Data Usage-Based Tier Update for December 2019 (here comes UU!)

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Why is Gastrodon not used for a variant of seismitoed?
It trades in stealth rock for reliable recovery, so a perfect fit on build which already have rocks and it can come in more times on the field to check things
 
Why is Gastrodon not used for a variant of seismitoed?
It trades in stealth rock for reliable recovery, so a perfect fit on build which already have rocks and it can come in more times on the field to check things
Maybe bc Gastrodon doesnt have toxic, and some people using this as a rain swepper tranks to Swift Swim
 

ausma

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Why is Gastrodon not used for a variant of seismitoed?
It trades in stealth rock for reliable recovery, so a perfect fit on build which already have rocks and it can come in more times on the field to check things
My guess is that Gastrodon lacks the offensive potential that Seismitoad has, that and, as stated, Gastrodon lacking Toxic really hurts it. Though, I do think Gastrodon actually is pretty good, but like in the past generations, despite being good, it just isn't getting used. It's quite the elusive situation

EDIT: Gastrodon doesn't legally get rocks this game until Home comes out. That's pretty much the reason why.

About these usage statistics, I'm going to give my Unasked opinions.

Kommo-o: So close, yet so far. I'm pretty sure this thing is going to rock UU for the short time it's in there with its insane versatility and its great defensive typing. Given how close it was to meeting the OU threshold, though, I wouldn't be surprised to see it rise in the roll for RU.

Gengar: Given how much Gengar was buffed moving into this generation, I'm genuinely surprised to see it so low. The fact it has the boosting move it's been searching for for generations and no longer really has a genuine wall in the eggs (plus its Gmax form is actually pretty good), I would have expected it to at least barely meet the cut.

Hatterene: I'm probably most surprised with Hatterene with how high it actually is. It's great on TR for sure given its ability, its speed, dual STAB, and offensive stats, but it being good in general reminds me a lot of Gen 5 Reuniclus where it prospers in TR but can just CM and press buttons. Very interested to see how it moves in usage!

Grimmsnarl: At first, I wasn't expecting this thing to be that good, but the fact it has a surprisingly solid defensive typing, Prankster, great support moves, and a great offensive game on top of that, it's very solid. Being a nice soft check to Hydreigon and a great backbone on screen archetypes, I suppose I can't say I'm too surprised it made the cut, but I am surprised with how high it is specifically.

Dracovish: The stats for this thing can't be completely accurate. I've seen this thing everywhere the past week or so, and for a good reason. It's relatively high up, but I'm honestly not gonna be surprised if it makes the top 10 in usage for the RU roll.

Overall, some surprises, but most of this is to be expected. Can't wait to see what hits RU and see how the usage fluctuates as the meta develops.
 
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ausma

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I just realized, due to the dex-it, there are only 400 pokemon in the dex.
Gen 4 had 493 pokemon.
RU was created in Gen 5.
It is actually feasible that Gen 8 could have just OU, UU, and NU. (and Ubers and LC but they're their own things independent from the standard tiers)
An interesting idea, but honestly, I'm unsure if the amount of Pokemon were the reason for RU's creation. From what I understand, they were made to better scope the potential of each Pokemon given the changes in the meta. In Gen 4, the lack of team preview and the much more consistent, linear degrees of power level made only 3 tiers really necessary, but now that we have factors like Dynamax, Gigantamax, Team Preview, and other developments, I feel like RU existing would help better create the par of which we scale the usage of each kind of Pokemon.
 

Kalalokki

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I just realized, due to the dex-it, there are only 400 pokemon in the dex.
Gen 4 had 493 pokemon.
RU was created in Gen 5.
It is actually feasible that Gen 8 could have just OU, UU, and NU. (and Ubers and LC but they're their own things independent from the standard tiers)
You might've missed that the usage cutoff was increased from 3.41% to 4.52%, creating smaller tiers overall. OU as of right now is 31 Pokémon strong, which would've been 37 with the old cutoff. If you cascade smaller tiers down the line, you'll get bigger and bigger differences between the new and old cut off and eventually you'll find that there will be enough stuff available for all of them. PU in gen 7 was arguably the biggest tier, as there was tons and tons of unranked stuff available even there. Even if there is less to go around, as long as there are people interested in playing a lower tier, people will form a tier and play it.
 
Dracovish: The stats for this thing can't be completely accurate. I've seen this thing everywhere the past week or so, and for a good reason. It's relatively high up, but I'm honestly not gonna be surprised if it makes the top 10 in usage for the RU roll.
The fact that Strong Jaw boosts fishious rend is a fairly recent discovery for it. If it had been found out earlier it probably would have a much bigger usage.
 
Relatively new to Smogon, although been a long time lurker and occasional player when a new gen starts. Can someone explain to me why some of these are so popular right now? I'm trying to learn for education purposes.

Conkeldurr: Is this purely a defog and bulky thing? I'm not really understanding it so high up.

Rotom-Wash: What about this gen makes it so popular? Just typing plus bulk?

Clefable: Little surprised to see it so high right now. Most of the tier are strong physical attackers, and it's bulky on the special side. Seems like with Dyna out there, there are no shortage of wallbreakers.
 
Rotom-Wash: What about this gen makes it so popular? Just typing plus bulk?
Keep in mind that almost everything that was good in generation 7 OU that survived dexit has higher usage in generation 8 OU. Even if we ignore pokemon that don't really benefit directly from dynamax, Ferrothorn went from 16% to 28%, Toxapex from 11% to 17%, and Clefable from 8% to 15%. In that respect, Rotom-W going from 10% to 19% doesn't actually stand out from the rest of the crowd. It's just a good pokemon that's getting more usage due to a reduced dex.
 

Shuckleking87

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I feel like this is the 10th time I've had to repeat this because it honestly probably is: No, we will not have to delete tiers due to the reduced roster.

There is an ADV ZU format where motherfucking Delibird is the one and only S Rank. We're going to be absolutely fine, especially once the foreign Pokemon are released.
ZU also is not an official format to my understanding. With less pokemon available, it makes sense to reduce the number of tiers, and I am not sure if we want tournament play with as terrible mons as the standard for a tier (as again ZU hasnt been introduced in tournament play, so I assume the answer to that question is no. But a way to compensate to have the same tiers is increasing the usage cutoff % so there are less mons per tier, which looks like was done for at least the first cutoff.

An interesting idea, but honestly, I'm unsure if the amount of Pokemon were the reason for RU's creation. From what I understand, they were made to better scope the potential of each Pokemon given the changes in the meta. In Gen 4, the lack of team preview and the much more consistent, linear degrees of power level made only 3 tiers really necessary, but now that we have factors like Dynamax, Gigantamax, Team Preview, and other developments, I feel like RU existing would help better create the par of which we scale the usage of each kind of Pokemon.
I am not sure how you can quantitatively come to the conclusion that the extra factors makes more tiers necessary, and no team preview needing less tiers, those conclusions don't really make sense. Also, to quote from the initial thread as to why RU was deemed necessary, "RU is the fourthtier for tiering based on usage. It exists as a result of there being so many Pokemon in the 5th generation that without it, NU would have easily more than 2/3 of the fully evolved Pokemon in the game among its ranks. In order to give players more freedom in tier choice and to give all of these Pokemon a chance in their power levels, like is the spirit of Smogon's tiers at all, the fourthtier RU was born." With about ~200 fully evolved + a few viable NFE mons, and like 40 mons were deemed OU with the more strict cutoff, 3 or 4 tiers seems pretty realistic.
 

Yung Dramps

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ZU also is not an official format to my understanding. With less pokemon available, it makes sense to reduce the number of tiers, and I am not sure if we want tournament play with as terrible mons as the standard for a tier (as again ZU hasnt been introduced in tournament play, so I assume the answer to that question is no. But a way to compensate to have the same tiers is increasing the usage cutoff % so there are less mons per tier, which looks like was done for at least the first cutoff.
I know ZU is not an official tier, I was just making a point, that being that if a functioning unofficial sub-PU tier can be made in a game with 384 Pokemon, then I'm sure we can make everything up to and including PU with 400+ mons and the reduced Pokemon count per tier. I'm also not sure where you got this idea that people don't wanna see or play tournaments primarily composed of exceptionally mediocre Pokemon/NFEs. NU and PU have their own Classic tournaments which go back to gens as old as DPP, sometimes even before that, and people get a kick out of seeing metas like DPP PU where the likes of Metang and Purugly can shine. Hell, I myself am extremely hyped for lower tiers this gen because (hopefully) the shrunken roster will allow for these formats to go back to their roots of being havens for genuine bottom of the barrel picks after how powercreep-infested their Gen 7 iterations were (because seriously, something has gone horribly wrong when Jellicent and Eelektross are what qualifies as "PU" nowadays)
 

Shuckleking87

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I know ZU is not an official tier, I was just making a point, that being that if a functioning unofficial sub-PU tier can be made in a game with 384 Pokemon, then I'm sure we can make everything up to and including PU with 400+ mons and the reduced Pokemon count per tier. I'm also not sure where you got this idea that people don't wanna see or play tournaments primarily composed of exceptionally mediocre Pokemon/NFEs. NU and PU have their own Classic tournaments which go back to gens as old as DPP, sometimes even before that, and people get a kick out of seeing metas like DPP PU where the likes of Metang and Purugly can shine. Hell, I myself am extremely hyped for lower tiers this gen because (hopefully) the shrunken roster will allow for these formats to go back to their roots of being havens for genuine bottom of the barrel picks after how powercreep-infested their Gen 7 iterations were (because seriously, something has gone horribly wrong when Jellicent and Eelektross are what qualifies as "PU" nowadays)
If people really wanted to see ZU as a tier in official formats, then it would be there now. Not saying nobody wants to see these tourneys, but it's an extremely small niche of people compared to OU/UU
 

ausma

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I am not sure how you can quantitatively come to the conclusion that the extra factors makes more tiers necessary, and no team preview needing less tiers, those conclusions don't really make sense.
My statement derives from the scaling of power levels and how the aforementioned factors are apart of determining them. I am fully aware that my statement isn't in line to the quoted reason, but the reasons I provided are mainly supports to the explicit reason as opposed to being conclusions in of themselves. By no means am I disagreeing or even trying to make my own conclusion for the reason of the tiers' existences.

"To give all of these Pokemon a chance in their power levels, like is the spirit of Smogon's tiers at all, the fourthtier RU was born."
This is essentially what I was trying to support. Given how there are more factors now than back in Gen 4 that determine how powerful a Pokemon can be in execution, the power cap for each and every Pokemon is so polarizing that the lack of RU would create the exact, explicit problem you quoted. Essentially, clumping the weaker Pokemon of this generation all into--say NU or PU for example--would instill the exact issue RU was created to absolve.

As I said, I'm not at all disagreeing with you, but I just wanted to clarify the logic behind what I said since I made myself unclear.
 

Shuckleking87

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As I said, I'm not at all disagreeing with you, but I just wanted to clarify the logic behind what I said since I made myself unclear.
I think I get what you're saying, but I would disagree that the power cap for each pokemon is really that polarizing. I think that basically every mon has a theorerical access to anything, so the power cap really isnt that higher for a mon than another, it's integrally calibrated. Maybe you could say that dynamax Unfezant is better than regular conkeldurr, but really usage stats determine the power cap. So if we have the cutoff higher like currently, and like 90 out of the ~180 viable or semiviable fully evolved mons/nfes, are in ou/uu, then a NU and maybe a RU would be sufficient to have legitimate mons for official tournament play. IMO it's more of a numbers game than a power creep issue
 
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earl

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I think I get what you're saying, but I would disagree that the power cap for each pokemon is really that polarizing. I think that basically every mon has a theorerical access to anything, so the power cap really isnt that higher for a mon than another, it's integrally calibrated. Maybe you could say that dynamax Unfezant is better than regular conkeldurr, but really usage stats determine the power cap. So if we have the cutoff higher like currently, and like 90 out of the ~180 viable or semiviable fully evolved mons/nfes, are in ou/uu, then a NU and maybe a RU would be sufficient to have legitimate mons for official tournament play. IMO it's more of a numbers game than a power creep issue
OU as it stands has 30ish mons, even if stuff decentralizes we’re still sitting at a 40 mon tier tops. That would put an 80 mon OU/UU at the high ends of reasonable estimates, especially with the new cutoff. We’re probably gonna have OU-PU under this new cutoff level, regardless of whether or not PU being NFE heavy someone makes it invalid
 
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