I would suggest you bring it up in the RBY and GSC viability lists as well, then.
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OU ADV OU Viability Ranking
- Thread starter McMeghan
- Start date
this is not really too important but I think hariyama is significantly better than machamp in adv ou and it's probably historically more common in ou as well. it can get more bulk out of its stats, even without thick fat, and whirlwind and knock off are pretty decent utility moves (since neither one can really sweep or kill much anyway esp w celebi, starmie, gengar, zapdos, claydol and mence being common as hell). there was a time when it seemed like i was playing against cm blissey/mixtar/forry stall teams exclusively and a lot of p2 so i tried out hariyama and machamp w my own pursuit-tar and dugtrio just kinda as fun gimmicks to see how well they could deal with the meta. they were solid stops to those issues definitely but with sand/spikes set up they're definitely not consistent enough defensively to do anything else, and they don't pull their weight offensively. regardless, yammy was totally better.
Sableye is better with knock off than hariyama.
Once upon a time, when real players used to play without legends, curselax was a serious threat and sableye was a nice counter. Sableye can block spin from forretress and claydol, can knock off, can counter medicham bander, standard curselax +6 dont ohko sableye with shadow ball. Don't have any weakness. Dugtrio cant trap cause you have recover instead of rest.
Its a nice poke in defensive teams or with tyranitar so you can know if the pokes have leftovers or choice band, most players dont want another knock off and go full to attack and their pkmn with choice band or dugtrio eat a nice counter. I think sableye can be a C-Rank.
Once upon a time, when real players used to play without legends, curselax was a serious threat and sableye was a nice counter. Sableye can block spin from forretress and claydol, can knock off, can counter medicham bander, standard curselax +6 dont ohko sableye with shadow ball. Don't have any weakness. Dugtrio cant trap cause you have recover instead of rest.
Its a nice poke in defensive teams or with tyranitar so you can know if the pokes have leftovers or choice band, most players dont want another knock off and go full to attack and their pkmn with choice band or dugtrio eat a nice counter. I think sableye can be a C-Rank.
List Changes:
I wouldn't be against some sort of debate about the S-Rank Pokemon. What should get spot 2/3/4 between Cune/Gengar/Celebi in your opinion?
Thanks for the replies once again, and feel free to propose anything that could cross your mind.
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Snorlax dropped to A-Rank (1st spot there).
- Alakazam and
Sableye added to C-Rank, at the bottom of the list.
- Swapped Zapdos and
Aerodactyl spot in A-Rank.
- Moved up Hariyama in C-Rank, as well as Tauros while Jynx got moved down.
- Many people advocated for Snorlax being Top A-Rank instead of S-Rank, something I can get behind. While being a metagame-definer Pokemon with a lot of different options going for it, everyone is prepared for it nowadays in some (and multiple) shape or forms and I think it's easier to play around than the other S-Ranked Pokemon, notably because of its poor speed.
- For the reasons mentionned in the thread, I felt like Alakazam and Sableye deserved a spot in the list. You can argue for them to be higher in the C-Rank for the next update.
- I decided to swap Zapdos and Aero in the list, like some players asked in the thread. I could go back to the old order but I feel like Zapdos deserves to be higher for its ability to run more than one set and because it's so good on both the offensive and defensive spectrum nowadays (on top of being an amazing spikes abuser).
I wouldn't be against some sort of debate about the S-Rank Pokemon. What should get spot 2/3/4 between Cune/Gengar/Celebi in your opinion?
Thanks for the replies once again, and feel free to propose anything that could cross your mind.
I think Gyarados should be moved up a fair amount. Passing Milotic would be too much, but passing porygon2 would be fine. Gyarados is immediately compared to Salamence because both have intimidate and function as dragon dance users. I'm not going to come out and say Salamence is worse than Gyarados- Gyarados is slower and doesn't have rock slide or a usable special attack stat. However gyarados has one amazing move that gives him a spot as a dangerous pokemon: taunt. With taunt it suddenly walls like suicune and skarmory can only whittle away at gyarados' excellent bulk while it sets up. It is very important to gyarados that he resists water and is neutral to ice. When you think about it the only "hard" counter gyarados has is Zapdos. Of course it's not that difficult to work around but at +1 almost nothing will outspeed and it can hit everything pretty hard with HP flying or earthquake. And let me say this again: gyarados gets past waters. There is no scald in gen3, the best they can go for are weak ice beams. Salamence (barring HP grass) will have issues with Pert and Milotic every time, and Gyarados goes straight past them. Of course the zapdos issue is bad and it has some other issues, but overall it deserves better than where it is right now.
Is the Smeargle thing an in-joke?
As if not I think there's a case for C-Rank and just getting rid of that other rank, mainly because of that team that had such good success in Smogon Tour. You can go Spikes with it too. It certainly fits in that category with other nichemons.
As if not I think there's a case for C-Rank and just getting rid of that other rank, mainly because of that team that had such good success in Smogon Tour. You can go Spikes with it too. It certainly fits in that category with other nichemons.
Still think Zap should be higher. Skarm and Pert are both super reliable mons but they just don't rank above Zap for me, who is both reliable and versatile, and its a rare occasion indeed when you realise Zapdos can't pull its weight in a matchup, which Pert and Skarm suffer from somewhat frequently given their lack of offensive presence (Pert not so much, but he struggles to do much aside from being the team buffer, given that half the time his attacks just thud against a Celebi). Playing against a Zapdos is playing against a multidimensional threat- it can wall, hit hard, and support all to an effective degree, and while you know it has Thunderbolt the rest of the possibilities leave it pretty up in the air as to what it will do.
As far as positions 2/3/4 go, imo it should be Gar>Cele>Cune. Gar is pretty much the face of despair in the meta, a myriad ways to ruin your day, even when you know the set it will still be troublesome, has a jolly easy time switching in thanks to that amazing typing (its one of the few things that can somewhat safely come in on Heracross, even Skarmory can't do that anymore), and because of those it additionally becomes the most viable spinblocker in the game, by a significant margin. Its got obvious downfalls but in the hands of good players Gengar just has too much going for it to not be #2 imo, there are too many teams where its worth a slot.
Cele for 3 because like Gengar, its by far the most viable mon of its type in the tier, being more than capable of soaking up Surfs and EQs, in addition to Leech Seeds, although Grass isn't nearly as desirable as Ghost is. With Natural Cure and Recover Celebi can basically buy you momentum by switching in(as well as being the hardest mon to remove in the tier). On top of that it can fulfill multiple roles on a team, with CM, Baton Pass, Psong, and Heal Bell to its name, and base 100 across the board to perform them all. Not as good as Gar because the value of its typing to a team isn't as beneficial, and Celebi in general is much more exploitable I find. Cune for 4 because while its a very potent offensive and defensive threat, it has to vie with Pert and Milo for a teamslot, and is compounded as a defensive mon by having only Rest as a recovery while being vulnerable to both Sand and Spikes. If I'm honest, I don't think it serves as a viable Mence/Aero check unless its running non CM Rest Talk. Using CM in that role tries to accomplish too much. A Resting Cune is far more often than not as good as a dead one once theres Spikes down, I find. I think Subcune is probably its best set right now, but it is a significant compromise from a role it would normally fill. I don't think Cune is by any means weak, or even significantly worse than its other S tier peers, but I think the fact that Pert and Milo exist is a significant impact on its viability compared to the other S-tiers that really are unique in their roles in the meta.
edit- also want to add that dodrio is basically just a worse mence/aero unless you really consider quick attack a legitimate reason to use it, drill peck doesnt even make it better because dodrio's attack makes it still weaker than mence and dodrio's movepool is so terrible your hidden power is going to be some garbage like steel or ground(where contemporaries would have EQ). cant fill an agilipass role either because, well, zapdos exists, who is just better in flat out every way. dont put dodrio on the list
As far as positions 2/3/4 go, imo it should be Gar>Cele>Cune. Gar is pretty much the face of despair in the meta, a myriad ways to ruin your day, even when you know the set it will still be troublesome, has a jolly easy time switching in thanks to that amazing typing (its one of the few things that can somewhat safely come in on Heracross, even Skarmory can't do that anymore), and because of those it additionally becomes the most viable spinblocker in the game, by a significant margin. Its got obvious downfalls but in the hands of good players Gengar just has too much going for it to not be #2 imo, there are too many teams where its worth a slot.
Cele for 3 because like Gengar, its by far the most viable mon of its type in the tier, being more than capable of soaking up Surfs and EQs, in addition to Leech Seeds, although Grass isn't nearly as desirable as Ghost is. With Natural Cure and Recover Celebi can basically buy you momentum by switching in(as well as being the hardest mon to remove in the tier). On top of that it can fulfill multiple roles on a team, with CM, Baton Pass, Psong, and Heal Bell to its name, and base 100 across the board to perform them all. Not as good as Gar because the value of its typing to a team isn't as beneficial, and Celebi in general is much more exploitable I find. Cune for 4 because while its a very potent offensive and defensive threat, it has to vie with Pert and Milo for a teamslot, and is compounded as a defensive mon by having only Rest as a recovery while being vulnerable to both Sand and Spikes. If I'm honest, I don't think it serves as a viable Mence/Aero check unless its running non CM Rest Talk. Using CM in that role tries to accomplish too much. A Resting Cune is far more often than not as good as a dead one once theres Spikes down, I find. I think Subcune is probably its best set right now, but it is a significant compromise from a role it would normally fill. I don't think Cune is by any means weak, or even significantly worse than its other S tier peers, but I think the fact that Pert and Milo exist is a significant impact on its viability compared to the other S-tiers that really are unique in their roles in the meta.
edit- also want to add that dodrio is basically just a worse mence/aero unless you really consider quick attack a legitimate reason to use it, drill peck doesnt even make it better because dodrio's attack makes it still weaker than mence and dodrio's movepool is so terrible your hidden power is going to be some garbage like steel or ground(where contemporaries would have EQ). cant fill an agilipass role either because, well, zapdos exists, who is just better in flat out every way. dont put dodrio on the list
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Double posting and bumping because on reflection I think a lot of whats in C currently belongs in gimmick tier. I think there's a noticable difference right now with a lot of them in that some of them have clear niches and are easily justifiable over other high tier mons on the right team, whereas some of them are questionable no matter what team you put them on.
I'll highlight which ones I think are gimmicky in particular-
On this note, I'd also like to bring back a bunch of mons mentioned earlier in the thread - Miltank, Kingdra, Ludicolo and such. If we were to expand gimmick tier to include the above mentioned mons I think these ones also belong there as well. Tbh I think the entirety of the rest of BL that we haven't covered would go there but some of BL just isn't notable at all (Registeel, Zangoose, etc) and so not worth mentioning anyway.
Anyway, thoughts?
I'll highlight which ones I think are gimmicky in particular-
- I can't see how Weezing really achieves a lot, on paper its great but I think a physical wall trying to burn things isn't as great as it sounds, especially when one of the things it would primarily check (Heracross) loves being statused, either from WoW or Sludge Bomb. FT/FB help in this regard but tbh I think I'd rather just carry a Mence or Gar or something, especially considering Weezing has pretty mediocre offensive utility outside boom. Yeah its a good lax answer, but so is Skarm, who just so happens to overlap on a lot of what Weez does, while doing more.
- Its basically worse than TTar in every way other than having a super strong EQ (and I guess it can live a BB), but even then TTar can generally break through stuff with repeated RSes. Megahorn isn't really much of a benefit because HP Bug generally creams its intended target anyway. I guess its slightly better at checking Mence/Aero? But not really.
- Read Rhydon, then remember it doesn't have a Flying or Normal resist, or a STAB RS. Can't switch in on anything. No option of lefties. Urk. Use Bandgon, it hits just as hard but without being a sucky mon.
- Basically Heracross does Machamp better. And so does Medicham. And so does Hariyama. Pretty much no matter what role you put it in one of its compadres will do it better. I think pretty much the only role it can contend with any of them as is as a bulky bander (Hariyama's speed really sucks for that), but I think thats pretty far down the niche barrel when you have a mon that can do only one thing possibly better than another 2 BL mons who receive negligable usage anyway, despite being otherwise better than Champ.
- In a metagame with no attacks Skarm and SD Focus Punch Hera existing, I see very little reason for Blaziken. Its not actually got any worse, but its just made redundant, I feel. The situations I envision where its better off than Heracross are when its running shit like HP Ice vs a Mence but all you really gain from that is an OHKO off of your prediction instead of the likely 2HKO you would've got if you predicted with Hera and gone for RS. And the opportunity cost for running mixed offenses over what you would run on Hera is pretty big IMO.
- I've never found a realistic use for this. Claydol has Spikes immunity (thats kinda huge for a spinner), checks what its supposed to check (TTar, Mence, Flygon) better, and has access to other support moves like Boom and Screens. Also has solid special bulk to actually take a Hidden Power/Ice Punch if need be. And a STAB Psychic for Gar. Donphan has like, a good EQ going for it. A good EQ does not a viable mon make. You could argue for HP Ghost in its 4th slot but I still don't think that really sells it over Dol on any team.
On this note, I'd also like to bring back a bunch of mons mentioned earlier in the thread - Miltank, Kingdra, Ludicolo and such. If we were to expand gimmick tier to include the above mentioned mons I think these ones also belong there as well. Tbh I think the entirety of the rest of BL that we haven't covered would go there but some of BL just isn't notable at all (Registeel, Zangoose, etc) and so not worth mentioning anyway.
Anyway, thoughts?
restalk wisp haze (which owns hera) is very good and i find its a lot harder for physical offense to overwhelm than skarm (and then theres always mag). dont discount the offensive set, it can potentially do a lot of damage... i remember funkasaurus had a team with it and it was surprisingly hard to switch into. i dont think it belongs in gimmick tier since its a good mon on its own and gimmick tier is home to a lot of garbage
i dunno, ttar is pretty strong but rhydons stab eq and access to sd makes it harder to wall for most teams that ordinarily wouldnt struggle with tar which i think is a great niche. its because of this that its better at busting open waters and that lets you sweep with a dder (like ttar himself!) so i think rhydon is fine here. also being harder to kill for dugtrio is pretty sweet.
havent used wak much but this seems accurate, although its one of the best receivers on those agili bp zapdos teams
yea i dont like machamp very much, agreed
i can see what youre saying and dont have a real counter argument aside from my feeling that putting ken in gimmick tier just seems wrong (bias aside)... it might be that stab fire is great offense and surprising mence with hp ice (bulkier sets are harder to wear down with -1 rock slides especially the wish variants) is always great. theres also that hp flying steelix that shuts hera down if it doesnt come into a focus punch that blaziken has no trouble with as well as raping unboosted slow jirachi. i agree that hera is usually better but ken as a gimmick just doesnt seem accurate.
claydol gets harassed by crunch/pursuit tar and struggles vs hp bug forre. also donphan is physically bulky as fuck and therefore much harder to wear down, especially since it can run protect (needs pursuit support obviously but its worth it). not quite gimmick tier imo...
I agree with weezing. It can be quite difficult to take down if you lack the right pokemon or if you're special attackers are ko'd. You cant reliably set up on it because of haze and it shuts down offensive threats with wilo wisp; a move usually only found on ghosts like gengar. It has pain split for recovery. Its pretty much the perfect answer for pokemon like snorlax. I could see it as a higher C rank imo.
I've been seeing more blaziken around for some reason and tbh, I find them to be somewhat unremarkable. On paper, they should be able to handle a good portion of the metagame but it doesnt have the speed to handle faster teams. It does make for pretty good wallbreaker when it sets up since its immune to burns although its too bad it cant boost any of its fire stab or coverage moves (besides rock slide or earthquake). Overall though I think its fine with where it is.
I've been seeing more blaziken around for some reason and tbh, I find them to be somewhat unremarkable. On paper, they should be able to handle a good portion of the metagame but it doesnt have the speed to handle faster teams. It does make for pretty good wallbreaker when it sets up since its immune to burns although its too bad it cant boost any of its fire stab or coverage moves (besides rock slide or earthquake). Overall though I think its fine with where it is.
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Alright, fair play to Weez. Though Restalk Wisp Haze just sounds crazy to me.
SD just has a generally terrible time setting up and base 40 speed does it no favours, and even in terms of a band set rhydons extra power just feels eh when TTar can often get off 2 hits on the things rhydon would be hitting once before they can actually respond, and also be able to take a SE special attack without instantly crumbling and proceed to maim a check anyway. With Rhydon you're giving up a lot of versatility and also a lot of defensive synergy, for what are (I think) pretty inconsequential benefits.
I don't know how I feel about Don+Tar...I'm just struggling to see why you wouldn't use something reliable like Aero there instead, who does pretty much the same job. Or, if you wanted to toy around with fun stuff, Regirock, who actually does something unique.
Honestly I did feel awkward myself suggesting it, but I really don't think its worth C. Those examples aren't ever going to sway you when you're building a team, lets be honest- I don't think anyone sits there and goes "What if they use a HP flying Steelix!? Gotta tweak my team for that top tier threat!" and if you're sending the chicken in on a rachi you're at he point in the game where you're clutching at straws. You're never putting Blaziken into a team because its the best choice- you're putting it in because you want to use Blaziken. Thats what constitutes a gimmick, as far as I know.
Pursuittar also harrasses Phan with HP Grass/Crunch/Ice Beam anyway since its special bulk is sub par, it may be harder to wear down through sheer attacks but the matchups where Donphan matters (i.e when theres spikes down) he's taking more damage than Dol anyway thanks to the spikes he's trying to spin away. HP Bug Forre is one upside I guess but then again some people run HP Fire Dol, so it works both ways. I've never seen anyone use the elephant seriously though.
I see no Regirock on the list. What a shame. My father bred and trained Regirocks back at the ranch. He'd let them come into the house and my little fella, Billy, slept on my bed at night sometimes.
He loved his stones because they had some great boom targets and could check a lot of stuff in a pinch. Curse/HPRock/Quake/Boom on Malphite is a very real threat. The nice boulders kill things.
He loved his stones because they had some great boom targets and could check a lot of stuff in a pinch. Curse/HPRock/Quake/Boom on Malphite is a very real threat. The nice boulders kill things.
Hello all, not sure how much my opinion will be taken into account seeing as I'm fairly new here, but I just wanted to weigh in on my opinion on the order of the s rank mons. I agree with meteor64.
I believe gengar should be the next one after Tyranitar. Gengar to me is kind of the face of the ADV OU metagame, even though tyranitar is the most dangerous mon, it is almost impossible to find a team archetype that you couldn't fit a gar onto. Sure it's lack of special stab and frailty can be an issue, but it's amazing coverage, access to some extremely dangerous support moves, and awesome unique typing more than makes up for this. With proper investment, the frailty can be patched up to an extent, and it doesn't usually miss the loss in offense. The fact that gengar is really the only good ghost type in the metagame makes it almost a necessity on stall teams (unless you want to use dusclops for some reason) as it is really the only good spin blocker. Sure dusclops is bulkier, but that spikes vulnerability and lack of speed or offensive pressure make this rather pointless. In this role as a spin blocker, it can still function as a late game cleaner, as well as an offensive threat, and the bulky taunt + willowisp set is in my opinion the best special spikes abuser in the game. It is not limited to this role however. It can function on CM offense teams as a great lure for special walls, and explode on them. Even on teams that don't require a lure, it can still pull off an all out attacker set that really threatens teams lacking in a dedicated special wall due to it's amazing coverage and speed, and the hypnosis set rivals aerodactyl as one of the best 'pull a victory out of your ass' late game cleaners.
Celebi after gengar because it is pretty much the definition of versatility, base 100 stats across the board mean it can do pretty much anything. It can be a decent support mon with heal bell, perish song and leech seed, it can use a defensive calm mind set with leech seed making it one of the best snorlax counters in the game, it can baton pass calm minds, swords dances, and subs, my personal favorite is the subseed baton pass set which grabs tempo against special walls better than any baton pass user in the game, considering it can actually switch in on them, and sub seed lock them before baton passing to a counter, which jolteon and zapdos can't really do. Finally the offensive cm set is in my opinion the best offensive calm mind poke there is. Stab on two of it's attacks, amazing coverage, good bulk, natural cure, and even a pseudo recovery move. The only "super" poke that really gives it competition is superachi, thanks to its toxic immunity. The main issue with celebi is dugtrio, and the fact that every one and their dog has HP bug on a ton of their move sets, but even with this, it's bulk allows it to get around this sometimes. The main reason I chose gengar over it is because gengar's niche as a spin blocker is far more important to this incredibly spikes based metagame than anything celebi does.
Suicune i think should be the last mon in the S rank. It is definitely a great poke that belongs in the S rank, it can out stall a lot of its counters thanks to pressure, it's amazing physical defense, and calm mind, and subcune is extremely dangerous if the opponent makes a mistake in assuming what set it is. There are two main problems I have with it. The first is that it is vulnerable to both spikes and sand, and on top of this has only rest as a recovery move, and is usually meant to check a wide range of physical attackers. Suicune is pretty useless while it is asleep, so with spikes down, it has a really hard time coming in again, and sleeping off those turns to become useful again, meaning during those turns unless you have two waters, those physically offensive pokes can run rampant on your team. You can run the restalk set, but this either gets rid of some of its utility by forgoing roar, or some of its most dangerous qualities by forgoing calm mind. The subcune set also has similar issues, except worse since it no longer even has rest, and substitute is wearing it down further. I often find subcune to be far less valuable when sand is up, simply because it can't recover off the damage from those subs, which kind of ruins the whole purpose of being able to sub up on defensive mons and bulky waters and setting up while they try and break it, because by the time you're actually set up enough to do anything, you're already at pretty low health. Don't get me wrong, it's still great and i've had a lot of success with it, it just becomes a lot easier to play around when two extremely common environmental effects, spikes and sand, severely decrease its utility. The second problem i find with it is that it is somewhat one dimensional, you're really only going to see sub cune and defensive cune, sure there's variation in defensive cune sets, but there are like 3 viable moves for the 4th slot. Also the only attacks you are ever going to see on it are surf, and ice beam, and occasionally hp electric, leaving it easily walled. Still its ability to beat a lot of its walls in the long run thanks to pressure makes it a great mon as long as it doesn't die to spikes in that long run.
I believe gengar should be the next one after Tyranitar. Gengar to me is kind of the face of the ADV OU metagame, even though tyranitar is the most dangerous mon, it is almost impossible to find a team archetype that you couldn't fit a gar onto. Sure it's lack of special stab and frailty can be an issue, but it's amazing coverage, access to some extremely dangerous support moves, and awesome unique typing more than makes up for this. With proper investment, the frailty can be patched up to an extent, and it doesn't usually miss the loss in offense. The fact that gengar is really the only good ghost type in the metagame makes it almost a necessity on stall teams (unless you want to use dusclops for some reason) as it is really the only good spin blocker. Sure dusclops is bulkier, but that spikes vulnerability and lack of speed or offensive pressure make this rather pointless. In this role as a spin blocker, it can still function as a late game cleaner, as well as an offensive threat, and the bulky taunt + willowisp set is in my opinion the best special spikes abuser in the game. It is not limited to this role however. It can function on CM offense teams as a great lure for special walls, and explode on them. Even on teams that don't require a lure, it can still pull off an all out attacker set that really threatens teams lacking in a dedicated special wall due to it's amazing coverage and speed, and the hypnosis set rivals aerodactyl as one of the best 'pull a victory out of your ass' late game cleaners.
Celebi after gengar because it is pretty much the definition of versatility, base 100 stats across the board mean it can do pretty much anything. It can be a decent support mon with heal bell, perish song and leech seed, it can use a defensive calm mind set with leech seed making it one of the best snorlax counters in the game, it can baton pass calm minds, swords dances, and subs, my personal favorite is the subseed baton pass set which grabs tempo against special walls better than any baton pass user in the game, considering it can actually switch in on them, and sub seed lock them before baton passing to a counter, which jolteon and zapdos can't really do. Finally the offensive cm set is in my opinion the best offensive calm mind poke there is. Stab on two of it's attacks, amazing coverage, good bulk, natural cure, and even a pseudo recovery move. The only "super" poke that really gives it competition is superachi, thanks to its toxic immunity. The main issue with celebi is dugtrio, and the fact that every one and their dog has HP bug on a ton of their move sets, but even with this, it's bulk allows it to get around this sometimes. The main reason I chose gengar over it is because gengar's niche as a spin blocker is far more important to this incredibly spikes based metagame than anything celebi does.
Suicune i think should be the last mon in the S rank. It is definitely a great poke that belongs in the S rank, it can out stall a lot of its counters thanks to pressure, it's amazing physical defense, and calm mind, and subcune is extremely dangerous if the opponent makes a mistake in assuming what set it is. There are two main problems I have with it. The first is that it is vulnerable to both spikes and sand, and on top of this has only rest as a recovery move, and is usually meant to check a wide range of physical attackers. Suicune is pretty useless while it is asleep, so with spikes down, it has a really hard time coming in again, and sleeping off those turns to become useful again, meaning during those turns unless you have two waters, those physically offensive pokes can run rampant on your team. You can run the restalk set, but this either gets rid of some of its utility by forgoing roar, or some of its most dangerous qualities by forgoing calm mind. The subcune set also has similar issues, except worse since it no longer even has rest, and substitute is wearing it down further. I often find subcune to be far less valuable when sand is up, simply because it can't recover off the damage from those subs, which kind of ruins the whole purpose of being able to sub up on defensive mons and bulky waters and setting up while they try and break it, because by the time you're actually set up enough to do anything, you're already at pretty low health. Don't get me wrong, it's still great and i've had a lot of success with it, it just becomes a lot easier to play around when two extremely common environmental effects, spikes and sand, severely decrease its utility. The second problem i find with it is that it is somewhat one dimensional, you're really only going to see sub cune and defensive cune, sure there's variation in defensive cune sets, but there are like 3 viable moves for the 4th slot. Also the only attacks you are ever going to see on it are surf, and ice beam, and occasionally hp electric, leaving it easily walled. Still its ability to beat a lot of its walls in the long run thanks to pressure makes it a great mon as long as it doesn't die to spikes in that long run.
Ehm... I dont know. All of your points are valid. It does seem like suicune has more faults than gengar, but (a healthy) suicune can take care of +1 ttar, mence, etc no problem with the right moves. I would agree with you about gengar but the biggest issue about it is that it has a hard time spin blocking starmie; especially if it packs psychic. Starmie is one of the most common, if not the most common spinner and it just laughs at gengar more times than not with its higher speed and recovery. However, just about every other job gengar does is done well. Even his old subpunch set can still be used with some success. Although, suicune can single-handedly sweep teams if given the chance while gengar is much less likely to do the same. I do see your point about suicune being fairly easy to wear down with sand (and spikes to an extent) being everywhere which is making swampert usable over it as a bulky water. Guess I wouldnt mind the switch.
As for celebi, she is so bulky that celebi is the reason a bunch of pokemon have to pack hp bug. She has an easy time doing whatever task you give her. The biggest difference that separates celebi from suicune is the lack of a phasing move. I dont know if I would put her over suicune but she sure does come pretty close.
As for celebi, she is so bulky that celebi is the reason a bunch of pokemon have to pack hp bug. She has an easy time doing whatever task you give her. The biggest difference that separates celebi from suicune is the lack of a phasing move. I dont know if I would put her over suicune but she sure does come pretty close.
Yeah I definitely see your point about starmie, although I disagree about it being the most common spinner, It is definitely the best, however I honestly see claydol (and even forretress) a lot more than I see starmie. But the main things is that the mere presence of gengar on the opponent's team forces you into a mind game, not so much with starmie, but with claydol especially. Gengar doesn't really even have to come in, but the fact that your opponent is carrying it is making you have to decide whether or not they should psychic or spin. If they psychic into a swampert or something and have to get forced out, then that's another turn of spikes on the table, and if they spin into your gar, then depending on the claydol's health you have to either switch, or decide whether or not the gengar will switch out. Starmie can be worked around to an extent, especially if forretress is your spiker. I do feel forretress has a small niche over skarm for this reason, as the ability to keep starmie from switching in while it spikes up means those spikes won't be immediately blown away as they would be with skarmory. I don't think forretress should be moved, it's fine where it is, I just feel this niche is often underrated. The main problem with starmie though is that there are a number of pokemon that wall it cold, and force it out. It is easy to force starmie to attack through some clever team building, in my opinion, this is what makes that ttar gengar forre core so good. a lot of the things it switches in on have the ability to either be dangerous if given a few free turns, or hit starmie back relatively hard, and if starmie is forced out at less than full health, it can often have a difficult time functioning, and be susceptible to dugtrio. Also, it's not like this makes dusclops much more viable, even though it walls starmie, this doesn't change how easy it is to kill with your own spikes. I do agree however that gengar has a much more difficult time than suicune at sweeping teams, This is really the only reason I could see it being put over gengar however, and in my opinion I feel gengar's role is more important due to the lack of other viable options to fill in its shoes.
I don't think I've ever viewed Gengars job as one of sweeping, but its very existence wins games more often than Cele/Cune, I find. I think I could support the notion that Gar is the easiest to anti-meta out of the S-tiers though, and so in those Starmie/Dol heavy periods I think Gar isn't the second best mon. But outside of that, he's a consistent game-winner, only outmatched by TTar, and so in my book, that puts him second.
ON a related note, people always seem to disagree on the viability of Starmie (or at least thats how it seems to me). I'm fine with it where it is but it might be worth discussing?
ON a related note, people always seem to disagree on the viability of Starmie (or at least thats how it seems to me). I'm fine with it where it is but it might be worth discussing?
I guess the thing with gengar is that it's usually not gengar itself that provides the huge threat (although it definitely can under the right circumstances) rather it's what it protects, those spikes, which are extremely threatening. As i said earlier, the mere presence of it on an opponents team forces you to play a mind game, It doesn't even have to enter the field to have an effect on the game. Also the fact that there aren't really any reliable switch ins to it until you know the set. Blissey doesn't really mind much of what gengar does, but a well timed explosion can often end the game in a cm offense vs blissey matchup. Everything else has to watch out for burns, sleep, or the potential of a super effective coverage move. Each of its sets functions quite differently yet looks quite similar on the surface, which can be very deadly.
I agree that starmie is good, the spinner set is a great support mon, outside of being able to get past gar it's also useful that it can just switch directly into skarmory and blow spikes away immediately, which no other spinner can really do. Forretress has to watch out for gengar, and everything else has to watch out for toxic. The main problem is that it struggles to do much else in the match up, but then again so does claydol. Furthermore, the offensive set more than makes up for this, and can use the passivity of the defensive set to its advantage, being able to do serious damage to a lot of its switch ins, namely celebi and zapdos.
I agree that starmie is good, the spinner set is a great support mon, outside of being able to get past gar it's also useful that it can just switch directly into skarmory and blow spikes away immediately, which no other spinner can really do. Forretress has to watch out for gengar, and everything else has to watch out for toxic. The main problem is that it struggles to do much else in the match up, but then again so does claydol. Furthermore, the offensive set more than makes up for this, and can use the passivity of the defensive set to its advantage, being able to do serious damage to a lot of its switch ins, namely celebi and zapdos.
Gengar's super strong but he's not number 2 because to a certain extent he's a pubstomping mon, and he's very very good against bad teams. When the big boys play with Gengar he's more matchup dependent - like, a Wispgar will do great vs Physimag, but not so well vs CM. A lot of people like Gar because he's easy to play and build with, and also is the only ghost really.
Like Dugtrio or Garen, the lower level play, the better he is. Something like, say, Heracross, is the opposite. A poorly played beetle does jack shit, but a well executed Hera can destroy the best players.
Like Dugtrio or Garen, the lower level play, the better he is. Something like, say, Heracross, is the opposite. A poorly played beetle does jack shit, but a well executed Hera can destroy the best players.
Yeah I definitely see what you mean, although I feel like this is mainly just because people are so used to playing against it. Better players can tell what sort of set its running based on the team that surrounds it to an extent, but if it wasn't as common, I don't think this would be the case. Heracross on the other hand is not quite as common because as you said it takes quite a bit of skill to use effectively. But its lack of usage not to mention that it hits so hard that even its counters can't really switch in on it consistently, makes it so many standard teams are vulnerable to it right off the bat. However, if it did get more usage I feel a lot more people would take it into greater consideration when team building instead of saying "oh dugtrio/skarm/gengar can take it on, im fine" With gengar on the other hand it's usually one of the first threats that comes to mind when building a team.
Y'know it feels weird to say it but that's an idea I can maybe get behind. I think Lax is better at being a reliable check to things because while it suffers just like Cune with the Spikes + Sand weak and is even more vulnerable to being punished on a switch because of its speed, Rest isn't isn't as dead a slot on it as it is with Cune, since it can take things like Zap/Mag Tbolt better than Cune can take a HP Flying or Rock Slide(also the side effects of special attacks are nowhere near as bad as RS, so he doesn't have to suffer from BS an awful lot besides Rachi spdef drops). He's also got more routes he can take with his sets as well, so whereas Cune's versatility is pretty much in the many ways it can sweep you with CM, Lax poses threats in more ways than just sweeping you straight with Curse. Which means he fits on more teams.
Also Body Slam is a beautifully versatile move, it means DDtar isn't as inclined to treat your Shadow Ball Curselax as a free switchin, same deal for people trying to go for clutch Aero (16 speed is a worthwhile investment on a curseless/non-brave lax for this imo). Generally throwing para's around while applying offense is a good thing.