Gouging Fire is a hard one because it checks off a lot of the conventional "broken" boxes -- teambuilding is restricted a bit and counterplay does not overlap a ton between sets. However, there is a lot holding it back from having the expected in-game impact of such a presence, which people (myself included) are starting to see. I am pretty conflicted and this is probably the suspect I have thought the most about all generation.
I think that the power level on the most discussed set -- DD Breaking Swipes -- allows for some flexible responses to it. I believe that the other sets all reveal themselves at team preview (see: Choice Band on Sun) or upon entry (see: offensive DD with the usual Booster Energy), which enables various degrees of counterplay depending upon your foresight and team. We have also seen some reactions to it within teambuilding such as the surge in Tera Fairy for Breaking Swipes on physical attackers (Great Tusk and Gliscor, for example) or the shift in set mix of some Pokemon like Landorus-T, Dondozo, and Volcarona. In short, Gouging Fire is very strong, but in-game responses to it are arguably sufficient.
With this in mind, I also think there are a lot of barriers to consistency in this metagame, especially in the teambuilder. Perhaps being patient as the metagame fluctuates and evolves is the best approach for this. I think you could ask a dozen different high level players what the biggest issue in the tier is right now and get a half dozen different (justified) answers -- some would say nothing, some would focus on one or two things, and others would provide you with a full list with the contents varying. Perhaps voting based on teambuilding restriction is another approach you can take though, especially if you believe the strain on building (i.e: exhausting an extra Tera type or relying repeatedly on a specific defensive core or single Pokemon) is overly restrictive relative to its peers in the metagame. I cannot say I am positive.
I was pretty confident that it was broken a few weeks ago and I think this sentiment resonated throughout a ton of the community, too. Take a look at the first pages of this thread or the community survey (4.1 from qualified in general and -- I did some math with the data quickly -- a 4.0 from people who are currently playing SV OU in SPL). This degree of support was on par with other suspects that ended with a healthy supermajority ban and even some quickbans, but I think the last couple of weeks of the metagame unfolding has shown some degree of regression both towards the perceived effectiveness of Gouging Fire and towards the amount of support it has.
This is not the first time something like this happened either -- Kyurem lost steam mid-suspect a month or two back and Zamazenta lost a lot of steam mid-suspct during the HOME metagame, too, which resulted in both staying (the latter doing so by a large margin, so it may have regardless). I think we need to accept that the metagame is still evolving at a breakneck pace with new ideas surfacing regularly, which leads to variable understandings and opinions with potentially large swaying of overall community sentiment.
I am still not fully decided on what I am voting (was very much leaning ban initially and now am slightly leaning towards anti-ban the more I think/write this out), but I think this is a prime example in showing the metagame is still changing a lot, even just within the two weeks a suspect takes, and why going through the suspect process itself is very important for finding the best outcome. People's experiences teambuilding or playing (especially on high ladder or within tournaments) as well as their shared accounts in community spaces certainly do matter. I am going to make another post as some of the above arguments have logic I want to touch on, too, so stay tuned for that.
I think that the power level on the most discussed set -- DD Breaking Swipes -- allows for some flexible responses to it. I believe that the other sets all reveal themselves at team preview (see: Choice Band on Sun) or upon entry (see: offensive DD with the usual Booster Energy), which enables various degrees of counterplay depending upon your foresight and team. We have also seen some reactions to it within teambuilding such as the surge in Tera Fairy for Breaking Swipes on physical attackers (Great Tusk and Gliscor, for example) or the shift in set mix of some Pokemon like Landorus-T, Dondozo, and Volcarona. In short, Gouging Fire is very strong, but in-game responses to it are arguably sufficient.
With this in mind, I also think there are a lot of barriers to consistency in this metagame, especially in the teambuilder. Perhaps being patient as the metagame fluctuates and evolves is the best approach for this. I think you could ask a dozen different high level players what the biggest issue in the tier is right now and get a half dozen different (justified) answers -- some would say nothing, some would focus on one or two things, and others would provide you with a full list with the contents varying. Perhaps voting based on teambuilding restriction is another approach you can take though, especially if you believe the strain on building (i.e: exhausting an extra Tera type or relying repeatedly on a specific defensive core or single Pokemon) is overly restrictive relative to its peers in the metagame. I cannot say I am positive.
I was pretty confident that it was broken a few weeks ago and I think this sentiment resonated throughout a ton of the community, too. Take a look at the first pages of this thread or the community survey (4.1 from qualified in general and -- I did some math with the data quickly -- a 4.0 from people who are currently playing SV OU in SPL). This degree of support was on par with other suspects that ended with a healthy supermajority ban and even some quickbans, but I think the last couple of weeks of the metagame unfolding has shown some degree of regression both towards the perceived effectiveness of Gouging Fire and towards the amount of support it has.
This is not the first time something like this happened either -- Kyurem lost steam mid-suspect a month or two back and Zamazenta lost a lot of steam mid-suspct during the HOME metagame, too, which resulted in both staying (the latter doing so by a large margin, so it may have regardless). I think we need to accept that the metagame is still evolving at a breakneck pace with new ideas surfacing regularly, which leads to variable understandings and opinions with potentially large swaying of overall community sentiment.
I am still not fully decided on what I am voting (was very much leaning ban initially and now am slightly leaning towards anti-ban the more I think/write this out), but I think this is a prime example in showing the metagame is still changing a lot, even just within the two weeks a suspect takes, and why going through the suspect process itself is very important for finding the best outcome. People's experiences teambuilding or playing (especially on high ladder or within tournaments) as well as their shared accounts in community spaces certainly do matter. I am going to make another post as some of the above arguments have logic I want to touch on, too, so stay tuned for that.
