Implemented Swanna in BW PU

[asa]

(this was written by Akir; thank you so much for your help here, really)
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After a push to revitalize BW PU from obscurity effectively ended a few years ago, the tier has enjoyed a strong string of competitive tournaments and a balanced metagame. This continues to be the case, but recently a concern from the community has become an outcry for action. Swanna has emerged as a blemish on the metagame and after careful consideration it is of the opinion of PU leadership that the best course of action for Swanna is a standardized suspect test.

Swanna has always been a strong member of BW PU, but in the time between the last ban years ago and now there has been enough experimentation on Swanna to unleash its latent potential. The SubRoost set is the best example of this as it is arguably the best stallbreaker in the format. However, the issue is not in the fact that it is a talented stallbreaker but instead in how it breaks stall: Hurricane spam. In BW PU, there are defensive Pokemon aplenty but most can struggle to tank back-to-back hurricanes. Walls like Audino and Zweilous can tank Hurricanes just fine on paper, but the confusion adds an unhealthy layer to the mix. Given enough luck, Swanna effectively has no defensive counters. This creates a situation where Swanna's entire list of counters has an asterisk next to it due to the problem of the walls in PU can either tank a Hurricane or pressure Swanna to stop spamming Hurricane. Not both.

Add in that Swanna's Speed lets it consistently heal back up to constantly reroll Hurricane luck and you are left with a Pokemon that can very commonly feel like it is rewarding luck over skill. In a format focused otherwise on good resource management and positioning, Swanna's ability to upend it all with just one or two good Hurricanes feels like an uncomfortable outlier that is, at best, not fun to play with or against. At worst, Swanna invalidates consistent defensive play by adding a coinflip over if it will even work. Resources are already tight; the added coinflip is a punishment for playing. All of the above doesn't factor in that Swanna is also adept at utilizing the holes it creates itself. Swanna outspeeds most of the tier and is comparatively strong for the format, making it a reliable option for sweeping after it is done stallbreaking. If it was just an annoying stallbreaker it would be one thing, but having the ability to also sweep with the same exact set after breaking through its own counters implies an unhealthy presence. Swanna's offensive prowess is also highlighted by the fact that it is also the best scarfer in the format and is able to consistently sweep with the same exact power level as the stallbreaker.

However, a suspect is warranted instead of an immediate ban because Swanna does have positive aspects. A healthy Speed tier and being a soft check to much of the tier eases some teambuilding on paper. When the most popular Pokemon in the format with a solid 60% usage is Monferno, a reliable check like Swanna is a very easy way to add some much-needed defensive and offensive synergy to offense. Even so, Swanna also makes teambuilding more difficult due to the strain that Swanna forces. The best answer to Swanna right now is a Klang + Zebstrika core, a two-slot solution that includes an easily-punished mon like Klang... all for the purpose of countering Swanna. Teambuilding strain has always been one of the biggest issues facing BW PU, and Swanna both helps and hurts this. In the end, Swanna needs some sort of answer. Swanna needs to have its day in court and to have the players who love the tier most come out and shape the future of the format. There are pros and cons to each decision, so this fork in the road is best decided by the community that keeps pushing the format forward.

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To be eligible to vote in this suspect test, you must have (i) played at least 3 games in any one of PUPL, BWPL, or PUBD with at least one win or (ii) made semifinals of the most recent BW PU Cup. We'll also be including Akir and Bella for their significant contributions to the tier and its resources (both in C&C and otherwise, especially Akir). Anyone that isn't on the below list but has some stake in the future of BW PU is still encouraged to share their opinion on Swanna in this thread, but please keep the discussion to whether or not Swanna is broken in BW PU.

Qualified Voters (35)

Akir
Alice Kazumi (BWPL IV)
Alkione (PUPL IX)
Bella
Cielau (BW PU Cup)
Cow (PUPL X)
Denial (PUPL VIII)
Dj Breloominati♬
Drud (PUPL X, BWPL III)
DugZa (BWPL III)
dunoks (PUPL IX)
Elfuseon
EviGaro (PUPL X, PUBD I, PUPL IX)
Feaniix (PUPL X, PUBD I, PUPL IX, BWPL III, BWPL II)
fish anemometer (BWPL IV)
gorex (PUPL IX)
Guille (PUPL X)
hex (BW PU Cup, BWPL IV)
LordST
LpZ (PUPL X, PUBD I, PUPL IX)
maki (PUPL VIII)
Medeia
ninjadog (PUPL IX, BWPL III, BWPL II)
Oathkeeper (BW PU Cup, BWPL II)
Raichy (BWPL II)
roxie (PUPL VIII)
SergioRules (PUPL X)
Shuckleking87 (PUPL VIII)
skrimps (PUBD I, PUPL IX)
Stories (PUPL IX)
Tack (PUPL X, PUBD I, PUPL IX)
Texas Cloverleaf (BWPL IV)
Xiri
yandaud
ziloXX (BWPL IV)

This thread will remain open for approximately two weeks, and voting will go up on Tuesday, January 7th, 2025.

 

[Stories]

Honestly I stopped playing this tier specifically because of Swanna. This mon has 0 defensive counterplay that isn't gonna just get haxed by broken Scald and Hurricane so it forces really awkward structures or lines of just spamming RestTalk with Eviolite SDef mons and praying you don't get haxed

 

[LpZ]

Honestly i stopped playing this tier specifically because of Swanna. This mon has 0 defensive counterplay that isn't gonna just get haxed by broken Scald and Hurricane so it forces really awkward structures or lines of just spamming RestTalk with Eviolite SDef mons and praying you don't get haxed

i contributed to deliver her ptsd ^

in all seriousness tho, not gonna repeat myself for like the 3rd time in a whole big post so im just gonna link my latest thoughts which is at the bottom of this post: https://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/bw-pu.3730796/post-10345443

 

[Alkione]

Outside of the whole haxy shit that thing can do, a good speedtier for BW PU, almost impossible to cover ( we're bored of playing klang eviolite or bronzor ngl, and those two can still get haxed by the sub set ), the number of sets that you've to GUESS, since you cannot check the set as you could instant lose the game by checking it...
Also retricting the building in a bad way. Where Monferno is having a Landorus job in the tier, Swanna is kinda of the Zygarde of the tier : a lot of set, can hax your counterplay, if you guess wrong you can lose the game, restrict the building too much
In himself Swanna is probably banworth imo, and again it's my opinion, but it would be probably way more fun to innovate and build without him being a constant threat to anything you want to create

 

[Django]

Guys I got semis in BW Cup with a bye, act win, then 1 win with stolen teams. Played 5 BW PU games total. Absolutely not qualified to vote based on that so I should probs be removed from the list

 

[hex]

last pupl was my first time ever really learning bwpu so i could help my player (Cow) and i ended up just suggesting using subroost swanna every week cuz every time i looked at a scout it just felt like that mon owned everything. little did i know it was bc swanna is an s tier mon! but as bwpu cup and bwpl came around i realized there isn't a reason to not use it tbh and i ended up spamming the hell out of it. it does feel pretty haxy + unfair at times, and with an alive swanna regardless of the game state i always felt like i could cheese out a win. i dont really like using the hax argument because at the end of the day thats mons and thats just the game we've chosen to play, but i suppose its quite consistent at getting that hax. i do think it can be an oppressive mon in the builder and like stories said having to run rest on some of your switchins is really cringe. anyway, i dont feel super strongly about banning swanna i think the tier is fine, i also dont think it would be a bad change for the tier if it was gone but as more posts (hopefully) come in ill feel stronger about either side of ban/dnb

 

[Cow]

subroost swanna forces a lot of coinflips with rest talk pulls, hurricane confusion, hurricane landing and scald burns, and when you factor in bw's sleep mechanic can leave a lot of games in the hand of god. while rng alone should not be the sole reason to ban a pokemon, (MACHAMP) scarf swanna has proved itself to be too powerful for the metagame to handle, sweeping almost every offence team. being forced to use klang should be a warcrime and even thats forced to sleep after a few switches and is doing a whole lot of nothing for the rest of the game. on top this you're also doing a lot of guess work, either off preview or the first time it hits the field to try and determine the set. ultimately this pokemon has proved to be a combination of too strong boosted by a lot of rng factors. i dont think the arguments of it having a good speed tier (not saying anyone specifically has made this argument) is justice to keep it in the tier and if anything the builder becomes a lot less restrictive with it gone.

 

[Bella]

So today, i decided to make a post defending the DNB position I have on Swanna, since every other post here is pretty much pro-ban or relatively neutral.

Anyways, Swanna is... not particularly a problem in my eyes? I feel like the meta is in a state of perpetual stability tbh, and the tier has kind of formed itself in a way where Swanna is perfectly run and easy to play around with the (various and simple) right lines. But aside from that, There are a few big points I feel like also contribute to my opinion of Swanna being overall fine.

1. SubRoost (and Scarf) can get easily counterplayed by offensive and defensive options.
Subroost is very very good, but I honestly feel like it has issues with how easy it is to counterplay once you know what you're doing? Like yeah, obviously Scald and Hurricane confusions are extremely extremely annoying, but the plethora of offensively faster threats such as Zeb, Purugly, the Simis, Raichu, Scarfers, etc all exist and can make it pretty difficult for a safe sub opportunity / easy sub break. I'll admit defensive threats are more iffy, but even then without non LO SubRoost / Scarf get pretty often checked by the likes of the Steels, Zweilous, Articuno, CroMuk, Audino, hell even Frillish exists to check it. LO is obviously a bit more tricky but even then you're entirely reliant on inaccurate canes and lucky scald burns.

2. Have you seen the hazard metagame?
I feel like Swanna is a Pokemon that really needs to switch in and out a lot in order to really be effective, and honestly? That's like, legit one of the biggest things holding it back LOL. With how easy it is to get rocks up for the entire game in the tier (considering your hazard control options are Tentacool and Natu), Swanna is basically forced to take 25% every time its wants to switch in or waste a valuable turn where it just gets OHKOd or Pivoted on to Roost / Sub. Obviously this effects other Pokemon too, but I feel like this affects Swanna the absolute most because alot of the other rocks weak major players in PU (Simisear, Swoobat, etc) all need to only switch in once to really get their setup going while swanna needs multiple opportunities to come in per game, especially if its scarfing.

3. Swanna IS the glue to the tier.
I feel like the big thing so many people are missing about Swanna is this: Swanna keeps so many potential problems in check. I feel like with a potential banning of Swanna looming, we open a potential pandora's box of Pokemon who are kept in part in check by Swanna. Monferno is the obvious example, do we really want to live in a metagame even more dominated by solely Frillish - Fisk cores because banning Swanna means Monfernos best offensive check is gone? It's the tiers best Cleaner, Revenge Killer, and Stallbreaker, and removing it creates a massive hole in the metagame that I'm not sure could properly be filled.

The last part of this post will just be me discussing a few pro ban points bought up in this thread, and my arguments against them:

Outside of the whole haxy shit that thing can do, a good speedtier for BW PU, almost impossible to cover ( we're bored of playing klang eviolite or bronzor ngl, and those two can still get haxed by the sub set )

Klang and Bronzor exist in the tier because of Swanna and... literally everything else lmao. Swanna does not force using these two, the two are so good because they counter swanna AND they counter Beheeyem, Zebs, Swoobat, etc. Also, I would say the speedtier is good, but managable. As i said, theres still alot of options to deal with it offensively, and scarf is honestly pretty weak and does not really need as much defensive counterplay as SubRoost does.

the number of sets that you've to GUESS, since you cannot check the set as you could instant lose the game by checking it...

It has 2 good ones, and its not that hard to guess if the swanna is scarf or subroost.

Also retricting the building in a bad way. Where Monferno is having a Landorus job in the tier, Swanna is kinda of the Zygarde of the tier : a lot of set, can hax your counterplay, if you guess wrong you can lose the game, restrict the building too much

I feel like it does not restrict the builder as much as any other top tier in the metagame? It restricts the builder as much as Monferno, Zeb, Fisk, and Stoutland do. You are naturally going to account for countering it, it's not like you are forced to bring 3 Swanna checks. It's something that will have its check accounted for because its checks are generally good Pokemon overall (that is unless you are using Chinchou like a freak).

[Swanna] does feel pretty haxy + unfair at times, and with an alive swanna regardless of the game state i always felt like i could cheese out a win. i dont really like using the hax argument because at the end of the day thats mons and thats just the game we've chosen to play, but i suppose its quite consistent at getting that hax. i do think it can be an oppressive mon in the builder and like stories said having to run rest on some of your switchins is really cringe.

See above. Its just as an oppressive threat to the builder as other top tiers.

Being forced to use klang should be a warcrime and even thats forced to sleep after a few switches and is doing a whole lot of nothing for the rest of the game.

I feel like your not forced to use Klang in the slightest, since you have like 7 other Swanna checks to use if you prefer. Also even when its sleeping it still is a nice spotcheck to like a 1/3 of the metagame, so like......

Anyways, Please Don't Ban Swanna. Sure, it could be a bit bullshit at times, but it's a Pokemon that has to exist for the tier's stability and the tier has time and time again adapted to it and kept it in check. It's a perfectly reasonable mon, and I will be voting DNB on it.

 

[Texas Cloverleaf]

My experience in BWPL did not lead me to feel Swanna is broken, but that it was likely above the power curve in how it constrained team building diversity and could take over the game. The speed tier in particular made it difficult to effectively run balance cores due to the need to outpace Swanna. Both the pro and anti-ban arguments I've been considering in this thread have merit to me but I am currently leaning pro-ban based on how I think it would impact the health of the tier. Swanna as a catch-all check to potential problems (Monferno cited above) does not hold water with me, setting aside that Monferno felt like a very healthy presence, I feel that Swanna's presence restricts the lower class too extensively to allow the full spread of defensive counter play to other threats to flourish and the metagame evolving in that direction would be positive. Given Swanna's predominantly offensive role and aforementioned weakness to hazards it does not fulfill the Lando-T role of catch all check and defensive glue that would otherwise justify it as a necessary limiter on other threats in the tier.

 

[Lily]

Been a while since I've actively played BW PU so feel free to disregard most or all of this, since it's not coming from a place of super recent involvement. That said the landscape of the tier is still close enough to how it was when I was on top of it and I do still follow from the sidelines so I'd like to think this isn't a classic case of "I don't play this tier BUT...".

I'm not sure how relevant the focus on odds in the OP is. I (poorly) wrote some code to determine how often Swanna actually wins against Zweilous - which is obviously impossible to discern as an exact science due to the non-deterministic nature of competitive battling but regardless;

the simulation assumes Swanna burns all 16 Hurricane PP in an attempt at getting through Zweilous - and it happens roughly 10% of the time before factoring in critical hit chances. This is assuming Zweilous never clicks an attacking move or Roar, too. I would estimate the odds are sliced in half if it does, if not more, but that would also involve determining the optimal click on a given turn (Dragon Tail is a more free click at 100% HP than at 50%, for instance) and I just did not wanna do that so I assumed it clicked Rest every turn instead.

Now these odds are not negligible, and it also assumes some best case scenarios on both ends (Swanna having all 16 PP, never having to use any moves other than Hurricane, and Zweilous not having taken chip earlier in the game), but it's pretty rare for this 1v1 to actually go awry for the Zweilous user and it does require a decent bit of smart positioning from the Swanna user, which is not necessarily a bad thing.

This is of course just one Pokemon because frankly it's a pain in the ass to do it just for Zweilous so I'm sure as shit not doing it for Audino's regenerating ass or whatever else, and I'm also realising just now as I write this that I didn't factor in crit odds so it's probably up a few percent given Swanna has a ~45% chance of getting at least one Hurricane crit across its 16 PP but even then the fact is that this mon's issues are that it kinda breaks too much shit even with RNG aside and the RNG just adds an extra layer to the mix that gets to be too much. The OP states this but in doing so it kinda goes overboard and doesn't really address why Swanna is a big problem to begin with.

Back when I super actively played Swanna wasn't really a huge deal; it was a known good for sure but it ultimately was held back by just being largely outclassed by Simipour which was faster and stronger and kinda did everything Swanna did without any of the bullshit necessary to do it. So you'd see a scarf Swanna every so often but that was about it. Things have obviously changed since but one thing has remained constant - BW PU has really bad Water resists in general, all of the "good" mons that resist Water happen to also be Water types ftmp and that kinda throws a huge spanner in the works when the faster Water type gets free subs on them. The Grasses exist but obviously get bopped by Hurricane and Dragons are few and far between and also bad other than Zweilous so you end up basically being forced to throw in these uber passive generic special walls (Klang, Bronzor, Audino) and you're basically always on the back foot.

In general this is why I preferred the tier with Simipour around, bc having an offensive Water resist (even if a frail one) that also pushed progress on its own was much more enjoyable to me than the awkward dance you have to do around not only Swanna but also Golduck and even Huntail now. It'd be one thing if there wasn't much entry for the Waters to go crazy; there are things like Stoutland and Ursaring that are really tough to prevent progress from but in return they usually have to either trade a ton of HP or abuse their much smaller amount of free clicks. Doesn't really apply to Swanna and other waters when basically every team is gonna have Monferno or Tort or Maractus or Shiftry or Vileplume or Marowak or whatever else. Getting all those opportunities to click as a strong wallbreaker with much more longevity than other wallbreakers is a pretty big deal.

So ultimately this is kind of a lot of words to be an uninvolved mostly-fencesitter; I don't have much of a claim to this tier anymore other than being a former (top?) player that now likes to watch it rather than play it. Mostly just wanted to make this post to say that the focus on RNG I'm seeing feels more like it's missing the forest for the trees; Swanna's luck potential is enabled hugely by the threat it commands rather than being the source of the threat itself, and the focus should probably be on that when it comes to a ban. I'm not informed enough to say whether or not it's broken; strong Waters are kinda fundamentally silly in this tier and the Flying STAB only amplifies that, but it clearly has good checks, even if they lose once in a blue moon. With that said, the passivity it forces is generally a detriment to metagames IMO and that's probably a valid reason to kick it, but I'm not advocating one way or the other. The post LpZ linked resonates with me the most though.

o7

 

[Akir]

To revive this thread a bit after the holidays I figured I would post my thoughts. To be honest, I have avoided giving my direct opinion on Swanna because I honestly have been indecisive on it for years now. Simply put, I do not think that Swanna is conventionally broken. If you are looking for a Linoone or Vigoroth level of garbage broken you will not find it in Swanna. It is, however, on the fence enough that I do think it leans more towards unhealthy more than anything.

So when I wrote the OP, I did not think it would be the OP. I thought it was a letter to the powers-that-be on why people are mad about Swanna. In retrospect I probably should have known but I think the OP hits on the frustration towards Swanna very well. It's not that Swanna is a lucky mon, it is just a mon that has the ability to reroll that luck over and over again until it works. The SubRoost set is great for keeping Swanna alive and continually slamming Hurricane, which is due to the fact that most walls in PU generally struggle to appropriately stop Swanna in a meaningful way. Simply taking a Hurricane is not enough, you need to also stop the SubRoost cycle. Many walls fail to do this, which is why seeing Swanna continually fish for Hurricane confusion and continually get it eventually is a lot more common than some would like. SubRoost Swanna rewards fishing for hax and is very good at it, which results in enough games that are decided by Hurricane that even the sight of Swanna makes people grit their teeth some. Above all, it's just not fun to lose to Hurricane nor is it fun to watch. Pokemon is Pokemon of course, and I am willing to accept that, but it still kind of sucks.

One thing I did do over the course of these years is wait and see how walls adapted to Swanna. Some were successful in finding new tech to stop the fishing...some more successful than others. Zweilous and Klang come to mind as the two walls most reliable in stopping it, with Zweilous swapping Dragon Tail for Roar (which is better anyway) and Klang being run alongside Zebstrika for a 1-2 punch to take care of it. Audino also runs Encore a lot more than it used to in order to stop it, and newly minted good mon Muk can also tank some hits and pressure enough back. However, all of these have some sort of flaw that prevent them from working over the course of the game and that hits the main issue with Swanna: it is unhealthy not on paper but in the gameplay. Zweilous and Klang both have to rely on Rest for recovery so they are on a timer for how long they can keep it up, Audino can't 3hko, and Muk sometimes only has Leftovers for recovery. All this to say that Swanna can fairly reliably outstall these walls and just try again with Hurricane later.

All of this typing so far was just to set the stage for all of the pieces coming together. The post above hit on a few things and I appreciate that but now I'm gonna tie them together fully. Here are the factors:
1. BW PU as a tier has mediocre Water resists.
2. Swanna is exceptional at keeping itself alive through matches.
3. Walls are only able to reliably stop Swanna in the short term, assuming no hax, and only some walls.
4. Swanna's toolkit makes it able to reliably fish for hax.
5. Swanna's power is above average, to the point where the Scarf set is considered a reliable sweeper.

All of this combined means that Swanna is a very effective stallbreaker that is up against a comparatively weak array of answers that it can reliably break down. Swanna is able to break through its own counters and sweep just fine all things equal, but this is ironically more consistent thanks to the help of hax to speed the process up. It is a very strong Pokemon even without the hax, but its ability to farm confusion makes all answers not guaranteed and makes this already difficult to handle Pokemon even harder to handle in the most annoying way possible. It is a bluntly miserable experience watching a tournament win tranform into a loss based on the other person fishing for confusion and getting it.

Unfortunately for you, reader, I have 3 years worth of opinions so I am not done. Also wanted to slide in the positives that make me waver and that is that Swanna feels amazing in the teambuilder. Base 98 Speed is great honestly; it's faster than all of the midrange mons like Stoutland, Gabite, and most notably Monferno, while not being so fast that the actual "fast" mons like Jumpluff or Zebstrika have no real issues. In fact, I would say that Swanna is the best Monferno check in the game in terms of how many teams it can fit on and how effective it is in that role. I am definitely not in the "Monferno is broken" camp. but more answers to the #1 mon means more varied builds in the teambuilder which means a more varied tier which is more fun frankly. The base 90-100 Speed tier is also surprisingly barren, with really only Swanna and I guess Mr. Mime and Leafeon in there as notable members. Stall is also on the rise, so a stallbreaker that is not a drain on defensive synergy or momentum is huge and hard to understate. I would miss Swanna dearly in the teambuilder if it were to be banned.

This is all not mentioning that while Swanna has an asterisk next to all of its counters, there are still a good number of them. Zweilous and Muk fit very well on to a ton of teams, and Audino and Ursaring fit on to others. Even Klang, terrible as it is, can still bask in the glory of the 5hko. As time moves on as well, people have gotten used to Swanna being the threat that it is and have learned more ways to check it. Zebstrika, just as the best example, is always good for checking SubRoost and is also everywhere. I am also a huge fan of Purugly even if I am alone in my camp. Scarf Swanna is definitely by far the best Scarfer in the format and a menace, but all of the aforementioned walls that can take SubRoost can take on Scarf even better.

So overall I am still on the fence after writing this and honestly I would be fine with however people want to take the metagame. I definitely didn't want to do nothing, so here is something. Might even edit this later in the day to add more thoughts...we will see. I wasn't even expecting to vote honestly, so that was a nice surprise. End of the day, I think it is up to us, the community as a whole, to decide which route we want to take this mon. But no matter which way this goes, I earnestly hope that this is the last suspect this tier ever needs. I know people have their wishlists for banning more mons and these lists are varied with arguments attached, but I do think that the tier - as it currently is and whatever it might change into come next week - is an excellent tier and I hope people enjoy it as much as I do.

tl;dr Swanna is a very good Pokemon that is arguably unhealthy even without factoring in the fact that it's great at fishing for confusion, but it is also a great addition to the teambuilder and isn't so broken that it's overwhelming.

 

[asa]

Voting for this suspect test has commenced: https://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/bw-pu-suspect-swanna.3757900/

 

[asa]

Swanna has been banned from BW PU.