Last I saw of it, at least in gen 8, was one BITCH of a crit me not set. Something like Cosmic Power Taunt Recover Night Shade, served as an endgame cleaner and abused 90 base speed taunts alongside mammoth bulk. Obviously, with the recover nerf it can’t pull it off as easily anymore but it exists.
-
Welcome to Smogon! Take a moment to read the Introduction to Smogon for a run-down on everything Smogon, and make sure you take some time to read the global rules.
-
Congrats to the winners of the 2023 Smog Awards!
Metagame SV OU Metagame Discussion
- Thread starter TPP
- Start date
- Status
Yeah keep doing this shit and next gen Game Freak will be giving you Tail Glow Lando.
252 Atk Choice Band Meowscarada Flower Trick vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Deoxys-Defense on a critical hit: 118-141 (38.8 - 46.3%) -- guaranteed 3HKO get real
you know…
Landorus-Therian @ Leftovers
Ability: Intimidate
Tera Type: Flying
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Nasty Plot
- Earth Power
- Tera Blast
- Psychic
nothing is stopping you from running plot Lando-T, it ties for the fourth highest special attack among ground types (and only Sandy Shocks will be legal of the three higher) and catches people off guard
It won’t be good but still
Please. DO NOT. If Shed Tail goes before HOME drops, let it STAY gone. With a limited dex, it's already powerful enough, but with an expanded dex, it'll be even more aggravating to deal with.
People have theorized that Husian Zoroark will be an answer to Rage Fist Annihilape, but only having ONE Pokemon to do that job in a whole ass tier won't be healthy.
Bundle and Mane can stay banned for all I care. The only realistic check to Bundle that I could see is Empoleon or Volcanion, but I sincerely doubt either of them are getting added in. Flutter Mane just... I don't think there's realistically a good expanded dex check for it.
Cyclizar can come back if Shed Tail goes.
Once Basculegion comes out, Houndstone will be unbanned because Last Respects will be banned in its place (assuming legion still gets to carry the move.)
Palafin feels like a 50/50 here. Might be tested but I don't know if it will come back or not.
No way in hell is funny ><> coming back. Pao, maybe (if it gets banned), but definitely not fish.
(There will be Pokemon that start in Uber; we just don’t know which yet and we aren’t going to vote until more information is confirmed)
A couple pages late but can we please stop mentioning Home as an excuse to not keep the meta healthy. We don't have a hard release date, just a tentative "Spring", and for all we know it could drop on the last day of May or end up delayed further.
It would be different if we had a date and said date was like 2 weeks away, because at that point action would indeed be a waste of time. But that's not the case so shush.
It would be different if we had a date and said date was like 2 weeks away, because at that point action would indeed be a waste of time. But that's not the case so shush.
Not the ascians!!!!
New tiering survey? Here’s how I voted and why:
Espathra: 4
Espa has been an issue for a while, but I’ve never seen it as broken. However, it doesn’t really add anything to the meta, and is more restrictive to teambuilding than it should be.
Garganacl: 2
Everyone is saying that Garg is broken, but if that’s our biggest issue than I’d say we’re in a pretty good spot for the meta. Garg adds a lot to the meta in being a bulky rocks setter that can be offensively threatening and is pretty simple to check in teambuilding. Many times I find I accidentally built a Garg counter into my team, like a mon with Sub, and if I didn’t, all I need to do is slap a Cloak on something. These checks tend to work no matter the Tera, and other sets have decent opportunity cost. It’s checks are somewhat common and good on their own, as well as it being quite valuable. However, I could see it becoming too annoying for its own good with Salt Cure’s chip.
Gholdengo: 1
I think it’s a relatively common opinion now that Gholdengo is good, but far from broken. Sort of like Lando in a way, being an amazing glue that fits on many teams, but far from broken. I don’t have much more to say other than people are overvaluing Good as Gold.
Other discussions:
Tera:
Over the past month and change since the Tera suspect, it’s become more and more clear that Tera is far from a banworthy problem. Even outside of that, there’s a precedent here: a mechanic, move, or ability has never been banned (as far as my memory goes) for any reason other than being uncompetitive. Tera is not uncompetitive. Even with that, Tera adds so much more flexibility to the builder and game that giving it up just doesn’t make sense for any reason than that you personally don’t like it. It adds so much more to the game than it removes. Even with that, almost every single ban that has happened so far (maybe bar Annihilape) has no argument for Tera being a central reason. Flutter Mane and Palafin for their insane stat spreads, Houndstone because of a move, Iron Bundle because of its insane speed and unresisted STABs, and Chi-Yu for not caring about being resisted in the first place. Even Chien-Pao doesn’t need Tera to be so good - it’s just a handy tool. Even Annihilape only had Tera as one part of its equation: Rage Fist, Taunt, it’s typing, its bulk, and the fact that it decimated bulky teams with Bulk Up+Taunt not even needing Tera.
Short version: Tera adds a lot more to the game than it removes, which makes it hard to argue to ban it since it really isn’t particularly a problem.
Covert Cloak
Underrated item of the year award here (sorry Clear Amulet, you were a close second), this item does so much more work than just checking Garg. Cloak Corviknight is super fun since you don’t need to care about SpD drops from Pult or Dengo and can just roost and pivot without worrying. This item also allows for more locked down late games so you can ignore paras, burns, and freezes. Not much more to say, other than HOME should improve this even more.
That’s all for now, sorry for the long Tera rant. (To confirm, I wouldn’t mind Tera Preview either)
Espathra: 4
Espa has been an issue for a while, but I’ve never seen it as broken. However, it doesn’t really add anything to the meta, and is more restrictive to teambuilding than it should be.
Garganacl: 2
Everyone is saying that Garg is broken, but if that’s our biggest issue than I’d say we’re in a pretty good spot for the meta. Garg adds a lot to the meta in being a bulky rocks setter that can be offensively threatening and is pretty simple to check in teambuilding. Many times I find I accidentally built a Garg counter into my team, like a mon with Sub, and if I didn’t, all I need to do is slap a Cloak on something. These checks tend to work no matter the Tera, and other sets have decent opportunity cost. It’s checks are somewhat common and good on their own, as well as it being quite valuable. However, I could see it becoming too annoying for its own good with Salt Cure’s chip.
Gholdengo: 1
I think it’s a relatively common opinion now that Gholdengo is good, but far from broken. Sort of like Lando in a way, being an amazing glue that fits on many teams, but far from broken. I don’t have much more to say other than people are overvaluing Good as Gold.
Other discussions:
Tera:
Over the past month and change since the Tera suspect, it’s become more and more clear that Tera is far from a banworthy problem. Even outside of that, there’s a precedent here: a mechanic, move, or ability has never been banned (as far as my memory goes) for any reason other than being uncompetitive. Tera is not uncompetitive. Even with that, Tera adds so much more flexibility to the builder and game that giving it up just doesn’t make sense for any reason than that you personally don’t like it. It adds so much more to the game than it removes. Even with that, almost every single ban that has happened so far (maybe bar Annihilape) has no argument for Tera being a central reason. Flutter Mane and Palafin for their insane stat spreads, Houndstone because of a move, Iron Bundle because of its insane speed and unresisted STABs, and Chi-Yu for not caring about being resisted in the first place. Even Chien-Pao doesn’t need Tera to be so good - it’s just a handy tool. Even Annihilape only had Tera as one part of its equation: Rage Fist, Taunt, it’s typing, its bulk, and the fact that it decimated bulky teams with Bulk Up+Taunt not even needing Tera.
Short version: Tera adds a lot more to the game than it removes, which makes it hard to argue to ban it since it really isn’t particularly a problem.
Covert Cloak
Underrated item of the year award here (sorry Clear Amulet, you were a close second), this item does so much more work than just checking Garg. Cloak Corviknight is super fun since you don’t need to care about SpD drops from Pult or Dengo and can just roost and pivot without worrying. This item also allows for more locked down late games so you can ignore paras, burns, and freezes. Not much more to say, other than HOME should improve this even more.
That’s all for now, sorry for the long Tera rant. (To confirm, I wouldn’t mind Tera Preview either)
This is some pretty crazy selective memory, given that Dynamax, Power Construct, Shadow Tag, Arena Trap, Drizzle + Swift Swim (and cousins), BW Sleep, and BW Gems as a whole were all banned for principally power-level-related reasons (even if you could argue some of them had uncompetitive elements as well, that wasn't enough to constitute a ban on its own — for example, Magnet Pull still exists unproblematically, and ADV hasn't banned Arena Trap yet and likely never will). And that's only looking at OU tiers. It also seems awfully convenient to exclude items from the discussion here when multiple items were banned for power level reasons (even if we ignore megas since they're just alternate formes).
I disagree with your Tera thesis for many other reasons, but let's not blatantly lie.
Today in an hour the Nintendo direct starts, so it all depends on what info we get today, let's be patient
speaking of patient, I'm gonna be a hypocrite and say that I have been swept by enough Espatras today as to take a decision on the matter, and that is
dumb turkey lmao
Espatra alone is really easy to shit on, but then you make it baby mode by adding indeede, armarouge, orthworm etc
honestly, depending on the release date of HOME, I would quickban espatra, and suspect test Shed Tail, and then unban espatra down the lane, its gonna be a low priority considering everything, but we have to see
I've had many things to do lately and have been very inactive last weeks and will probably stay inactive for most (potentially all) of this month as well, to the point that I'm unsure to even take the survey as my image of the meta is still stuck on the time of the previous survey.
That said, from what I could see and read, it feels like Espathra becoming broken again lately is partly due to a new Fire-type variation being discovered, partly from finding out that Orthworm is still capable of passing off Shed Tails even if it is much worse than Cyclizar at it. Orthworm being back at OU right after Cyclizar was banned, seing a sudden burst in usage even though Shed Tail is pretty much the only thing it can do and is not even particularly good at it and renewed talk on how Espathra is broken when that had slightly faded out after the Cyclizar ban makes me think that banning Shed Tail may be the right answer after all.
Espathra in the past felt to me like a mon that could take an entire match on her own, but not without preparation and set-up turns... which is pretty much true for all set-up sweepers, stopped only by our many Unaware users. Her ability to raise Speed for free and shoot STAB Stored Power makes a huge difference, specially considering Unaware does nothing on Stored Power's BP, but she still needs 2~3 free turns to setup (1+ CM, 1 Roost/Protect for Speed Boost, maybe Substitute depending on match up). I'd only consider this broken if helped by team support, but I don't think Screens alone push it past the banning point.
I can understand banning it anyway as playing against her feels like walking through a mine field where a single misstep can turn your team into unwilling shrapnel unless you're running Tera-Dark Unaware Clodsire or Calm Skeledirge (and even Skeledirge VS Espathra has the potential to flip either way depending on EV spreads on both sides and support moves on Espathra). But can't help but feel that banning Shed Tail would tone it down, and that Orthworm's usage rising with her own is not so much an indicator of Espathra being broken (although not denying it neither), as much as Shed Tail being bonkers even on sub-optimal mons.
But again, my practical experience in the meta is rather outdated, so rather than taking this as an argument to defend Espathra against Shed Tail, please consider it a very roundabout way to ask:
do you feel Orthworm's usage demonstrates that Shed Tail should be banned after all?
and
do you think banning Shed Tail would fix Espathra, or tune it down enough or at all?
That said, from what I could see and read, it feels like Espathra becoming broken again lately is partly due to a new Fire-type variation being discovered, partly from finding out that Orthworm is still capable of passing off Shed Tails even if it is much worse than Cyclizar at it. Orthworm being back at OU right after Cyclizar was banned, seing a sudden burst in usage even though Shed Tail is pretty much the only thing it can do and is not even particularly good at it and renewed talk on how Espathra is broken when that had slightly faded out after the Cyclizar ban makes me think that banning Shed Tail may be the right answer after all.
Espathra in the past felt to me like a mon that could take an entire match on her own, but not without preparation and set-up turns... which is pretty much true for all set-up sweepers, stopped only by our many Unaware users. Her ability to raise Speed for free and shoot STAB Stored Power makes a huge difference, specially considering Unaware does nothing on Stored Power's BP, but she still needs 2~3 free turns to setup (1+ CM, 1 Roost/Protect for Speed Boost, maybe Substitute depending on match up). I'd only consider this broken if helped by team support, but I don't think Screens alone push it past the banning point.
I can understand banning it anyway as playing against her feels like walking through a mine field where a single misstep can turn your team into unwilling shrapnel unless you're running Tera-Dark Unaware Clodsire or Calm Skeledirge (and even Skeledirge VS Espathra has the potential to flip either way depending on EV spreads on both sides and support moves on Espathra). But can't help but feel that banning Shed Tail would tone it down, and that Orthworm's usage rising with her own is not so much an indicator of Espathra being broken (although not denying it neither), as much as Shed Tail being bonkers even on sub-optimal mons.
But again, my practical experience in the meta is rather outdated, so rather than taking this as an argument to defend Espathra against Shed Tail, please consider it a very roundabout way to ask:
do you feel Orthworm's usage demonstrates that Shed Tail should be banned after all?
and
do you think banning Shed Tail would fix Espathra, or tune it down enough or at all?
I personally think Dynamax was uncompetitive since it completely warped the tier around its presence, but I can see how some of these somewhat muddy the waters of what is strictly competitive or not. However, these all (except Power Construct and Drizzle/Swift Swim which I think the latter was a dumb complex ban and Drizzle should have been banned entirely, but that’s bias) remove something directly from the tier. I guess uncompetitive wasn’t the right word here, and restrictive would have been more fitting.
Why are people talking about espathra being broken?It certainly has decent counterplay. Something which doesn't is this mf iron valiant.
Like this guy kills everybody in two hits bar slowking and scream tail which are uu mons [scream tail super underated btw]. People say this stuff counters it?
252 SpA Choice Specs Iron Valiant Psyshock vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Clodsire: 374-440 (80.7 - 95%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 SpA Choice Specs Iron Valiant Psyshock vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Amoonguss: 224-264 (51.8 - 61.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 SpA Choice Specs Iron Valiant Thunderbolt vs. 252 HP / 64 SpD Toxapex: 196-232 (64.4 - 76.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Black Sludge recovery
[Tera grass toxapex dies to
252 SpA Choice Specs Iron Valiant Moonblast vs. 252 HP / 64 SpD Tera Grass Toxapex: 154-183 (50.6 - 60.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Black Sludge damage]
point is nothing walls this guy. Not exactly the chi-yu of being unwallable but with prediction its as unwallable as like iron bundle. Not to mention trick and/or destiny bond
Like this guy kills everybody in two hits bar slowking and scream tail which are uu mons [scream tail super underated btw]. People say this stuff counters it?
252 SpA Choice Specs Iron Valiant Psyshock vs. 248 HP / 0 Def Clodsire: 374-440 (80.7 - 95%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 SpA Choice Specs Iron Valiant Psyshock vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Amoonguss: 224-264 (51.8 - 61.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 SpA Choice Specs Iron Valiant Thunderbolt vs. 252 HP / 64 SpD Toxapex: 196-232 (64.4 - 76.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Black Sludge recovery
[Tera grass toxapex dies to
252 SpA Choice Specs Iron Valiant Moonblast vs. 252 HP / 64 SpD Tera Grass Toxapex: 154-183 (50.6 - 60.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Black Sludge damage]
point is nothing walls this guy. Not exactly the chi-yu of being unwallable but with prediction its as unwallable as like iron bundle. Not to mention trick and/or destiny bond
they are too obsessed by Booster Energy, like alcohol addiction
for real tho, yes, nothing resists it, but has some coverage problems, and you can force it out with something after it picks something off, not to mention is frail and sometimes not fast enough, its good, its her best set, but valiant is no problem
That's like saying "ah you can force out the enemy army out for 5 hours after losing 1/6th of your land until you eventually lose more and more"
Iron Valiant @ Choice Specs
Ability: Quark Drive
Tera Type: Fairy
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Aura Sphere
- Moonblast
- Shadow Ball/Thunderbolt
- Psyshock
Let's use this as a sample set, nothing resist everything, but you need tandems (these are examples)
takes everything but Psyshock
takes shadowball/thunderbolt and psyishock
takes SB and Psy and KOs with Flower Trick
takes everything but thunderbolt and moonblast
while not a fan of eating AS, it can stall it out a bit
takes a moonblast and ohkos with gunk shot
is inmune to AS, lives a psyshock and can kill with a high roll shadow ball from specsAlso, changing topic completly, Nintendo Direct DID NOT SHOW ANYTHING Pokémon RELATED
We are still blind about HOME date, therefore, lets we can take one more suspect before HOME
No Home lol. Maybe on Pokémon Day.
But we got Game Boy, GBA, and Metroid Prime Remaster all shadow dropping today so who cares anyway.
There's a lot of reasons to kick it, and you can go peek at natdex where it's even dumber, but for the time being tera is here to stay (a small pool of mons makes it more tolerable for now) so I won't harp on this.
Ape could circumvent even offensive counterplay by terastilizing out of bad match ups, which was a pretty significant piece of what pushed it over the edge. It's typing pre tera was much more flawed defensively prior to tera, and made it possible to pressure it from getting out of control.
As far as the topic of shed tail being the problem which has somehow come back up again, I feel the need to reiterate that Orthworm's shed tail is far more high risk, high reward, due to how committal the use of it is. And due to the worm's low speed and spdef, it's easier to limit it with good play. Something like Espathra abuses it to be better than it already is, but it doesn't necessarily need it to become broken, as people have demonstrated.l.it can abuses its own substitute to get by would be answers. Other abusers are just that, abusers. But there isn't any other mon, except maybe Volcarona, who could abuse it a potential overbearing effect. And...
Can we stop comparing shed tail to baton pass? There is no comparison, beyond sub passing (which was never really a reason it got axed) and calling shed tail uncompetitive, when the sole broken abuser was made broken because of Regen+tail combo, while even having a golden premium collection of utility. People always used sitrus berry worm, which has never been an issue and something like a hypothetical rest talk shed tail is gimmicky and the definition of exploitable, as unlike rest talk Dondozo, Worm has very little relevant defensive utility when abusing shed tail.
Worm has proven to be functional, but calling it broken or uncompetitive when it's a much more flawed pokemon that requires a decent hand to get good mileage out of, just seems insane to me. Also no, worm rising to OU doesn't prove shed tail is broken move. It proves the move is worth making work on an otherwise meager pokemon and stretching the talents it does have to make it not dead weight.
How are you guys forgetting Gholdengo? I run the common Nasty Plot Gholdengo set with Covert Cloak in many of my teams and I've never had that much of a problem dealing with Specs Valiant. Sure, it often hits hard and if you lose your check (Dengo in my case) it's hard to deal with, but there are other ways to control it. As you and 1LDK said, there's Amoonguss, Pex and Clod, all of which are safe pivots and can scout its move. The only problem is Psyshock for Clod, but the other two mons have Regen so you can always go to one of your Psychic resists and recover your health in the process. Also, if Valiant is Specs you can outspeed it with several mons, for instance Volcarona at full health easily lives any hit and it's able to set up on its face, and if Valiant spams Moonblast you don't even get 3HKOd. The next turn you're at +1 and you kill it with any move considering its garbage SpDef. It also gets outsped by Cinderace, Scarf Dengo, Gren, Meowscarada and Moon, and it's frail enough to get 2HKOd by Extreme Speed from Dragonite at +0. Ting Lu also always takes 1 or 2 hits and can chip it if necessary.
Don't get me wrong, it's a very good mon, but it's not even close to being as broken as any of the other currently suspected mons.
What are y'all thoughts on Greninja this gen? I know he got the nerf, competition with the other protean users and got more bulky threats but I feel he's still quite good, especially under rain with specs/LO.
I've been using Specs with STABs, Beam, and Spikes!
clearly the specs are to make spikes hit harder
I have personally been experimenting with Soft Sand + Tera Ground, it hits so hard that it breaks the game and goes back to 0, crazy
- Status