Metagame SV OU Metagame Discussion

[Poirepi]

The metagame is filled with mindless offense for the most part. The things we want to ban like Palafin and Bundle require heavily defensive Pokemon that really only fit in stall, so it’s not like banning them will make matters worse.

You making up some narrative that we are forcing a defensive metagame is your problem. If you can’t see why the cover legendaries start as Uber and you can’t see the clear sarcasm Pabloaram is using, then maybe take a step back and lurk more

As far as I remember, I wasn't attacking anyone until Pabloaram tried to make a joke (this is how you call it when irony is inappropriate). Passive-agressive responses exist, you know.

The cover legendaries ALWAYS start as Uber. This is not the point, and it's a shame that you're trying to turn it into some kind of legitimation.

 

[mcooper527666]

I have an idea (though it might be a controversial one), why don’t we have TWO seperate tiers/meta games: one with Terastalizing allowed, and one without. To each his/her own, you know?

 

[Finchinator]

As far as I remember, I wasn't attacking anyone until Pabloaram tried to make a joke (this is how you call it when irony is inappropriate). Passive-agressive responses exist, you know.

The cover legendaries ALWAYS start as Uber. This is not the point, and it's a shame that you're trying to turn it into some kind of legitimation.

Someone making a joke isn’t call to insult them. Consider that a “keep the insults out of this thread” warning.

You’re entitled to whatever opinions, just like Pablo and everyone else. But being condescending does nobody any good.

 

[BolTingBlazie]

Someone making a joke isn’t call to insult them. Consider that a “keep the insults out of this thread” warning.

You’re entitled to whatever opinions, just like Pablo and everyone else. But being condescending does nobody any good.

Ubers is an OU banlist guys, chill... Mostly the council wants to get the blatantly overpowered stuff out of OU for now like palafin-H, iron bundle, and flutter mane that do not have any good checks or counters for and likely never will. Also once basculegion arrives we can suspect last respects... But for now houndstone has to stay ubers because we don't have basculegion or hisuian basculin, and it is the only pokemon that gets last respects.

 

[HydreigonTheChild]

the things that should get banned is palafin for sure, its just busted with BU sets and just you cant really beat it even wiht counters cuz it can tera into something as well and its last move can be whatever it wants, sub, taunt, or wave crash for a nuclear stab. CB is strong to but like not ban worthy. It just can beat pretty much anything and HO has like 0 counterplay for it and defense just gets shut down by taunt and bozo fish is the sole counterplay to it.

Gholdengo should be banned. you litterally cannot remove hazards at all, corv cant, most rapid spinners cant and have to deticate a slot to be able to hit it, and its not like it doesn't have counterplay to that esp with scarf make it rain just is a nuke in a half. I just believe its ban worthy, its unhealthy and just makes hazards stupid op unless ur running niche stuff such as maushold.

Iron bundle should be banned... litterally cannot deal with it, specs just is nuclear and u 50/50 pretty much every time it comes in, I bet the only reason it isnt banned is cuz hazards cut into its longetivity a lot and make it a pain to bring in more than once. Boots takes this weakness away and makes it so u cannot even scout, so you just have to hit harder than it can sweep your team as unless u have stuff such as blissey, or a good tera you really are out of luck

 

[MrE]

I'm sorry but Shed Tail on Orthworm is just as broken as it is on Cyclizar and needs banning just as much.

 

[Not Zer0]

Gholdengo should be banned. you litterally cannot remove hazards at all, corv cant, most rapid spinners cant and have to deticate a slot to be able to hit it, and its not like it doesn't have counterplay to that esp with scarf make it rain just is a nuke in a half. I just believe its ban worthy, its unhealthy and just makes hazards stupid op unless ur running niche stuff such as maushold.

Two of the three best spinners, and some of the best mons in the format to boot, are Ground types (Great Tusk, Iron Treads) who naturally want to run an option that hits Air Balloon Gholdengo anyway (Knock Off, Volt Switch). Obviously, if its not Balloon, it runs a serious risk of getting completely blown up by EQ every time it tries to block spin. Getting taxed into running Knock on Great Tusk is a minor annoyance because you might have a hard time fitting rocks (or spin if you don't care about hazards actually) but you could do a lot worse than running one of the best moves in the game. Cyclizar also can run Knock or just say see-ya! and click the funny Shed Tail button.
Glimmora is, again, almost always naturally packing an option that smacks Gholdengo. Earth Power is a very good choice on this mon. Obviously this means the Air Balloon set is a problem but you can always forgo one of Rocks of Spikes to run Power Gem.
Torkoal always runs Lava Plume.
If you're really digging deep into off-meta choices for spinners Coalossal also runs Lava Plume, Tsareena runs Knock Off, Avalugg frequently runs EQ, and Brambleghast should not have a hard time fitting a Ghost move.
These are all natural choices for these mons and usually they run these moves (or at least think about it) anyway. Certainly the priority on these coverage options becomes higher due to the prevalence of Gholdengo but... that just sounds like a good meta call to deal with one of the best mons in the format.

Hazards being insanely prevalent is a trait of this metagame and not a symptom of Gholdengo's presence. Hazard setters are everywhere and removal is at an all-time premium. It will of course be easier to remove if Gholdengo is gone because Corv can Defog freely, but I think other spinblockers have to be scared of the same stuff Gholdengo is. Most Ghost Types are thoroughly uninterested in catching an EQ or a Knock Off. This might just be a meta where players need to learn how to play with hazards up or run Boots.

tl;dr most spinners hit Gholdengo with coverage options they want anyway, this is a hazards up meta with or without Gholdengo so you should go to the shoe store

 

[LadyLynn]

One thing I noticed about Iron Bundle is that its STABs aren't just unresisted, but that almost everything that resists Hydro Pump is outright weak to Freeze Dry.

Theoretically, something that resisted Hydro Pump but wasnt weak to Freeze Dry could switch in more easily and then be able to tank the 70 BP freeze dry, but the only Pokemon I can think of that fit that definition are like... Abomasnow and Baxcalibur? Thick Fat Azumarill? Really scraping the bottom of the barrel here.

Maybe I'm late to the party here and I'm saying something really obvious, but hey sue me I've only just been getting back into Pokemon since I last played actively in gen 4 xD

 

[HydreigonTheChild]

I'm sorry but Shed Tail on Orthworm is just as broken as it is on Cyclizar and needs banning just as much.

lol? #1 its slow #2 its not passing such high hp subs esp since its taking hits and can just be hit on the special side and even some hits on the physical side can make shed tail fail

Two of the three best spinners, and some of the best mons in the format to boot, are Ground types (Great Tusk, Iron Treads) who naturally want to run an option that hits Air Balloon Gholdengo anyway (Knock Off, Volt Switch). Obviously, if its not Balloon, it runs a serious risk of getting completely blown up by EQ every time it tries to block spin. Getting taxed into running Knock on Great Tusk is a minor annoyance because you might have a hard time fitting rocks (or spin if you don't care about hazards actually) but you could do a lot worse than running one of the best moves in the game. Cyclizar also can run Knock or just say see-ya! and click the funny Shed Tail button.
Glimmora is, again, almost always naturally packing an option that smacks Gholdengo. Earth Power is a very good choice on this mon. Obviously this means the Air Balloon set is a problem but you can always forgo one of Rocks of Spikes to run Power Gem.
Torkoal always runs Lava Plume.
If you're really digging deep into off-meta choices for spinners Coalossal also runs Lava Plume, Tsareena runs Knock Off, Avalugg frequently runs EQ, and Brambleghast should not have a hard time fitting a Ghost move.
These are all natural choices for these mons and usually they run these moves (or at least think about it) anyway. Certainly the priority on these coverage options becomes higher due to the prevalence of Gholdengo but... that just sounds like a good meta call to deal with one of the best mons in the format.

Hazards being insanely prevalent is a trait of this metagame and not a symptom of Gholdengo's presence. Hazard setters are everywhere and removal is at an all-time premium. It will of course be easier to remove if Gholdengo is gone because Corv can Defog freely, but I think other spinblockers have to be scared of the same stuff Gholdengo is. Most Ghost Types are thoroughly uninterested in catching an EQ or a Knock Off. This might just be a meta where players need to learn how to play with hazards up or run Boots.

tl;dr most spinners hit Gholdengo with coverage options they want anyway, this is a hazards up meta with or without Gholdengo so you should go to the shoe store

Yes but it means they have to read the switch, and in general i havent seen a great tusk or an iron treads successfully spin against it. They can also get blown up by modest scarf and making spinning always a risk since balloon so common esp since if it runs knock it cant run rocks which means u can just pressure it again. You really struggle especially since if u spin and u hit into it you are just forced out by make it rain always, knock doesn't even KO so you cannot spin -> knock to kill it unless you have booster energy which I have seen less and less run. I mean torkoal isnt a good spinner anyway, and it gets pressured anwyay pretty darn hard for trying to do so especially since its free entry for shed tail users

 

[ayevon]

lol? #1 its slow #2 its not passing such high hp subs esp since its taking hits and can just be hit on the special side and even some hits on the physical side can make shed tail fail

Shed Tail is just an uncompetetive move regardless of who's using it. The ability to pass subs in response to a switch from the opponent allows too many free setup turns for too little opportunity cost. Obviously Earthworm certainly has much more opportunity cost than Cyclizar, but it has an amazing typing and ability combo which can allow it many free turns itself. Shed Tail + 4 or 5 setup mons, especially in a meta with tera and booster energy, just become setup roulette.

 

[658Greninja]

Going to what Poirepi is saying

There is a reason broken shit gets banned. Take Dracovish for example, it OHKOd neutral targets and 2HKOd/OHKOd resists, especially in rain. Nothing can take a banded Fisheous Rend except for Seismitoad and other water absorb/storm drain pokemon. So people gravitated towards Toad for that reason and also rocks + knock. The problem wasn’t that Vish didn’t have any notable counters, its the fact that every team had to run the same Clef/Corv/Toad team to not get steamrolled by Vish. It lead to a very stale and restricting metagame.

Alot of people claim banning mons leads to a stale meta when it leads to the opposite. Less restriction means more freedom in the builder. This is why people think ADV is one of the best competitive gens. While it is centralized around sand + spikes, most of that gen’s OU threats are either immune to one or the other, or both. You can find creative sets and even creative choices in the builder like Camerupt which is meant to act as a check to Zapdos and a breaker, or Hariyama and it being the best user of Knock in a game where 90% of the tier relies on lefties to stay healthy.

This is also why alot of people hate BW OU. Because we didn’t ban the broken things flying around, everyone has to either run Sand or run the broken stuff themselves, but that is a topic for another day.

So yes, banning unhealthy threats leads to a more diverse metagame. Agree or disagree but that is the way it is. Also don’t disregard Ubers as a tier, it is a widely popular tier (especially in DPP and BW). It is an option.

 

[Bugboy]

Y’all need to learn to ignore things or just remove troll comments, there’s no reason an entire page of this forum should be used on this conversation.

 

[HydreigonTheChild]

Shed Tail is just an uncompetetive move regardless of who's using it. The ability to pass subs in response to a switch from the opponent allows too many free setup turns for too little opportunity cost. Obviously Earthworm certainly has much more opportunity cost than Cyclizar, but it has an amazing typing and ability combo which can allow it many free turns itself. Shed Tail + 4 or 5 setup mons, especially in a meta with tera and booster energy, just become setup roulette.

maybe it is but I rarely have found earthworm to setup subs htat often due to it being slow and just being unable to take repeated hits. Cyclizar has regen to do this multiple times a game and to give multiple subs. Like at most Earthworm gets 1 sub up and that is all it does since u can just u know.. hit it out of range. Sure its ability is nice but its not like it can really switch into most ground types and scout safely esp if the opponent predicts that

 

[Poirepi]

Going to what Poirepi is saying

There is a reason broken shit gets banned. Take Dracovish for example, it OHKOd neutral targets and 2HKOd/OHKOd resists, especially in rain. Nothing can take a banded Fisheous Rend except for Seismitoad and other water absorb/storm drain pokemon. So people gravitated towards Toad for that reason and also rocks + knock. The problem wasn’t that Vish didn’t have any notable counters, its the fact that every team had to run the same Clef/Corv/Toad team to not get steamrolled by Vish. It lead to a very stale and restricting metagame.

Alot of people claim banning mons leads to a stale meta when it leads to the opposite. Less restriction means more freedom in the builder. This is why people think ADV is one of the best competitive gens. While it is centralized around sand + spikes, most of that gen’s OU threats are either immune to one or the other, or both. You can find creative sets and even creative choices in the builder like Camerupt which is meant to act as a check to Zapdos and a breaker, or Hariyama and it being the best user of Knock in a game where 90% of the tier relies on lefties to stay healthy.

This is also why alot of people hate BW OU. Because we didn’t ban the broken things flying around, everyone has to either run Sand or run the broken stuff themselves, but that is a topic for another day.

So yes, banning unhealthy threats leads to a more diverse metagame. Agree or disagree but that is the way it is. Also don’t disregard Ubers as a tier, it is a widely popular tier (especially in DPP and BW). It is an option.

Thank you for your answer.
I do however disagree on some points :
- When one pokemon is overcentralizing, it is absolutely normal to ban it ; Dracovish was clearly broken. However, it took some weeks before we could really say, for sure, that it was banworthy.
- In the current gen, "many" pokemons are currently considered "broken" ; but is this a natural evolution of the game (which I think), or an effort on Smogon part to keep a metagame we are so used to removable ? What I mean, is that if there are many "broken" mons, it's maybe because we are currently facing a massive powercreep. In this regard, I think we'd better take it for what it is, and test "truly" broken mons, instead of trying to level the metagme down to what we consider "balance".
- In gen 8, this wasn't an issue at all, since, except for Dracovish, Urshifu S and GDarm (and maybe Melmetal), the new mons weren't as strong as they currently are.
- Moreover, we have to take into account the new mechanic of this Gen. Contrary to Dynamax, which was clearly too overcentralizing and unfit to a 6v6 format (and yet, I keep thinking that we should have dove more into it before banning it), Terastalization seems a bit more "balanced" or less centralizing. In this regard, it redefines the shape of our expectations of what a metagame should look like. I'm pretty sure that Flutter Mane would have had many counters thanks to Tera, had we given it more time.

As for Ubers, I already stated my point : it's not a tier until we actually have more than 2 "real" uber mons. No one was really playing ubers in gen 8 before Pokemon Home came. And moreover, we know that OU banned mons never really shine in the tier.

 

[Not Zer0]

Yes but it means they have to read the switch, and in general i havent seen a great tusk or an iron treads successfully spin against it. They can also get blown up by modest scarf and making spinning always a risk since balloon so common esp since if it runs knock it cant run rocks which means u can just pressure it again. You really struggle especially since if u spin and u hit into it you are just forced out by make it rain always, knock doesn't even KO so you cannot spin -> knock to kill it unless you have booster energy which I have seen less and less run.

Its very easy to make situations where Knock Off is the best midground play and Volt Switch is very noncommittal. This is not demanding on the Donphan pilot. You're right that you're probably not going to kill Gholdengo in one play sequence (unless you accurately call out their switch) but that's just kind of the name of the game when you're playing into a good spin blocker. Its also totally reasonable to run, for example, Corv and Great Tusk, since either can bait in Gholdengo and pop a prospective Balloon, paving your way to a much easier path to removal.
This is more a matter of opinion but I think its good that clicking spin is a risk. Risk and probability management are important skills, and I have never liked the frequency of Defog being an extremely safe play. Same applies to spin.
Of course, if its not Balloon, then yes you are risking being blown up by Make it Rain. However, Gholdengo is not running many items right now. It's probably Air Balloon or Scarf, so if you stay in on an unrevealed item Gholdengo and get exploded by Make It Rain that sounds like your fault to me. You should really be packing something to come in on Scarf Gholdengo anyway in this meta. You can of course also cater your Great Tusk set to beating Air Balloon variants reasonably well.

 

[G-Luke]

Flutter Mane, Houndog, Palafin, Roaring Moon, Iron Bundle, Goldhengo, Annihilape... at this rate, you'd better start making a new tier, which you could call "OU if smogon knew how to adapt to changes". Perhaps the old pokemons which we used to rely on (Corvi, Chansey, Dragapult aso) do not fit the same role as before. But instead of letting something develop, we prefer to try and make the new metagame similar or so to what we were used to. No doubt that following this pattern, Tera will be banned, then the booster energy item, so that, when Home comes, we can once again run the same Corvi/Ferro/Heatran/Pult teams.

Ferro isn't even coming in Home.

I never understood this mentality from people. Why should we sit and wait for weeks to stew on things WE KNOW are dumb with limited counterplay? All because you want a precious little metagame where everything can be used, broken or otherwise. There are three different metagames where you can do that, Ubers, Anything Goes and National Dex AG. Like what is the real issue here? Can you actually provide sensible counterplay to either Palafin or Flutter Mane? Like really?? It's so annoying too because it clogs up the thread and distracts from actually important discussions. You're clearly not interested in OU development with the takes you're spouting, so just like, go play AG or something

 

[ayevon]

Its very easy to make situations where Knock Off is the best midground play and Volt Switch is very noncommittal. This is not demanding on the Donphan pilot. You're right that you're probably not going to kill Gholdengo in one play sequence (unless you accurately call out their switch) but that's just kind of the name of the game when you're playing into a good spin blocker. Its also totally reasonable to run, for example, Corv and Great Tusk, since either can bait in Gholdengo and pop a prospective Balloon, paving your way to a much easier path to removal.
This is more a matter of opinion but I think its good that clicking spin is a risk. Risk and probability management are important skills, and I have never liked the frequency of Defog being an extremely safe play. Same applies to spin.
Of course, if its not Balloon, then yes you are risking being blown up by Make it Rain. However, Gholdengo is not running many items right now. It's probably Air Balloon or Scarf, so if you stay in on an unrevealed item Gholdengo and get exploded by Make It Rain that sounds like your fault to me. You should really be packing something to come in on Scarf Gholdengo anyway in this meta. You can of course also cater your Great Tusk set to beating Air Balloon variants reasonably well.

Games definitely can come down to clicking the right moves with Tusk/Treads fairly often, and fairly early in battles as well. Clicking knock off into a Garchomp with helmet can cause you take north of 50% from earthquake + contact damge, and Glimmora can do huge damage to both with energy ball/earth power or poison you and remove the hazards you set up with mortal spin. Knock is a great move, but the punishment you can take from clicking it into the two premier hazard setters right now is pretty massive.

 

[MrE]

lol? #1 its slow #2 its not passing such high hp subs esp since its taking hits and can just be hit on the special side and even some hits on the physical side can make shed tail fail


Yes but it means they have to read the switch, and in general i havent seen a great tusk or an iron treads successfully spin against it. They can also get blown up by modest scarf and making spinning always a risk since balloon so common esp since if it runs knock it cant run rocks which means u can just pressure it again. You really struggle especially since if u spin and u hit into it you are just forced out by make it rain always, knock doesn't even KO so you cannot spin -> knock to kill it unless you have booster energy which I have seen less and less run. I mean torkoal isnt a good spinner anyway, and it gets pressured anwyay pretty darn hard for trying to do so especially since its free entry for shed tail users

You pass the sub to something that resists what you're currently facing so the sub doesn't break, then you set up on the switch or get a free set up whilst they break the sub and if they switch to something that hits you super effective you tera to hide your weakness and at this point you're so far behind you're unlikely to win. It's broken and it's absurd it wasn't insta banned like baton pass was and always will be.

 

[Not Zer0]

Games definitely can come down to clicking the right moves with Tusk/Treads fairly often, and fairly early in battles as well. Clicking knock off into a Garchomp with helmet can cause you take north of 50% from earthquake + contact damge, and Glimmora can do huge damage to both with energy ball/earth power or poison you and remove the hazards you set up with mortal spin. Knock is a great move, but the punishment you can take from clicking it into the two premier hazard setters right now is pretty massive.

That's absolutely true, been there many times myself. I think you've got to have some balls to go hard Glimmora on either but the Chomp is definitely punishing. Normally this hasn't been as much of a problem for me because I try not to let Chomp stack without taking some punishment so it has to think about switching in on my spinner. Harder to get in the Tusk to spin if it ends up taking Chomp chip but I've found that trade to be pretty worth. I still think Knock is usually a good midground but this is totally a complication that needs to be accounted for.

 

[kosecant]

Here’s an ironic thin about Gholdengo: he’s incredibly vulnerable to hazards. There’s no way for it to recover health as far as I know, which makes it super easy to wear down with some spikes up. People just need to realize that defog is worse than spin in this meta, and that’s okay. There are only like 2-3 good defoggers, and they currently struggle in this highly offensive meta anyways. It’s been pretty well proven that the best spinners in the tier can pretty easily mess Gholdengo up, so just use them if hazards are that big of a problem for your team.

 

[ayevon]

Here’s an ironic thin about Gholdengo: he’s incredibly vulnerable to hazards. There’s no way for it to recover health as far as I know, which makes it super easy to wear down with some spikes up. People just need to realize that defog is worse than spin in this meta, and that’s okay. There are only like 2-3 good defoggers, and they currently struggle in this highly offensive meta anyways. It’s been pretty well proven that the best spinners in the tier can pretty easily mess Gholdengo up, so just use them if hazards are that big of a problem for your team.

it has the move recover and only takes 6.25% from all hazards assuming it has a balloon

 

[Not Zer0]

Here’s an ironic thin about Gholdengo: he’s incredibly vulnerable to hazards. There’s no way for it to recover health as far as I know, which makes it super easy to wear down with some spikes up. People just need to realize that defog is worse than spin in this meta, and that’s okay. There are only like 2-3 good defoggers, and they currently struggle in this highly offensive meta anyways. It’s been pretty well proven that the best spinners in the tier can pretty easily mess Gholdengo up, so just use them if hazards are that big of a problem for your team.

Gholdengo gets Recover and (imo) Air Balloon Recover is its best set, so it can definitely have longevity if you play it well! I wouldn't say its incredibly vulnerable to hazards either considering it resists rock and is immune to tspikes but Spikes can definitely end up being annoying.

 

[carbonlifeform]

If anyone is looking for checks against Annihilape, Sub/Wisp/Disable/Hex 'Pult is as strong as it ever was. Also handles Palafin very well (and lots of other stuff, too). Loves partnering with Glimmora.

Other notes:
I love Iron Hands so much more than I thought I would. It's an amazing offensive glue mon.

TFlame doing pretty well for me as I figure out how to pilot it in it's role. Definitely needs EVs optimized, but will nab a few replays once I ladder a bit higher.

Finally, I really want to love Lokix, but it isn't quite handling what I want it to without Band. Running Adamant First Impression/Sucker/U-turn/Taunt with Silver powder, so maybe it's on me for being too cute?

 

[Soiramio3000]

I don't mind annihilape being banned(although I don't think it is thaaaat broken) but seeing gholdengo getting banned really sucks.
gholdengo should be allowed to be an OU staple.

I just made a good team with gholdengo in it and I don't want my team to be ruined.

sticky web teams will not be functional without it since there are only 3 sticky web setters and they are all flawed.
spidops is the only functional one since it has some bulk and some decent moves.

 

[SinnohEevee]

As a mostly VGC player, I'm curious. Why do you prefer Smogon Singles over VGC? In therms of VGC, I like the quick pace, the concept of making a team where not everyone shows up, and the offensive side of it. There's also arguable more creative ideas and a chance to make support pokemon more useful. That's my opinion, I'm not objective about what I said. Why do you prefer singles?

Smogon lets you generate Pokémon out of thin air instead of having to breed the perfect teams. But I know Game Freak made it easier with the recent gens.