np: OU Suspect Testing Round 2 - Who am I to break tradition?

[Mario With Lasers]

If you ban the abusers, you do realize that you'll end up banning all pokemom with rain based abilities, don't you? Unless you want Luvdisc banned, I suggest you quit using that arguement.

Has Luvdisc ever been a threat to anyone? No. We know exactly who could/should get banned for being "broken" under rain, we don't need a blanket ban or anything alike.

Wanna know why?
How do you define whether something is broken in the rain?

...Being broken in rain. Do you want me to draw it for you, or anything...? I mean do you think we want to ban ALL of them, is that so ?__?

Gorebyss and huntail are nice trick roomers.

Never saw them last gen and you didn't either.

Kingdra is a phenominal dragon dancer, yet you want it banned.

That's like saying Scarfchomp shouldn't have been banned even if "only" Yachechomp was broken.

Kabutops is a usable lead.

Yeah, in NU, right.

Poliwrath had uses before it got swift swim.

...Well no one said we should ban Poliwrath. I mean, it's Poliwrath, not even Swift Swim makes it instantly good...

In 4th gen, rain abusers were not banned because rain timed out after several turns. Rain abusers are still not broken. Drizzle is what is broken.

In 3rd Gen, Salamence was not Uber because its main STAB sucked. Overpowered Dragons are not the problem. Draco Meteor and Outrage are the problem.

 

[phalanx]

drizzle is not overpowered, it is just an effect, the stuff that uses the effect are the overpowered ones
and drizzle makes thunder 100% accurate so yea sur its overpowerred when it boosts a super effective move against waters.

 

[astrohawke]

Poliwrath is very good. Water/fighting hits a lot of OU really hard right now. If you come in on something that is going to switch out, you can belly drum and sweep.

 

[jrp]

Gliscor can be used to abuse sandstorm, yet it wasn't banned.
Substitute, toxic, EQ, roost @ brightpowder. Simplistic.

Anyway, Huntail/gorebyss in the lower tiers in the past. Not OU.
Kabutops is UU. How can it be used as a NU lead?

Like I've said, rain dance is perfectly fine. If someone can counter just leaving rain as it was in 4th gen, and being caused by the move Rain Dance, I will stop arguing against drizzle. But there is really no reason to counter that, other then that rain dance is less useful.

What's his name, the genie gets mischevious heart and rain dance. So no taunting. He can use volt change to get a sweeper in.

 

[moe1216]

Like I asked earlier but never got an answer, what would happen to the metagame if Rain was banned? Would that make sand become more dominant and the three sand beasts, Garchomp, Landlos, Doryuzu, take the spotlight? Or would sun, the underdog alongside Hail, start to get some more use?

 

[Benlisted]

They are not broken in rain, they're broken in drizzle rain. Rain existed in the form of a move, and it still does. For the 50th time, ban drizzle, people can use rain dance.

In 4th gen, rain abusers were not banned because rain timed out after several turns. Rain abusers are still not broken. Drizzle is what is broken.

Well when I refer to Rain I mean Perma-Rain, sorry if I'd confused you with that. I tend to use Damp Rock Rain to refer to non-perma Rain. We seem to be going in circles somewhat, but the reason I don't want to ban is Drizzle is again, that with Sun and SS present I believe Damp Rock Rain will prove ineffective and as such fall into unviability. In any case, that RD can still be used as a consolation should be no factor on the banning of Drizzle.

Admittedly, in 4th Gen, Rain abusers were not banned due to the 8 turn max Rain. However the new environment of 5th Gen now features permanent sources of every weather, which I see as a change in the meta environment itself. It is this alteration to the meta environment and the change in circumstances that results in Rain abusers now being broken - admittedly solely under Rain. The main reason I am arguing this point is because the whole idea of removing Drizzle and thereby altering the environment of the 5th Gen meta significantly does not sit well with me at all, and I believe it should be avoided.

@Moe1216 again: Sorry, I didn't realize you were asking that as well. Well as I mentioned in my edited post on the bottom of the last page, I see Rain falling out of use as it cannot keep up with SS and Sun. I would imagine that SS and Sun begin to vie for top spot, most likely with teams abusing Dory and Landllos coming out on top, but I see Sun emerging as a significant and much more common threat to many teams with Rain eliminated as an offensive weather. Quite honestly if Drizzle is banned I wouldn't be surprised to see Drought, Dory and LLandlos, or even Sand Stream up for suspect testing soon after. As to the non-weather side of it, I have no idea.

 

[astrohawke]

Like I asked earlier but never got an answer, what would happen to the metagame if Rain was banned? Would that make sand become more dominant and the three sand beasts, Garchomp, Landlos, Doryuzu, take the spotlight? Or would sun, the underdog alongside Hail, start to get some more use?

Sun would likely see a little more use. Sand will always be the dominant weather but non-weather teams will also be much more usable. Right now, if you're not running weather yourself, it extremely difficult to contend with rain. Hail still fails as usual.

Garchomp should probably eventually be banned again because nothing has changed since last gen. SD Yache chomp still tears apart everything. There are no new counters to handle it. Dory and Landlos may also be banned but it depends.

 

[moe1216]

@Moe1216 again: Sorry, I didn't realize you were asking that as well. Well as I mentioned in my edited post on the bottom of the last page, I see Rain falling out of use as it cannot keep up with SS and Sun. I would imagine that SS and Sun begin to vie for top spot, most likely with teams abusing Dory and Landllos coming out on top, but I see Sun emerging as a significant and much more common threat to many teams with Rain eliminated as an offensive weather. Quite honestly if Drizzle is banned I wouldn't be surprised to see Drought, Dory and LLandlos, or even Sand Stream up for suspect testing soon after. As to the non-weather side of it, I have no idea.

It's fine Benlisted. I'm just worried that with Rain possibly getting banned, sand may be next. Sure rain has a bunch of pokes with swift swim, but everyone only uses Kingdra, Ludicolo, and Kabutops because they are the most viable. If it does get banned, sand rises back up and it's triple threats Garchomp, Landlos, and Doryuzu will essentially take their place, and if it becomes a slippery slope and I pray it doesn't they may be next alongside Hippo and Ttar if people start hating sand as much as rain.

Sun would likely see a little more use. Sand will always be the dominant weather but non-weather teams will also be much more usable. Right now, if you're not running weather yourself, it extremely difficult to contend with rain. Hail still fails as usual.

Garchomp should probably eventually be banned again because nothing has changed since last gen. SD Yache chomp still tears apart everything. There are no new counters to handle it. Dory and Landlos may also be banned but it depends.

It's true Garchomp still tears stuff up, but what about Terrakion and Keldeo? they both have 129 base in an offensive stat and 108 speed. Even if Garchomp set up, he couldn't take a hit from them could he? If not then that means that instead of the three rain sweepers, we have their counterparts to deal with after rain loses viability if it it gets banned.

 

[capefeather]

The main reason I am arguing this point is because the whole idea of removing Drizzle and thereby altering the environment of the 5th Gen meta significantly does not sit well with me at all, and I believe it should be avoided.

However, we need to account for the possibility that the developers failed to implement a good idea to make an enjoyable metagame. Weather control is definitely worth keeping in principle and we should definitely be very careful in banning stuff like this. However, if rain is broken then that's simply too bad and it may be best just to throw it away.

 

[Benlisted]

However, we need to account for the possibility that the developers failed to implement a good idea to make an enjoyable metagame. Weather control is definitely worth keeping in principle and we should definitely be very careful in banning stuff like this. However, if rain is broken then that's simply too bad and it may be best just to throw it away.

That's a very good point. Developer oversight is never something one can eliminate (especially when gamefreak is the developer in question). It seems that they had little experience of whether last Gen's Rain abusers would prove overpowering in an environment with Drizzle from Politoed, presuming they take any interest in this or any community's OU meta.

I'd like to know your opinion on whether Drizzle and hence perma-rain would still be broken without its prime abusers though, and if you feel that removing the abusers rather than Drizzle would be a good idea or not?

 

[astrohawke]

The best thing to do imo would be to ban swift swim. If you want it to be fair, then banning sand throw and chlorophyll can work too. With that you're still free to use a rain team with perma rain and all those pokemon are still available to be used if you like them. But some people are against banning abilities.

The next choice is to ban politoed. That leaves all those pokemon still usable and a damp rock rain dance strategy is still available. Although it will become the gimmick it was in gen 4 and not a real OU strategy.

The worst thing to do would be to ban the actual swift swim pokemon themselves as that would just remove too many pokemon from the game when there are other better choices available.

 

[jrp]

Why on earth would people use politoed if the abusers got banned? Tyranitar got use in 4th gen, but that's because it could do so much besides set up sandstorm. Politoed has no chance of use if the abusers get banned, since it can do nothing except support rain teams. Please for gods sake, think about it >_>

 

[Mario With Lasers]

Why on earth would people use politoed if the abusers got banned? Tyranitar got use in 4th gen, but that's because it could do so much besides set up sandstorm. Politoed has no chance of use if the abusers get banned, since it can do nothing except support rain teams. Please for gods sake, think about it >_>

Ok tell me, do you think we want to ban every single abuser in existance, from Kingdra to Luvdisc, including every Water/Electric/Steel-type in existance? Is that so?

The worst thing to do would be to ban the actual swift swim pokemon themselves as that would just remove too many pokemon from the game when there are other better choices available.

Is it really that difficult to ban Kingdra+Ludicolo+Kabutops+(maybe)Gorebyss if it makes Drizzle a viable and non-broken strategy in OU?

 

[jrp]

I don't think that. I tend to overexaggerate But banning the abusers is pointless though.

What use would drizzle have if there is nothing useful to abuse it? There is really no point in doing that.

4th gen, kingdra abused rain, but there was no question of it gdtting banned. So why now? Why not let it be a rain dance sweeper?

 

[Mario With Lasers]

I don't think that. I tend to overexaggerate But banning the abusers is pointless though.

What use would drizzle have if there is nothing useful to abuse it? There is really no point in doing that.

4th gen, kingdra abused rain, but there was no question of it gdtting banned. So why now? Why not let it be a rain dance sweeper?

And why not let Drizzle have its non-broken sweepers? We're going to "nerf" something regardless, be it Kingdra or Rain. And there will always be useful Rain abusers, "Specs Hydro Pump" bulldozes everything.



At least I agree with you we shouldn't ban Swift Swim, I guess.

 

[Darusare]

If it does get banned, sand rises back up and it's triple threats Garchomp, Landlos, and Doryuzu will essentially take their place, and if it becomes a slippery slope and I pray it doesn't they may be next alongside Hippo and Ttar if people start hating sand as much as rain.

Its a game of whos the best honestly
today its rain
tomorrow its sand

Honestly I really like the 4th Gen metagame
I think that by the end everything was fun and competitive like it should be,
im a fan of banning rain
because almost every other team runs it
If rain gets banned sand will rise
and dory is also a bit insane
and people will complain just as much
garchomp should get banned
allowing flygon not to get stuck in bl or uu
idk
drought doesnt seem as broken
but who knows when rain is banned

 

[SS5 vegito]

Instead of banning one or the other, wouldn't it just be easier to script Drizzle Politoad and Manaphy on the same team incompatible?

 

[Benlisted]

The best thing to do imo would be to ban swift swim. If you want it to be fair, then banning sand throw and chlorophyll can work too. With that you're still free to use a rain team with perma rain and all those pokemon are still available to be used if you like them. But some people are against banning abilities.

The next choice is to ban politoed. That leaves all those pokemon still usable and a damp rock rain dance strategy is still available. Although it will become the gimmick it was in gen 4 and not a real OU strategy.

The worst thing to do would be to ban the actual swift swim pokemon themselves as that would just remove too many pokemon from the game when there are other better choices available.

I can see why Swift Swim being banned is a reasonable possibility, but again the point stands that it is not this ability alone that breaks those who can abuse it well, as things like Luvdisc etc show. Amazing typing, stats and movepool all contribute, for example Kingdra. The same applies for Chlorophyll and Sand Paddle; that Doryuuzu is considered by some broken due to Sand Paddle, but Muurando is evidence enough that the ability itself is not inherently broken.

Again I'd like to make the point that removing Swift Swim destroys the viability of almost all the current Swift Swimmers (Kingdra excepted) in OU except in very niche roles, and removing Drizzle will likely have a similar if not stronger effect. So banning some abusers will effectively render more pokemon Uber, but will result in less pokemon being viable in OU.

I don't think that. I tend to overexaggerate But banning the abusers is pointless though.

What use would drizzle have if there is nothing useful to abuse it? There is really no point in doing that.

4th gen, kingdra abused rain, but there was no question of it gdtting banned. So why now? Why not let it be a rain dance sweeper?

But you fail to take into account that in the scenario I and some others seem to be suggesting - banning the top Rain abusers - there will still be many useful things to abuse Rain: Gorebyss, Omastar, Floatzel, Qwilfish. They will merely be not as powerful as the current Rain abusers, and hopefully result in the playstye being balanced with the rest of the meta.

Kingdra could be banned in 5th Gen due to the change in circumstances of the meta. No, it itself has barely changed, but the metagame has, and in the case of the meta shifting, new things become broken and can be banned. The question of letting it remain a Damp Rock Rain sweeper is irrelevant - that's a concilatory assumption about a future meta that should have no bearing on a banning decision.

@SSVegito: I suggested the possibility of making Kingdra etc incompatible with Drizzle in OU a little before, and ofc the same could be applied to Manaphy. In Manaphy's case there are arguments for banning it excluding Rain's influence, however, and in the case of making a cluase like that, the issue is setting a precedent for increasingly complex bans and clauses which could simply become too multifaceted and numerous.

 

[capefeather]

I'd like to know your opinion on whether Drizzle and hence perma-rain would still be broken without its prime abusers though, and if you feel that removing the abusers rather than Drizzle would be a good idea or not?

I'm not sure because my internet is preventing me from doing much battling for another 4-5 days :( For last round, all I can say is that I eventually learned to deal with rain with a sun team before the suspect craze, but the team that I mainly used last round was utterly vulnerable to it. I also had a rain team with just Manaphy and Kingdra and it wasn't bad, though I got people who beat it telling me that it was predictable.

 

[jrp]

Lol, that's such a bad idea though, manaphy's probably getting banned anyway, and why would anyone vote for a rule that limits team combinations? Not to mention, manaphy isn't on all rain teams, kingdra generally is.

 

[Benlisted]

I'm not sure because my internet is preventing me from doing much battling for another 4-5 days :( For last round, all I can say is that I eventually learned to deal with rain with a sun team before the suspect craze, but the team that I mainly used last round was utterly vulnerable to it. I also had a rain team with just Manaphy and Kingdra and it wasn't bad, though I got people who beat it telling me that it was predictable.

Ah that sucks, fair enough. I would be very interested to see how a team lacking some of the key swift swimmers performs in the current environment, might try it myself.

Likewise I found that dealing with Rain as Sun was in fact easier than beating a lot of Sand as Sun. TTar in general is just a bitch. Anyway, it seems that an issue with Rain at present is that it prevents people from being able to reliably use team styles which have worked for them in the past. Admittedly some of this could be due to failure to adapt, but the sheer number of people complaining about Drizzle and the fact that a lot of high level players are points to the fact that Rain does restrict options for certain teams quite significantly at present, forcing them to overcentralise just to counter Rain. Since I'm all in favour of a diverse meta, I don't want to see these styles stifled at the hands of Rain, but I likewise don't want to see Rain obliterated by them in return.

 

[Darusare]

Kingdra could be banned in 5th Gen due to the change in circumstances of the meta. No, it itself has barely changed, but the metagame has, and in the case of the meta shifting, new things become broken and can be banned. The question of letting it remain a Damp Rock Rain sweeper is irrelevant - that's a concilatory assumption about a future meta that should have no bearing on a banning decision.

The best option is really a mix
outside of rain Kingdra isnt broken
and banning team combinations is ridiculous
even manaphy isnt that broken outside of rain
banning the drizzle ability is my first choice
with sand its a different story though
dory and grachomp are pretty broken outside of sand

 

[reachzero]

I'm certain Nintendo never gave a second thought to what Drizzle Politoed or Drought Ninetales would mean to the 6v6 singles metagame, simply because Nintendo has never, ever cared about competitive 6v6 singles.

I think the key difference between perma-Rain and perma-Sand is exploitability. First of all, there are far more viable, threatening Pokemon with Swift Swim or Hydration than with Sand Throw or Sand Power. Sand Veil is very annoying, but not inherently broken (undesirable, yes). Secondly, aside from these abilities, Rain has three effects. It powers up Water moves, nerfs Fire moves, and makes Thunder and Hurricane 100% accurate. Even without the support of Swift Swim, this would still be an enormous offensive advantage for a dedicated Rain offense team. On the other hand, Sand has only two non-ability effects, causing 6.25% damage per turn and boosting the SpD of Rock-types. Considering that the only Rock-types of consequence are Tyranitar, Aerodactyl and Terakion, this is quite modest in its impact. In other words, Sand is only strongly abusable (i.e. abusable to the point of being potentially broken) by two Pokemon, Doryuuzu and Randorosu. If perma-Rain is banned (which in my opinion it certainly should be), could anyone seriously foresee problems with a Sand team without Doryuuzu or Randorosu? Even without Manaphy OR Swift Swim, I would still not want to face a dedicated Rain team.

Finally, Drizzle teams are inherently more balanced and less vulnerable to type disadvantages than are Sand Stream teams. The Swift Swimmers lack common weaknesses (for instance, Kingdra and Ludicolo are not weak to Electric or Grass), unlike Rain teams with tend to be very weak to Water, Ice and generally any very threatening Pokemon holding a Balloon. Moreover, there is a far greater type range that can exploit Rain: Electric Pokemon benefit heavily from the use of Thunder, and make excellent complements to the Water types, Fire-weak Pokemon like Scizor and Nattorei appreciate the weakening of Fire moves. Sand Stream teams are very powerful, but they are so because of exactly two Pokemon, and even so they have serious liabilities. Drizzle teams are much more powerful because there is such a wide range of Pokemon that can exploit Rain, going well beyond just the Swift Swimmers. Unless the team you are facing is a dedicated anti-Rain team (by which I mean something like either Hail stall, or offense with Nattorei, Porygon2 and Tyranitar all on the same team), you will always have a significant advantage while using a Drizzle team.

Since we're on the topic of Weather, I think the jury is still out regarding Drought teams. Those tend to have many more liabilities than the other two Weathers, such as difficulty facing Dragon-types, being much more vulnerable to the type of attacks Sun promotes (Fire), and generally the poor coverage options of Grass types. I would rather wait and see what happens with Drizzle and with Doryuuzu and Randorosu before I worry much about Drought at all.

Edit: Yes, I realize that both Rain and Sand nerf Morning Sun and Moonlight as well, but I don't think many Pokemon are using those anyway.

 

[jrp]

Main thing with all the weather, I now run a scarf golduck to counter them, which it can do but fails against rain.

He can water stab the rock and fire types that abuse weather and still outspeed with cloud nine + scarf and kill the set up pokemon.

Rain needs to get banned. No team building limitations, or banning swift swimmers, ban drizzle.

Drought is sadly not as threatening as rain or sandstorm.

Sand stream has some uses, once your dory and landlos are gone, you're pretty much down for the count though


Darusare, how is dory broken out of the sand?

 

[astrohawke]

Is it really that difficult to ban Kingdra+Ludicolo+Kabutops+(maybe)Gorebyss if it makes Drizzle a viable and non-broken strategy in OU?

Kingdra, kabutops and ludicolo are not the only swift swim sweepers. They just happen to be the best ones right now and most used because most good rain teams only carry 3 sweepers. They need the other 2 slots for coverage with pokemon like nattorei, zapdos etc. If you ban those, there are plenty of others waiting to see action like huntail, gorebyss, omastar, qwilfish, relicanth, floatzel, golduck, poliwrath etc. All these pokemon are capable sweepers.

Why on earth would people use politoed if the abusers got banned? Tyranitar got use in 4th gen, but that's because it could do so much besides set up sandstorm. Politoed has no chance of use if the abusers get banned, since it can do nothing except support rain teams. Please for gods sake, think about it >_>

You can still run a rain team without swift swim abuse just the same as running a sand team without abusing sand throw. Rain still provides benefits to boosting water attacks and 100% thunder on top of canceling out other weathers. Your water pokemon still hit just as hard, they just don't outspeed everything in the game and are therefore much easier to deal with. There's also the option of rain stall with dry skin/rain dish/hydration. Rain is not all about speed/power and swift swim abuse but that's the only thing you will see coming from rain because that's what's broken about it.