where did i ever say skymin wasn't completely uncompetitive bullshit nonsense? i just posited that sleep is better than flinch and people are frothing at the mouth because of it. neither skymin nor darkrai nor anything currently in ubers deserves to drop and this shouldn't even be a point of discussion in the current climate
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Metagame SV OU Metagame Discussion v3
- Thread starter TPP
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legalize dry passing!
I will personally increase the use of Flatter in order to prevent dry passing
what does this mean
Flatter is like Swagger but for opponent's Spa, I guess it would create some legal shenanigans
Edit: For some reason I forgot Swagger isn't banned anymore
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Hey now. Don't change the subject tomohawk
I offer you a deal: a free, completely built from the ground up Haunted Flutter Mane House (Last Respects not included). Here, you can relive the worse and most freakish times of Gen 9 OU. It even has a built-in guardian Flutter Mane :o
In exchange, I receive the Skymin Glasshouse. Personally, I believe the interior could be reworked, and much needed grassy terrain would make this home an ideal retirement living space. I will pay you approximately 127 million dollars for the Skymin Glasshouse. Meanwhile, the Flutter Mane Haunted House costs a simple 55 thousand dollars. But I'm offering it for free
Do you accept the deal, Buzzwole?
So first off, this is incredibly condescending. Although you are correct, it's more likely he just made a mistake. Secondly, it will never get 2 calm minds against a competent player. The most likely scenario is you come in against something- say, Breloom- and it gets 1 calm mind on the switch. Then, assuming it carries both moves, it will sub and protect up to +6 speed. At this point, it has a 180 bp Stored Power at +1. This would be scary on something that wasn't espathra.
+1 0 SpA Espathra Stored Power (180 BP) vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Gholdengo: 157-186 (49.8 - 59%) -- 99.6% chance to 2HKO
+1 0 SpA Espathra Stored Power (180 BP) vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Empoleon: 105-123 (28.2 - 33%) -- 89.2% chance to 4HKO after Leftovers recovery
+1 0 SpA Espathra Stored Power (180 BP) vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Heatran: 138-163 (42.7 - 50.4%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
Vs resists, does barely anything
+1 0 SpA Espathra Stored Power (180 BP) vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Clefable: 318-375 (80.7 - 95.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
+1 0 SpA Espathra Stored Power (180 BP) vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Manaphy: 292-345 (85.6 - 101.1%) -- 6.3% chance to OHKO
+1 0 SpA Espathra Stored Power (180 BP) vs. +1 252 HP / 0 SpD Ursaluna-Bloodmoon: 277-327 (64.4 - 76%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
+1 0 SpA Espathra Stored Power (180 BP) vs. 144 HP / 0 SpD Dragonite: 292-345 (81.3 - 96.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO (not even considering multiscale!)
+1 0 SpA Espathra Stored Power (180 BP) vs. +1 0 HP / 0 SpD Tera Water Ogerpon-Wellspring-Tera: 202-238 (67.1 - 79%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
+1 0 SpA Espathra Stored Power (180 BP) vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Unaware Dondozo: 276-325 (54.7 - 64.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
+1 0 SpA Espathra Stored Power (180 BP) vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Slowking-Galar: 270-318 (68.5 - 80.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
+1 0 SpA Espathra Stored Power (180 BP) vs. 248 HP / 252+ SpD Unaware Clodsire: 282-332 (60.9 - 71.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
vs generally bulky pokemon
+1 0 SpA Espathra Dazzling Gleam vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Greninja: 230-272 (80.7 - 95.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
+1 0 SpA Espathra Dazzling Gleam vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Samurott-Hisui: 246-290 (76.6 - 90.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
+1 0 SpA Espathra Dazzling Gleam vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Hoopa-Unbound: 138-164 (45.8 - 54.4%) -- 51.6% chance to 2HKO
+1 0 SpA Espathra Dazzling Gleam vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Meowscarada: 232-274 (79.1 - 93.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
against generally frail darks, as I assume I don't have to calc against ting-lu or kingambit.
+1 0 SpA Espathra Stored Power (180 BP) vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Empoleon: 105-123 (28.2 - 33%) -- 89.2% chance to 4HKO after Leftovers recovery
+1 0 SpA Espathra Stored Power (180 BP) vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Heatran: 138-163 (42.7 - 50.4%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
Vs resists, does barely anything
+1 0 SpA Espathra Stored Power (180 BP) vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Clefable: 318-375 (80.7 - 95.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
+1 0 SpA Espathra Stored Power (180 BP) vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Manaphy: 292-345 (85.6 - 101.1%) -- 6.3% chance to OHKO
+1 0 SpA Espathra Stored Power (180 BP) vs. +1 252 HP / 0 SpD Ursaluna-Bloodmoon: 277-327 (64.4 - 76%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
+1 0 SpA Espathra Stored Power (180 BP) vs. 144 HP / 0 SpD Dragonite: 292-345 (81.3 - 96.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO (not even considering multiscale!)
+1 0 SpA Espathra Stored Power (180 BP) vs. +1 0 HP / 0 SpD Tera Water Ogerpon-Wellspring-Tera: 202-238 (67.1 - 79%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
+1 0 SpA Espathra Stored Power (180 BP) vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Unaware Dondozo: 276-325 (54.7 - 64.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
+1 0 SpA Espathra Stored Power (180 BP) vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Slowking-Galar: 270-318 (68.5 - 80.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
+1 0 SpA Espathra Stored Power (180 BP) vs. 248 HP / 252+ SpD Unaware Clodsire: 282-332 (60.9 - 71.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
vs generally bulky pokemon
+1 0 SpA Espathra Dazzling Gleam vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Greninja: 230-272 (80.7 - 95.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
+1 0 SpA Espathra Dazzling Gleam vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Samurott-Hisui: 246-290 (76.6 - 90.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
+1 0 SpA Espathra Dazzling Gleam vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Hoopa-Unbound: 138-164 (45.8 - 54.4%) -- 51.6% chance to 2HKO
+1 0 SpA Espathra Dazzling Gleam vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Meowscarada: 232-274 (79.1 - 93.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
against generally frail darks, as I assume I don't have to calc against ting-lu or kingambit.
are you talking about doubles?Flatter is like Swagger but for opponent's Spa, I guess it would create some legal shenanigans
Edit: For some reason I forgot Swagger isn't banned anymore
because in singles these "legal shenaningans" would do next to nothing.
keep in mind that it is perfectly legal to switch a contrary pokemon like enamorous on a predicted defog (this can cause you to get +1 evasion).
I looked up for the baton pass users that do not have access to some other form of pivoting, the only ones that would be affected by a legal "Dry passing" are:
- clefable (this one has wish, so I guess, it would help, but it already has competition with alomomola).
- hatterene (I am not sure if it is a good idea for a slow pivot, I could be wrong)
- ninetales-alola(I can see that working in its favour, I hope that wouldn't be too much for the metagame).
- ninetales (I am not sure if it counts since you can argue that healing wish is technically pivoting).
- weavile ( that could work very well).
- polteageist(I don't think that it would want to run that).
- a lot of pokemon in RU and NU, I can not list them all, most of them would still see zero play in OU with or without dry passing.
Hatt already runs eject button on sun teams, it absolutely appreciates drypassing, and clef is NOT outclassed by alomomola, as it brings a whole different set of attributes, namely different abilities and spdef. Ninetales-a probably still runs healing wish over it, as since it's so fast and frail it usually gets either outsped and KO'd or drypasses first and it's functionally the same as just switching out.
The "legal shenanigans" are an argument people like to bring up about drypassing, how stat drops and accidental buffs might affect drypassing I.e. you switch into a swagger and then bpass it off to a physical attacker, even if you did not run a setup move on the passer. Personally I don't think this is a big enough deal to matter, as the most common passes you will do are drops from intimidate, moonblast, shadow ball etc rather than positive passes, but it could lead to a bad precedent for other decisions.
NabboCheTesta
Gniubbo come sempre
A lot of these calcs read "dead with a couple switches into rocks and a stiff breeze" to me, but the real issue is that the scenario you're painting is unrealistic.
A competent Espathra team will have it behind screens/veil -where it can absolutely afford a second CM vs a neutral hit- and will be structured to pressure the Dark and Steel types that can give it issues.
I don't think that this is a good comparison.
running baton pass would require you to sacrifice a move a moveslot.
the eject button does not do that.
if you think that baton pass would still benefit it, what moveslot would you be willing to sacrifice?
I am not trying to argue here, I am just curious.
what do you think about the slowkings?
I am pretty sure that they both would be better options than baton haterene thanks to regenerator and slack off.
I know this argument has already been discussed to death but to me it kinda is quite a big deal. Even with just pure drypassing, do you also ban all possible transferable conditions in combination with BP or a certain arbitrary number are acceptable? What about any current or future ability which boosts the user stats? Or the aforementioned "accidental" boosts (still potentially exploitable IMO, reminds me of Sand Rush Exca on Gen 5 Rain teams)? To me it would set a bad precedent in terms of rulings
NabboCheTesta
Gniubbo come sempre
Agreed, for me the technical burden to ensuring BP stays healty is just too much to justify it in the meta. Some slow mons would appreciate the pivot move but I don't think that is what makes or breaks them in the first place.
The core reason to use Hat in the first place is Magic Bounce, so I don't think it can be sensibly compared with the Slows in that scenario.
E: cleaned up hilarious mess.
127 million dollars and a free house… there's gotta be a catch. are you sure there's not some fine print saying you get my soul or my firstborn child or something? i ain't falling for that shit again
ok, so i want to preface this by saying that legalizing only drypassing would work in theory and make the meta a bit more interesting, but it flies in the face of tiering policy, especially after the council bent over so far backwards to keep baton pass and eventually just decided "fuck it, the whole move goes". now, i think some changes to tiering policy are merited, but doing something this complex and arbitrary would not be good and it wouldn't stand a genesect's chance in ou as a tiering proposal.
that being said.
- clefable was infamous last gen for its ability to use wish and teleport to safely pass wishes to things, so it would absolutely use baton pass to similar effect. yes, it faces stiff competition from alomomomomola, which passes significantly bigger wishes and heals itself at the same time, but clefable has the benefit of not needing boots to be immune to hazards, so it serves as a better knock off absorber. clefable also has tools that mega luvdisc lacks, like thunder wave and stealth rock for some reason, so there's a lot of role-compression possibilities there
- hatterene would be a fantastic slow pivot with the move, especially as an anti-lead—lead with hatterene against an opponent's hazard setter, then bp out and react to whatever they do
- alolan ninetales would just be bullshit with this. it's already grimmsnarl 2 and would become even more grimmsnarly with a pivot move
- ninetales really likes the ability to set sun and pivot out without dying and would probably see significantly more use on sun teams, especially ones with a more offensive bent
- weavile is one of the few mons you listed that i actually don't see running baton pass too much. it's always been best as a swords dance cleaner and doesn't much like switching, especially when it can't even pass its boosts
- polteageist definitely would not run bp if it was drypass only. its singular function is setting up
- among mons you didn't mention, umbreon and scream tail would likely see some use as wishpassers
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okay, fair enough, I forgot about that.
but you still did not answer the question about sacrificing a moveslot.
all 4 moveslots that it is currently running seem to be serving a purpose.
what do you plan of abandoning?
it is running 2 utility moves and 2 stab options, which one is suppossed to be more worth dropping?
I mean the Flutter Mane has to come from somewhere.
Which also is a good example of 'what would Darkrai be like in OU'. Just a little bit slower than FM, and lot bulkier.
NabboCheTesta
Gniubbo come sempre
It
The CM set is obviously not worth considering here because CM not being usable with BP just defeats the purpose anyway.
I think the Mystical Fire slot on the pivot set could feasibly accomodate BP instead to get a good threat in safely rather than rely on prediction to moderately dent a Steel-type switch-in, especially given that the general objective of the set pretty much aligns with that.
Based on the sets on the analysis:
The CM set is obviously not worth considering here because CM not being usable with BP just defeats the purpose anyway.
I think the Mystical Fire slot on the pivot set could feasibly accomodate BP instead to get a good threat in safely rather than rely on prediction to moderately dent a Steel-type switch-in, especially given that the general objective of the set pretty much aligns with that.
TCTphantom
formerly MX42
Honestly, I would be down for a full on mask off reset for the Indigo Disk. Drop as much stuff as possible. Force us to solve Tera first and foremost, than we start quick banning shit. Or test Tera first and then we do our hard reset.
It would be a mess. But to be honest, almost any meta at the start of the final wave of dlc will be a mess. It’s gonna be gross dealing with a ton of new mons in the tier and figuring out what the hell rainbow Tera is anyway. To be honest, I think in hindsight while plenty of the Pokémon banned would have unhealthy elements to them without Tera, Tera played a role in many. Zamazenta C for instance is a lot less scary without Tera dark crunch to help it deal with ghosts. Urshifu Rapid Strike is a worse breaker without Tera Water Punching Glove Surging Strikes. Palafin and Annihilape are as dumb as they are due to their Tera Bulk Up sets. Heck, Chien Pao and Chi Yu are as scary of offensive breakers as they are partially due to Tera. Obviously, some of those (or even all of them) would still be broken in a non Tera metagame. Without Tera though in its current form, at least some of those are worth a look perhaps.
Go full on scorched earth at this point. Unban pretty much everything that isn’t Shed Tail, Flutter Mane, Last Respects, and Iron Bundle if we ban Tera.
It would be a mess. But to be honest, almost any meta at the start of the final wave of dlc will be a mess. It’s gonna be gross dealing with a ton of new mons in the tier and figuring out what the hell rainbow Tera is anyway. To be honest, I think in hindsight while plenty of the Pokémon banned would have unhealthy elements to them without Tera, Tera played a role in many. Zamazenta C for instance is a lot less scary without Tera dark crunch to help it deal with ghosts. Urshifu Rapid Strike is a worse breaker without Tera Water Punching Glove Surging Strikes. Palafin and Annihilape are as dumb as they are due to their Tera Bulk Up sets. Heck, Chien Pao and Chi Yu are as scary of offensive breakers as they are partially due to Tera. Obviously, some of those (or even all of them) would still be broken in a non Tera metagame. Without Tera though in its current form, at least some of those are worth a look perhaps.
Go full on scorched earth at this point. Unban pretty much everything that isn’t Shed Tail, Flutter Mane, Last Respects, and Iron Bundle if we ban Tera.
Except for Volcarona, free him. He did nothing wrong man.
"Let's intentionally destroy the tier to maximize the chance of banning [thing I don't like]" is transparently bad faith.
As it stands, this is a low point in the metagame to me. Releases and fallout will do that, but I think there's some room to go until we hit a better metagame. I’m very excited to get there and think each move will unlock a gold amount of progress.
Ursaluna-Bloodmoon outright dictates the fate of archetypes, constricting the builder to unreasonable degrees. Wanna run balance? You’re stuck using passivemons like SubProt Gliscor, CM Unaware Clef, CM Cress, or even Blissey if you don’t want to dive deep into the realms of lower tiers. Wanna run stall? Better hope it’s not the wrong set and you’re still packing CM Blissey almost always, if not normal Blissey + CM Unaware Clef to cover the set mix. Wanna run offense? Bit more feasible, but you’re still reading 1.5-2 Pokemon for it if you can’t keep pressure up perfectly or potentially time Teras. This thing absolutely has to go.
Beyond this, there are still some demons that plague us. To me, Roaring Moon is one of the lowkey broken things we see right now. Very few things check DD Tera Fly consistently. With attack booster and potentially Tera, it can outmuscle Dondozo, PDef Unaware Clef, and Tusk, who it hits super effectively. Taunt can further annihilate stall by stopping Gliscor’s Toxic while BB/EQ hits things like Kingambit, Garg, and Heatran hard. Knock Off is also a huge selling point as it makes Zapdos less reliable into it and helps the team in general while maintaining a presence as a strong STAB option. I feel like hyper offense frequents Moon and it’s because of the lack of true countess. It’s nowhere near as broken as Bloodmoon, but it’s definitely discussion worthy.
Other things I find to be worth discussing are Kingambit, Manaphy, Gliscor, and Wellspring. Kingambit was broken before imo and not much has changed beyond the allocation of EVs/Tera/fourth move — it’s similarly potent in my eyes. Manaphy hasn’t troubled me too much and I cannot speak to wanting it banned as I don’t personally, but I know it registers for many others. Gliscor I find more annoying than broken, but I think it’s gaining some steam and should remain in talks. And finally Wellspring has blossomed nicely and while we see more adaptations to it and Tera against it, we should keep in mind the impact it has on our teams and play.
Ursaluna-Bloodmoon outright dictates the fate of archetypes, constricting the builder to unreasonable degrees. Wanna run balance? You’re stuck using passivemons like SubProt Gliscor, CM Unaware Clef, CM Cress, or even Blissey if you don’t want to dive deep into the realms of lower tiers. Wanna run stall? Better hope it’s not the wrong set and you’re still packing CM Blissey almost always, if not normal Blissey + CM Unaware Clef to cover the set mix. Wanna run offense? Bit more feasible, but you’re still reading 1.5-2 Pokemon for it if you can’t keep pressure up perfectly or potentially time Teras. This thing absolutely has to go.
Beyond this, there are still some demons that plague us. To me, Roaring Moon is one of the lowkey broken things we see right now. Very few things check DD Tera Fly consistently. With attack booster and potentially Tera, it can outmuscle Dondozo, PDef Unaware Clef, and Tusk, who it hits super effectively. Taunt can further annihilate stall by stopping Gliscor’s Toxic while BB/EQ hits things like Kingambit, Garg, and Heatran hard. Knock Off is also a huge selling point as it makes Zapdos less reliable into it and helps the team in general while maintaining a presence as a strong STAB option. I feel like hyper offense frequents Moon and it’s because of the lack of true countess. It’s nowhere near as broken as Bloodmoon, but it’s definitely discussion worthy.
Other things I find to be worth discussing are Kingambit, Manaphy, Gliscor, and Wellspring. Kingambit was broken before imo and not much has changed beyond the allocation of EVs/Tera/fourth move — it’s similarly potent in my eyes. Manaphy hasn’t troubled me too much and I cannot speak to wanting it banned as I don’t personally, but I know it registers for many others. Gliscor I find more annoying than broken, but I think it’s gaining some steam and should remain in talks. And finally Wellspring has blossomed nicely and while we see more adaptations to it and Tera against it, we should keep in mind the impact it has on our teams and play.
Ok, I will admit that I did not consider screens when I made my post. However, my issue is that we already have a massive amount of pokemon that fit the archetype of "setup sweeper behind screens/veil". Polteageist, Sneasler, Ceruledge, Dnite, Valiant, Manaphy, etc. All of these have A: The coverage to deal with their counters (DO NOT require team support) B: more spammable stab than Psychic and C: don't waste the screen turns by continually sub/protecting. And for the calcs, I was simply trying to prove that espathra does not effortlessly sweep teams with 1 calm mind boost. With screens however, I could see it having a niche on those teams, as its bulk improves significantly, and its job wouldn't be to sweep, it would be to be ONE OF the sweepers to wear down the enemy for your other sweepers and potentially sweep if it gets a favorable matchup.
This sounds a bit odd to me honestly, since up until quite recently RM was considered UU material. Do you think this is due to Knock Off being such a great buff or is it maybe a product of the main walls of the tier being forced to run Spdef from BM, in addition to the popularity of Screens atm?
Comparing totally different metagames. Knock Off was big, but this tier also has a different composition altogether. While it was worse during the middle of the Summer, Roaring Moon saw nearly 40% usage last week in SCL, which is the biggest tournament we have seen in this young metagame so far, and it’s nearly staple status on hyper offense.
I’d say Veil helps it, but also general pace of setup spam teams and how easy a synergy add it can be on these offenses.
Knock off is a huge buff to moon, since now it can force progress even on the walls of the tier that usually deal with it(dozo hates losing its item)
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