np: UU Stage 3 - We Are The Champions

Moo said:

Hippo makes Sandstorm a bit overwhelming in UU. The reason it does this is because it's miles better than Hippopotas, and usually means that a sandstorm user can keep its weather in play with ease. Hippowdon is much bulkier than Hippopotas, and can even take certain special attacks from the likes of Empoleon and Roserade (around 60% from Scald / Giga Drain) and do a considerable amount of damage back. Pair it with Roserade, which can switch into most things that give Hippowdon trouble, and you can take advantage of bulky waters by setting up on them. Hippowdon's ability to set up Stealth Rock with ease also puts a great hindrance on Hail teams.

Also, it pretty much dominates most things that give Stoutland (best sand sweeper) trouble, which also increases sandstorms effectiveness. Things like Aggron, Rhyperior and Registeel are good examples of these. Hippowdon can easily switch in to these, and attack them or set up Stealth Rock. That's a bit of a strange point, but when you compare sand usage to pre-Hippowdon times, you will see that it's true. The reason for this is because its Attack stat is considerably higher, and it is bulkier too, and has Leftovers. So basically, Hippowdon makes Sandstorm a bit too good, and I think it needs to go.

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SJCrew said:

UU is in such a state of disarray right now and I think many of us now understand why. We were all prepared for some overdue change when we saw the fun new OU drop downs we'd get to play with last month, but none of us had predicted just how unhealthy an effect stronger Sand teams would have on the tier as a result of the one we'd mostly handwaved: Hippowdon. Yes, we did have to deal with Sand teams before the drops. No they were not dominating the leaderboard or seen on every other team. Why?

Let's look at it this way. You send in Rhyperior to counter Stoutland, and you're prepared to spam CB Earthquakes. But in comes the Hippo as your Earthquakes fail to break half, dealing an impressive, but still insufficient range of 43.6% - 51.4% in damage. Free Slack Off for Hippowdon and a chance to perpetuate this cycle until Rhyperior is dead or 3HKO with Earthquake if you're brave enough to stay in. Contrast this to dealing with the useless Hippopotas, who takes this hit about 11% harder without Leftovers recovery (47.1% - 55.6%), but also racks up more net damage attempting to switch into attacks the way Hippowdon does over the course of the match, and has a pathetic Earthquake that merely tickles Rhyperior (23.6% - 28.1%), and other Stoutland checks like Registeel (31.9% - 38.5%; who will then proceed to stall you out with Toxic), and Cobalion (40.9% - 48.3%; no investment). The best it can do to any of these guys is Roar them out after setup, which doesn't stop them from coming back and doing it again.

Now what does this all mean? To start with, Hippopotas is a mediocre physical wall and won't even cover half of the threats you need it for. In order to protect yourself from these checks, you'll need one or two secondary safe switches for the Pokemon Hippopotas will inevitably fall to. If you want Blastoise for spinning, you may even need a third, since Blastoise doesn't cover physical attackers all that well either, and can't check Chandelure at all without a Specially Defensive spread. The liability of having Hippopotas for a teammate extends to the rest of its team, which is forced to try and make do with its shortcomings, and ultimately limits the options available to a Sand player. Without these options, you may miss strategies like Spike stacking, which makes it even easier for Stoutland to muscle past the likes of Rhyperior and friends. Trying to incorporate all of these into a Hippopotas-based Sand team requires a lot of work and will ultimately leave you wondering whether or not you should just use a balanced weatherless team, which has a diverse selection of sweepers with less weaknesses than Stoutland and unlimited flexibility.

In layman's terms:

Hippowdon + Stoutland = the unbreakable god duo

Hippopotas + Stoutland = i have a rock and/or steel-type, gg

We all know what Stoutland can do, as he's been doing it for months. But simply put, he needs more help than Hippopotas can offer, and Hippowdon was the gift from God he needed to be more than just 'viable' in UU. The choice here is clear: ban Hippowdon.

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Heysup said:

Before I actually start, I'm just going to say I'm not talking about the power of SS teams. That is a whole different issue. This is solely about Hippowdon and its effectiveness as a physical wall on a sandstorm team.

It's kind of pathetic that we're talking about banning Hippowdon after not banning Alakazam, and just so this isn't irrelevant complaining, I want to point out that we have a precedent to follow. Where as Alakazam's weakness was that he doesn't 1-2HKO "everything", Hippowdon can't even survive two of most of the attack's he's "supposed to". Offensive vs Defensive is hard to compare, but I can't be the only one that sees how much more difficult to deal with Alakazam really is. Of course, I can still argue its UU for non-precedent related reasons at the risk of being too subjective.

Let's start, as we have to, with the argument to actually ban it. "It walls too much". If this were true, I'd support banning it as it's a valid reason, but I don't believe it's actually anywhere close to being true. Well, I guess there are those who will constantly remind everyone that CBCross, CBRhyperior, and CBAggron "only" get 43% on their respective attacks, which means that Hippowdon avoids a 2HKO....without entry hazards.

There is a common misconception that Spikes and Stealth Rock are not only uncommon, but bad, never used, etc on other teams / specifically against Sandstorm teams....that's one of the most absurd things I've heard in a while. Let's think of the common Sandstorm team, then think of the common Spikers.

Hippowdon / Stoutland / Roserade / Water / Filler / Filler...etc.

Froslass and Roserade are the two most common Spikers in my experience, and Froslass sets up 2 layers on 4 of those Pokemon, 3 safely on 2 of them, and it threatens 3 of them with setting up a layer and KOing afterwards. Roserade sets up on Hippowdon (though it needs to be switched into Stealth Rock or on a double switch etc) and the ever-present bulky waters.

Rapid Spinners do exist. For example, Hitmontop, Blastoise, Donphan. How does one plan on keeping Spikes off the field when one can't switch into any Spiker? Are you going to spin on Froslass? Blastoise vs Froslass ends with 3 layers of Spikes and a Blastoise at ~35% from Pain Split and a weak Ice Beam. Hitmontop can't even touch Froslass. Donphan is not only KOed by Ice Beam flat out, but also loses if Froslass switches into anything besides Head Smash. VS Roserade? Blastoise dies. Donphan dies. Hitmontop loses, but can Spin...but those Spikes are going right back up after Hitmontop switches out. Please note for late: all of these Spinners can easily spin on Hippowdon himself and other common Sandstorm Pokemon.

So sorry, over-optimists, to rain on your parade, but you are not going to prevent hazards from being up for at least some of the game as an effective Sandstorm team.

Now that we have established the ease in which both Spikes and Stealth Rock are put on the field, it's time to really evaluate the effectiveness of Hippowdon's physical defense. All of the sudden those 43% minimum attacks, 3HKOes, become 2HKOes just like that with one layer of Spikes and no Stealth Rock. What makes matters worse is that Stoutland is almost always paired with Hippowdon meaning Pokemon such as Aggron and Rhyperior get free switch-ins. Stealth Rock alone reduces the chance of Hippowdon surviving by about half (as far as I know).

What about those people that say, "well one side having Spikes means the other side also having Spikes"? Well not only is this not true, but it's also irrelevant. Believe it or not, Heracross and Rhyperior deal the same amount of damage with ~80-90% of their HP as they do with 100%. Hippowdon cannot take the same amount of damage with only ~80-90% HP.

You may be thinking, "what does Hippowdon even wall?", and the answer is simple: not many physical heavy hitters or special attackers. However, he walls some weaker fast sweepers like Scarf Flygon, Scarf Darmanitan, and the like. Make no mistake, this is an argument in favor of Hippowdon. He also still checks those "43%" Pokemon quite easily, though Heracross is still a hard motherfucker to deal with. That's his main use. Getting him in, setting up Sandstorm, and checking a lot of Pokemon with his moderate attack and amazing defense, he is still incredibly useful. He can turn Stoutland from shit into a killing machine, making offensive teams cry as their health dwindles, and makes stall teams cry by Roaring them around with no Lefties recovery.

This is only physical attacks so far, and at the risk of sounding heavily one-sided against Hippowdon I'm just going to point out that almost every powerful Special Attacker has a way to 1-2HKO it, and pretty easily. It only resists common Special Attacks including Sludge Bomb and Thunderbolt, but those are coming from Roserade and Zapdos, what on earth is Hippowdon going to do against those two.

In conclusion and in summary, Hippowdon is UU. He is (subjective as this may be) far less scary defensive as Alakazam is offensively, so by precedent we should not ban him if we are to really believe that Alakazam is UU. But more importantly, he simply isn't good enough. Thanks for reading this whole thing / fuck you if you didn't.

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kd24 said:

there are multiple things we need to consider when making this decision - the most important of which is "why hippowdon specifically" - as others will claim and state when we arent discussing hippopotas.

what makes hippowdon broken is not solely him the pokemon or solely sandstorm - it is hippowdon summoning the sandstorm. i think this is point that needs to be addressed - it is hippowdons synergy and what he means as a teammate for sandstorm teams that make him broken.

so before i start talking about hippowdon and hippopotas, let me just explain why hippo summoning sand is broken in the first place - hippowdon creates a completely unhealthy metagame where he combos with pokemon that receive ridiculous boosts with him as a partner - boosts that indirectly overpower multiple pokemon.

i can start with the most obvious one - stoutland. there couldnt have been a better match made in UU than these two and its obvious why - stoutland (who can deal with ghosts so we can ignore that) spams choice banded frustrations only resisted and hence forth walled by the scarce amount of rock-types and steel-types. hippowdon in turn wall most of these pokemon, or force them into terrible positions (this is because one of the only "safe" methods to defeating this combo relies on giving these walls choice band or high impact items like life orb, which in turn only makes it harder for them to wall stoutland or for them to defend against any other part of the team, generally geared perfectly towards defeating these threats). many of the same arguments taken from excadrill's arguments apply perfectly to stoutland - he destroys speed tiers and completely forces the meta around himself. imagine in ou, if exca was weaker and forced to use a cb to do damage, but to make up for it, he had a sand partner which completely walled all of his counters - this is why hippowdon is like for stoutland. so why you may wish to argue "stoutland is broken" and there isn't anything wrong with doing that - the offender of non competitiveness is hippowdon who as i said before, creates all sorts of combos that are almost impossible to break through - made even tougher by stoutland (and alakazam).

i suppose ill get to alakazam next - this is yet another sweeper who absolutely benefits from hippowdon. hippo has the ability to wall what you were using to stop alakazam such as escavalier and non wisp spiritomb - a zam with a substitute provides another form of attack that hippowdon entirely supports and like i have mentioned before - zam requires almost no prediction with a sub and the right teammates. the time for zam to be banned has passed but it doesnt mean we cant eliminate the bigger offender, the pokemon who once again like stoutland, provides yet another pokemon perfect support.

so "hippo cant wall cb attacks 'that well' and still has trouble with super effective attacks" - my retort is so what? hippowdon doesnt care about that, hes walling the things he is supposed to wall while hitting back hard enough, supporting all the general teammates around him. i can go one step further and mention roserade and a bulky water-type - one again, beautiful type synergy with hippowdon, being able to take the water, ice, grass attacks directed at him, being able to counter more of those threats that would wall your attackers, and setting up spikes / phazing around in the process. this is a combination that beautifully plays itself out for you. the last slot barely matters but you may see a ghost or a scarf flygon or w/e - it doesn't matter much here, this is usually just meant to plug up the holes left. the problem, like i said, is the issue of hippo + the perfect attacking partners + perfect defensive partners - the only way to truly dominate this meta besides using sand yourself is to completely go anti-meta - thats how over centralizing sand is.

now why hippowdon and not hippopotas? well that should be clear from my paragraphs but i will reiterate it clearly here: hippopotas does not provide the walling or attacking support that hippowdon does. it is not eliminating the counters of zam or stoutland (escavalier and bisharp, things hippowdon could wall can now threaten not only hipppopotas but the whole team structure by default) because it doesnt have the same defensive prowess of hippowdon - the lack of recovery, the decrease of bulk, the MUCH weaker attacking power - they turn hippopotas into a LIABILITY, not a threat like hippowdon. its my belief that stoutland and sand in general becomes very manageable with the liability that is hippopotas providing the sand - and this is why im in favor of banning hippowdon, its his summoning of sand with his unique qualities that creates broken threats and a broken metagame.

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ToF said:

I think there is a reason that the majority of teams atop the UU leaderboard are Sand teams. If you haven't understood yet, the answer is simple: Hippowdon. Hippowdon was the drop that Sand teams needed in order to in my opinion become the dominant strategy in the tier. Although Stoutland is the premier sweeper on Sandstorm teams, the reason the Hippowdon - Stoutland combination is so difficult to defeat is because of the mighty Hippowdon.

The most common Stoutland counter I've seen is Rock-types, namely Rhyperior, and Steel-types, namely Registeel.. Without a layer of Spikes and Stealth Rock out, not even CB Rhyperior can 2HKO physically defensive Hippowdon. As for Registeel, it's doing nothing but Toxic'ing your Hippowdon, which can be remedied by some team support (Aromatherapy, Heal Bell). Hippowdon in this manner becomes the perfect partner to Stoutland - all of Stoutland's premier counters are walled by Hippowdon. If you analyze Hippopotas in the same scenario, not only does it take hits less effectively than Hippowdon even with Eviolite, but it's also more prone to hazards damage because of a lack of Leftovers. Additionally, Hippowdon has a much larger base attack stat, which translates to a much stronger Earthquake when checking these strong physical threats.

Based off of laddering with multiple teams (Sand, Stall, and Hail), I personally think Sand and Hail are the dominant strategies and most powerful strategies in the tier. If it came down to Sand vs. Hail, Sand IMO has the advantage because of the versatility of the Hippowdon + Stoutland combination. In order to compensate for both of these weathers being too powerful, I think the fully evolved parent need's to be booted to stabilize the power-creep. Sand in this case will still be quite the force even with Hippopotas as the weather-inducer, but not nearly be as difficult to break as the Hippowdon - Stoutland combination.

As of now, the BW UU tier is kind of in a flux because of the different weather capabilities. These weather conditions IMO are too strong; you might not agree with this assessment, but the data is in front of you. The majority of top 10 ladder teams are sand, and people have gotten to #1 on the ladder with simple BlizzSpam teams. If you want to diminsh the capabilities of these kinds of teams, you need to hit them at their source: the weather inducer. Hopefully, by banning Hippowdon (and hopefully eventually Abomasnow), not only will weather teams take a bit of a hit, but it will also encourage greater variety of teams (which as of now are kind of non-existent, and limited to Sand, Hail, and Stall).

Hippowdon should be BL for a tl:dr.

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Snunch said:

Hippowdon is a tricky pokemon to evaluate. It plays two major roles: countering nearly every physical attacker that can’t hit it with a super effective attack and providing sand stream support as a direct way of supporting Stoutland. With phazing, recovery, and a high attack stat, Hippowdon is difficult to set up on. Hippowdon is broken in UU because both roles have significant detrimental effects on the metagame, and a ban on Hippowdon is the best way to fix both.

Make no mistake; Hippowdon walls nearly every physical attacker in UU, the only exceptions being super effective hits and outrageously strong CB attacks from pokemon like Heracross. Even adamant Darmanitan can’t break Hippowdon. The difference between Hippowdon and other walls such as Cresselia is that Hippowdon is not easily exploitable. With a high attack stat, a solid movepool, reliable recovery, and phazing, Hippowdon is both difficult to switch into and difficult to set up on. A high number of powerful special attackers in UU can’t comfortably come in on Earthquake, and Hippowdon can run a very viable specially defensive spread that allows it to take on pokemon like Alakazam and Chandelure in exchange for losing the ability to counter unboosted Darmanitan. Hippowdon reminds me of Chansey, except that Hippowdon can both phaze and actually attack. Judging solely on its ability to wall such a significant portion of the metagame alone, Hippowdon is an elite UU wall.

Although it is certainly not broken itself, sandstorm as a passive effect should not be ignored when discussing Hippowdon. By virtue of being a great pokemon, Hippowdon has made sandstorm a common field condition. This was not true with Hippopotas because it was a bad pokemon and therefore very rare. Sandstorm as a common field condition in UU, however, restricts the number of viable strategies in UU and decreases diversity. Life Orb sweepers without recovery are virtually dead, as the benefits of using LO are in every case outweighed by the fact that the pokemon in question is suicidal. For example, LO Raikou can break through the bulky ground types that normally haunt it, but losing the extra 6.25% health per turn makes it a clearly inferior set in practice. A larger concern, and one that should receive more attention, is sand making rendering many recovery moves moot. This heavily detracts from the metagame, as many pokemon that would otherwise range from viable to key staples in the metagame. Pokemon like Arcanine could be centerpieces of this metagame, and pokemon like Tangrowth could be viable physical walls, but sand renders them completely unviable. Again, I’m not arguing that these factors solely warrant a ban on sand, just that they contribute to the big picture.

Alright, now for the big issue: Stoutland. Anybody who plays UU for a day can tell that Hippowdon + Stoutland is a broken combination. Stoutland has good natural bulk and spams a type with good neutral coverage, and can even switch in safely and pursuit the ghosts who would stop it. This makes a team of offensive pokemon unviable without using one of the precious few rocks / steels that actually check Stoutland. The top of the ladder reflects this, with every team either being a sand clone or carrying one of the precious few Stoutland checks. The silver lining is that for the most part, bulky rocks and steels stop Stoutland cold. This would make it risky to use a sand team in UU; much like rain dance teams, you would be removing skill from the match in order to play a match that was almost entirely decided by team matchup. This is why rain dance teams do not work well on the ladder, and it is the risk that balances out the power of Stoutland. However, with Hippowdon, this silver lining disappears. Every bulky rock / steel that makes a good check to Stoutland is dealt with quite easily by Hippowdon. Cobalion, Bisharp, most Rhyperior, Registeel, etc. are all hard countered by Hippowdon. This removes the inherient risk that should be associated with using a sandstorm team and is not a balanced strategy. By contrast, Hippopotas actually loses to pokemon like SD Cobalion and is easily exploited. Therefore, banning Hippowdon but allowing Hippopotas to stay would balance out sand.

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DetroitLolcat said:

I really didn't want to vote "Ban" for Hippowdon as I'm generally opposed to banning things in general, but Hippowdon is just simply too good for UU because of the team support and the ease of abusing Sand in the current metagame. Hippowdon provides so much utility to a Sand team that Hippopotas couldn't, and this great utility really pushes the papa Hippo over the edge.

It needs to be said that this is a vote on Hippowdon, not Sand in general. Sand will still be alive and well in UU with Hippopotas setting it up, so I'm only considering the effects of Hippowdon's presence over Hippopotas's and why those buffs make Hippowdon a broken force in UU.

I feel that I'm reiterating the points the other Council members said when talking about the broken core of Stoutland and Hippowdon. In the previous metagame, Hippopotas had very little general utility; it had all of the support options Hippowdon has now, but not enough bulk (and a lack of Leftovers!) to take UU's most powerful Physical hits and therefore much less ability to abuse its support options. Hippowdon can wall every Physical attacker that doesn't carry a super-effective attack besides the best of the best Choice Band users.

Even though things like Choice Band Heracross and (rarely) Choice Band Rhyperior can break the Stout+Hippo core, spamming Choice Banded Fighting and Ground type attacks doesn't go very far in UU, as bulky Ghosts like Mismagius or Golurk can ruin your day. Hippowdon also gets reliable recovery in Slack Off, so giving it even a single turn without pressuring it can put your team in a world of hurt.

Hippowdon gets Leftovers recovery, too. All of those 43-53% calculations (e.g., CB Rhyperior, CB Aggron) just went from clean 2KOs to requiring Spikes support as well. And what if the opponent predicts an Earthquake and sends out Mismagius? You just lost all of your offensive momentum trying to break the Hippo. Hippopotas, however, can't take as many hits that just barely 2KO because he doesn't have the Leftovers recovery that Hippowdon can use to avoid losing to those threats. Hippowdon can also do significant damage to opponents with its massive Earthquakes, which have significant offensive presence even without investment. Hippopotas's 180 Attack just falls short.

But the key issue here is what Hippowdon's support does to Stoutland. Notice that I said Hippowdon support, not Sand support. Hippowdon+Stoutland has so much synergy that UU simply cannot handle it. The Pokemon that wall Stoutland like Rhyperior, Aggron, and Registeel can't do a thing to Hippowdon. Rhyperior needs two hazards to have a chance at beating Hippowdon, Aggron needs to use CB Aqua Tail to even have a chance with hazards (and spamming CB Aqua Tail makes you Roserade bait). Registeel can't do a thing to any common Sand staple besides Toxic Hippowdon. But Roserade sets up on Registeel all day.

Pokemon that want to come in on Hippowdon (bulky Waters) simply can't handle Stoutland with one layer of hazards and Sandstorm active. All of the Bulky Waters that take 42% damage from CB Return suddenly can't take two hits because of Spikes, Stealth Rock, and Sandstorm. And even if not all of those are up and the Water survives, it can't come in later and do it again. Not to mention that Roserade beats up on Bulky Waters, so using a bulky Water to check Stoutland suddenly gives the opponent a free turn to throw Spikes at you. Bottom line is Stoutland ends up winning in the end, even if you temporarily stop him. And all those Ghosts are taken out by Crunch. Even if you can stop Stoutland by predicting well, it won't matter when Stoutland comes in later and Pursuits your Ghost out of the match, then comes in to spam more Returns.

With Hippopotas, Sand teams have to outsource their main Physical walls, which restores a sense of balance to the UU tier. Hippowdon can take just too many hits, recover off the damage, and form an impenetrable core with Stoutland, and that's why I have to vote Hippowdon BL.

You're only beating Stoutland's Return if your opponent accidentally set Happiness to 0. And if he's using Frustration...

God help you.

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