To get the metagame in shape for NDPL as fast as possible, we’ve decided to hold another council vote against any possible odds to follow. Given the circumstances of the outcome. Blaziken is now quickbanned from National Dex UU.
BlazikenBlaziken’s offensive capabilities, while underwhelming at first glance, is no stranger to anyone who has played it. Thanks to Speed Boost, its brutal STAB combination, and access to Swords Dance, the reality behind dealing with Blaziken goes from colloquial to borderline impossible. After a boost, very few Pokemon are capable of standing up at the combination of Fire + Fighting coverage, whereas resists to both such as Gyarados and Tapu Fini are easily threatened by Life Orb Thunder Punch, or Knock Off in the case of non-Colbur Berry Slowbro, Skeledirge, and the Lati-twins. Air Balloon sets also make for valid choices in the itemslot, being used to grab free setup opportunities against Grounds such as Hippowdon and Excadrill, albeit at the cost of immediate power.
Beyond this, thanks to the prevalence of Dual Screens support from Grimmsnarl, to say nothing of its pre-existing ability to threaten common defensive Pokemon otherwise used to deal with physical threats, such as Aegislash, Buzzwole, Skarmory, and Tangrowth, made better by the removal of Terastalization, nullifying their ability to live one such hit in a pinch and retaliate, these changes have resulted in Blaziken becoming far more consistent at finding opportunities to setup and threaten opposing teams. To top things off, the majority of our Speed Control options in this metagame that are actually capable of outspeeding Blaziken at +1, such as Mega Aerodactyl and Choice Scarf Latias, are also extremely unreliable due to only being able to check Blaziken within a very narrow window of turns, on top of needing to play around the risk of being attacked on the way in, while its common resistances to priority moves such as Scizor’s Bullet Punch, and Bisharp or Cinderace’s Sucker Punch, do them no favors in this regard either.
Thus, as a result of being thoroughly overwhelming to account for with too few reliable options able to stop it, we have unanimously opted to quickban Blaziken from the tier.
Light ClayWhile Blaziken was very much seen as an unreasonable presence to have in the metagame. Light Clay just narrowly avoided a quickban, and will be expected to continue playing an important factor in supplementing the offensive potential of several other Pokemon during NDPL for some time, most notably the likes of Galarian Moltres, Celesteela, and Dragon Dance Mega Tyranitar. How potential action against it affects the ongoing Premier League remains a subject we will be looking to decide on down the road, be it a quickban into immediate retest, or something else.
The full voting list can be found here:
| Enamorus | Blaziken | Aegislash | Gyarados | Sableye-Mega | Light Clay | |
| Arishem | Do Not Ban | Ban | Do Not Ban | Suspect (1) | Do Not Ban | Suspect (2) |
| sanguine | Do Not Ban | Ban | Do Not Ban | Suspect | abstain | Ban |
| Runo | Do Not Ban | Ban | Do Not Ban | Suspect (2) | Suspect (1) | Ban |
| Niadev | Do Not Ban | Ban | Do Not Ban | Suspect | Abstain | Ban |
| Pubo | Do Not Ban | Ban | Do Not Ban | suspect(2) | Do Not Ban | Suspect (1) |
| Outcome | No Action | Banned | No Action | Suspect (2) | No Action | Suspect (1) |
Aegislash and Enamorus continued to be voted on, although it appears that opinions around them around have become comparatively tame besides their pre-Terastal incarnations. In addition, as Gyarados and Mega Sableye received suspect votes too, we will continue to revisit these Pokemon in the near future as well.
I hope to see a very exciting NDPL Season for anyone involved. Tagging Kris to help implement this.