (55 - 64.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Kyurem Focus Blast vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Corviknight: 195-230 (48.7 - 57.5%) -- 50% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Kyurem Ice Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Corviknight: 146-173 (36.5 - 43.2%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
252+ SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Kyurem Focus Blast vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Corviknight: 130-153 (32.5 - 38.2%) -- 97.9% chance to 3HKO
252+ SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Kyurem Earth Power vs. 248 HP / 0 SpD Volcarona: 175-207 (46.9 - 55.4%) -- 73.4% chance to 2HKO
So, Jirachi is actually able to boast a really good chance of avoiding a 2HKO while threatening a potential one back, and its typing gives it a relatively decent matchup versus physical Kyurem as well. But even at that, this is just one singular Pokemon that is by no means splashable onto teams. As for Corviknight, it isn't effective Kyurem counterplay in the slightest, facing a 2HKO roll no matter what ability it runs, and if it has an Assault Vest...well, let's just say the thought of running regenvest Corviknight only to lose to physical anyway isn't exactly reassuring. Silvally-Electric can admittedly fish for a Poison Fang poison, but could just die to a 2HKO in the process or not get the poison at all, meaning it gets even lower on HP for practically nothing in return. Volcarona is actually pretty cool as a Kyurem answer (especially if it dares to run Mystical Fire), but it can't do anything versus physical regardless:
A common basis of reasoning I use here is that most things that can switch into an attack from Kyurem set don't exactly capitalize on it once they're in, meaning they inevitably lose to subsequent attacks from special sets or become setup fodder for physical ones. I consider the existence of two completely different (physical vs. special) but totally viable Kyurem sets more than enough of a problem on its own. As we've just observed by actually looking at the calcs and probable scenarios, most if not all Pokemon that can sort of deal with one set are dismantled by the other, meaning that Kyurem legitimately has the means to break down just about every defensive core it runs into—so claiming that its strength is overstated but using examples of pokemon that it can very feasibly plow right through is contradictory.
2. Kyurem's weaknesses
I actually don't disagree with these points at base (obviously, since I brought them up in the original suspect post), but there are still a few things to note:
First, team support is certainly a viable way to remedy Kyurem's weakness to Stealth Rock. Racool used a team that capitalized on offensive pressure and pivoting in order to deter opposing teams from ever trying to put up hazards, meaning that the field was virtually almost always clear of them. In the same way, one can use hazard pressure of their own to bait opposing teams into trying to send out hazard removal, the vast majority of which is just Kyurem lunch. Also, 3/4 of the Stealth Rock users mentioned here (Garchomp, Swampert, Blissey) are potentially all slower than Kyurem and face destruction from either the physical or special set, meaning that they can be taken advantage of if they try to put up hazards as it switches in.
Next, Kyurem more than makes up for how annoying it can be to fit into teams with how easily it dismantles opposing ones. More often than not in discussion about Kyurem, I find that people resort to listing nothing but offensive threats as their Kyurem counterplay, but consider this: Unless you're running 6 Pokemon faster than Kyurem on every team, it will always have something to be faster than and threaten. Next, how are those threats getting in? Barely any of them can even risk switching into Kyurem's coverage (Victini, I guess?), and still more of them lose if it Dragon Dances (+1 Attack, +1 Speed). Also, the very nature of discussion centered around relying on offense to deal with something points to the significance of the lack of defensive counterplay, in my opinion. At the very least, in Kyurem's case it suffocates the teambuilder by discouraging the use of defensive Pokemon that would otherwise serve various roles without Kyurem in the tier.
Not going to discuss speed too much since I've gone into this in the OP already, but let's not forget that Dragon Dance boosts speed—not just attack—and the amount of things both slower and faster than itself that [particularly a special attacking] Kyurem can absolutely shred is enough of a boon to excuse its relatively middling speed tier.
Hopefully, this post elucidates why Kyurem might not be overrated or overestimated at all.
Thanks for the reply, we're making progress in the assessment of the Kyurem problem, which is great. While I get your arguments, which are strong most of the time, I'd like to respond to some of them which I find weaker.
On why banning King's Rock is an option that should be seriously considered
- King's Rock isn't even close to centralizing, meta-defining and consistent. But these are not the only reasons why you should consider banning something. Why is King's Rock frustrating and annoying ? Why does losing (and even winning) because of Kyurem flinching you thrice in a row leave such a bitter taste ? Because it's uncompetitive, it introduces a luck factor that leaves too little room for skill.
- Now this needs deeper explanation, because the whole game of pokémon is obviously driven by luck (mostly critical chances, secondary effects and missing chances) ; and managing risk/reward takes a huge part in playing it. Hurricane and Scald rely on luck and they're not banned ; they see high usage because the risk of Scald not burning or Hurricane not hitting is balanced by the advantage they give when they land. Inferno and Zap Cannon (take away No Guard, it doesn't matter in my point) aren't banned, but we don't use them because of how unreliable they are compared to the advantage they provide. So in every choice you make in the builder there is this balance between reliability and strength (there might be a better way to put it but I didn't find one). If Scald had only 10% chance of burning, it's less likely that we would use it over Surf or Hydro Pump ; if Hurricane had only 50% chance of hitting we would run Air Slash.
- And here is my point : the reliability / strength balance when using Skill Link + King's Rock is unhealthy. That's pretty much the definition of uncompetitive. The advantage it gives when landing the 40% flinch is so high it makes up for the 60% chance of this item being useless every time you click Icicle Spear. Imagine we had an ability that gave 20 or 30% chance of doubling your damage when attacking : it would obviously be banned, even though not everyone would use it ; because it would be strong enough to where using it makes sense, but luck-based enough to where you don't want to rely on it if you're looking to have consistent results, and to where you'd feel very bad if you lost to it, or even won because of it.
- Kyurem being the only good user of King's Rock doesn't change the inherent uncompetitiveness this item brings. And once again, some other extremely luck-based things aren't banned because the reward isn't big enough compared to the chances of not landing ; but flinching is so strong that it makes up for the 60% chance of not landing each time. If an item that is uncomptetitive anyway is only used by one strong mon then it should definitely be banned, as there is no reason to not ban it (otherwise you could say "no one uses it so it doesn't change anything"). Another important thing to mention is the example of Dark Pulse, because it sees high use with even less chance of flinching. The thing is you don't only use Dark Pulse for the purpose of flinching, it's just the best Dark move you have ; while King's Rock's only purpose is lucking tf out of your opponent.
- Therefore I'm sorry but I'll take every argument using the King's Rock set with a grain of salt, especially if you bring it to the table multiple times, which you did. I know you don't consider King's Rock to be the main reason why Kyurem should be banned though, so let's keep going.
On Kyurem's strength
- I find the argument saying "it might be the other set so your answer to the physical set might be ohkoed anyway" rather weak. Every team that isn't HO has at least one physical wall and one special wall anyway, so this fact doesn't change much in the builder ; you just have to consider them separately (like you'd consider separately Noivern and Terrakion). So when you say "just because your physical wall beats physical Kyurem doesn't mean you're prepared for one—it could just be special and plow through your team anyway, with the same going for a case of special checks to deal with the SFLO set" you're right that one should consider both sets in the builder, but each set can be dealt with by a different mon, so it's not that big of a deal. It doesn't matter either when you know which set the opponent uses, be it from team preview or scouting. So the only situation where this ambiguity matters is when it's in front of you in game and you don't know which set it is. And while that situation is indeed very hard to deal with and likely to happen, it only happens once and capitalizing from it isn't so easy because you usually have to guess the opponent's guess, taking in account the possibilities of midgrounds (which are usually useful resources in these situations). So when you say this "most if not all Pokemon that can sort of deal with one set are dismantled by the other, meaning that Kyurem legitimately has the means to break down just about every defensive core it runs into", you're wrong here.
- On the physical set, Mew is indeed a very unreliable answer (maybe with Will-O-Wisp though) as apposed to Doublade, which is truly a counter. Toxapex is also very shaky, although you didn't mention it can serve as a pivot to a breaker that takes Freeze Dry well, as it pretty much forces its use. I still consider Fini a reliable answer, as Kyurem needs to win two 50/50s in a row to make progress against the Regenerator set ; and it really just loses against the PH set. On the Cobalion/Genesect counterplay, while I agree on what you said, I want to add that their presence makes clicking Dragon Dance very hard, as they can always come in and force it out as it uses that move ; and that puts more pressure on the Kyurem player to make the right guess.
- On the special set I think you overturn the problem when you say "if your primary solution to beating Focus Blast Kyurem has to be "Well, they can't always hit", then that's probably not healthy regardless of overestimations regarding its reliability", or at least you only deal with one side of the coin. Relying on that to beat Kyurem isn't ideal, but Kyurem itself relying on that isn't ideal either. My point is that you can afford to have Blissey or Snorlax as your Kyurem answer because of how unreliable it is a beating them. So relying on Kyurem is as bad as relying on Snorlax here, from a larger standpoint. But I agree that special Kyurem being able to beat those is quite big. In the case of Blissey, I'll maintain that it indeed is a coin toss, because it can Teleport and heal 33% with Regenerator, forcing Kyurem to hit two Focus, given it predicts the switch and then clicks Focus Blast again (which isn't obvious either because a hard switch is always possible). For Snorlax, Roost looks to be a rare move on Kyurem. I really want to underline that Kyurem's speed allows for more 50/50s than any other breaker in the tier, because there is always the possibility of the opponent going to his faster breaker on a predicted Focus Blast or Earth Power ; which balances its strength a lot.
On how we agree on the weaknesses
Well I agree with what you said on the weaknesses. Maybe they're not understated but they exist, they're here and they explain Kyurem's rather low usage.
Metaphysical thinking on metagame management
Something important that went through my mind a while ago when we had that discussion around Magic Bounce is that metagame debates and how to deal with a pokémon/ability/etc. can never really end. They can never end because there is no truth to what we must refer. There is just a general feeling when playing the tier ; a subjective view of what it should be. Usually, and I think it's the case here (and for Magic Bounce too imo as well as Regen and Poison heal, etc.), both ways, banning and not banning, are fine, because of the subjective nature of a player's experience in the tier. The one thing we all agree on is that a metagame needs diversity and competitiveness. So we ban uncompetitive and overcentralizing mons. I don't think Kyurem belongs to either of those. Kyurem fits more in the third category, "broken", which is way more driven by subjective view ; because a mon that is deemed broken, but that is not precisely overcentralizing (Kyurem isn't nearly as centralizing as Noiver, Bulu or Blaceph), is just put on the table because it's annoying to face.
- I find the argument saying "it might be the other set so your answer to the physical set might be ohkoed anyway" rather weak. Every team that isn't HO has at least one physical wall and one special wall anyway, so this fact doesn't change much in the builder ; you just have to consider them separately (like you'd consider separately Noivern and Terrakion). So when you say "just because your physical wall beats physical Kyurem doesn't mean you're prepared for one—it could just be special and plow through your team anyway, with the same going for a case of special checks to deal with the SFLO set" you're right that one should consider both sets in the builder, but each set can be dealt with by a different mon, so it's not that big of a deal. It doesn't matter either when you know which set the opponent uses, be it from team preview or scouting. So the only situation where this ambiguity matters is when it's in front of you in game and you don't know which set it is. And while that situation is indeed very hard to deal with and likely to happen, it only happens once and capitalizing from it isn't so easy because you usually have to guess the opponent's guess, taking in account the possibilities of midgrounds (which are usually useful resources in these situations). So when you say this "most if not all Pokemon that can sort of deal with one set are dismantled by the other, meaning that Kyurem legitimately has the means to break down just about every defensive core it runs into", you're wrong here.
- On the physical set, Mew is indeed a very unreliable answer (maybe with Will-O-Wisp though) as apposed to Doublade, which is truly a counter. Toxapex is also very shaky, although you didn't mention it can serve as a pivot to a breaker that takes Freeze Dry well, as it pretty much forces its use. I still consider Fini a reliable answer, as Kyurem needs to win two 50/50s in a row to make progress against the Regenerator set ; and it really just loses against the PH set. On the Cobalion/Genesect counterplay, while I agree on what you said, I want to add that their presence makes clicking Dragon Dance very hard, as they can always come in and force it out as it uses that move ; and that puts more pressure on the Kyurem player to make the right guess.
- On the special set I think you overturn the problem when you say "if your primary solution to beating Focus Blast Kyurem has to be "Well, they can't always hit", then that's probably not healthy regardless of overestimations regarding its reliability", or at least you only deal with one side of the coin. Relying on that to beat Kyurem isn't ideal, but Kyurem itself relying on that isn't ideal either. My point is that you can afford to have Blissey or Snorlax as your Kyurem answer because of how unreliable it is a beating them. So relying on Kyurem is as bad as relying on Snorlax here, from a larger standpoint. But I agree that special Kyurem being able to beat those is quite big. In the case of Blissey, I'll maintain that it indeed is a coin toss, because it can Teleport and heal 33% with Regenerator, forcing Kyurem to hit two Focus, given it predicts the switch and then clicks Focus Blast again (which isn't obvious either because a hard switch is always possible). For Snorlax, Roost looks to be a rare move on Kyurem. I really want to underline that Kyurem's speed allows for more 50/50s than any other breaker in the tier, because there is always the possibility of the opponent going to his faster breaker on a predicted Focus Blast or Earth Power ; which balances its strength a lot.
The issue to me is that even the common pokemon that were presented as supposedly reliable answers to Kyurem have been shown to lose anyway because of Kyurem's immense damage output—so if that's the case, what else is left? I don't think it's much of a counterargument to say that teams have both physical/special walls considering that in my previous post I went through how the vast majority of them lose to Kyurem regardless of what they run/do, so the fact that Kyurem has two different sets is certainly a strong position. Also, you said 'So when you say this "most if not all Pokemon that can sort of deal with one set are dismantled by the other, meaning that Kyurem legitimately has the means to break down just about every defensive core it runs into", you're wrong here.' I quite literally gave examples of how Kyurem breaks down every defensive switchin you mentioned, and even explained how those scenarios are mostly in Kyurem's favor, whereas you seem to be relying on theoretical evaluations of a player's ability to both identify/predict the Kyurem set and then still pull out an advantage state if they guess wrong—which is problematic, because as I proved in my previous post, most things that beat one set outright lose to the other, so it's not as if there's any form of saving grace for them there. I wouldn't exactly call my reasoning and evidence wrong.
Something important that went through my mind a while ago when we had that discussion around Magic Bounce is that metagame debates and how to deal with a pokémon/ability/etc. can never really end. They can never end because there is no truth to what we must refer. There is just a general feeling when playing the tier ; a subjective view of what it should be. Usually, and I think it's the case here (and for Magic Bounce too imo as well as Regen and Poison heal, etc.), both ways, banning and not banning, are fine, because of the subjective nature of a player's experience in the tier. The one thing we all agree on is that a metagame needs diversity and competitiveness. So we ban uncompetitive and overcentralizing mons. I don't think Kyurem belongs to either of those. Kyurem fits more in the third category, "broken", which is way more driven by subjective view ; because a mon that is deemed broken, but that is not precisely overcentralizing (Kyurem isn't nearly as centralizing as Noiver, Bulu or Blaceph), is just put on the table because it's annoying to face.
I don't particularly agree with this, frankly. It's a given that views on the meta are all going to be subjective, but that subjectivity is relative to one's experience/knowledge on competitive trends as well as what level of play they're most inclined towards. Trying to frame already subjective umbrellas like "uncompetitive and overcentralizing" as objective reasoning for bans is contradictory to me. Sure, Kyurem might not appear to be uncompetitive or overcentralizing, but the entire point is that it's nearly impossible to prep for without either running its few counters or stacking a team with speed control. Saying that because Kyurem shouldn't be seen as banworthy because it isn't as centralizing as Noivern, Bulu, or Blacephalon is bad tiering—and if anything, if those other three are considered too problematic for the meta then they should be banned too. If it's so "annoying to face" that in the finals of a major tournament, the players are literally deciding to soft ban it so they don't have to try and prep for it, then that's more than enough grounds to discuss a suspect test, let alone a ban.
In summation:
Conceding that "Kyurem isn't as good as we think" =/= "Kyurem shouldn't be banned"
At the point where arguments for beating something exist mostly in theory and are deconstructed by actual calcs/scenarios, it doesn't matter how subjective the reasoning is or what external uncompetitive/non-centralizing factors exist; there is still more than enough justification for a ban.
This isn't really the place to discuss a King's Rock ban any further, so I'm not going to.
The issue to me is that even the common pokemon that were presented as supposedly reliable answers to Kyurem have been shown to lose anyway because of Kyurem's immense damage output—so if that's the case, what else is left? I don't think it's much of a counterargument to say that teams have both physical/special walls considering that in my previous post I went through how the vast majority of them lose to Kyurem regardless of what they run/do, so the fact that Kyurem has two different sets is certainly a strong position. Also, you said 'So when you say this "most if not all Pokemon that can sort of deal with one set are dismantled by the other, meaning that Kyurem legitimately has the means to break down just about every defensive core it runs into", you're wrong here.' I quite literally gave examples of how Kyurem breaks down every defensive switchin you mentioned, and even explained how those scenarios are mostly in Kyurem's favor, whereas you seem to be relying on theoretical evaluations of a player's ability to both identify/predict the Kyurem set and then still pull out an advantage state if they guess wrong—which is problematic, because as I proved in my previous post, most things that beat one set outright lose to the other, so it's not as if there's any form of saving grace for them there. I wouldn't exactly call my reasoning and evidence wrong.
I don't particularly agree with this, frankly. It's a given that views on the meta are all going to be subjective, but that subjectivity is relative to one's experience/knowledge on competitive trends as well as what level of play they're most inclined towards. Trying to frame already subjective umbrellas like "uncompetitive and overcentralizing" as objective reasoning for bans is contradictory to me. Sure, Kyurem might not appear to be uncompetitive or overcentralizing, but the entire point is that it's nearly impossible to prep for without either running its few counters or stacking a team with speed control. Saying that because Kyurem shouldn't be seen as banworthy because it isn't as centralizing as Noivern, Bulu, or Blacephalon is bad tiering—and if anything, if those other three are considered too problematic for the meta then they should be banned too. If it's so "annoying to face" that in the finals of a major tournament, the players are literally deciding to soft ban it so they don't have to try and prep for it, then that's more than enough grounds to discuss a suspect test, let alone a ban.
In summation:
Conceding that "Kyurem isn't as good as we think" =/= "Kyurem shouldn't be banned"
At the point where arguments for beating something exist mostly in theory and are deconstructed by actual calcs/scenarios, it doesn't matter how subjective the reasoning is or what external uncompetitive/non-centralizing factors exist; there is still more than enough justification for a ban.
You seem to reproach me for not thinking in a concrete enough way, as if showing calculations that give good chances of 2hko and evoking one of many possible scenarios suddenly made the argument more valid. On the contrary, I think that you are the one who doesn't think enough about the concrete situations where a player uses Kyurem. I never tried to show that Toxapex, Snorlax, Blissey, Fini, etc. beat Kyurem 100% of the time, as they will lose in many cases. I just wanted to show that in the concrete context of a game it's very far from being obvious, and that while on paper Kyurem has the tools to defeat all the answers, it doesn't happen often because of the numerous weaknesses I mentioned in my post.
I don't know if you play OU, but Kyurem is very comparable to Nidoking in OU. Both have no switchin on paper and have ways of dealing with every sort of counterplay ; but both are slow and rely a lot on 50/50s. I truly don't understand what you find inconcrete, what "exists mostly in theory" in me saying Kyurem enables tons of 50/50s and situations where luck is involved, as that's what it does every time it's in. And if you don't predict right, Kyurem indeed does nothing. Like Nidoking, it can make extremely quick progress if you predict right, but it has weaknesses that balance that power.
I said I'd edit my thoughts into my ID post but it got buried so I'm posting again. I'm also gonna be adressing some points that have been brought up in the exchange between atha and think.
A) As Think already mentioned in the OP, the two Kyurem sets we're talking about are special SFLO and physical skill link. First I'd like to address the special set.
1) I agree (with Atha) that SFLO Kyurem is not nearly as reliable in practice as it seems on paper. Reasoning:
While it has the tools to beat any switchin bar AV Genesect/Corviknight (which people should try exploring anyway - they aren't as bad as they might seem), italways relies on successful prediction from the Kyurem player (needs to Earth Power on the switch when facing AV Silvally/Jirachi) AND luck in the case of Blissey/Snorlax. Vs the fat normals you have to predict correctly (click Focus Blast) AND hit twice, which is not an easy task. Add to this the fact that SFLO sets are usually ran because you get comparable damage to Specs while having the freedom to switch moves, so players are usually inclined to play conservatively with Kyurem and go for the obvious play.
Therefore, yes Kyurem is a pain to prep for in builder, but it's frequently not as reliable as it may seem. Additionally, the prediction reliant nature of Kyurem means that, on average, the better player should get rewarded in scenarios where Kyurem comes in and gets to click buttons - which is usually regarded as a good thing. TL:DR - Kyurem needs to predict correctly (and hit Focus Blast) to beat its switchins
0 Atk Snorlax Facade (140 BP) vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Kyurem: 178-211 (45.5 - 53.9%) -- 46.9% chance to 2HKO
252+ SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Kyurem Focus Blast vs. 248 HP / 252+ SpD Snorlax: 328-387 (62.7 - 73.9%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Poison Heal
252+ SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Kyurem Focus Blast vs. 4 HP / 252 SpD Blissey: 309-367 (47.3 - 56.2%) -- 82.4% chance to 2HKO
It should go without saying that if your primary solution to beating Focus Blast Kyurem has to be "Well, they can't always hit", then that's probably not healthy regardless of overestimations regarding its reliability. It's also worth noting that in the case of Blissey, it isn't a coin toss at all. Blissey's best move(s) to hit a SFLO Kyurem with are Seismic Toss [and Skill Swap]—not exactly threatening in any way. Focus Blast has a 70% chance to land, not 50%. In the case of Snorlax, if the Kyurem user really expects a Protect at any point as it tries to kill off the Snorlax, they can just Roost and go for another Focus Blast right after—completely nullifying the 2HKO chance of Facade.
252+ SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Kyurem Earth Power vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Jirachi: 177-208 (43.8 - 51.4%) -- 6.6% chance to 2HKO
0 Atk Jirachi Iron Head OR Flash Cannon vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Kyurem: 188-224 (48 - 57.2%) -- 92.6% chance to 2HKO
252+ SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Kyurem Earth Power vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Silvally-Electric: 182-216 (46.1 - 54.8%) -- 58.2% chance to 2HKO
252+ SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Kyurem Ice Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Corviknight: 220-259 (55 - 64.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Kyurem Focus Blast vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Corviknight: 195-230 (48.7 - 57.5%) -- 50% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Kyurem Ice Beam vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Corviknight: 146-173 (36.5 - 43.2%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
252+ SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Kyurem Focus Blast vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Assault Vest Corviknight: 130-153 (32.5 - 38.2%) -- 97.9% chance to 3HKO
252+ SpA Life Orb Sheer Force Kyurem Earth Power vs. 248 HP / 0 SpD Volcarona: 175-207 (46.9 - 55.4%) -- 73.4% chance to 2HKO
So, Jirachi is actually able to boast a really good chance of avoiding a 2HKO while threatening a potential one back, and its typing gives it a relatively decent matchup versus physical Kyurem as well. But even at that, this is just one singular Pokemon that is by no means splashable onto teams. As for Corviknight, it isn't effective Kyurem counterplay in the slightest, facing a 2HKO roll no matter what ability it runs, and if it has an Assault Vest...well, let's just say the thought of running regenvest Corviknight only to lose to physical anyway isn't exactly reassuring. Silvally-Electric can admittedly fish for a Poison Fang poison, but could just die to a 2HKO in the process or not get the poison at all, meaning it gets even lower on HP for practically nothing in return. Volcarona is actually pretty cool as a Kyurem answer (especially if it dares to run Mystical Fire), but it can't do anything versus physical regardless:
2) On the topic of Kyurem switchins not being able to threaten Kyurem:
I honestly never saw this as an issue. It has been my understanding that it's implicitly accepted that there's a bunch of mons (in AAA and in general as well most likely) that actually just win MUs they should in theory lose due to grossly outstatting their supposed counter. Case in point: Tapu Bulu winning 1v1 vs Corviknight in pretty much every OMWC game that matchup happened. Kyurem is just a particularly egregious case since it has 680 BST, so the only way to reliably kill it is status/revenge killers. The reason i don't really think AV pivots being unable to 1v1 Kyurem is a big issue, since pivoting into offensive counterplay as opposed to straight up 1v1ing is one of the (if not the) hallmarks of AAA, so if we use this as a reason to say Kyurem is problematic I think a bunch of stuff becomes problematic as well. Another example of this is Togekiss vs Corviknight, something that came up way more frequently in DLC 1/post home metas where Togekiss would easily 1v1 Corvi at +2 since Iron Head barely 2hkod whereas Fire Coverage clean 2Hkod or even ohkod Corvi, depending on the set. Another, more recent example, is PH Chomp vs Fini. Again, Fini just loses the 1v1 if it switches in on an SD from Chomp. TL:DR - switchins being unable to straight up 1v1 the mon they are eating hits from is not a rare occurence in AAA and is certainly not something that only happens vs Kyurem
B) We can now move on to the physical set.
I think this one is a bigger issue than SFLO. First of all there's the King's Rock 40% flinch chance which is really dumb and I do think we should consider banning that stupid item. It just brings nothing positive to the table imo. But regardless of that, I think the main issue with physical Kyurem reveals itself when we consider the fact that, for a large portion of aaa teams, the main form of counterplay for a bunch of threats is just pivoting into offensive counterplay (because alot of defensive mons just don't hit hard enough to beat the mons they are supposed to answer 1v1). This is where dealing w physical Kyurem gets tough.
1) Mons that can eat a hit from and might be able to 1v1 it but they cant fit pivoting moves. Example being Dauntless Mew, which actually barely lives a 2hko from King's Rock, but loses if it gets flinched and doesn't ohko w Body press. Dies to NMIce tho. Even then its not guaranteed that it wins, so if you get flinched or highrolled you just lose a mon.
+1 252+ Atk Kyurem Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. +1 252 HP / 252+ Def Mew: 165-200 (40.8 - 49.5%) -- approx. 3HKO
+1 252+ Atk Never-Melt Ice Kyurem Icicle Spear (5 hits) vs. +1 252 HP / 252+ Def Mew: 200-240 (49.5 - 59.4%) -- approx. 99.6% chance to 2HKO
+1 252+ Def Mew Body Press vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Kyurem: 262-310 (67 - 79.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
2) The mons that can eat hits from it, but can never hope to 1v1 it, BUT can pivot out of it lose a bunch of their HP in the process since blanket physical walls don't usually run regenerator (as opposed to Regenvest mons on the special side)
This means that while something like Intimidate Corvi can act as a one time pivot, it gets chunked for 45+ and possibly flinched in the process, which kinda just loses you the game if there was anything else Corvi was supposed to check. We haven't even arrived at the worst part yet - kyurem boosts its speed, which means that the available pool of offensive counterplay shrinks hard if Kyurem gets to DD up. Scarfers aren't very common and even then they have to hit it SE to win, so the most reliable offensive counterplay for Kyurem is just Triaging it with Drain Punch or Draining Kiss, the latter needing some chip to kill as well or running sth like Genesect/Cobalion which resist both STABs.
3) As mentioned above, mons that 1v1 it by virtue of typing - really only limited to steel types like Gene, Cob, Jirachi, Heatran as water types can get freeze dried and thus lose. TL:DR - The "pivot into offensive counterplay" strat is much less reliable vs DD kyurem since physical walls tend to not run regen (meaning they get worn down by repeated switchins) and +1 Kyurem is much harder to revenge than +0 Kyurem. Also King's Rock flinches can be game over, uncompetitive item.
C) After writing this all down, it seems to me that the biggest issues w Kyurem are, in order:
1) the unpredictability of which set it's running - although this can be offset by AAA experience imo, it gets easier to guess sets once you've played this meta a bunch. Unless you face Jrdn, you can never reliably guess sets vs him lmao
2) KING'S ROCK
3) very limited counterplay to the Skill Link set
4) lack of splashable defensive counterplay to the SFLO set - hard counters exist, they are just very hard to fit on teams
D) That said, I'd like to mention a weakness that hasn't been brought up yet.
Specifically the fact that the only +2 Triage mon Kyurem reliably checks is Tapu Bulu. This is not something to gloss over imo. It's one of the things that came up very frequently when I was trying to build with Kyurem. For example, Barra + SFLO Kyurem sounds amazing on paper - people go into Grass/Water/Dragon/Intim/Daunt mons on Barra Flip Turn and you just bring in Kyurem and start clicking. However, both of these mons just hard lose to a +2 Conk, Togekiss or even Golisopod if Kyurem is chipped.
And if we get back to the "offensive counterplay is the only form of reliable counterplay for a bunch of threats in AAA" point this means that your teambuilding options are very limited if you wanna fill out a team that started as Barra + Kyurem (especially considering you get owned by Victini, so you also need a Chomp/Pert/FF). Might as well just run Genesect instead since it pressures the same mons Kyurem does while being neutral to Punch and resisting Leech + DKiss. TL:DR get Triaged noob
Kyurem fits more in the third category, "broken", which is way more driven by subjective view ; because a mon that is deemed broken, but that is not precisely overcentralizing (Kyurem isn't nearly as centralizing as Noiver, Bulu or Blaceph), is just put on the table because it's annoying to face.
Saying that because Kyurem shouldn't be seen as banworthy because it isn't as centralizing as Noivern, Bulu, or Blacephalon is bad tiering—and if anything, if those other three are considered too problematic for the meta then they should be banned too. If it's so "annoying to face" that in the finals of a major tournament, the players are literally deciding to soft ban it so they don't have to try and prep for it, then that's more than enough grounds to discuss a suspect test, let alone a ban.
I don't think asking why mons X, Y and Z are not being suspected over mon Q when they are all more centralizing is an invalid question. The intent was probably not to say Kyurem isn't banworthy, but to say those 3 are more banworthy than Kyurem - which is a subjective thing anyway.
But back to the main point, I'd say it's a good question since it reveals something about the council's priorities. The difference between Blace/Bulu/Noivern and Kyurem to me (I can't speak for the rest of the council) is in the splashability of their checks.
The first 3 just happen to share checks with a bunch of other threats, so while centralizing by forcing counterplay to be put on every team, their checks also answer a bunch of other mons so you don't really have dead slots if you don't run into them. For example, Noivern checks like Elecvally and Nihilego tend to answer Gengar well enough; Blace checks like Chomp, Fini and Pert tend to do well vs Victini and Bulu checks like Intim/Mummy Corvi and Intim Mew tend to do well vs Terrakion (Bulu offensive counterplay OTOH gets murdered by it, so I'm not trying to say Noivern can switch into Terrak).
In the case of Kyurem, it seems to me that it lacks splashable counterplay, forcing very specific checks instead. By suspecting Kyurem before the other three we kinda implicitly stated that being centralizing is not that bad when the checks these mons force onto teams help deal with other high profile threats as well (which tends to not be the case with Kyurem - Rachi for example is kinda shit because its a steel type AV mon that loses to Gengar).
But then again, most Noivern checks are not good Blace checks - if you think AV Elecvally checks Blace you're gonna get knocked and then die to Mind Blown, so you're forced to run a Garchomp or something anyway. Which brings me back to AV Corvi/Genesect - they actually answer SFLO Kyurem reliably while also beating Gengar and are not as bad as you would think - most other blanket special walls just lose to Blace anyway, so it's not like adding these requires team support that other special walls would not require. TL:DR Blace/Bulu/Vern checks are more splashable than Kyurem checks, but the difference is not as big as we might think
F) In conclusion, even after writing this all down I'm not sure what my vote will be. Leaning BAN, but if i do that it's gonna be because of the Skill Link set, not the SFLO set. Overall, I don't actually think the meta is in a bad place at all (and consequently that a Kyurem ban is not 100% necessary, nor am I convinced any bans are absolutely necessary rn). I think it's very playable and buildable, especially for a ladder environment where no single game matters and its more about consistently winning over a large amount of games instead of having to win a specific game (as is the case in tournament play). Those scenarios are always tough, but that's just the way comp mons is.
You might be wondering how I lost my 1 game. Was I outplayed? Have bad match up? Haxed perhaps? Alas you would be wrong, because didn't lose a single match. I was cruising and halfway through I wanted to check my progress.... and there was my 1 loss, just chilling there, completely uninvited to the party. Truly unfortunate way to miss out on the 25-0, but thems the breaks.
Gonna be voting ban, might explain more later but the abridged version is that like many of the top breakers, Kyurem forces a long list of considerations for teams to actually be able to beat it thanks to its bulk, access to Roost, access to Freeze-Dry/Focus Blast/EP to beat a huge portion of the accessible Ice resists and checks to other special mons, and DD on top of that beating a large portion of the common physical walls. Unlike the other breakers though, it's harder to prepare cores to consistently deal with Kyurem, because the mons that are intended to partially beat Kyurem aren't actually that common, due to their lacking overlap with counterplay to other things in the meta. All Kyurems can bypass the most common ways of dealing with the other relevant Ice type in Weavile, and each set beats typical blankets of the physical/special spectra, which usually results in shoe-horning in sub-optimal or very team-specific mons just to have Kyurem checks, and again when you're running multiple slots mainly focused on Kyurem and those options are mid-tier you get builder issues. There really just aren't enough teams that can pack things like AV Rachi/Toxapex/Heatran and then go on to add MORE Kyurem counterplay -- it just doesn't work out. The prevalence of physdef walls and Pert/Chomp also make it so that p much every team has to consider what their potential temporary Kyurem switchin would be, and Kyurem isnt exactly friendly to soft counterplay due to the aforementioned coverage and setup options. For example, if you bring Victini + Corviknight vs a Sheer Force Kyurem, there's a decent chance you either get your Victini smashed by EP on the switch, or you try to scout with Corviknight and leave yourself too low to check other things that it was intended for. Meanwhile the Kyurem is just tossing up whether it wants to throw out a safe Ice Beam or a very-slightly-less-safe EP, both of which could come with a huge reward and neither of which comes attached with a true risk. While more offensive playstyles can at least hold their own vs Kyurem with some good play, those teams have their own flaws which can largely be accounted for by Kyurem's teammates, while on the flip side the closest thing to a consistent pressure point for Kyurem teams is Rocks, and even those can be accounted for if the Kyurem player just loosens some of their other matchups. All in all, while there are plenty of ways that Kyurem can lose one game, there's a lack of actual consistent responses to turn to that allow people to secure their Kyurem matchups even when they are specifically aiming to do so (prepping for anyone who likes Kyurem in AAA is genuinely pain), and as a result the mon just feels unfair both in the builder and in game.
Sidenote, non-pokemon bans are only done in very special circumstances which I don't realistically see King's Rock meeting. While it is a luck-based element, it isn't generally viewed to actively be a problem across multiple mons in the metagame, and without that cases for banning King's Rock that are based off Kyurem's Skill Link set would simply become part of Kyurem's toolkit when discussing bans (regardless of whether Kyurem without King's Rock is considered bannable). It's also worth noting that such bans have a very high threshold for what is considered to influence gameplay "too much" (think Moody, Evasion, OHKO moves), probably because of the slippery slopes surrounding the many RNG based parts of this game. I don't see a King's Rock ban really being backed by tiering policy, nor do I see strong enough evidence that anything within AAA's concept should make us deviate from tiering policy in this case (even though the extra distribution of Skill Link could create at least part of a worthwhile argument here, my earlier concerns about it being overall not relevant enough to warrant that type of action still apply for now).
In regards to atha's musings on broken/unhealthy/uncompetitive elements, a quick look here would show that part of Smogon's definition of "broken" is that broken things take away from the skill of the game. The term "uncompetitive", while it would be the obvious antonym for competitive, is not in fact the only antonym that is regularly used here -- at least in a Smogon context, "broken" also counts as an opposite of "competitive".
EDIT: almost forgot, I used this team for 15 games and this team for 10 games. If you want other examples of teams with more standard Kyurem sets you can use this or check out racool's sample team here.
I think Ill be voting ban here. Kyurem's strong as fuck first of all, any special wall usually needs to run av regen to take 2 hits and pivot out. It stands out from the other absurdly strong special attackers bc the very unique freeze dry + earth power combo kinda just hits everything you wanna run for the others (generic special attackers) super effectively. It's fast enough to still outspeed most mons on the field in a pretty bulky offense / at least pivot-dominated tier and it's fat enough to the point where you're usually forced to let a mon take 2 hits from it cause whats winning 1v1 vs it on the switch. The nidoking comparison is fair although I think kyurems a bit better cause unlike nidos stabs, faster mons dont really switch into sflo freeze dry barring like volca/tini so kyurem kinda pins the opponent down into truer (?) 50/50s alot more often in my experience. Rocks can limit it but unless youre running a rocker that beats kyu already you still need a passable switchin to it which like mentioned above feels pretty restricting imo. With that said I think its still just a borderline case and imo theres counterplay just probably not enough.
Theres another stupid but non-trivial effect it has where dd kyurem can kinda just get two free dds the first time it comes in (threat of sflo is there and it works both ways with sflo bluffing dd) and then simply flinch past your intended counter which is a little silly. 41% flinch is really pushing it for me at least.
Team I used wasnt anything special but here's the kyurem set i was using you pretty reliably freeze things in long games and dont really die I think its pretty fun
getting haxed in ur 25th game so u have to pllay 13 extra games on the aaa ladder is not a pleasant feeling.
I agree with what atha and tnm said , kyurem user itself has to win a lot of 50/50s to sweep efficiently while also keeping rocks and its moderate speed tier in mind. Still leaning towards ban tho considering its physical set is as if not more viable and skill link + kings rock is cancer
I don't know what to say about Kyurem as I don't know much the AAA metagame, so I'll make my opinion on it by reading yours.
Zarmag is a revolutionary concept of team based on Zarude + Magnet pull Garchomp (who is the mag because it does the same thing as Magnezone). The team provided by Palapapop has proven to by particularly strong against some AAA top players like PandaDoux . However, it's completly ineffective againt the ladd. That's why I decided to play a classic regen + double poison heal instead. Also s/o to my homie Bekaray for seing me lose against mono pikachu likes.
(and for being really sweet!!)
