np: OU Suspect Testing Round 3 - So Long and Thanks for all the Fish

[TLK]

Has anybody tried Tangrowth? Regeneration on a pokemon that has better physical defense than even Skarmory is amazing. It can switch into Nattorei with impunity, and at full health can even survive a +2 X-Scissor from LO Adamant Dory.

And he's not dead weight against stall because he can Sleep Powder to help your counters plow through while also being hard to wear down with Regeneration switches. The only problem I see with him is that you can't run him alongside Nattorei, who is probably more useful in this current meta than Tangrowth is.

I admit I've not used Tangrowth as a defensive Pokemon, but I don't like the grass type on it's own. His special defence is also pretty poor so he isn't a great counter to special attacking water types (which almost always have Ice Beam).

With Knock Off and Sleep Powder though, he can cripple two Pokemon easily. In Gen 4 I had a nice Tangrowth set that was Sub/Leech Seed/Stun Spore/Sleep Powder. Unless they had a heal beller, it could cripple two or three things fairly easily. It was pretty handy actually.

 

[Benlisted]

The ground resist tan posseses is one of his best assets over natt imo, especially given the rise of excadrill and landorus. His spdef is quite an acute issue given the number of things that randomly carry fire moves this gen, some of them stuff he'd really like to wall, like ttar. Luckily his huge number of options to cripple stuff switching in and the fact that his huge hp and regeneration give him a few ways around this.

 

[YAYtears]

Blissey walls half the metagame by the way.

Specs ninetales in the sun, specs shandera in the sun, lanturn (lol), starmie can trick, and if it rapid spins, it's done its job, specs politoed, specs kingdra, subsplit gengar, subdisable gengar, tyranitar, crocune, tormentran w/ taunt, NP voltlos, anti-lead voltlos, tauntWoW/toxic Burun/Mew, Lucario, Indernape, any choiced attacker with trick, sub CM jirachi, even ulgramoth, CM Espeon, baton pass Vaporean, Rankurusu, Shinporra, CM clefable, Porygon-Z, LO latios w/ psycho shock, Kerudo (unreleased), Zoroark I guess, Baton pass Vaporean (does is job), gorebyss, subseed shaymin/jarooda, Electrivere, CM Birijiron, and LO Deoxys-S all can handle Blissey well to an extent, giving the player good momentum.

 

[Meru]

Specs ninetales in the sun, specs shandera in the sun, lanturn (lol), starmie can trick, and if it rapid spins, it's done its job, specs politoed, specs kingdra, subsplit gengar, subdisable gengar, tyranitar, crocune, tormentran w/ taunt, NP voltlos, anti-lead voltlos, tauntWoW/toxic Burun/Mew, Lucario, Indernape, any choiced attacker with trick, sub CM jirachi, even ulgramoth, CM Espeon, baton pass Vaporean, Rankurusu, Shinporra, CM clefable, Porygon-Z, LO latios w/ psycho shock, Kerudo (unreleased), Zoroark I guess, Baton pass Vaporean (does is job), gorebyss, subseed shaymin/jarooda, Electrivere, CM Birijiron, and LO Deoxys-S all can handle Blissey well to an extent, giving the player good momentum.

I don't think you understand the purpose of Blissey.

It works similar to Gen 3 Swampert. If they run Hidden Power Grass, they may counter Swampert, but they gimp themselves vs. pretty much everything else.

In the same way, she forces pokes to run movesets that are worse against common offensive teams (not all of the pokes you listed are worse than the average set, but most are) in order to beat just her.

 

[PK Gaming]

For once we agree lol, Tangrowth is damn solid in this metagame. That physical bulk is incredible.

 

[Buzzcut]

Specs ninetales in the sun, specs shandera in the sun, lanturn (lol), starmie can trick, and if it rapid spins, it's done its job, specs politoed, specs kingdra, subsplit gengar, subdisable gengar, tyranitar, crocune, tormentran w/ taunt, NP voltlos, anti-lead voltlos, tauntWoW/toxic Burun/Mew, Lucario, Indernape, any choiced attacker with trick, sub CM jirachi, even ulgramoth, CM Espeon, baton pass Vaporean, Rankurusu, Shinporra, CM clefable, Porygon-Z, LO latios w/ psycho shock, Kerudo (unreleased), Zoroark I guess, Baton pass Vaporean (does is job), gorebyss, subseed shaymin/jarooda, Electrivere, CM Birijiron, and LO Deoxys-S all can handle Blissey well to an extent, giving the player good momentum.

Choiced Ninetails is terrible, haven't played much DW so I have no idea on the best Shandera set, Lanturn I have a hard time believing because charge beam isn't consistent and it has no reliable recovery, Starmie can trick or run Psycho Shock, but that ruins it's effectiveness, Politoad is underwhelming to begin with, Choiced Kingdra is terrible and should be mixed or purely attack, Gengar hurts itself running either set and if it does win, it's barely living, Tyranitar isn't special, I have never seen a Crocune this gen, Tormenttran with taunt is terrible and hardly an offensive solution, Voltolos has to rely on focus blast or get statused, and I'm now realizing how many problems there are, so I'll list the ones that aren't problems.

Shandera I can't provide a counter claim, Starmie CAN but I wouldn't if I were running an offensive team, which is how the debate started, anything with Trick has to predict properly (and not everything gets trick and this can easily be said about stall as well), Shaymin does well against Blissey due to the special defense drops, and Mew can probably do well.

The original point was that Offensive teams can deal with Blissey, but they have to hurt themselves to do it. A lot of special threats have to have a way to hit Blissey and only Blissey, whether that be trick, special defense drops, Psycho Shock (which is pretty much inferior in every other situation except for hitting Blissey) or boosting up to still only 3HKO. I would much rather run a 4 attack Choiced Starmie with the amount of fighting types this gen, but that's simply not possible.

It's not a perfect comparison to stall teams and Reun, but it's pretty close. Instead of complaining, think of a solution or wait for others to tell you a solution if you're that kind of person. It is not broken, it's something every team must consider. I can't have a team with pure special attackers and no trick, Psycho Shock, etc. and complain about Blissey being broken, so stall shouldn't be able to run a team without a check to magic guard users and complain about a magic guard user. It's a two way street.

 

[Arc Tech]

Not to mention Blissey can just run mail to deal with trick users.

Reinuclus has no such option to negate such a large portion of it's checks. The closest might be trick room, but a lot that checks it out also checks it in TR. And it also makes it not have the power to boost up. Next would be hp fire for shu, but it cripples Reinculus versus tyranitar, and lessens it's power versus numerous other threats (the dark/flying vulture, heatran, any other dark type bar spiritomb/sableye)- it hurts reinculus more than mail hurts blissey.

 

[YAYtears]

Specs Kingdra in rain=beast. It's already resisted by Nattorei, so you could have a bit more power to it. Yes I know swift swim swim+rain is banned, so you could run specs starmie too. Also, I thought +2 LO focus blast from Voltlos 2HKOs 252/0 bliss. Psycho shock isn't that bad; it's a psychic that hits a bit less on roob. Most tyranitar I see are mixed, but usually see fire blast/ice beam/crunch/SR, and the majority of those attacks are special lol. Not to mention that CM birijiron is also effective against sand and rain, though its a bit weak to status. Oh and mail on bliss sucks. Its like an inferior chansey in terms of leftovers. And anyways if the opponent runs full stall, you get to cripple at least someone with trick right? (bar scarftar revenge killers.EDIT: Where you can decide to switch moves and attack again(confirmed in research thread), though it requires a lot of suppport to bring ttar down to which you can kill it.) Oh yeah and you can predict the switch out and attack. Same deal with rank.

 

[Lamppost]

Actually most people run a specially bulky ttar with crunch/pursuit/fireblast/SR.
Just thought i'd share that

 

[Arc Tech]

Specs Kingdra in rain=beast. It's already resisted by Nattorei, so you could have a bit more power to it. Yes I know swift swim swim+rain is banned, so you could run specs starmie too. Also, I thought +2 LO focus blast from Voltlos 2HKOs 252/0 bliss. Psycho shock isn't that bad; it's a psychic that hits a bit less on roob. Most tyranitar I see are mixed, but usually see fire blast/ice beam/crunch/SR, and the majority of those attacks are special lol. Not to mention that CM birijiron is also effective against sand and rain, though its a bit weak to status. Oh and mail on bliss sucks. Its like an inferior chansey in terms of leftovers. And anyways if the opponent runs full stall, you get to cripple at least someone with trick right? (bar scarftar revenge killers.EDIT: Where you can decide to switch moves and attack again(confirmed in research thread), though it requires a lot of suppport to bring ttar down to which you can kill it.) Oh yeah and you can predict the switch out and attack. Same deal with rank.

+2 focus blast 2hkoing... means he gets possibly twaved and LO stalled (unless it's like 75% ish but I doubt that, I only remember it doing 20-25% ish without NP/LO).

If it's immune to trick, it's not an inferior chansey. It has a pretty good advantage over chansey- it never has to worry about trick users. And it still has more sp atk. Don't knock it till you try it (and yes I have used mail bliss). And they could always run mail tar- you can't switch moves after a failed trick. having a mailed pokemon on a stall team is VERY useful-it meas you never have to fear trick, which as you said, would otherwise usually cripple one of your team members. Most trickers are specially based, so Blissey and ttar make the best use out of mail, being able to switch in on an attack or a trick.

 

[YAYtears]

Losing out on leftovers recovery and power, rendering mail useless in all other situations (isn't that what we discussed about ways to counter rank?). Did calcs and found that +2 LO focus blast from Voltlos does 71.4% - 84% damage, KOing it after 2 SR switch ins or 1 SR+1 layer of spikes. Used zapdos in smogon calc.

 

[Arc Tech]

Guess that I must've been having low damage rolls (not that I bothered focus blasting blissey that often...).

Losing out on an item is a lot less significant than losing out on a teamslot or a moveslot when the item is not that important- leftovers is less important to a wall with recovery than losing LO would be to a sweeper- 6% versus 30%. True, the 6% accumulates, but if you have a recovery move that will probably provide more. And obviously wishbliss loses more than softboil bliss thanks to protect. Plus, mail stops not one poke but a whole class of pokes that gives all the pokes in your teamstyle (if you're running heavy stall) and therefore team a big problem.

 

[capefeather]

So I finally tried Sawsbuck on the sun team, and while I'm finding it slightly better than Venusaur, it seems to be unable to switch in on much. I've been having virtually no luck on my other teams (other than one). I put a couple of checks to Blaziken on my rain team and it still seems to lose to him... I mean, I didn't want to resort to a Def-leaning Tentacruel, but it seems to be the best way to deal with this menace without a huge compromise.

I'm not sure what happened to the metagame to make it more defensively oriented (from what I've been seeing today), but I think that teams are beginning to become more vulnerable to Swords Dance Landorus. I'm finding that I'm actually finding time to SD on the teams that I run into now. Reuniclus seems to be a great partner for it, not just because SD/TR or RP/CM combos are possible to account for a wide variety of teams, but also because the redundant Fighting resistance allows one to scout for the other.

 

[masterful]

So I finally tried Sawsbuck on the sun team, and while I'm finding it slightly better than Venusaur, it seems to be unable to switch in on much. I've been having virtually no luck on my other teams (other than one). I put a couple of checks to Blaziken on my rain team and it still seems to lose to him... I mean, I didn't want to resort to a Def-leaning Tentacruel, but it seems to be the best way to deal with this menace without a huge compromise.

I'm not sure what happened to the metagame to make it more defensively oriented (from what I've been seeing today), but I think that teams are beginning to become more vulnerable to Swords Dance Landorus. I'm finding that I'm actually finding time to SD on the teams that I run into now. Reuniclus seems to be a great partner for it, not just because SD/TR or RP/CM combos are possible to account for a wide variety of teams, but also because the redundant Fighting resistance allows one to scout for the other.

I for one am amazed that the metagame is as defensive as it appears at times, what with the continued dominance of THundurus and Rain teams in general. Nasty Plot Thundurus is just so colossally powerful one of its greatest checks is simply getting set up first

 

[YAYtears]

Since I'm running stall, I'll just log the battles I have and talk about them. I will comment on the viability of stall in this metagame.
Team:
Swampert, Bliss, skarm, foretress, gyrados, Latias
score 8-4
1 sun 3 SS 5 non-weather Bulky Offence 2 rain 1 deoxys+baton pass goregybyss.
Notes:
Last man dory swept my team once, especially when gyrados was down. Lost another due to a misplay of laziness by me. Crit by SD terakion messed me up once; seriously the best physical tank still can't avoid being 2 HKOed by a +2 (insert physical attacker here) even with max investment, meaning a crit can devestate the battle. I got swept by an NP (lum) voltlos once too: my blissey couldn't do anything to it in rain (I had flamethrower) and it would have swept me if it hadn't got 2 focus blast misses. Against the DS + Gorebyss strategy, I already had 1 layer of toxic spikes b/c deoxys mispredicted and the gorebyss was phased by gyrados. It isn't a foolproof strategy guys. and no mail blissey lol. Thas in the mid 1100s and I just reached 1200 (I only laddered for 2 days so far.) Stall seems to be a bit weaker now with a lot more power (in which the tanks could only phase), and when the tanks we know are 2HKOed by the guys it tanks when given a free turn.

 

[JSND]

Lol with spikesrock + bulky offense ans roob everywhere i dont want to run stalll really.

What make gen 5 annoying is how perfectly balanced offense and defense is, creating a bulky offensive metagame. This make playing stall harder tbh

 

[badabing]

Actually most people run a specially bulky ttar with crunch/pursuit/fireblast/SR.
Just thought i'd share that

Usually only one dark move on the standard ttar. Insert Ice beam/superpower over the other

 

[Arc Tech]

Lol with spikesrock + bulky offense ans roob everywhere i dont want to run stalll really.

What make gen 5 annoying is how perfectly balanced offense and defense is, creating a bulky offensive metagame. This make playing stall harder tbh

I'd say that the biggest nerf to stall this gen is not reinculus (it has a ton of defensive/stallish checks&counters, including unaware quagsire, CM roar latias... other things which I forgot...) nor shinpora, but Nattorei. It allows offensive teams to easily acquire what was once stall's advantage - many layers of hazards- in only one pokemon. I often ran skarmory in otherwise offensive teams last gen for just that reason, but Nattorei has an advantage over skarmory as a pure spiker thanks to its valuable water resistance and excellent annoyance options (twave and leech seed). Now stall no longer has an advantage damage-wise over offense when switching, and it makes it much harder for walls to avoid 2hkos.

 

[masterful]

I'd say that the biggest nerf to stall this gen is not reinculus (it has a ton of defensive/stallish checks&counters, including unaware quagsire, CM roar latias... other things which I forgot...) nor shinpora, but Nattorei. It allows offensive teams to easily acquire what was once stall's advantage - many layers of hazards- in only one pokemon. I often ran skarmory in otherwise offensive teams last gen for just that reason, but Nattorei has an advantage over skarmory as a pure spiker thanks to its valuable water resistance and excellent annoyance options (twave and leech seed). Now stall no longer has an advantage damage-wise over offense when switching, and it makes it much harder for walls to avoid 2hkos.

I must say I can't agree. Forretress was available all throughout last generation, and despite being weaker on the special defensive side, was much like Nattorei in many ways. I would name the culprit of the shift away from stall this generation as the deluge of offensive powerhouses such as Thundurus or Shell Smash pokes whose few counters are usually just faster, more powerful sweepers, and can't be walled in the traditional sense. The lack of defensive monstrosities outside of Nattorei this gen has made it arguably less safe to run stall, if you can believe that, as with just one turn of set-up many sweepers can instantly win a game.

 

[Kefka Palazzo™]

I know this has been brought up a couple times, but I've been having a lot of trouble with Latios lately.

I can force him out fine with my Scizor. The problem is that Scizor pretty much becomes useless afterward.
I gave him 252 Sp.Def EVs and a Careful nature to take the blow better, but he takes 50% - 59% from that Draco Meteor.
Worse yet is when it's a LO variant and it forces me out with HP Fire or something.

I'm really changing my mind about Latios.
Not that many things can set up on -2 Latios without being crippled or being weakened enough for an easy revenge kill.

Btw, many of the examples put always assume the worst case scenario for Latios, but what about the things switching in ON Latios? The Scizor I used is taking 12% from Stealth Rock and then taking another 50%+ from that Meteor.

It's kinda ridiculous, don't you think?

 

[UnhandledException]

I can force him out fine with my Scizor. The problem is that Scizor pretty much becomes useless afterward.

Needs more Pursuit, don't you think?

Anyway, Sdef Jirachi/Metagross/Bronzong all work decently against Latios(and other psychic types for that matter, think Espeon and Reuniclus), Metagross especially since he can use pursuit and bullet punch. In fact, scarfTar, in addition to hard-countering Latios can also deal with stuff like the genies.

 

[Kefka Palazzo™]

Needs more Pursuit, don't you think?

Anyway, Sdef Jirachi/Metagross/Bronzong all work decently against Latios(and other psychic types for that matter, think Espeon and Reuniclus), Metagross especially since he can use pursuit and bullet punch. In fact, scarfTar, in addition to hard-countering Latios can also deal with stuff like the genies.

I was running an SD variant, but I had the misfortune of running into LO variants when I used Pursuit x_x

Pursuit was also a bad thing to lock myself into with all the Fighting types.

Jirachi does work nicely, but Metagross just seems so...near useless whenever I use him and Bronzong doesn't seem to do much other than maybe set up screens or set up Stealth Rock or something.

Tyranitar seems kinda bad for my team with Sandstream, so I'm not going to use him.

I'll try Jirachi, but it stills seems like that list is pretty small where most are kinda mediocre this gen :/

 

[masterful]

I was running an SD variant, but when I had the misfortune of running into LO variants when I used Pursuit x_x

Pursuit was also a bad thing to lock myself into with all the Fighting types.

Jirachi does work nicely, but Metagross just seems so...near useless whenever I use him and Bronzong doesn't seem to do much other than maybe set up screens or set up Stealth Rock or something.

Tyranitar seems kinda bad for my team with Sandstream, so I'm not going to use him.

I'll try Jirachi, but it stills seems like that list is pretty small where most are kinda mediocre this gen :/

No matter what you lock yourself into as a Choice band Scizor, you will have to switch out. If you have problems with Latios, use a CB Specially defensive set. It works extremely well, and you can always sacrifice a poke on your team if you are that afraid of being outpredicted and getting hit by HP Fire (unless it is an Expert Belt version, which isn't too threatening at all).

 

[Arc Tech]

I must say I can't agree. Forretress was available all throughout last generation, and despite being weaker on the special defensive side, was much like Nattorei in many ways. I would name the culprit of the shift away from stall this generation as the deluge of offensive powerhouses such as Thundurus or Shell Smash pokes whose few counters are usually just faster, more powerful sweepers, and can't be walled in the traditional sense. The lack of defensive monstrosities outside of Nattorei this gen has made it arguably less safe to run stall, if you can believe that, as with just one turn of set-up many sweepers can instantly win a game.

Forretress forced a lot less pokemon out- it had no status options, less power, and less resistances. It's only advantages are no fighting weak, and rapid spin and toxic spikes- things which are most important to a stall based team. Nattorei has gyro ball off slightly higher attack and less speed, and power whip, for increased type coverage. It can come in on bulky waters with near-impunity and set up. Forretress could set up on far less, offered more of a set-up opportunity (which offense teams couldn't afford), and did less after it set up.

The difference between the two is astounding- just look at their differences in usage. And don't say it is a difference in metagames- with more fighting types, this gen is probably harsher to nattorei than last gen would've been. All it has for relief is rain to help its fire weakness.

 

[Kefka Palazzo™]

No matter what you lock yourself into as a Choice band Scizor, you will have to switch out. If you have problems with Latios, use a CB Specially defensive set. It works extremely well, and you can always sacrifice a poke on your team if you are that afraid of being outpredicted and getting hit by HP Fire (unless it is an Expert Belt version, which isn't too threatening at all).

The bold part bothers me.
It's kinda hard to have death fodder in the first few turns of a battle, isn't it?