Resource USUM Doubles OU Viability Rankings (Updated 11/16 on post #293)

>>Tier 2<<
Pokemon that are generally strong and can easily be placed on a variety of teams, but don't have the same level of prowess as the threats in Tier 1.


Mega Charizard-Y --> stay in tier 2

Zard-y teams are strong, but I don't think zard should be tier 1 for two main reasons. First, I don't think Zard carries its teams enough to be tier 1. In tier 1 we see mons like Landorus, Incin, Fini, mons that can be on almost any team in the game, regardless of any of the other pokemon. Metagross fits onto almost any core and is one of the most broken Megas in the game. Charizard doesn't reach that level of prominence. Charizard teams are strong, yes (I've played pretty much only one team since snake and it's a zard team), but that's what they are. They're charizard teams. Charizard does the vast majority of the work in those games, and if it doesn't, I lose. I think the fact that charizard has to so much be *built around* means that it ought not be tier 1.


Tapu Bulu --> tier 3
Bulu is outclassed by other grass types and generally makes your team pretty weak. It hung on to top tier relevance due to the threat of scarf bulu + Gengar, but I think with Gengar gone that bulu is going to decline in usability greatly. The mon is just worse than kartana and amoonguss, and with koko coming back into relevance, isn't needed as much to check fini. Let bulu go to tier 3, where it belongs.

Tapu Koko --> stay in tier 2
Not super convinced on this one, but I think that Koko just isn't as good as the other tier 1 mons. Would like to wait on noms to tier 1 until after koko shows its strength in SPL


Zygarde --> tier 1
Zygarde is an effective offensive replacement to landorus on many teams. Currently landorus is mostly used as a bulky pivot, using berry and stealth rocks and u-turn to facilitate intimidate shuffling, and sometimes it does damage with earth power. While those are all strengths big enough to make lando tier 1, Zygarde provides the offensive ground damage that a lot of teams would like, without the harm of side eq. Zygarde's band set has been getting a lot of traction, especially with that team that Stax made to go 40-0 in dlt. I think that Zygarde, while it doesn't have all the supporting tools, is a top tier threat that fits on a lot of teams, as incineroar can often fill the intimidate slot sufficiently, leaving zygarde to do the damage.

>>Tier 3<<
Pokemon that are generally strong, but can be dead weight in some matchups, don't have great matchups vs a lot of Tier 1 and 2, or are only particularly useful for checking a certain team style.

Aegislash --> tier 4 or lower
Sord sucks right now I know you guys know this everybody knows this. Earth power, incineroar, and z moves have all combined to make this pokemon that was a defensive and offensive wall, merely a slow, high damage mon that doesn't even work under trick room. Gengar leaving makes aegislash a bit stronger potentially, but I don't think it should have been tier 3 in the first place.

Ferrothorn --> tier 4
Ferrothorn sucks and is not generally strong, the other grass types (amoonguss kartana bulu) are far stronger. Ferro only really gets use on rain teams, and barely even then. Incineroar's existence makes this mon pretty much worthless. Dropping it one tier seems fair considering its usage.


Stakataka --> tier 4
Stak is not generally strong. The quad weaknesses to fighting and ground, along with the stunningly low speed and weakness to taunt leave stak high and dry a lot of the time. It only sees use on hard trick room, an archetype that is strong, but not overpowering. Considering that the pokemon that actually makes hard trick room good, camerupt, is tier 4, and stak only sees use with camerupt specifically, I think dropping it down to be buddies with camel makes sense. Stak is droppable on that team and camel is not, and stak sees no use elsewhere.


Suicune -->tier 4
If you want tailwind, run zapdos, if you want a water type, run fini. Suicune doesn't do damage and gets hurt by the fini hate that teams have to run. I rarely if ever see suicune at high level competitive play, and the role compression it offers doesn't seem like enough to have it be tier 3.

>>Tier 4<<

Pokemon which have broad applications on a variety of teams but are simply less effective than the Pokemon in the higher tiers. This also includes Pokemon which, while good, only fit on a specific team style or require heavy support but are still stronger than Pokemon in the tiers below.


Celesteela --> tier 5
I literally have not seen this mon once in 6 months. It suffers from the ferrothorn problem. Every team has a fire type, or an electric type, or both. While ferrothorn has the rain niche, celes does not. Is celes generally stronger than mega latias, heatran, lando-i, araquanid, lurantis and naganadel, all of which have seen recent snake success? I don't think so.

Chansey --> tier 3
Chansey's niche of being a special wall has been invaluable in testing and in tournament play. Counterplay exists to chansey to be sure: physical mons, knock off, ohko'ing the partner. However, chansey's special bulk puts a ton of pressure on opponents at all points throughout the game, and provides a wincon that almost no other pokemon in the game does right now. With gengar and its immunity to seismic toss leaving DOU, chansey only gets stronger.



Mega Salamence --> tier 4
Mence blows @bowman. With koko getting better, mega man getting better, double intimidate and/or fini on every team, I'm really not sure mence has much to go for it in the current meta. Not to be rude, but iirc your snake teams with mence on them didn't do well either, giving it not only a bad performance in usage, but a bad performance in tournament play as well.




Cresselia --> tier 4 or 3
Cress has done great in snake and is the backbone of most semi-room teams. the combination of levitate, massive bulk, and ice coverage has led to it being the TR'er of choice for teams that are slow, but not too slow. I think that fits the definition of 'This also includes Pokemon which, while good, only fit on a specific team style' for tier 4
One thing quickly is I would disagree with aegi ->4. It's sub set is very solid, and pairs incredibly well with Bul. If you play king shield right it can completely destroy physical attackers, and it's the best ghost stab now that Gengar is gone.
 

talkingtree

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Shift time! First things first, due to AuraRayquaza's continued hiatus we've decided to move forward with the remaining 5 members of the VR council. Thanks for your time helping us out and I hope to have you back sometime soon!

Ludicolo UR -> 5
Demantoid: Yes. Rain isn’t great in general right now but Ludicolo’s grass-typing make it one of its best options.

emforbes: Yes, outclasses kingdra as an offensive threat because of grass typing and provides fake out support to stop situations such as lead fake out + tr/tw to swing the speed advantage out of the rain users favor.

MajorBowman: Sure, Ludi has some cool coverage for rain teams that Swampert and Kingdra can’t provide and probably has the best Fini matchup of any Swift Swim mon

SMB: Yes, kingdra is pretty bad rn so ludicolo has more room in rain teams, the ability to deal with some common rain checks like fini, or ferro/kyub with a z focus blast set and the utility it provides with fake out should give it a place in the vr.

talkingtree: abstain

Stakataka 3 -> 4
Demantoid: Yes. Could see this moving down even further. It has trouble killing things right now because of bad offensive coverage and its susceptibility to intimidate.

emforbes: Yes, its weaknesses make it hard to use combined with the difficulty it has breaking any balance teams with intimidate.

MajorBowman: Yes, pretty nonexistent outside of hard TR and even then it’s probably the worst setter on the team. Too one-dimensional and weak to common threats

SMB: Yes

talkingtree: Yes, still decent but nowhere near as good as it once was

Deoxys-A 3 -> 4
Demantoid: No. Still very threatening when used correctly. Has the coverage/power to break through any threats it wants to.

emforbes: No, usage has dropped but it’s still a ridiculous offensive threat that doesn’t need too much support besides lele + incin checks if deo or lele isn’t running fightinium.

MajorBowman: No, still super scary under the right circumstances and liable to take 2 or 3 KOs without much trouble if you let it

SMB: No, huge offensive threat with a wide movepool that lets it choose its checks, guess it wrong and you are 100% losing more than 1 mon, it requires some support to work tho so tier 3 is perfectly fine.

talkingtree: No, same as I voted last time

Mew 4 -> 3
Demantoid: No. Has decent utility but most sets have less offensive presence than chansey :I

emforbes: No

MajorBowman: No, good pokemon but too much of a jack of all trades to be anything better than “good”

SMB: No

talkingtree: No, it’s flexible but not great at any one thing. 4’s perfect imo

Porygon2 4 -> 3
Demantoid: Yes. Probably the most reliable tr setter right now and it has the ability to be used on other teams.

emforbes: Yes, decent offensive threat against the right teams and has ridiculous bulk. Walls a ton of mons with recover and can trick room to support its teammates.

MajorBowman: Meh, it’s a pretty good Pokemon but pretty susceptible to knock off and kinda struggles to create offensive pressure. Stay 4

SMB: Yes, pretty good mon rn that mega gengar is gone, probably the most reliable tr setter and can also work in no tr teams with icy wind/electrowebs. Nice zygarde check, can be a wincon with toxic, learns ally switch, definitely tier 3 material.

talkingtree: ehhhh I’m not the biggest P2 supporter but I can see why others like it. Stay 4, only just

Tornadus 4 -> 5 -> UR
Demantoid: 4. Still has good offensive coverage with just Acrobatics and decent defensive typing. Also one of the few Tailwind setters faster than Kartana and Megagross.

emforbes: No, flying is a solid offensive type in this meta and defiant allows it to pressure a ton of teams.

MajorBowman: 4 is fine, don’t see a reason for it to change right now

SMB: 4 is fine

talkingtree: No

Araquanid 5 -> 4
Demantoid: Yes. Has pretty good typing and bulk. Sticky Web is a good support option and Liquidation hits pretty hard even on resists or after Intimidate.

emforbes: Yes, has niche support moves in wide guard and sticky web, and does a ton of damage. Resisting ground and the Z set walling incin is very nice.

MajorBowman: Yes, good typing for taking on certain threats and super strong liquidation, cool support moves too. One of the strongest Z moves in the tier too, worthy of 4.

SMB: Yes, this is one of the few viable ground resists in the tier and can work in most playstyles; as a webs setter in offense or as a heavy hitter in semiroom or full TR teams while also providing support with wide guard or bug bite.

talkingtree: abstain, haven’t liked it myself but others seem to use it well

Cresselia 5 -> 4 -> 3
Demantoid: No. Don’t really see what it’s supposed to do other things can’t.

emforbes: No, Tier 4 I can see but I’ve only really seen it on Volcanion Ttar builds. Even then it doesn’t seem to perform to well outside of support ttars pressure under tr with ice coverage and helping hand. I think its outclassed as a tr setter by p2.

MajorBowman: 4 is good, 3 too high. Solid TR support mon and Seed CM is great, not nearly 3 level though

SMB: 4 is alright, it's an ok TR setter in semiroom teams but the set that makes it tier 4 in my opinion is electric/grassy seed paired with cm and psyshock which can be really annoying to deal with if you get rid of phazing moves, taunt or toxic. Kinda works like mega latias and doesn't take the mega slot.

talkingtree: Definitely not 3, but I’ll say 4. Echoing SMB that Seed CM is super strong

Lurantis 5 -> 4 -> 3
Demantoid: 4. A lot of things can’t hit it too hard which gives it time to boost itself.

emforbes: No, 4 I agree with.

MajorBowman: Remain 5, it literally has 1 set and is pretty reliant on TR being up

SMB: 4, this is becoming a staple mon in semiroom teams and for a good reason

talkingtree: 5 for me, it’s really restricted to what it can run and what teams it fits on.

Ferrothorn 3 -> 4
Demantoid: Yes. Most teams run coverage that hits it hard because of Kartana making it harder to use as a wincon.

emforbes: Yes, outclassed by kart and doesn’t do enough damage. Hard for it to be a wincon with Incin’s popularity in the meta.

MajorBowman: Yes, my nom

SMB: Yes, it’s been a while since genesect stopped being the best fire type and now most teams are overprepared for this due to kartana success.

talkingtree: Yes, both noms that touched on this said it well

Togedemaru UR -> 5
Demantoid: Yes

emforbes: Yes, definition of a niche mon.

MajorBowman: no, meme sets don’t belong on VR

SMB: Yes, I guess it had a good showing in invitationals.

talkingtree: I wish this wasn’t good. 5 is fine though

Kartana 2 -> 1
Demantoid: Yes. Has plenty of sets that can all be effective like tailwind and sub with fight z, grass z, or berry. It has influenced the viability of many pokemon which lead me to believe it is worthy of 1.

emforbes: No, still has glaring weaknesses and isn’t as effective as the other tier 1 mons in my opinion.

MajorBowman: I think Kart is the definition of tier 2. Great Pokemon but pretty exploitable weaknesses and not a lot of room to get creative. Stay 2.

SMB: No

talkingtree: I think this is still just towards the top of 2 for me. Definitely close to the best it’s ever been, but there are just a few too many little things that keep it from being 1 material imo

Mega Metagross 1 -> 2
Demantoid: Yes. I’ve never liked Megagross very much. It doesn’t hit particularly hard especially after intimidate. It’s also hit very hard by most things faster than it and has some 4 mss. It also doesn’t really seem to influence the meta very much compared to other tier 1s.

emforbes: No lol

MajorBowman: also what SMB said

SMB: Uhhh this is definitely the worst mon in tier 1 but I still think it fits with the description of what a tier 1 mon should be so keep it in 1.

talkingtree: what SMB said

Tapu Koko 2 -> 1
Demantoid: No. It’s definitely better than before but I think its inability to get OHKOs hurts it a lot.

emforbes: No

MajorBowman: my nom

SMB: No

talkingtree: nah

Mega Charizard Y 2 -> 1
Demantoid: No. Its typing and stats really hurt it because it doesn’t get very many switchin opportunities.

emforbes: No

MajorBowman: also my nom

SMB: Requires a ton of support to work optimally i don’t think this will ever be tier 1

talkingtree: This only recently rose to 2 so I don’t want to overreact and push it even higher. Definitely good, but not 1; at least not yet

Mega Salamence 4 -> 3
Demantoid: Abstain. I like it better than before but I used to think it was unviable.

emforbes: Yes

MajorBowman: YES

SMB: Yes

talkingtree: Yes, Mence is back. It’s not fantastic, but a few recent stars like Zard Y and Kartana give Mence more positive matchups than it used to have

Tapu Bulu 2 -> 3
Demantoid: No. While Kartana’s speed gives it more offensive presence Tapu Bulu can switch into Lando, Fini, and Koko much more easily. I also never found the scarf set to be that great so I don’t think that leaving is that bad for Bulu.

emforbes: No

MajorBowman: NO

SMB: huh, no, this is probably the best tapu if we don’t count fini, provides a lot of utility with grassy terrain and is a nice switch in to mons like koko, fini, zygarde, lando… Keep in 2.

talkingtree: what Demantoid said


Zygarde 2 -> 1
Demantoid: No. Intimidate is extremely common and it's harder to set up substitute and DD than before. Its Band set is good but I don’t think it hits hard enough to be tier 1 material.

emforbes: No

MajorBowman: Demantoid said it well, still a big threat but not impossible to manage. Stay 2

SMB: No

talkingtree: Better than it was when it first fell from 1, but not good enough to rise back imo

Aegislash 3 -> 4
Demantoid: Yes. Slow steels aren’t that great right now.

emforbes: Yes

MajorBowman: Yeah that’s fine, cool mon still but doesn’t have as wide of a niche these days

SMB: Yes

talkingtree: yeah, I still like Aegis but I gotta admit it’s seen much better days

Suicune 3 -> 4
Demantoid: Yes. Pure water isn’t a great defensive typing right now and it’s very weak.

emforbes: Yes

MajorBowman: Yeah that’s fine, agree with tree that it shouldn’t go lower than 4 though. Inner Focus Roar is really cool and it’s a pretty reliable tailwind setter

SMB: yes, kartana popularity has hurt its viability a lot

talkingtree: Yes, I don’t see this ever falling lower than 4 though

Celesteela 4 -> 5
Demantoid: Yes. Another slow steel that needs to drop.

emforbes: Yes

MajorBowman: yeah i kinda forgot it existed tbh

SMB: I’d say keep it in 4, offensive celesteela is a pretty good and underrated set, the utility set isn’t going to win battles like it did before but it still can be good in some games checking Psychic- and Steel-types

talkingtree: 5. Celesteela “feels” 4 to me but looking at what else is in 4… I think I have to agree. If it could run all 5 of Heavy Slam / Flamethrower / Leech Seed / Protect / Wide Guard it would be better, and its plethora of coverage moves end up being really tough to justify

Chansey 4 -> 3
Demantoid: Yes. Has amazing support options along with walling a majority of the tier. Opponents are usually forced to double target it if they want to sufficiently threaten it, which gives its partner a free turn.

emforbes: No

MajorBowman: no, also ban chansey

SMB: No

talkingtree: No, I think Chansey’s good and it’s become more relevant than most mons in 4 but that’s because its niche is so different from the majority of mons in Doubles right now, not because it’s some meta-shaping force. 4’s still good for now imo

Landorus-T 1 -> 2
Demantoid: sobad

emforbes: No

MajorBowman: lol what

SMB: ?_? (no)

talkingtree: lol

Tapu Lele 2 -> 1
Demantoid: sobad

emforbes: No

MajorBowman: lol what

SMB: No

talkingtree: … Usage stats are not viability rankings.

Gastrodon 4 -> 3
Demantoid: No. Its bulk and/or power always leaves me disappointed. It also has very bad 4 mss.

emforbes: No, I agreed with everybody else’s comments.

MajorBowman: might be a little excessive, gastro is neat but not tier 3 level

SMB: No, gastrodon is ok but let’s not overhype it

talkingtree: What SMB said

Mega Diancie 5 -> 4
Demantoid: No. Don’t see a reason for this change.

emforbes: No

MajorBowman: if zard keeps growing in popularity this might make sense but no for now

SMB: No

talkingtree: What Demantoid said

Note: this is significantly smaller than the current listing of tiers 4 and 5, but any mons that were getting full written reasonings were removed from the slate here.

Changes
Ludicolo UR -> 5
Stakataka 3 -> 4
Porygon2 4 -> 3
Araquanid 5 -> 4
Cresselia 5 -> 4
Lurantis 5 -> 4
Ferrothorn 3 -> 4
Togedemaru UR -> 5
Mega Salamence 4 -> 3
Aegislash 3 -> 4
Suicune 3 -> 4
Celesteela 4 -> 5
Bronzong 4 -> 5
Mega Gardevoir 5 -> 4
Kommo-o 4 -> 5
Mega Latias 5 -> 4
Scrafty 4 -> 5

Thanks for all the discussion and nominations this round, there were quite a lot of changes (especially to Tier 4) so hopefully the VR looks better to everyone!
 
Mega tyranitar 4->3
Mega t-tar is actually pretty good right now. If if it can get of a dragon dance, it's attack reaches monsterous levels, and it can because very hard to stop. The rise in use of char-y, and mega mence have made it way better, although it does need a lot of support to deal with intimidate. It's also one of the best rain checks (and on a much lesser level sun/hail). Overall I think it fits tier 3 perfectly.
 

Egor

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Agree with M-Ttar's rise to 3. Being able to handle SeedCM Cress, as well as other common/rising mons like ZardY, M-Metagross, and M-Mence is nice, and, echoing Jrenner, M-Ttar's bulk allows it to setup DDs more easily, reaching sky-high Atk stat. Some other techs like SR, Fire Blast for Kart & Gene, and Ice Beam for Lando are definitely cool too.
 
Gothitelle 4 -> 3

I think with the Gengar ban its set of defensive match ups improved and with fewer ghosts the strength of Shadow Tag also improved. On top of that there isn't a better Shadow Tag user. There's also the psychium z competitive set that Biosci ran week 1 of SPL, which as merit with stat reduction like Incineroar and Manectric being everywhere.

Long story short, it isn't less effective than the pokemon in the higher tiers anymore so it doesn't fit the description of tier 4, and the description of tier 3 being dead weight in some matchups and not having great match ups against Tier 1 and 2 pokemon like Metagross, Genesect, and so many more makes it seem more fitting in tier 3.

Will look through the changes, and try to put some commentary later this week about anything interesting that caught my eye.

EDIT:

Necrozma UR -> 5
At the moment just getting it on the list would be a good place to start, similar to how Togedemaru got ranked, Necrozma should be at least on the rankings. It's a direct response due to Photon Geyser, it's also starting to find a place on semi-room teams acting as a more offensive Cresselia. It had good amount of success in the Invitational and continues getting general use.

Salamence
When it comes to Salamence I'd like to see a bit more insight and discussion, cause I'm not sure about whether or not it's fitting in Tier 3 or Tier 4. I am starting to see an uptick in Salamence which is nice, but it's still hard for me to judge it's viability myself. It seems like it has a niche, but I'm just not sure how generally applicable said niche is.
 
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talkingtree

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Kind of late, but I just wanted to go ahead and respond to Human's call for more discussion on Salamence. By the way, this is just a post about my opinions and has nothing to do with the VR council as a whole or the running of the thread.

I was definitely part of the group that was calling for Mega Salamence to be forgotten and tossed in the garbage for a while. I think what finally convinced me that it's more usable now is its defensive attributes - being able to reliably switch in on Grass + Fighting from Kartana and Tapu Bulu (even Lurantis) is huge, as is Hyper Voice hitting Kartana behind a Substitute. Mega Salamence also has a key resistance to Fire that is the main reason I'd justify using it over Zapdos as your team's bulky Tailwind setter, giving it much more flexibility against Incineroar and Mega Charizard Y. The fall of bulky slow Steel-types like Aegislash, Celesteela, and Stakataka also definitely helps, especially as two of the three common Steel-types (Kart and Gene, not Metagross) are instead neutral to Flying.

There's still a lot of issues for Mega Salamence in this meta - dual Intimidate is a pretty common thing to face, so DD sets can have a lot of trouble getting going, using DD as a way to remove Intimidate drops instead of ever really getting boosts. Diancie being fairly common is also a huge thorn in its side, since it's pretty much a liability as soon as Diancie enters the field, either taking Mence's hits easily or setting Trick Room to spit on your attempt to move first through Tailwind.

Taking advantage of Mega Salamence's unique combination of defenses, power, utility, and coverage options is infinitely more fruitful than thinking of it as some damage powerhouse, because it will rarely bust through teams on that alone.
 

ryo yamada2001

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I think the current viability rankings in their current state aren't as helpful as they could be because of the ambiguity of placements. Current placements merely show which Pokemon is good, but don't bother explaining their position. I think writing small blurbs of more specific information would make it easier to argue for a position of a Pokemon on the list and it would help making a clearer distinction between actual tiers.

As opposed to Smogdex analyses, the viability rankings give more flexibility in updating its content due to it being a thread, which would allow us to add more recent, contextual, and meta information to a specific Pokemon. We could for example point towards certain high level tournament games and take them up in the blurb. Not only does this strengthen arguments for specific placements, it would also help newer and older players alike to have an immediate resource to see in which teams and scenarios certain Pokemon prevail. This would be particularly beneficial for lower tier mons, which are often a bit forgotten. Using blurbs like these would also help as a standard of posting quality, giving some more guidance to posters in what makes strong arguments or not.

It might lead to a few formatting issues but I think we could make a separate post, or just link Pastebins with information like n10sit does for DUU.
 

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Naganadel 5 -> UR
Haven't been around this thread in a while, but I was actually really surprised to see this survived the low-tier sweep a couple weeks ago. I've tried really hard to make it work but it's absolutely irredeemably awful, it does basically 0 damage to anything that it's not hitting super-effectively. It's frail and doesn't have the offensive power, either in terms of type matchups or sheer power, to justify its frailty. Pretty sure it hasn't been relevant since at least early 2018, though I'd be interested to see if anyone's done anything with it that I might have missed.
 
Naganadel 5 -> UR
Haven't been around this thread in a while, but I was actually really surprised to see this survived the low-tier sweep a couple weeks ago. I've tried really hard to make it work but it's absolutely irredeemably awful, it does basically 0 damage to anything that it's not hitting super-effectively. It's frail and doesn't have the offensive power, either in terms of type matchups or sheer power, to justify its frailty. Pretty sure it hasn't been relevant since at least early 2018, though I'd be interested to see if anyone's done anything with it that I might have missed.
I've actually been experimenting with a few sets for it, and it's been pretty decent. It's fast as hell, has access to a ton of great moves, in sludge bomb, Draco, u-turn, fire blast, snarl, and most importantly tailwind (Although it does have 4-moveslot syndrome). I tried an AV set and it actually worked pretty well as a somewhat specially bulky support mon. As for it doing nothing against things it doesn't hit super effectively, it can hit a ton very hard, it can take out every tapu, and hits crazy hard against a decent portion of the meta... also currently the only viable poison type now that Gengar is gone. Defiantly deserves a rank in my opinion.
 

MajorBowman

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currently the only viable poison type now that Gengar is gone
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it can take out every tapu
252 SpA Life Orb Naganadel Sludge Bomb vs. 252 HP / 0+ SpD Tapu Fini: 276-328 (80.2 - 95.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

I'm a little bit tired of seeing posts (by a number of users, not you in particular) that just spout off random "facts" about a Pokemon that they try to pass off as reasons that it should be whatever rank with zero support. If you're going to nominate something or comment on another nomination while using specific facts to back up your claim, please make sure these facts are correct. Something we've said time and time again is to provide evidence. Post relevant damage calcs or replays in which the Pokemon in question shows off whatever you're claiming about it. I emphasize "relevant" because saying "Naganadel is good because it beats Kartana" and posting it doing 600% to Kart with Life Orb Fire Blast is pointless.

It's a little bit different when you're nominating something to drop in ranking because it doesn't really make sense to "prove" something is bad - you can find or fabricate a replay of any Pokemon coming in and getting knocked out without doing anything and call it a day. It is more difficult, however, to find reasons for something to rise in ranking since you need to actively show that it deserves to be higher than its current position. That is entirely intentional; you need to convince us why something is good with actual evidence rather than anecdotes.
 
View attachment 157642

252 SpA Life Orb Naganadel Sludge Bomb vs. 252 HP / 0+ SpD Tapu Fini: 276-328 (80.2 - 95.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

I'm a little bit tired of seeing posts (by a number of users, not you in particular) that just spout off random "facts" about a Pokemon that they try to pass off as reasons that it should be whatever rank with zero support. If you're going to nominate something or comment on another nomination while using specific facts to back up your claim, please make sure these facts are correct. Something we've said time and time again is to provide evidence. Post relevant damage calcs or replays in which the Pokemon in question shows off whatever you're claiming about it. I emphasize "relevant" because saying "Naganadel is good because it beats Kartana" and posting it doing 600% to Kart with Life Orb Fire Blast is pointless.

It's a little bit different when you're nominating something to drop in ranking because it doesn't really make sense to "prove" something is bad - you can find or fabricate a replay of any Pokemon coming in and getting knocked out without doing anything and call it a day. It is more difficult, however, to find reasons for something to rise in ranking since you need to actively show that it deserves to be higher than its current position. That is entirely intentional; you need to convince us why something is good with actual evidence rather than anecdotes.
Forgot amoongus was a thing tbh, and I've been ohkoing it with acid downpour, and sort of forgot that wasn't a normal set.
 

Platinum God n1n1

the real n1n1
is a Tiering Contributor

Torkoal --> Tier 5

Who would have thought a Turtle could be a sun summoning fire monster?
This mon had developed a poor reputation because its commonly seen on bad ladder TR teams and is a staple of annoying mono-fire teams. But in SPL it has showed us that its deserving of a spot on the VR.
Due to its shell it has an impressive defense stat of 140. Although its SpA is quite low, the power of the sun and strong fire moves make up for that. Its also been used successfully as a sun setter to support mons with Chlorophyll and mons using Moonlight.
 
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Torkoal --> Tier 5

Who would have thought a Turtle could be a sun summoning fire monster?
This mon had developed a poor reputation because its commonly seen on bad ladder TR teams and is a staple of annoying mono-fire teams. But in SPL it has showed us that its deserving of a spot on the VR.
Due to its shell it has an impressive defense stat of 140. Although its SpA is quiet low, the power of the sun and strong fire moves make up for that. Its also been used successfully as a sun setter to support mons with Chlorophyll and mons using Moonlight.
The one thing I think should be brought up is it's decent utility moves in incinerate, rapid spin, clear smog, and stealth rocks. It's not the best user of any of these, and does have trouble using spin because of its rock weakness, but it's usable IMO.
 
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Chansey 4 -> 3

I’m going to make this nom knowing fully well that it was voted on and rejected last round because I think it’s really not correct.

Chansey’s ability to consistently command the end game better than any other Pokemon right now as well as pivot into any special attacker and most physical attackers in the mid game give it incredible utility on par with many of the best defensive Pokemon. It invalidates some of the hardest to wall threats in the game, such as the rising Charizard Y and Tapu Koko, and therefore compresses so many roles, a key feature of a great DOU 'mon.

Usage stats =/= viability, I know, but it’s impossible to say Chansey is “not some meta-shaping force” (paraphrasing tree) when in Snake, it had more usage than any non Tier 1 / 2 mon, and this share of usage has consistently kept growing into the first 3 weeks of SPL.

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen7doublesou-421444
Croven vs. emiforbes. Chansey provided a fuck ton of utility during this game, from Heal Pulse bringing Incineroar and Venusaur back to relevant HP and firing off Seismic Tosses every once in a while. Even in the face of a +1 Atk Genesect for half of its turns in, Chansey was able to reliably check nearly all of emiforbes' team without much effort. If Chansey has anything short of a plain atrocious matchup, this is very often what happens.

I would like to hear more discussion on this one especially from the VR council, who on the whole, did not say much against this besides “no.”


expect some more noms tomorrow because i think a lot of mons deserve to move down atm
 

ryo yamada2001

ryo yamada2001
is a Community Contributor Alumnusis a Tiering Contributor Alumnusis a Top Contributor Alumnus

Mega Gardevoir to 5 or unranked
The lack of replays for DaAwesomeDude1's waifu is pretty telling of its viability and relevance. Even the pokemon in the thread art want to vote Gardevoir down to 5

Gardevoir requires a ton of support in order to shine to the point where it's not really worth running. It struggles against the extremely common and powerful Mega-Metagross, or Zard-Y which has seemingly been getting more common by the week (check SPL). Gardevoirs extreme (physical) frailty make it difficult to properly respond to things it should check

60atk Mega-Salamence does more than 100% to 72hp/36def MGarde, and 252atk Kartana does at least 86% to it with Leaf Blade, which is particularly unforgiveable in a metagame filled with Stealth Rocks and Fake Outs. It's so frail that it even struggles to beat Incineroar in a 1v1, see https://i.imgur.com/2TVZkum.png

Gardevoir also simply just does not have the firepower to respond to a majority of this metagame right now. It struggles immensely against Edu's Metagross sample and all its variants (Kart > Amoong in particular), it gets clapped by Emilios Zard sample, it gets whittled down incredibly quickly by Ezrael's Manec balance. Even the more outdated samples (Scizor balance and Camelroom) have favourable matchups

The only relevant recent replays I could find for Gardevoir were MiltankMilk bringing Sub Gardevoir doing fuck all and Biosci beating Bowman where it surprisingly did more than fuck-all, but still pretty little

I'm sure that there's some theorycrafted possibility Gardevoir might be viable but currently we shouldn't host mons on this rankings when they're not getting used; especially when they don't even shine when heavily built around


Hoopa-Unbound to 4, 5, or unranked, as long as you just move this thing down
Another physically frail middling speed tier Pokemon that requires to move first in order to be useful, meaning it needs a ton of support to really get going. Also yet another mon whose life has been made more difficult by Incineroar.

Its firepower is also not significant enough to warrant building around it completely, as stuff like Fini, Bulu and Incin just laugh at this thing. Intimidate pivoting is stronger and easier than ever making it difficult for Hoopa to perform at full capacity. The things that can't comfortably eat Hoopa's attacks are things that streamroll this offensively anyway, it takes very little in a Rocks/FO Incin-filled metagame to quickly whittle this down.

also don't come at me with fightium Z because that shit has seen a grand total of 0 usage

fuck Croven
 


Amoonguss 2 -> 3

Amoonguss' competition as a Grass-type has never been more apparent - Kartana and Tapu Bulu have Against the general metagame, it has disappointing terrain matchups against 3 out of the 4 Tapus and heavily competes for a teamslot with the fourth. This mon requires support to be used close to its full potential, and even then, it often doesn't warrant it - requiring a specific Tapu for one sleep and a meat shield that doesn't last long isn't indicative of a Tier 2 Pokemon. also gross as best mega mence and zardy rising etc etc

158343

Tapu Lele 2 -> 3

This Pokemon has had a negative, sub 40% winrate in every official SM team tournament besides the first Snake Draft, where it went even.

Snake II | 17 | Tapu Lele | 8 | 10.81% | 37.50% |
SPL IX | 10 | Tapu Lele | 18 | 18.75% | 38.89% |
Snake I | 8 | Tapu Lele | 24 | 25.00% | 50.00% |
SPL VIII | 9 | Tapu Lele | 23 | 23.00% | 21.74% |

Don't give much attention to any of these winrates besides maybe the last Snake's in regards to its current viability but I want to be able to have an honest conversation about it how good it is. I think it's easy to get steamrolled by a Lele or a Deoxys-A offense and think "it's not great defensively but wowee it hits hard with Psychic!" This is not a reason to keep it at this level. Giving up the incredible defensive utility of Bulu or Fini or combination of speed and power that Koko has is often not an option to optimize a team. I think this is about on par with Deoxys-A in terms of viability and really only fits consistently on teams trying to abuse the two together.



Victini 3 -> 4

Has not seen much use or experimentation since its initial days with the Assault Vest set, and I don't see it becoming more prominent. While an alright Metagross and Tapu Lele check, it really can't damage Mega Charizard Y and doesn't do much to stop it from chipping it and plowing through its partner with Heat Wave. Rocks also really suck to the point where I'd consider Defog on a team with this - you die pretty cleanly to two Stomping Tantrums after any chip, good luck switching into a Scarf Lele more than once. I think this a mon, similar to Incineroar, better with a berry on a defensive set, but it hasn't been used and I don't see it being much better with that anyway.
 
Backing up n1n1 and Jrenner’s noms for Torkoal —> Tier 5

Boasting a 100% win rate in SPL across a statistically significant 2 games, Torkoal deserves to be recognized for its potential and given a spot on the VR.

Sun is incredibly powerful in the current meta, and even more so when you don’t have to sacrifice a mega slot and a 4x stealth rocks weakness for it. It boosts recovery from moonlight and synthesis, making bulky wincons like Cress and MVenu that are rapidly rising in popularity even harder to KO. Sun can also allow Venu to have 2x speed prior to mega evolving, letting it behave as both a fast offensive early game threat and a late game bulky wincon. Boosting the power of fire moves (both its own and its teammates) and allowing solar beam to be used without charging or a z crystal are obvious benefits.

Arguably most importantly, however, is the reduced damage from water types. In SMB's match vs Emforbes, SMB’s sun prevented Emforbes’s Volcanion from clicking steam eruption on his Diancie out of fear of missing the KO and activating a weakness policy, forcing Emforbes to play his Volcanion extremely passively, and allowing SMB’s Diancie to come in and set up a second trick room later on, sealing the game. SMB also had a neat bulldoze into WP diancie tech that didn’t get to come out during the game but could work very well in some best of 1s.

Similarly in my match vs Human, Torkoal’s sun kept Human from being able to muddy water my diancie with his Fini, leaving it with enough HP to survive a thousand arrows and enabling it to put on some serious offensive pressure under TR. With significant but not unreasonable spdef investment, sun can allow Mega Camerupt to survive two muddy waters from Tapu Fini, and even steam eruption from some Volcanion.

Torkoal also gets stealth rocks, which pressures some of the only mons that are able to switch in on its combination of sun-boosted fire stab and solar beam, like Incineroar, Charizard, Salamence, Volcanion, and Victini. Zygarde can reliably switch in, but is prevented from clicking thousand arrows if a weakness policy diancie is on the team (Torkoal’s best partner). Torkoal also struggles to do damage against Chansey and calm mind Cress, but having partners with knock off / toxic mitigates this issue.

Torkoal can even run firium Z, picking up surprise OHKOs on bulky pokemon like Kyurem and non-boosted Zapdos, and can even OHKO Kartana and Mega Scizor through protect.
While Torkoal definitely doesn’t fit on every team, or even most teams, it fits the tier 5 definition: “Pokemon that can only serve a specific role not needed by most teams, but can still perform excellently.” It partners excellently with TR Diancie, forming a solid full room or semi room core to build around, and doesn’t take up a much needed mega slot.
 
Kingdra 3->4 or 5
rain is just really really bad rn, and when I do see rain I'm seeing ludi/swampert just as often, if not more often than kingdra... personally I just think it's gotten a lot worse
 
could you please be a little bit more detailed. we understand you think it's gotten worse, that's why you're nominating it down, but what happened to make it worse?
Its not really that kingdra itself is worse, it's that rain is way worse. I think its partially because zard is much more common now, and opposing weather makes it a bit harder to use.
 
Its not really that kingdra itself is worse, it's that rain is way worse. I think its partially because zard is much more common now, and opposing weather makes it a bit harder to use.
Ok but do you have any replays showing why this causes a bad match up? What other evidence can you use to support this claim? The VR isn't for simple one liners that do not truly add discussion and talking points to the rankings in general.



on that point i will be adding noms in a few
 

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