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CAP 9 CAP 9 - Secondary Typing Discussion
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Well, seeing as we currently have a type that provides no insurance against secondary effects at all, I'm sticking to my guns, that I began to flare at the end of the last thread.
Dark/Ground
Let me explain. The Steel type has already been written off. Bad STAB, it would make the pokemon x4 Fighting weak, as well as x2 fighting and ground weak.
The next best thing at stopping secondaries is the Ground Type, which actually has a good STAB.
Dark/Ground:
Resists:
Ghost, Rock, Poision, Dark
Immune to:
Psychic, Electric
Weak to:
Grass, Water, Ice, Fighting, Bug
Looks bad, but it's not for the purpose of what we are attemtping to do. Ghost, Dark, Posion, Psychic and Electric are common users of Secondary effects, and several others do not like Dark or Ground STABS (Looking at you, Celebi and Jirachi)
In addittion, we gain Stealth Rock resistance, and immunity to Thunder Wave and Sandstorm. Sure, it isn't going to stop 'Inferior Scizor' or 'Set-up Bait when tricked a choice item and uses Persuit', but it's still good for the aims of the CAP.
EDIT: Wow, first post 0_o. And strong support too.
Dark/Ground
Let me explain. The Steel type has already been written off. Bad STAB, it would make the pokemon x4 Fighting weak, as well as x2 fighting and ground weak.
The next best thing at stopping secondaries is the Ground Type, which actually has a good STAB.
Dark/Ground:
Resists:
Ghost, Rock, Poision, Dark
Immune to:
Psychic, Electric
Weak to:
Grass, Water, Ice, Fighting, Bug
Looks bad, but it's not for the purpose of what we are attemtping to do. Ghost, Dark, Posion, Psychic and Electric are common users of Secondary effects, and several others do not like Dark or Ground STABS (Looking at you, Celebi and Jirachi)
In addittion, we gain Stealth Rock resistance, and immunity to Thunder Wave and Sandstorm. Sure, it isn't going to stop 'Inferior Scizor' or 'Set-up Bait when tricked a choice item and uses Persuit', but it's still good for the aims of the CAP.
EDIT: Wow, first post 0_o. And strong support too.
Ground, Ground, Ground, Ground, Ground!
Point #1: Let's face it, a pokemon that gets crippled by common secondary effects will fail to do its job of stopping the secondary.
Point #2: Of all the secondary effects, Trick is arguably the most crippling and no typing will prevent this, followed by Stealth Rock depending on typing, followed by Thunder Wave. Allow me to compare Thunder Wave to its fellow status moves:
Point #3: If we choose to give CAP9 a different typing, how else do we ensure that Thunder Wave never cripples it? Ability of course. Now let's think, what abilities make CAP9 immune to Thunder Wave's effect? Limber, Motor Drive and Volt Absorb. Of those, Limber is so specialist that dedicating an ability solely to that cause when other abilities that can help CAP9 deal with multiple secondary effects (Shed Skin and Magic Guard mostly, followed by Sticky Hold and Klutz for dealing with Trick) is a waste. Volt Absorb and Motor Drive grant CAP9 an immunity that could have been obtained through typing anyway.
Point #4: Let's look at a Dark/Ground defensive combo:
From the poll, we already decided we wanted CAP9 to be weak to Fighting and Bug so I shall discard those. Of the three remaining weaknesses, Water is never used without STAB, and Grass and Ice are only used as non-STAB moves on Electric-types.
To be continued.
Point #1: Let's face it, a pokemon that gets crippled by common secondary effects will fail to do its job of stopping the secondary.
Point #2: Of all the secondary effects, Trick is arguably the most crippling and no typing will prevent this, followed by Stealth Rock depending on typing, followed by Thunder Wave. Allow me to compare Thunder Wave to its fellow status moves:
- Toxic - shortens the longevity of walls but has little effect on offensive pokemon, especially frail ones like Infernape.
- Will-o-Wisp - unless CAP9 relies almost entirely on physical attacks, this is even less threatening than Toxic due to its consistently low damage.
- Hypnosis/Spore - being unable to do anything is annoying (hence Thunder Wave being so crippling) but at least it wears off and is guaranteed to wear off within four turns.
Point #3: If we choose to give CAP9 a different typing, how else do we ensure that Thunder Wave never cripples it? Ability of course. Now let's think, what abilities make CAP9 immune to Thunder Wave's effect? Limber, Motor Drive and Volt Absorb. Of those, Limber is so specialist that dedicating an ability solely to that cause when other abilities that can help CAP9 deal with multiple secondary effects (Shed Skin and Magic Guard mostly, followed by Sticky Hold and Klutz for dealing with Trick) is a waste. Volt Absorb and Motor Drive grant CAP9 an immunity that could have been obtained through typing anyway.
Point #4: Let's look at a Dark/Ground defensive combo:
- Immune to Electric and Psychic
- Resistant to Ghost, Rock, Poison and Dark
- Weak to Fighting, Bug, Grass, Ice and Water
From the poll, we already decided we wanted CAP9 to be weak to Fighting and Bug so I shall discard those. Of the three remaining weaknesses, Water is never used without STAB, and Grass and Ice are only used as non-STAB moves on Electric-types.
To be continued.
Natural Cure and Poison Heal. Also, Guts and Marvel Scale actually abuse paralysis.
Frankly, I'm against making it immune to status when there are abilities that can actually take advantage of it. I would rather have a type that has good offensive coverage with Dark and leaves CAP9 with very few weaknesses and a Stealth Rock resistance. That's why I support Fighting.
I'm supporting Fighting and Ground, both of them have great type coverage, and they both resist the ever common Stealth Rock.
Umbreon Dan-but don't you agree that if the Pokemon is naturally immune to forms of status, then the ability can be dedicated to other things-you know, things that actually help "Stop the Secondary"? If the Pokemon can't do the most possible to Stop the Secondary, doesn't that defeat the purpose?
Ground is not my my first choice for pairing with Dark
Dark/Ground has the following weaknesses:
Fighting
Bug
Water
Ice
Grass
And resists:
Psychic (*0)
Ghost
Dark
Electric (*0)
Rock
Poison
The two immunities are nice, particularly in CAP, but the weaknesses to Fighting (Lucario, Machamp, some CAPs), Bug (Scizor), Water (Starmie, Swampert, Gyarados, etc) and Ice (random Ice attacks) will lead to a very unstable Pokemon IMO, regardless of concept.
Two types I'll suggest are Fighting and Poison.
Fighting, offensively with Dark, is resisted by Heracross and Toxicroak, which is great coverage. Fighting also gives a way to take on Scizor (defensively) and Skarmory (offensively).
Fighting/Dark Weaknesses:
Flying
Fighting
Resists:
Psychic (*0)
Rock
Dark (*4)
Ghost
Sure, with less resists (essentially just Electric as Poison is negligible) it might have a harder time switching in but the fewer weaknesses will prove very useful defensively.
Finally, Poison is a great type to pair with Dark yielding a sole weakness to Ground, though few resists to go with it. It also provides Toxic immunity and Toxic Spikes absorption. Offensively, it's fairly weak. Essentially CAP9 would be a super Drapion.
Status can be dealt with using the ability; such as Flash Fire or Motor Drive.
Dark/Ground has the following weaknesses:
Fighting
Bug
Water
Ice
Grass
And resists:
Psychic (*0)
Ghost
Dark
Electric (*0)
Rock
Poison
The two immunities are nice, particularly in CAP, but the weaknesses to Fighting (Lucario, Machamp, some CAPs), Bug (Scizor), Water (Starmie, Swampert, Gyarados, etc) and Ice (random Ice attacks) will lead to a very unstable Pokemon IMO, regardless of concept.
Two types I'll suggest are Fighting and Poison.
Fighting, offensively with Dark, is resisted by Heracross and Toxicroak, which is great coverage. Fighting also gives a way to take on Scizor (defensively) and Skarmory (offensively).
Fighting/Dark Weaknesses:
Flying
Fighting
Resists:
Psychic (*0)
Rock
Dark (*4)
Ghost
Sure, with less resists (essentially just Electric as Poison is negligible) it might have a harder time switching in but the fewer weaknesses will prove very useful defensively.
Finally, Poison is a great type to pair with Dark yielding a sole weakness to Ground, though few resists to go with it. It also provides Toxic immunity and Toxic Spikes absorption. Offensively, it's fairly weak. Essentially CAP9 would be a super Drapion.
Status can be dealt with using the ability; such as Flash Fire or Motor Drive.
Guts dosen't stop the speed drop and 25% chance of not moveing.
Marvel Scale dosen't either.
Poison Heal as an ability dosen't. It needs Toxic Orb to do so, takeing a valuable item slot. Considering from the sounds of things, CAP9 will be switching in on Trick as well, or at least, that was the idea with the Dark Type in the first place, Toxic Orb wouldn;t activate, or Dark CAP9 would need to reveal itself before Trick.
Natural Cure only works when switching out. Dosen't help until then.
Although, I am likeing the fact that Dark/Fighting has only 2 weaknesses, the simple fact remains that it in no way at all will Stop the Secondary. This leaves that job 100% to the ability.
That's the last I'll be saying for tonight.
Marvel Scale dosen't either.
Poison Heal as an ability dosen't. It needs Toxic Orb to do so, takeing a valuable item slot. Considering from the sounds of things, CAP9 will be switching in on Trick as well, or at least, that was the idea with the Dark Type in the first place, Toxic Orb wouldn;t activate, or Dark CAP9 would need to reveal itself before Trick.
Natural Cure only works when switching out. Dosen't help until then.
Although, I am likeing the fact that Dark/Fighting has only 2 weaknesses, the simple fact remains that it in no way at all will Stop the Secondary. This leaves that job 100% to the ability.
That's the last I'll be saying for tonight.
From the main typing thread:
Conclusion: At the moment, I am supporting either Fighting or Ground as a secondary type.
On Ground, I agree with a number of the points in both Umbreon Dan's and Objection's posts. Dark/Ground is a fairly solid defensive typing despite a number of weaknesses, it gets two good STABs, AND it is immune to Thunder Wave. However, I may consider it unnecessary if we intend to have an ability that can block all status effects, as Umbreon Dan said, though it is nice, if we have Poison Heal, to allow it to switch in initially.
On Fighting, it is also solid defensively: two weaknesses in place of Dark/Ground's five, and an even better offensive typing, resisted only by Toxicroak and Heracross. However, it could be considered a little too good offensively; we don't want CAP9 to turn into a bulky tank of sorts, really, and giving it near-unresisted STAB seems to be the wrong way to go.
That's all I've got so far. My mind is made up that Fighting or Ground is the best choice for a secondary type, but not which. I'll post more reasoning on this part later, I have some issues IRL that need cleaning up first.
I haven't quite set my sights on one in particular, but I think it should resist Stealth Rock, as a preliminary point. This narrows it down to Steel, Dark, and Fighting. Steel has horrible defensive synergy with Dark;
Conclusion: At the moment, I am supporting either Fighting or Ground as a secondary type.
On Ground, I agree with a number of the points in both Umbreon Dan's and Objection's posts. Dark/Ground is a fairly solid defensive typing despite a number of weaknesses, it gets two good STABs, AND it is immune to Thunder Wave. However, I may consider it unnecessary if we intend to have an ability that can block all status effects, as Umbreon Dan said, though it is nice, if we have Poison Heal, to allow it to switch in initially.
On Fighting, it is also solid defensively: two weaknesses in place of Dark/Ground's five, and an even better offensive typing, resisted only by Toxicroak and Heracross. However, it could be considered a little too good offensively; we don't want CAP9 to turn into a bulky tank of sorts, really, and giving it near-unresisted STAB seems to be the wrong way to go.
That's all I've got so far. My mind is made up that Fighting or Ground is the best choice for a secondary type, but not which. I'll post more reasoning on this part later, I have some issues IRL that need cleaning up first.
Don't forget, this CaP will have moves, as well. Moves that, after threatening away the secondary user (or possibly KOing it) can stop, reverse, deter, use as a advantage, etc. the opponent's secondary moves. Immunities do you no good if you can't get rid of the pokemon using secondary moves.
I'm really liking Fighting right now. Helps it to scare off stuff like Blissey and Umbreon, gives it a Stealth Rock resistance, lets it off with only two weaknesses, only one of which (Fighting) is really used frequently, and it's good on the offensive end in general too. All things considered, it's looking pretty nice, IMO.
The main alternative to Dark/Fighting seems to be Dark/Ground right now. However, the five weaknesses (Fighting, Bug, Water, Grass, Ice) really puts me off from it. It's nice beyond that, but I'm not sure how well it would be able to perform with so many weak-points to strike.
The main alternative to Dark/Fighting seems to be Dark/Ground right now. However, the five weaknesses (Fighting, Bug, Water, Grass, Ice) really puts me off from it. It's nice beyond that, but I'm not sure how well it would be able to perform with so many weak-points to strike.
I support Poison as a secondary typing, because you can absorb Toxic Spikes on the switch, which is a huge plus. It also grants you only one weakness. Granted, it's a Ground-type weakness, but only one weakness none the less. Being resistant to both of Dark's weaknesses is great too.
Fighting is a great option as well, since you are able to hit steels with a SE STAB Attack. However, you lose the ability to absorb TS, or any status for the matter, and you get a few more weaknesses.
While Ground can stop paralysis (aside from Glare, Body Slam and Force Palm), it comes at a cost: you are still weak to Bug, unlike the previous two typings. This is most important since Jirachi, one of the most common Trick users, has U-turn. This can cause problems when facing Jirachi, since you think you are coming in on Trick, but you get hit by a SE U-turn instead. It also leaves you weak to Ice moves, which are plentiful thanks to Salamence running around. While Ground has it's benefits, i personally don't think it shines as much as Fighting or Poison.
Also, remember abilities play a huge part in this. Limber can be used to stop paralysis, while poison heal can stop poison. Just keep that in mind when picking a type.
Fighting is a great option as well, since you are able to hit steels with a SE STAB Attack. However, you lose the ability to absorb TS, or any status for the matter, and you get a few more weaknesses.
While Ground can stop paralysis (aside from Glare, Body Slam and Force Palm), it comes at a cost: you are still weak to Bug, unlike the previous two typings. This is most important since Jirachi, one of the most common Trick users, has U-turn. This can cause problems when facing Jirachi, since you think you are coming in on Trick, but you get hit by a SE U-turn instead. It also leaves you weak to Ice moves, which are plentiful thanks to Salamence running around. While Ground has it's benefits, i personally don't think it shines as much as Fighting or Poison.
Also, remember abilities play a huge part in this. Limber can be used to stop paralysis, while poison heal can stop poison. Just keep that in mind when picking a type.
My support for the secondary typing is going towards Fighting.
Yes, Ground sounds solid on paper. Usually a bulky type, SR resistance, Sand immuntiy, Thunderwave immunity, and good STAB move in Earthquake. What's not to like? Well, the fact that it only gains 1 resistance, 1 immunity, but adds an extra 3 weaknesses would be a good place to start. Ground also might have an excellent STAB in Earthquake, but plenty of pokemon make great use of Earthquake without STAB. Metagross, Gyarados, Aerodactyl, and Salamence are the best examples. SR resistance... Fighting offers that as well. It doesn't offer Sand resistance, but that is very minute. Finally: Thunderwave. Yes, T-wave can be crippling and Ground offers an immunity to that while Fighting does not.
More on Thunderwave, though. Well, that can be solved a variety of ways without even having it included in typing or ability. Heal Bell? Aromatherapy? CAP9 will also have moves that can, as Admiral Korski mentioned, stop, reverse, deter, or use as a advantage the status inflictions the opponent decided to use. While being immune to exactly one status: Thunderwave, I don't feel that Ground as a typing would offer anything more than just that; one immunity.
A lot of people from the concept thread argued that Dark was a bad thing to have STAB on. Well, can you tell me how necessary Ground STAB is? It's nice. Not useful.
What can fighting offer it?
Firstly, it would offer great coverage. Dark and Fighting is unparalleled coverage, guaranteeing at least neutral on every type when considered individually; being only resisted by Toxicroak and Heracross when taken in context of multiple typing. It also provides an excellent compliment to Dark, once finished, by providing only two weaknesses in Fighting and Flying. Flying is rarely seen attacking type in OU as well. You still recieve the SR resistance that has been being praised for by other types.
Other than that, I am very partial to Dark/Poison, as listed by familyguyman. Defensive prowess aside, (slight poll jumping here) I can easily see a Dark/Poison creature with Shed Skin and an overall excellent movepool. I would have a hard time deciding between Fighting or Poison if it actually came down to the two.
Also, if any of my ideas listed above don't really connect with each other, or are worded poorly, please let me know so I can explain myself better. I'm rather busy IRL at the moment, and have to write this up relatively quickly.
A note on Fighting, most Steels will be hit neutrally since their secondary type is often Psychic, Bug or Flying. Heatran, Lucario, Magnezone and Empoleon are the OU Steels weak to Fighting. Lucario gets special mention since he will switch into a Choice'd Pursuit (after CAP9 absorbs Trick) any day of the week.
I think that fact will keep Dark/Fighting from being too strong offensively but still serviceable thanks to good neutral coverage.
Oh and to reiterate on Ground. I don't want this to become Cyclohm 2.0 where a great Pokemon on paper has a crippling weakness to common offensive types (Ground + Ice for Cyclohm). Ice + Water + Bug + Grass + Fighting is just too easy to exploit by some top OU threats.
CURRENT SCORECARD (based on amount of apparent support in the thread):
1. Fighting
2. Ground
3. Poison
Anyway, I'm restating my support for Ground. The immunties are a great asset, and I think the ability (which would otherwise be spent on blocking effects) can be better used for other things.
1. Fighting
2. Ground
3. Poison
Anyway, I'm restating my support for Ground. The immunties are a great asset, and I think the ability (which would otherwise be spent on blocking effects) can be better used for other things.
Based on some arguments look upon in the main typing thread, it looks like people disagreed with Dark as an acceptable type, because all the reasons people like me gave were "STAB Pursuit" only. They argued that we aren't focusing enough on anything else, and that we could've covered many other secondary moves with another type.
Well first of all, there are many more things to be decided for our CAP. Right away after we decide one thing about our CAP (Dark) people rant about better decisions. Well now's the chance to look upon those "better" decisions. There's still 1 more type left, 2 whole abilities, and an entire Movepool! Don't think we won't consider everything. We just can't make everything.
Now onto the second type; I have a good reason to believe Fighting or Ground would be the best choices. What Fighting offers is a method to remove Blissey and Steels that resist Dark from the picture with a STAB Fighting attack, it removes the Bug weakness, as well as adding a much needed resistance to SR.
Ground on the other hand, with many of the same reasons as before, could work well too. I do not believe Steel to be all right with Dark. 4x fighting weakness kills it almost completely.
Well first of all, there are many more things to be decided for our CAP. Right away after we decide one thing about our CAP (Dark) people rant about better decisions. Well now's the chance to look upon those "better" decisions. There's still 1 more type left, 2 whole abilities, and an entire Movepool! Don't think we won't consider everything. We just can't make everything.
Now onto the second type; I have a good reason to believe Fighting or Ground would be the best choices. What Fighting offers is a method to remove Blissey and Steels that resist Dark from the picture with a STAB Fighting attack, it removes the Bug weakness, as well as adding a much needed resistance to SR.
Ground on the other hand, with many of the same reasons as before, could work well too. I do not believe Steel to be all right with Dark. 4x fighting weakness kills it almost completely.
I say Fighting is probaly the best choice.
The near-perfect coverage helps against defensive teams which would commonly use secondary moves. Only having 1 common weakness is cool too. Other than the easily dismissed Flying weakness (could hurt it against Skarm or Crobat) the Fighting type has no downsides to add to the Dark typing.
It can be agreed that being resistant to SR is almost a must for a stop-the-secondary pokemon.
I don't really like Ground, too many weaknesses to be worth it.
The near-perfect coverage helps against defensive teams which would commonly use secondary moves. Only having 1 common weakness is cool too. Other than the easily dismissed Flying weakness (could hurt it against Skarm or Crobat) the Fighting type has no downsides to add to the Dark typing.
It can be agreed that being resistant to SR is almost a must for a stop-the-secondary pokemon.
I don't really like Ground, too many weaknesses to be worth it.
Raj
CAP Playtesting Expert
I agree wholeheartedly with Draco with Poison.
so uh, what is your idea of "stopping the secondary" if abusing status-inducing moves isn't it?
I really don't see why thunder wave is getting so much hype. seriously, it's probably not even as common as toxic. in any case, when's the last time you've heard someone complain about switching blissey or milotic into one?
Ground's five common weaknesses are pretty outrageous. fighting has two and poison has one. that's definitely worth the trade-off of not being sandstorm-immune.
As I said in irc, Poison is really a nice typing to have. Resisting Toxic, which cuts survability a lot, removing toxic spikes, also having only 1 weakness, which a lot of big threats are immune to (read: salamence, gyarados, latias and company) can make this thing quite a pest, and not only that, but a great offensive partner for these mentiones pokemons.
And as Draco said, abilities play a very big role, which can make this thing a true contender.
Just my 2 cents, go poison!
PS: fuck you celebi :p
And as Draco said, abilities play a very big role, which can make this thing a true contender.
Just my 2 cents, go poison!
PS: fuck you celebi :p
Of the types on which people have focused so far, I favor Fighting for its Stealth Rock resistance, excellent STAB, and cancellation of meaningful weaknesses with the primary type. I would be reasonably happy with this result.
However, I would like to recommend that we take a second look at Dragon. Many people seem to think that choosing this type automatically takes the Pokemon down a glass-cannon, offensively-oriented road. Also, I understand the objection to another Dragon-type right after Cyclohm. However, Dragon has several strengths which I think require consideration.
1.) Strong defensive typing. Steel has been largely written-off because it would give CAP9 a 4x weakness to Fighting. I agree with this reasoning. However, Steel was first suggested because it is such an overall strong type defensively. Dragon is similar in this regard, without the crippling Fighting weakness. A Dark/Dragon CAP9 would have the following:
Resistance: Dark, Electric, Fire, Ghost, Grass, Water, Psychic (immune)
Weakness: Bug, Dragon, Fighting, Ice
This is not exactly Empoleon, but it is an excellent selection, one which would allow CAP9 to repeatedly switch in to opposing attacks from numerous threats. This creates compelling synergy with one of the project's other primary goals: minimizing the impact and relevance of entry hazards. And while it is not itself resistant to Stealth Rock, I believe that this has been overemphasized thus far, since there is a lot more to "the secondary" than just that. Adding an ability like Levitate, Magic Guard, or even Soundproof to a Dark/Dragon could still give phaze-reliant stall teams absolute fits.
2.) Strong offensive typing. This is not as good a case as the above, but Dark/Dragon is still excellent from an offensive standpoint, even if it's no Kingdra or Revenankh. Dark and Dragon are collectively resisted only by Steel, and Dragon adds a useful super effective STAB against such persistent threats as Salamence and Flygon, giving CAP9 added relevance against teams other than the obvious Stall.
3.) Flavor. A Dark/Dragon CAP9 would allow us to explore two rich, hitherto underexplored typings in terms of flavor concepts. As several users have pointed out, Dragon has always meant one or both offensive stats reaching at least base 100 and a diverse movepool of non-STAB attacks including potent options like Earthquake, Fire Blast, and Surf. Dark on the other hand, has remained nebulous, used mostly on dual-type Pokemon with no really consistent thread between them. Murkrow and Darkai suggest that it may be tied to the night, so what about a "sleeping dragon" Pokemon? This plays to a stat spread less focused on hyper offense (which everyone seems to agree CAP9 should avoid), and would invite an interesting new take on both of these types. By contrast, Ground and Fighting are both well-explored.
To me, the best argument against Dragon is simply the risk of similarity to Cyclohm. It would be another secondary Dragon, and Cyclohm did already have Shield Dust, overlapping slightly with this concept. This seems like a really inadequate criticism, as the goal of CAP9 is to produce an interesting and relevant new contribution to the metagame. CAP has reused types before, such as between Revenankh and Arghonaut, so I would not hesitate to do it again if it is the best choice for CAP9. I believe that, in this case, it is.
However, I would like to recommend that we take a second look at Dragon. Many people seem to think that choosing this type automatically takes the Pokemon down a glass-cannon, offensively-oriented road. Also, I understand the objection to another Dragon-type right after Cyclohm. However, Dragon has several strengths which I think require consideration.
1.) Strong defensive typing. Steel has been largely written-off because it would give CAP9 a 4x weakness to Fighting. I agree with this reasoning. However, Steel was first suggested because it is such an overall strong type defensively. Dragon is similar in this regard, without the crippling Fighting weakness. A Dark/Dragon CAP9 would have the following:
Resistance: Dark, Electric, Fire, Ghost, Grass, Water, Psychic (immune)
Weakness: Bug, Dragon, Fighting, Ice
This is not exactly Empoleon, but it is an excellent selection, one which would allow CAP9 to repeatedly switch in to opposing attacks from numerous threats. This creates compelling synergy with one of the project's other primary goals: minimizing the impact and relevance of entry hazards. And while it is not itself resistant to Stealth Rock, I believe that this has been overemphasized thus far, since there is a lot more to "the secondary" than just that. Adding an ability like Levitate, Magic Guard, or even Soundproof to a Dark/Dragon could still give phaze-reliant stall teams absolute fits.
2.) Strong offensive typing. This is not as good a case as the above, but Dark/Dragon is still excellent from an offensive standpoint, even if it's no Kingdra or Revenankh. Dark and Dragon are collectively resisted only by Steel, and Dragon adds a useful super effective STAB against such persistent threats as Salamence and Flygon, giving CAP9 added relevance against teams other than the obvious Stall.
3.) Flavor. A Dark/Dragon CAP9 would allow us to explore two rich, hitherto underexplored typings in terms of flavor concepts. As several users have pointed out, Dragon has always meant one or both offensive stats reaching at least base 100 and a diverse movepool of non-STAB attacks including potent options like Earthquake, Fire Blast, and Surf. Dark on the other hand, has remained nebulous, used mostly on dual-type Pokemon with no really consistent thread between them. Murkrow and Darkai suggest that it may be tied to the night, so what about a "sleeping dragon" Pokemon? This plays to a stat spread less focused on hyper offense (which everyone seems to agree CAP9 should avoid), and would invite an interesting new take on both of these types. By contrast, Ground and Fighting are both well-explored.
To me, the best argument against Dragon is simply the risk of similarity to Cyclohm. It would be another secondary Dragon, and Cyclohm did already have Shield Dust, overlapping slightly with this concept. This seems like a really inadequate criticism, as the goal of CAP9 is to produce an interesting and relevant new contribution to the metagame. CAP has reused types before, such as between Revenankh and Arghonaut, so I would not hesitate to do it again if it is the best choice for CAP9. I believe that, in this case, it is.
Poison types cannot make use of Poison Heal! Remember that.
Poison has only 1 weakness yes, but it just makes Steel types that much more threatening. Fighting on the other hand, will more easily take care of Steels that try to come in and set-up.
Unless I'm mistaken-in which case, please correct me-but "Stop" means to end something, to make it inactive. In what way does setting up tons of status affects "Stop" secondaries? Anyway, thunder wave deserves the "hype" as you call it-paralysis is just as bad as toxic. Yes, the weaknesses are definitely worthy of some though, but surely someone can come up with a way to counter these issues-like people were planning to counter the flaws of Dark/Fighting.
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