i wanted to write about what i think should be one of the next two suspects now that volcarona has been banned for awhile, namely either Kyurem or Waterpon. I think both of these mons are largely similar in their negative impact and their effect on building: They both exert large pressure on anything remotely fat and largely need to be out-offensed; defensive counterplay to these mons is largely flawed and temporary at best. Balance often needs at least 1 and usually 2 slots dedicated to outspeeding/outoffensing these mons.
Kyurem has easier stopgaps, but is still very hard to wall. Freeze dry is one of the dumbest moves in the game on a mon that strong, and largely forces a freeze dry resist on teams that want to be defensively sound into it or else any set (but especially specs) has a field day into that team. The issue is that with the dissapearance of volc, it's gotten much harder to fit these. Freeze dry is only resisted by fire, steel and ice; ice is a dogshit defensive typing and weavile (the only real option) is switching into a specs ice beam once max because of how frail it is. Steel is obviously good, and options like kingambit and gholdengo are good switchins, but they need to be scouted for unless its earth power and they get chunked. Heatran is even worse, as not only does it
suck struggle into the metagame right now, its 4x weak to earth power. Similarly, volc used to be a great freeze dry resist that wasn't weak to earth power, but since it's left, the only non-HO options for a fire type freeze dry resist are Skeledirge and Cinderace; these two mons aren't bad, but Cinderace (arguably the better one) is like Weavile in its frailty and still gets blown up by EP on a wrong predict. Skeledirge is more bulky imo isn't great right now and is similarly blown up on a wrong guess. And none of these mons are sufficient at stopping Kyurem. To be defensively sound into all kyurem sets, you largely need one of 3 defensive structures: Gking + freeze-dry resist, spdef garg + freeze dry resist, and mola + sturdy freeze-dry resist. SpDef Clef is an option but tbh making your knock absorber unable to take physical hits is really bad. This forces really awkward scenarios where, without these structures your defensive structure can be just blown up by Kyurem, and even with them it can still get broken through. Non-gking structures often rely on protect to scout out specs, but if it comes in on something without protect then Kyurem has the opportunity to throw out extremely strong stab attacks or EP. Thats forgetting that Kyurem can tera to either get stab EP or even stronger ice stab. Let's say you have a Gking team with Weavile as your freeze dry resist, and as you switch in your Gking to specs Kyurem, it tera ices and does (51.2 - 60.4%); now your only option is to switch in is Weavile, which takes even more damage from that specs ice beam (59.7 - 70.4%) or just sacking something. And while yes, Weavile is a frail freeze dry resist, there are maybe 4 viable bulky freeze dry resists, and 2 of them (Heatran and Skeledirge) are not that good or splashable. And obviously, specs kyurem has counterplay; its very hazard weak and can be outsped; however, specs kyurem is always paired with removal, so there's no guarantee rocks stays up when it comes in, it can get access to the snow defense boost to make it harder to take down, but also its speed tier largely constrains building; it forces fat teams to have at least a couple mons that can revenge it, otherwise it iwll shred through those teams even more. As well, it's not like its that slow; it outspeeds key threats like Great Tusk, Landorus and Gholdengo, so its able to force switches on them. That's forgetting the freeze chance it has on its moves; often Kyurem just spams its ice attacks, and the freeze chance will proc eventually and can create a much more favourable position for it. And while it can be awkward defensively, its offensively too threatening in my opinion and doesnt deserve a place in the tier.
Waterpon is in some ways worse; while kyurem at least can be held off defensively, Waterpon is faster (so its harder to outoffense) and ironically HARDER to stop defensively despite its seemingly worse offensive coverage. Switchins to Waterpon are really limited to Pult (kinda/not really), dragonite (kinda/not really), grasspon (kinda), rillaboom (kinda), serp (garbage), meow (kinda), sinistcha (kinda), amoonguss (very hard to fit), kingambit (not really) and tera grass mons (usually not good). Notice how I say 'kinda' because none of these can consistently withstand Waterpon; it either has the coverage to cripple or break through it, or they're just too frail to withstand more then one or two hits. Sinistcha is theoretically the best of these; it resists both its stabs and gets access to strength sap to restore its health, and I would argue Sinistcha actually has a lot of use outside this match up (ironically I think waterpon makes sini worse). However, if Waterpon has encore, it can punish strength sap and start setting up. If it has knock off, it just wins, straight up. Even without these tools, Sini can get mostly worn down by Waterpon anyways, and doesnt want to click strength sap in case Waterpon is an encore variant, and if its a knock variant instead you're even more screwed. PR variants it does well into. Its often touted as a check, but to be honest Sini is best as a spinblocker and wincon, and Waterpon can wear it down to the point where it can no longer spin block effectively. All the other grasses bar amoonguss are often too frail to take more then a couple hits, or get crippled by knock off. Rillaboom can theoretically eat more hits, but it activates grassy terrain and so can ironically power up Waterpon's power whips, and after an SD waterpon has a 50% chance to OHKO rillaboom. Pult similarly can switch in once but is not that bulky and can get screwed by potential knock off or play rough. Dragonite is very sturdy but ironically only really fits on offense anyways and never runs roost, so its often also liable to getting punished by knock off or play rough. Kingambit also gets hard punished if its an encore set, as well as getting chunked by Waterpon's Ivy Cudgel in general. While these require Waterpon to pick and choose what it cripples, notice that knock is extremely consistent at stopping any defensive counterplay, and that you don't know Waterpon's last move until it uses it on you, at which point it can likely take a kill if you've guessed wrong. As well, Ivy Cudgel is a notoriously insane move that has a high crit chance, so there's a fairly high chance where it clicks it after a swords dance and does way more damage then it should; as well, like with Kyurem, its speed tier is high enough that it forces offensive counterplay; nothing can wall it and it threatens out anything defensive, so it either forces frail offensive mons to eat a hit or just gets a kill on a fat mon. This thing has no defensive counterplay, to the point where
658Greninja made a guide on Rotom-mow, a mon that has been OU viable maybe once, because of its ability to resist Waterpon's stabs. This is also forgetting that it can tera to switch up its weaknesses and power up its already insane Ivy Cudgel.
As well, i've commonly heard from people that they KNOW waterpon is broken and that its bullshit, but that they don't want it to go because it stops 'degenerate strategies', and I feel sometimes like this community doesn't learn from its own mistakes or has amnesia. This fearmongering often happens literally ANY TIME a dominant mon is suspected, where someone admits its bullshit but doesnt want it gone because the tier might be gone without it, and honestly its repeatedly been shown to be a shitty argument. If something is broken without Waterpon (or Volcarona, or Archaludon, or Chien-Pao, or Gliscor...) then it will get looked into after. If you have to admit that a mon is broken before saying that its necessary, you've admitted that the right course is that it should be banned. It's a bad argument and if people REALLY think Waterpon isn't broken, i would much rather here them argue that on its own merits then admit its brokenness but just not want change in the tier because its scary.