wrote in solgaleo
solgaleo stocks are at an all time low, mon sucks trust we will be freeing the goat in 2025
solgaleo stocks are at an all time low, mon sucks trust we will be freeing the goat in 2025
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Metagame SV OU Metagame Discussion v4
- Thread starter TPP
- Start date
When we banned Kyurem, ZapKingLu definitely took over. No way it didn’t. I was seeing it at the 1000s, the 1200s, the 1600s, everywhere. Zapdos burned itself in my mind. Glowking screamed in my ears every moment. Ting-Lu turned every rainbow I saw to grayscale. The three horsemen of doom, ZapKingLu, rode up to my bedside. But right when I thought I was dead, when I believed I had breathed my last breath of the Galarian Weezing-purified air, the gallant Kyurem showed up, with a lance in his right Heavy-Duty Boot. He dispelled the Zapdos, he froze the Glowking in its tracks, and he shattered the Ting-Lu. The one week of hell was enough to convince me: keep Kyurem in the metagame.
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Mashallah brother free the lion
I FORGOT TO WRITE IN SOLGALEO.... I'M SORRY SOLGALEBROS
at least I got Moon in there...
remember to vote 5 on Woger
at least I got Moon in there...
remember to vote 5 on Woger
this might be the most closed-minded sentence I've ever seen in my life
How are people still complaining about SS in 2025
Everything I am about to say relates purely to ladder play, since I am not a tournament player and will not pretend to have in-depth understanding of tournament planning.
Tera Blast is problematic because it's high variance, and specifically, it's unpredictable variance.
Competitive gameplay requires a degree of predictability - Clefable has thrived for generations, thanks in large part to having a movepool containing virtually every move it could desire, allowing it to adapt to a changing metagame despite unimpressive stats, and having the tools to make use of both of its excellent abilities. Regieleki was UU in Gen 8 due to its poor coverage options, and when Tera Blast solved that problem, it was immediately yeeted to Ubers.
Tera Blast is often compared to Hidden Power, and it's a valid comparison, but the two differences - the degree of commitment and the raw power - mean it serves an entirely different role. Hidden Power had three main use cases: as a STAB move to offset a poor movepool (Gyarados with Hidden Power Flying), to snipe a 4x weakness (Hidden Power Grass to snipe Swampert, Hidden Power Ice to snipe Lando-T), and the occasional use to hit a target that resisted everything else the user could bring. With a maximum of 60/70 BP, it's not strong enough to be more than that; it's a lousy STAB move and - generally - poor coverage; neutral STAB would routinely beat out super effective Hidden Power.
Tera Blast is stronger. 80 BP STAB is an effective 120 BP, or literally twice as strong as Gen 6-7 Hidden Power, enough to be a powerful coverage move. It's also very committal, either you teratsalize the mon carrying Tera Blast, or it's a dead move slot; the only mon that gets anything out of an 80 BP Normal move is Regieleki, and that's solely because it's the best move to hit ground types.
Thus, Tera Blast falls into two categories: valuable coverage move, such as Serperior and Regieleki, or a lure, such as Kingambit sniping Fighting types with Tera Blast Flying or Fairy. The former is unproblematic because you can reasonably expect it, and the mon ends up evaluated by judging the extra coverage versus the commitment required to access it - Volcarona was deemed broken, Serperior fell to UU. The latter is the problem.
It's not just that it's a lure; rather, it's a lure that everything has access to, and is powerful enough that - unlike Hidden Power - it's not relying on targeting a 4x weakness to pay off. Somewhat ironically, if Tera Blast was a better move baseline, if it wasn't an un-move on most physical attackers and lousy on special attackers, it would be more common and less of a problem. You'd expect it, you'd account for it both during team building and during play, and keeping tools in check to deal with a less-surprising Tera Blast would be just another hallmark of skill.
Physical Tera Blast on Kingambit wouldn't be an independently good move, by any means, but you could run it on a SD/Sucker/Kowtow/TB set and click the move to hit Dark resists and not be completely hosed when needing to terastalize something other than Kingambit. In lower tiers, you could run it on Gyarados for that Water/Normal neutral coverage, and turn it into a STAB Flying move if useful to sweep; again, not a good move, but a usable one that offers some value at all times.
By becoming more common, and less of a pure lure, it'd be more predictable, and thus less of a tiering challenge; Kingambit having a move to nuke Great Tusk would be a normal (albeit uncommon) thing, rather than a rare tech that cannot be reasonably expected. As it is, SURPRISE TERA BLAST! isn't something that can be predicted, isn't something that can be reasonably played around, and thus isn't - by the actual Smogon definition of the term - competitive.
time to break out the crystal ball again
behold! the mystical spirits have revealed to me that if waterpon were banned, we would in fact see a significant increase in balance and stall, though neither one would become overwhelming. tera dragon stocks would plummet. rockpon would rise to ou and occupy several of waterpon's offensive roles; rillaboom and meowscarada would also fill in some, though not all, of the void she left behind. moltres, garganacl, ting-lu, primarina, and alomomola usage would skyrocket, though waterpon's niche would be filled well enough that nothing would end up becoming op in her absence. pecharunt would fall back to uu, but it would take a bit of time
On a different topic, given the actual reasons given by voters in the Palafin suspect test, I doubt that Solgaleo has any chance dropping into OU.
Palafin didn't stay in Ubers because the majority found it broken, but because the majority felt that it was one more threat to deal with in a metagame saturated with too many threats already. It's hard to imagine Solgaleo not being voted to stay Ubers for the same reason, as just one more threat to deal with in team building.
Palafin didn't stay in Ubers because the majority found it broken, but because the majority felt that it was one more threat to deal with in a metagame saturated with too many threats already. It's hard to imagine Solgaleo not being voted to stay Ubers for the same reason, as just one more threat to deal with in team building.
I would be surprised to see Solgaleo retested anytime soon. Never say never though
gods planhttps://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/sv-ou-tiering-surveys.3711911/page-2#post-10415802 -- survey is out!!!
-- knock yourself out
Also agree, wrote in Hearthflame because it deserves a shot in this new meta.
For the survey, I voted 4 on Kingambit and Kyurem, 2 on Ogerpon-Wellspring, 1 on Zamazenta and Raging Bolt, and 3 on Gliscor. Tera Blast I gave a 3 just 'cause I want action on Tera, and that will probably be the only action we get on Tera, but I don't consider it the highest priority.
My opinion on the survey is that it seemed a lot like the other surveys. Maybe I wasn't too observant, but was there supposed to be something particuarly different this time? I remember hearing something about that, but apparently not too well since I can't remember what it actually was. Oh well... The survey was pretty good. I tried to start a second one just to see if I could and it didn't let me. So that's good I guess.
Here are for my opinions:
I enjoyed the meta much more with Kyurem out of the builder. I'd like to see it gone. I don't think it will be the next suspect, though. It's still a 5 for me.
Tera Blast is a 5 for me. It should be suspected very soon. It doesn't solve the inherent issues of Tera, but banning it does solve its own set of issues. I'd like to see Regieleki drop and Volc stay banned, but I'm getting ahead of myself.
Gambit was a 4 for me. It is very borderline in a Tera meta, but still manageable due to its weaknesses. I would likely give it a lower score without Tera Blast since the offensive variance would drop a lot. Although it is still cheese, I feel like you can usually play around a defensive Tera on Gambit.
Wellspring is a 3 for me. I don't have strong feelings to ban it anymore. I haven't felt that way since like DLC1. It's mostly just a 110 speed wallbreaker, which isn't fast by gen 9 standards. And I don't think Trailblaze is the best choice considering slower teams would be slower anyways and offensive teams usually pack speed control like priority. One consequence of banning it would be that you'd open up the potential spam of certain water moves, which could be both good and bad. It would at least be an interesting suspect.
Zama, Bolt, and Gliscor aren't broken. Gliscor in particular was just voted as not broken in the latest suspect
Two things I think should be considered that were off the survey:
1. Roaring Moon
Gouging Fire was broken because of DD + BE + Tera cheese. Roaring Moon has the same sort of problem. Banning Tera Blast would help, but mostly only with somewhat nerfing Tera Fairy. Defensively, Tera Fairy would still work. Moon's coverage moves are really good so banning TB wouldn't really stop it enough. I'm not just talking EQ/Acro, but also other coverage moves like Iron Head or Stone Edge that may be less expected.
2. Hamurott
I didn't put this on the survey itself, but I wanted to mention it for the way that thing centralizes hazards. All the ire people have had over gen 9 for Gliscor and Ghold with hazards should really be blamed on Hamurott. Remove Ceaseless Edge from the picture and you streamline anti-hazard tech with things like fast Taunt and Hatt. The issue is that Hamurott isn't conventionally broken. Therefore, it's harder to bring up. It is overcentralizing, though. It is my opinion that, at some point, we need a deeper discussion around this thing.
Here are for my opinions:
I enjoyed the meta much more with Kyurem out of the builder. I'd like to see it gone. I don't think it will be the next suspect, though. It's still a 5 for me.
Tera Blast is a 5 for me. It should be suspected very soon. It doesn't solve the inherent issues of Tera, but banning it does solve its own set of issues. I'd like to see Regieleki drop and Volc stay banned, but I'm getting ahead of myself.
Gambit was a 4 for me. It is very borderline in a Tera meta, but still manageable due to its weaknesses. I would likely give it a lower score without Tera Blast since the offensive variance would drop a lot. Although it is still cheese, I feel like you can usually play around a defensive Tera on Gambit.
Wellspring is a 3 for me. I don't have strong feelings to ban it anymore. I haven't felt that way since like DLC1. It's mostly just a 110 speed wallbreaker, which isn't fast by gen 9 standards. And I don't think Trailblaze is the best choice considering slower teams would be slower anyways and offensive teams usually pack speed control like priority. One consequence of banning it would be that you'd open up the potential spam of certain water moves, which could be both good and bad. It would at least be an interesting suspect.
Zama, Bolt, and Gliscor aren't broken. Gliscor in particular was just voted as not broken in the latest suspect
Two things I think should be considered that were off the survey:
1. Roaring Moon
Gouging Fire was broken because of DD + BE + Tera cheese. Roaring Moon has the same sort of problem. Banning Tera Blast would help, but mostly only with somewhat nerfing Tera Fairy. Defensively, Tera Fairy would still work. Moon's coverage moves are really good so banning TB wouldn't really stop it enough. I'm not just talking EQ/Acro, but also other coverage moves like Iron Head or Stone Edge that may be less expected.
2. Hamurott
I didn't put this on the survey itself, but I wanted to mention it for the way that thing centralizes hazards. All the ire people have had over gen 9 for Gliscor and Ghold with hazards should really be blamed on Hamurott. Remove Ceaseless Edge from the picture and you streamline anti-hazard tech with things like fast Taunt and Hatt. The issue is that Hamurott isn't conventionally broken. Therefore, it's harder to bring up. It is overcentralizing, though. It is my opinion that, at some point, we need a deeper discussion around this thing.
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I was a big tera blast hater for the longest time but ended up giving it a 2 on the survey. I won't contest that it is uncompetitive, cheesy, and provides little to no value. It also gatekeeps volc which would probably help deal with some threats such as Kyurem.
HOWEVER
The move is fun to use and very cool while we won't get anything like it in the future if we end up banning it here whereas volc will inevitably return eventually. So for the legacy of this gen we could maybe consider keeping it idk tho might change my mind.
HOWEVER
The move is fun to use and very cool while we won't get anything like it in the future if we end up banning it here whereas volc will inevitably return eventually. So for the legacy of this gen we could maybe consider keeping it idk tho might change my mind.
The time to suspect Heartflame would've been when gouging fire was in the tier..... With that mon gone, what's changed to make Heartflame OK?
Anyways, meta ratings.
Competitiveness: 6
Enjoyment: 6
Kingambit: 1
Kyurem: 2
Ogerpon-W: 1
Zamazenta: 2
Raging Bolt: 3
Gliscor: 3
Tera Blast 5:
Write-in: Roaring Moon, Dragonite, Stored Power, Terapagos-Terastal form, Archaludon w/o Eshot, Webs, Magearna
Tera Blast is indeed cool, esp on choice mons like Bolt and Basculegion, but the breaking point for me is all the crazy DDers that run it. Moon, Dnite, Kyurem, even random shit like Thorns.
All the write-ins were extremely biased picks. The only one I ask players to take seriously is Terapagos since this tier needs that mon. It would open up too many exciting and cool builds with its scor busting + spinning capabilities. The tier needs a mon like it to provide a soft check to most threats.
Anyways, meta ratings.
Competitiveness: 6
Enjoyment: 6
Kingambit: 1
Kyurem: 2
Ogerpon-W: 1
Zamazenta: 2
Raging Bolt: 3
Gliscor: 3
Tera Blast 5:
Write-in: Roaring Moon, Dragonite, Stored Power, Terapagos-Terastal form, Archaludon w/o Eshot, Webs, Magearna
Tera Blast is indeed cool, esp on choice mons like Bolt and Basculegion, but the breaking point for me is all the crazy DDers that run it. Moon, Dnite, Kyurem, even random shit like Thorns.
All the write-ins were extremely biased picks. The only one I ask players to take seriously is Terapagos since this tier needs that mon. It would open up too many exciting and cool builds with its scor busting + spinning capabilities. The tier needs a mon like it to provide a soft check to most threats.
The discussion around Palafin centered around the variety of sets and items it could run while still being a dangerous threat.
Solgaleo doesn't have super strong STAB priority, it doesn't have any way to boost it's own attack, it has a much worse typing, a worse pivot move (teleport), and severe 4MSS.
They serve very different roles on teams. Solgaleo is way less splashable, its options as a pivot/utility 'mon are extremely limited, and it can't offensively boost. The argument of threat saturation requires the 'mon to actually have the options to make it threatening vs. different sorts of teams, and the lion is simply too limited by its typing and movepool to be able to do that with any consistency.
I'm not going to comment if it's broken or not until we actually get a chance to see it in OU, but they just aren't comparable.
Personal votes with very brief explanations:
Enjoyment: 6
Competitiveness: 8
Kingambit: 3
Kyurem: 4
Ogerpon-W: 3
Zamazenta: 1
Raging Bolt: 2
Gliscor: 2
Tera Blast: 5
Enjoyment: 6
Competitiveness: 8
Kingambit: 3
Kyurem: 4
Ogerpon-W: 3
Zamazenta: 1
Raging Bolt: 2
Gliscor: 2
Tera Blast: 5
Enjoyment
A bit tedious to build for atp but I think there's a ton of untapped potential in half the tier which is exciting in and of itself to mess with. Actual enjoyment I think will improve by a good margin with a bit more tiering to remove the more oppressive stuff.
Competitiveness
I think everything in the tier can be responded to in some capacity whether that's by smart Tera allocation and/or good building. On average the better player wins even if there are some dubious elements to it that I believe deserve further evaluation. The tier is on a very good trajectory wrt competitiveness.
My stance on Kingambit has slowly started to worsen over the course of the generation from my original one. A lot of my stance was based on having healthy merits but with Zamazenta and Raging Bolt around as well as a lot more strong priority/effective reactive counterplay to work with, Kingambit has begun to feel less necessary. I really like the defensive utility of its typing and Sucker Punch but the winning power can be bolstered to an unreasonable extent if you predict around it incorrectly, and the issue is that it's pretty difficult to do that with Kingambit compared to other things. Resource management comes down to correct evaluation of Kingambit's set (Tera type and Speed mainly) but that's not very easy to ascertain since it has a lot to choose from all to accomplish the same thing but against different things. I think at its core it has some reliable counterplay (mainly via status moves, Encore, Substitute, competent Sucker Punch resistances) but those things are not always active resources and are things Kingambit users often should and do play around.
This tier was better without Kyurem around, it still does the same dumb shit, and it's been using Tera Blast more than ever. Without Tera Blast it's probably relatively within reason but this mon is still ridiculous and its oppression has felt more obvious to me than before now that we've had the taste of a metagame without it. Arguments by SupaGMoney and co. in the suspect thread made me a bit more open to its presence, but I still really don't like it around nor do I feel it's necessary.
Really annoying hugely because while it has some semi-reliable checks, most are vulnerable to U-turn (which has obnoxious synergy with its STAB combination) or simply even being overpowered. The fact it can 2HKO the entire unresisted tier makes it very frustrating to play defensively against without dedicated counterplay, which makes it a very potent Balance/Fat throttler. That being said I do think it very much can be out-offensed because of its vulnerability to hazards and its awkward Speed tier, but I need to use it more to develop a more nuanced opinion. I think it defo deserves a closer look either way.
It's a huge skill check into offense and has some really obnoxious offsets but frankly I've hugely enjoyed its presence in the tier. It suffers quite a bit into Ghost-types/can be 1v1'd by status, smart resource management, and leveraged into via resistances. This mon is completely fine imo.
Can have very convincing results but its Speed tier has become such a ridiculously easy threshold to EV your Ground-types and resistances for to where you can for sure outplay it. Overall I enjoy its presence in the tier, feels like it does what Kingambit does but in a more fair feeling way.
Was close to voting a 3 on Gliscor, but I settled on 2. It can be a disgusting progress maker at times but Protect turns are hugely telegraphed which can be exploited, and because it lives and dies on maximizing its ability to generate empty turns I feel like outpivoting it is actually quite feasible too. Obviously it will force progress esp if you try to directly overwhelm it but I don't really think that's an inherently broken thing. SD sets are fine esp since they lack initial power.
Tera Blast
Tera Blast is unhealthy. Here's why.
A bit tedious to build for atp but I think there's a ton of untapped potential in half the tier which is exciting in and of itself to mess with. Actual enjoyment I think will improve by a good margin with a bit more tiering to remove the more oppressive stuff.
Competitiveness
I think everything in the tier can be responded to in some capacity whether that's by smart Tera allocation and/or good building. On average the better player wins even if there are some dubious elements to it that I believe deserve further evaluation. The tier is on a very good trajectory wrt competitiveness.
My stance on Kingambit has slowly started to worsen over the course of the generation from my original one. A lot of my stance was based on having healthy merits but with Zamazenta and Raging Bolt around as well as a lot more strong priority/effective reactive counterplay to work with, Kingambit has begun to feel less necessary. I really like the defensive utility of its typing and Sucker Punch but the winning power can be bolstered to an unreasonable extent if you predict around it incorrectly, and the issue is that it's pretty difficult to do that with Kingambit compared to other things. Resource management comes down to correct evaluation of Kingambit's set (Tera type and Speed mainly) but that's not very easy to ascertain since it has a lot to choose from all to accomplish the same thing but against different things. I think at its core it has some reliable counterplay (mainly via status moves, Encore, Substitute, competent Sucker Punch resistances) but those things are not always active resources and are things Kingambit users often should and do play around.
This tier was better without Kyurem around, it still does the same dumb shit, and it's been using Tera Blast more than ever. Without Tera Blast it's probably relatively within reason but this mon is still ridiculous and its oppression has felt more obvious to me than before now that we've had the taste of a metagame without it. Arguments by SupaGMoney and co. in the suspect thread made me a bit more open to its presence, but I still really don't like it around nor do I feel it's necessary.
Really annoying hugely because while it has some semi-reliable checks, most are vulnerable to U-turn (which has obnoxious synergy with its STAB combination) or simply even being overpowered. The fact it can 2HKO the entire unresisted tier makes it very frustrating to play defensively against without dedicated counterplay, which makes it a very potent Balance/Fat throttler. That being said I do think it very much can be out-offensed because of its vulnerability to hazards and its awkward Speed tier, but I need to use it more to develop a more nuanced opinion. I think it defo deserves a closer look either way.
It's a huge skill check into offense and has some really obnoxious offsets but frankly I've hugely enjoyed its presence in the tier. It suffers quite a bit into Ghost-types/can be 1v1'd by status, smart resource management, and leveraged into via resistances. This mon is completely fine imo.
Can have very convincing results but its Speed tier has become such a ridiculously easy threshold to EV your Ground-types and resistances for to where you can for sure outplay it. Overall I enjoy its presence in the tier, feels like it does what Kingambit does but in a more fair feeling way.
Was close to voting a 3 on Gliscor, but I settled on 2. It can be a disgusting progress maker at times but Protect turns are hugely telegraphed which can be exploited, and because it lives and dies on maximizing its ability to generate empty turns I feel like outpivoting it is actually quite feasible too. Obviously it will force progress esp if you try to directly overwhelm it but I don't really think that's an inherently broken thing. SD sets are fine esp since they lack initial power.
Tera Blast
Tera Blast is unhealthy. Here's why.
im too lazy to go indepth on every vote i just wanted to briefly say that waterpon+kyurem are in need of immediate action and tera blast warrants a suspect test. ive had moments where i thought gambit/zama/glis/bolt were broken but not really right now and they're for sure not the most pressing issues, wouldn't be opposed to discussion/suspect in the future tho.
waterpon is simply way too good at breaking and way too volatile based on minor set differences. all the good pokemon that check it like dnite pult bolt zap (Kinda) have pretty poor efficacy vs literally any set w knock pr or turn, the niche pokemon that check it like sinistcha apple (100% spl winrate!) amogus pex are pretty poor into knock but also fail to rlly gain back momentum against turn. it would be one thing if pon struggled to get in or was easy to rk but it's not. it's decently fast with an amazing defensive typing, genuinely one of the better ground resists available to offense, and solid bulk supplemented by the ability to flip a ton of mus w tera. just a flat broken mon methinks.
im less passionate about kyurem mainly cuz it's already been spoken about to death. very limited defensive responses, especially ones that last, that make running anything remotely slow 10x harder. if it makes gliscor broken we just ban gliscor Lol though if im being honest one ice mon that already struggles w tera gliscor somehow being the sole solution to gliscor has always been a silly argument.
still dont really know if tera blast ban Makes Sense but i have decided that i'm open to it being banned as it really isnt contributing much as is. 99% of the time the move is used on dnite moth or tera ground blast on random shit which whatever is not worth preserving honestly though i will miss ice move lando. at minimum, public sentiment seems to be p against tera blast and that should warrant Something.
i definitely think this metagame has a bit of catch-up to play with the suspect cheating and wasting time on palafin. circumstances are what they are and it's not on council would just like to see a little less dead time inbetween suspects. hoping for something like pon -> tera blast -> kyurem -> reevalute glis and the zama vs gambit dynamic.
waterpon is simply way too good at breaking and way too volatile based on minor set differences. all the good pokemon that check it like dnite pult bolt zap (Kinda) have pretty poor efficacy vs literally any set w knock pr or turn, the niche pokemon that check it like sinistcha apple (100% spl winrate!) amogus pex are pretty poor into knock but also fail to rlly gain back momentum against turn. it would be one thing if pon struggled to get in or was easy to rk but it's not. it's decently fast with an amazing defensive typing, genuinely one of the better ground resists available to offense, and solid bulk supplemented by the ability to flip a ton of mus w tera. just a flat broken mon methinks.
im less passionate about kyurem mainly cuz it's already been spoken about to death. very limited defensive responses, especially ones that last, that make running anything remotely slow 10x harder. if it makes gliscor broken we just ban gliscor Lol though if im being honest one ice mon that already struggles w tera gliscor somehow being the sole solution to gliscor has always been a silly argument.
still dont really know if tera blast ban Makes Sense but i have decided that i'm open to it being banned as it really isnt contributing much as is. 99% of the time the move is used on dnite moth or tera ground blast on random shit which whatever is not worth preserving honestly though i will miss ice move lando. at minimum, public sentiment seems to be p against tera blast and that should warrant Something.
i definitely think this metagame has a bit of catch-up to play with the suspect cheating and wasting time on palafin. circumstances are what they are and it's not on council would just like to see a little less dead time inbetween suspects. hoping for something like pon -> tera blast -> kyurem -> reevalute glis and the zama vs gambit dynamic.
i've been very disconnected from SV OU and mons in general lately, i voted 6 for enjoyment bc im struggling a lot with teambuilding, 8 for competitiveness bc the tier seems in a good state, 5 for kyurem wogerpon and tb to raise the score and 1 for the rest to lower it. wrote in solgaleo so that we retest and y'all can shut up about bringing down ubers
I wrote in lugia for the bit but also if a hypothetical no tera meta ever happens I would definitely consider asking to free it
Also if you all want terapagos down here just ask to ban tera it isn’t that hard, for those who want to free it
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Enjoyment: 8
Competitiveness: 6 (solely because of Roaring Moon)
Kingambit: 5 (won’t miss fighting this, but I will be sad to not be able to use it anymore)
Ogerpon-Wellspring: 5 (broken bs mon, made me start playing offensive teams [which I do enjoy now, but still])
Kyurem: 3 (I used to hate it but I haven’t seen bro in like 50 games)
Gliscor: 5 (idc)
Raging Bolt: 5 (when it Teras and gets a guaranteed kill because it’s so fat…)
Zamazenta: 1 (Pech is OU now, lock in)
Tera Blast: 5 (can something please happen in this tier lol, also it’s uncompetitive or whatever)
wrote in Roaring Moon (I don’t even be losing to it like that but it usually forces a kill or tera)
forgot to write in Solgaleo but I urge you all to do so if you haven’t done the survey yet (I mean, if you care about the lion…)
Competitiveness: 6 (solely because of Roaring Moon)
Kingambit: 5 (won’t miss fighting this, but I will be sad to not be able to use it anymore)
Ogerpon-Wellspring: 5 (broken bs mon, made me start playing offensive teams [which I do enjoy now, but still])
Kyurem: 3 (I used to hate it but I haven’t seen bro in like 50 games)
Gliscor: 5 (idc)
Raging Bolt: 5 (when it Teras and gets a guaranteed kill because it’s so fat…)
Zamazenta: 1 (Pech is OU now, lock in)
Tera Blast: 5 (can something please happen in this tier lol, also it’s uncompetitive or whatever)
wrote in Roaring Moon (I don’t even be losing to it like that but it usually forces a kill or tera)
forgot to write in Solgaleo but I urge you all to do so if you haven’t done the survey yet (I mean, if you care about the lion…)
Enjoyment: 8
I'm not very good at teambuilding which is the reason this isn't higher but gen 9 is the first tier I've played seriously and I'm pretty happy with what I see.
Competitiveness: 9
I personally rarely feel cheated out of games, and almost all my failures can be attributed to mistakes in play or teambuilding. I think strategies have stayed fairly diverse and interesting, and I think archetypes interact overall well with each other.
Kingambit: 2
Probably one of the more banworthy things in the tier, but the meta is so well teched to deal with it by now that maybe the impact isn't so clear. I think it really struggles to make progress when it's forced on defense, which is quite common these days, and it's hard to win with unless something else on its team opens a big hole which is equally exploitable by other threats.
Ogerpon-Wellspring: 2
My experience with Wellspring has been okay. In game it feels just like any other mon, but maybe once I get better at teambuilding I'll appreciate what a strain it is. I mostly play samples and public teams.
Kyurem: 2
Same with Wellspring. I like the meta both with and without Kyurem, to be honest.
Gliscor: 1
The post-Gliscor suspect shows me that the swords dance Gliscor threat everyone was bigging up was basically nonexistent. Gliscor is a nice supporting piece in the meta and I don't think it's overly centralizing at all.
Raging Bolt: 1
I wasn't even aware this was on people's radar. I feel like Raging Bolt is just Gambit that interacts with stuff much more consistently when you're playing with and against it.
Zamazenta: 1
This is the most honest goodness in a metagame full of madness. My humble king
Tera Blast: 4
Makes games volatile and uninteractive, reduces skill expression in gameplay and building.
It isn't that common or even good, but it's not healthy for the metagame. I'd be glad to see it go, as I think it's one of the final touches this version of the metagame (before other bans) would appreciate.
I'm not very good at teambuilding which is the reason this isn't higher but gen 9 is the first tier I've played seriously and I'm pretty happy with what I see.
Competitiveness: 9
I personally rarely feel cheated out of games, and almost all my failures can be attributed to mistakes in play or teambuilding. I think strategies have stayed fairly diverse and interesting, and I think archetypes interact overall well with each other.
Kingambit: 2
Probably one of the more banworthy things in the tier, but the meta is so well teched to deal with it by now that maybe the impact isn't so clear. I think it really struggles to make progress when it's forced on defense, which is quite common these days, and it's hard to win with unless something else on its team opens a big hole which is equally exploitable by other threats.
Ogerpon-Wellspring: 2
My experience with Wellspring has been okay. In game it feels just like any other mon, but maybe once I get better at teambuilding I'll appreciate what a strain it is. I mostly play samples and public teams.
Kyurem: 2
Same with Wellspring. I like the meta both with and without Kyurem, to be honest.
Gliscor: 1
The post-Gliscor suspect shows me that the swords dance Gliscor threat everyone was bigging up was basically nonexistent. Gliscor is a nice supporting piece in the meta and I don't think it's overly centralizing at all.
Raging Bolt: 1
I wasn't even aware this was on people's radar. I feel like Raging Bolt is just Gambit that interacts with stuff much more consistently when you're playing with and against it.
Zamazenta: 1
This is the most honest goodness in a metagame full of madness. My humble king
Tera Blast: 4
Makes games volatile and uninteractive, reduces skill expression in gameplay and building.
It isn't that common or even good, but it's not healthy for the metagame. I'd be glad to see it go, as I think it's one of the final touches this version of the metagame (before other bans) would appreciate.
You know what? You convinced me.
I play gen 9 since the very beginning, then I quit playing like a year ago (around ursaluna-b suspect iirc).
The thing is that I never had the chance to get "the hang" of gen 9, either at teambuilding or straight up playing ladder games.
Your video was such a revelation (just like those cringey images of Trump at the Oval Office with a ghost of Jesus at the back lol)
Now I realize why I suck at gen 9: it was tera blast all along. Now I finally understand it and thanks for giving us a good insight of the game in a digestible video. Thank you!
PD: Release the Lion
This sounds like actual cancer. I’m not the biggest fan of Woger but holy fuck this would be an obnoxious metagame.
Enjoyment: 6
Competitiveness: 7
Kingambit: 2
Kyurem: 3
Ogerpon-W: 2
Zamazenta: 5
Raging Bolt: 3
Gliscor: 5
Tera Blast: 5
I am pretty apathetic to most offensive threats in the tier now. I think Raging Neck is actually worse than Kingambit due to having more balanced bulk and weaknesses that are less easily exploitable, it can also make itself harder to kill with CM which is something that Gambit can’t do. Kyurem is just another Pokemon in the cartel of “Click Dragon Dance to win instantly” and I don’t consider it particularly worse than Moon or DNite.
To this day I still find it baffling how people can not only consider Shitmazenta balanced but even an actively healthy part of the metagame. There has never been a Pokemon outside of Ubers with such an obscene combination of bulk, speed, and attack and a lot of times all it has to do is click ID once, maybe tera, and win the game. I fucking hate this thing.
I fully support banning Tera Blast. It would objectively mitigate the problems surrounding Tera and potentially allow for some drops.
Terapagos would be a beyond cancerous addition to the metagame, becoming a brainless, guaranteed Rapid Spin due to Tera Shell making it impossible to immediately offensively pressure and making spinblocking basically impossible due to Dark Pulse/Ice Beam coverage.