np: XY UU Stage 1 - Reload [Salamence: BL | Next: DROPS!!!]

[WebBowser]

+1 252+ SpA Smeargle Boomburst vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Hippowdon: 190-225 (45.2 - 53.5%) -- 1.2% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

+1 4 SpA Venomoth Bug Buzz vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Hippowdon: 175-207 (41.6 - 49.2%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery

they both do the same amount of damage. plus, who the actual fuck uses 252+ Spa smeargle.

Also, venomoth has tinted lens if you wan to take a bit more of an offensive

Venomoth is bulkier than Smeargle, too. It hardly matters because both are really, really frail, but Venomoth, at the very least, doesn't need sash.

252 Atk Mega Absol Sucker Punch vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Venomoth: 220-259 (63.9 - 75.2%)
252 Atk Mega Absol Sucker Punch vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Venomoth: 220-259 (78.2 - 92.1%)

252 Atk Mega Absol Sucker Punch vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Smeargle: 322-381 (102.5 - 121.3%)
252 Atk Mega Absol Sucker Punch vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Smeargle: 322-381 (128.2 - 151.7%)

These two posts bring up similar points, so I will address them both at the same time.

Ununhexium to answer your question regarding smeargle, I ask, why not use 252 SPA smeargle? (you can argue timid vs modest because the speed is actually relevant) As Spooky's post shows, it's not like smeargle can actually take a hit or anything, and smeargle just happens to have a 120 BP special STAB and also just happens to have access to the game's best boosting moves. Lets face it, without quiver pass, venomoth is completely outclassed by vivillian. Is venomoth so much stronger then smeargle that it must be banned from UU, despite being less versatile and having a less reliable sleep move?

Sergeant Spooky Sash is pretty much the best item for either of them as it allows them to setup on offensive threats as well as defensive threats with non-laughable presence (which is most of them), the fact that smeargle is OHKO's by absol sucker punch is just one more reason to not bother running bulk on smeargle.

My point is this, venomoth has roughly the same chance of sweeping the tier as smeargle (which is next to none). They both have the ability to pass their boosts to a more favorable recipient. Smeargle can do this roughly as well as as venomoth AND smeargle can do a bunch of other supporty-things, meaning you can't see the quiver pass from 200 miles away (and nobody seems to expect the boomburst smeargle). It appears that the general opinion is that smeargle is not broken and is in fact quite bad. Why is venomoth any different?

 

[KM]

there's really no point bickering over venomoth because it's banned and it won't be retested for a while. smash pass and baton pass as a whole are going through a smogon-wide suspect test in some sense at the minute so this entire discussion is really quite useless, not even to mention the fact that comparing moth to SpA smeargle is ridiculous (if you really want an answer as to why, feel free to pm me, don't want to clog up this thread any more)

on a relevant note, i've found the following salamence set to be quite good as an anti-stall sweeper and wallbreaker


Salamence @ Life Orb
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 252 Spd / 252 Atk / 4 SDef
Jolly Nature
- Hone Claws
- Iron Tail
- Dragon Rush
- Fire Blast / Roost


Intimidate and good typing gives salamence the pseudo-bulk to scare away stuff like Mienshao/Heracross/Victini/Darmanitan when they're locked in allowing him to set up a hone claws, which makes all of his moves 100% accurate and stupidly strong. Iron Tail OHKOs every Florges set at +1, and Fire Blast is for Forretress and MTon and stuff. Roost is optional if you want to have a little more staying power.

some relevant calcs:

+1 252 Atk Life Orb Salamence Iron Tail vs. 252 HP / 252 Def Florges: 439-517 (121.9 - 143.6%) -- guaranteed OHKO
+1 252 Atk Life Orb Salamence Dragon Rush vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Slowbro: 220-261 (55.8 - 66.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
+1 252 Atk Life Orb Salamence Dragon Rush vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Suicune: 214-253 (52.9 - 62.6%) -- 99.6% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
4 SpA Life Orb Salamence Fire Blast vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Forretress: 676-801 (190.9 - 226.2%) -- guaranteed OHKO
1 252 Atk Life Orb Salamence Dragon Rush vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Nidoqueen: 368-434 (95.8 - 113%) -- 75% chance to OHKO
4 SpA Life Orb Salamence Fire Blast vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Filter Mega Aggron: 201-238 (58.4 - 69.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
+1 252 Atk Life Orb Salamence Dragon Rush vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Tangrowth: 203-239 (50.2 - 59.1%) -- 76.6% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
+1 252 Atk Life Orb Salamence Dragon Rush vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Cresselia: 208-246 (46.8 - 55.4%) -- 13.3% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

very strong wallbreaker, great for sweeping weakened teams w/o a scarfer

 

[Petrico94]

Ununhexium you sure about that? Cuz methinks Smeargle now has the option to sweep roughly as much as venomoth.

Venomoth has stats even without Quiver Dance. Smeargle cant hold leftovers(black sludge) because his speed and health make him an easy OHKO by anything, if he ever hopes to use baton pass in his life time he's stuck with focus sash. I know Venomoth has x4 to rocks but atleast it could take a grass attack after that.

252 SpA Roserade Sludge Bomb vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Venomoth: 90-107 (26.1 - 31.1%) -- 32.5% chance to 3HKO after Stealth Rock and Black Sludge recovery

252 SpA Roserade Giga Drain vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Venomoth: 38-45 (11 - 13%) -- possibly the worst move ever

252 SpA Roserade Sludge Bomb vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Smeargle: 265-313 (84.3 - 99.6%) -- 75% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock

 

[WebBowser]

Petrico94 You are comparing resisted hits to neutral hits, of course venomoth is going to take them better. I could also post super effective hits on venomoth and compare them to neutral hits on smeargle, those calcs prove nothing. And no, I never argued that venomoth had less bulk then smeargle.

Kitten Milk I find your statement rather odd. kokoloko himself invited discussion on venomoth when he announced it's ban (either that or I suck at detecting sarcasm). I find Smeargle and Venomoth to be very comparable, or at least the two most comparable things that are/were UU. Neither of them have much of a chance of sweeping on their own, and even when boosted, they struggle to 2hko any special wall worth their salt, but because thay are able to pass those same boosts to other pokemon, they can be considered threats. I have reason to believe that in some ways, smeargle is more reliable then venomoth at accomplishing what it does, which is obtain boosts with a fair bit of reliability, possibly threatening a few swap ins, and then eventually passing the boosts on to a more competent sweeper. Venomoth has better stats to be sure, but smeargle boasts a 120 BP STAB, which evens them out considerably (frankly, I'm just trying to say that venomoth is a crappy sweeper, I'm not trying to say that boomburst smeargle is threatening in any way). You are correct that this may become irrelevant depending on the OU council's decision on BP, but since we are primarily talking about quick passing, anything short of a full ban on BP will not affect venomoth or smeargle's viability (trust me, I'm very familiar with that debate).

I do not make arguments that I cannot defend (most of the time...)

 

[Shiny Minun]

I think we have the right to argue with a completely unfitting ban. I have to agree with WebBowser, the off handed Venomoth ban seemed silly for UU as it wasn't cause any problems here at all. I'm almost certain it will back in UU after its subject but I feel like we're wasting time on it when in all honestly the RU council should be dealing with it, we have more than enough things to test we I think it was a bit of misjudgement to just throw Moth in to save the lower tiers, since they're still in beta. It's not like the other leaders were just ignoring it.

But it at least makes the lower tiers more playable, but I think the point of the beta is to see the immediate issues and remove them before you turn into a real tier.

But on the salamance topic... wow this thing is a powerhouse!

I think the most solid answer for anything salamence runs is slowbro. That is obvious. besides that I don't see ANYTHING that can take what mence is dishing out reliably. Sure there are some neiches like furfrou or alomomola that take salamence very well but fail to do much else in return.

With him being able to set up speed whenever he is not threatened, and intimidate to make most priorities a non-issue, offensive checking is almost out of the question. forcing defensive options in just for a chance to scratch him.

My only issue with this subject is that I wish there was more dragons dropping down at once, just one dragon isn't enough to get the tier to start running ice moves, I feel they would be less overwhelming as a whole if we had to prepare for salamance, zygarde, haxorus all at once. Obviously the use of Ice beam would sky rocket and because of which more teams would be prepaired to deal with these threats.

and I only say that because every time I argue that slowbro deals with [insert dragon here] I get yelled at because apparently slowbro hates running ice beam even though its more popular than toxic even without dragons running amok.

Also: players are still surprised by H.pump salamance, the donphan kill count is rising.

 

[Ernesto]

Venomoth wasn't causing problems in UU? Blame the players, it was spammed in UUPL and proven broken there.

We don't need to cater to ladder play only, so the argument that it wasn't breaking the ladder is moot.

That doesn't mean I agree entirely with a clean Veno ban instead of QuiverPass (and SmashPass) in particular, which is imo the real issue. But if we're still deciding on policy we might as well get rid of the biggest offender while we're at it.

 

[KM]

Petrico94 You are comparing resisted hits to neutral hits, of course venomoth is going to take them better. I could also post super effective hits on venomoth and compare them to neutral hits on smeargle, those calcs prove nothing. And no, I never argued that venomoth had less bulk then smeargle.

Kitten Milk I find your statement rather odd. kokoloko himself invited discussion on venomoth when he announced it's ban (either that or I suck at detecting sarcasm). I find Smeargle and Venomoth to be very comparable, or at least the two most comparable things that are/were UU. Neither of them have much of a chance of sweeping on their own, and even when boosted, they struggle to 2hko any special wall worth their salt, but because thay are able to pass those same boosts to other pokemon, they can be considered threats. I have reason to believe that in some ways, smeargle is more reliable then venomoth at accomplishing what it does, which is obtain boosts with a fair bit of reliability, possibly threatening a few swap ins, and then eventually passing the boosts on to a more competent sweeper. Venomoth has better stats to be sure, but smeargle boasts a 120 BP STAB, which evens them out considerably (frankly, I'm just trying to say that venomoth is a crappy sweeper, I'm not trying to say that boomburst smeargle is threatening in any way). You are correct that this may become irrelevant depending on the OU council's decision on BP, but since we are primarily talking about quick passing, anything short of a full ban on BP will not affect venomoth or smeargle's viability (trust me, I'm very familiar with that debate).

I do not make arguments that I cannot defend (most of the time...)

venomoth has far superior typing allowing it both handy resistances which allows it to switch in certain choice locked mons and set up with much greater ease than smeargle as well as giving it extra added utility by absorbing toxic spikes. more importantly though, its abilities are incomparable. smeargle gets own tempo, which is defensively underwhelming and useless in 99% of matches. on the other hand venomoth gets wonder skin which allows it to not get hit by taunt / encore / status / roar 50% of the time (i can't stress enough how important this is) or alternatively if it wants to be an offensive threat it can just carry a life orb and run tinted lens to significantly threaten even pokemon who resist it.

the reason your comparison is invalid is because comparing venomoth and smeargle by their neutral offensive damage output is like comparing hippowdon and slowbro based on how much damage scald or earthquake does. the entire worth of a quiverpasser is dependent on their ability to reliably pass, and it's ridiculous to even assert that SpA smeargle is viable - it basically needs magic coat in the last slot to prevent it from being complete taunt or set up bait. venomoth is necessarily preferable as a quiver pass sweeper due to the reasons I listed above, not to its neutral damage output

i suppose you're welcome to continue talking about venomoth and why it "isn't broken" as koko did say that "bitching can commence" but i think it's pretty self-evident in that statement that you will accomplish precisely 0 change by saying that a threat that has been banned should not have been. instead of operating under the assumption that the council and koko are retarded and trying to prove why venomoth is actually healthy in the UU meta, you could alternatively try and understand why it was unhealthy for the metagame as a skill-based game and actually focus your argument on talking about suspects that your discussion might actually effect the outcome of

 

[WebBowser]

Ernesto : I agree that just because something is not being used does not make it not broken. I also agree that no ban should take place solely for the benefit of lower tiers. These are flawed arguments. However, I still have to ask, are Venomoth's sweeping stats so much better then other quiver passers (namely smeargle) that it is broken and others are not? I have shown that venomoth's attacks at +1 are approximately 20% stronger then smeargle at +1. At +2 (shell smash) and +3(tail glow), smeargle outdamages venomoth handily with boomburst, though both of these methods have their drawbacks. Smeargle has the additional advantage of having more reliable sleep moves, meaning that he is more likely to disable something before making the pass.

I am not saying smeargle is broken, or even better then venomoth. What I am saying is that it is generally agreed that smeargle is a rather bad pokemon. Is being 20% better then smeargle grounds for banning? Where does Gorebyss and Huntail fit into all of this? They have better bulk and offensive stats then either smeargle or venomoth, but no sleep move. Does that make them better or worse?

*edit*

Ninja'd by kitten milk

*edit 2*

Kitten Milk First off, I am insulted that you believe I think so little of the UU council just because I happen to disagree with one of their decisions. I do not think that venomoth's brokenness was obvious at all and that I have the right to question it. I do appreciate you taking the time to state why venomoth was broken. I was not aware that wonder skin affected such a wide variety of moves (roar in particular is significant, I thought roar no longer checked accuracy modifiers). I apologize for any insult that I said/implied.

 

[Godsend]

Web Browser, you're arguing against a thing that isn't want makes Veno broken. Nobody says it sweeps like a mofo get it out, it's that it supports like a mofo. It has infinetly defensive stats, typing and ability then Smeargle.

 

[Bouff]

why the fuck are you posting calcs of how veno and smeargle fare against certain mons when they're boosted offensively, because 9/10 times you're not even going to be sweeping with moth, you're going to be sweeping with other mons like megadoom, queen, or kyurem. venomoth doesnt have near the potential to sweep through whole teams as it has pretty shitty coverage.

 

[Patrick1088]

why the hell are you running steel wing?
252 Atk Salamence Iron Tail vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Florges: 308-364 (85.5 - 101.1%) -- 12.5% chance to OHKO
+1 252 Atk Salamence Iron Tail vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Florges: 308-364 (85.5 - 101.1%) -- 12.5% chance to OHKO

Have fun with 75% accuracy. If you thought Focus Miss and Stone Miss were bad, then you can have fun with Iron Tail. Mence can't afford to miss even once since Moonblast is almost guaranteed OHKO after SR. I suppose you could run Hone Claws > DD, but you can't sweep as cleanly since you can be revenge killed very easily. Just my opinion though...

 

[Mahmudkipz]

I'd like to address that even though mechanics change in Grass types can absorb Sleep Powder, Venomoth is still very broken - why would you switch a Grass type in a Venomoth when its typing just screams fuck Grass types? Uninvested Bug Buzz at +1 still does a ton, and even if you manage to stop Venomoth from passing, your Grass type has just been severely weakened and perhaps can't check opposing bulky waters anymore. The only Grass in UU that takes Bug Buzzes neutrally and not get outright demolished by Sludge Bomb is Chesnaght, who still doesn't enjoy eating Bug Buzzes with its mediocre SpDef and has its STABs 4x resisted by Venomoth.

Oh, and about Vital Spirit/Insomnia to prevent sleep powder, how many users of those abilities are viable in UU? Noctowl? Magmortor? Delibird? None of these are very viable in the current metagame and/or has better abilities to use. And before you mention Magic Bounce, Absol needs to be Mega Evolved to switch in on a predicted sleep powder, and in fact can't switch into either of Venomoth's attack. Xatu can work but Xatu is a niche mon in UU whose sole purpose is Magic Bounce - good luck on predicting status moves because Xatu isn't exceptionally bulky either. Sleep Talk on things might seem to solve this, but there is always the problem of choosing the wrong move or the sudden wake-up that gives your opponent free turns, especially if you are choiced.

Back to Venomoth, Bug/Poison typing is also surprisingly good of a typing, leaving Venomoth with only 4 weaknesses and a blessed 4x fighting resist allowing it to find many setup opportunities. Out of the 4 weaknesses, only Fire type attacks are super common in the tier, very few things carry Flying moves as their coverage due to low distrubution, most Rock moves are unreliable accuracy-wise, and Psychic doesn't provide much coverage-wise to many things. Its speed tier also affects how good it is at Quiver Passing compared to other quiver passers, as it is the fastest Quiver Dancer in the tier currently and can outrun the majority of the tier after a Quiver Dance and Sleep Powder/Bug Buzzes/Baton Pass away on them.

 

[Ununhexium]

Have fun with 75% accuracy. If you thought Focus Miss and Stone Miss were bad, then you can have fun with Iron Tail. Mence can't afford to miss even once since Moonblast is almost guaranteed OHKO after SR. I suppose you could run Hone Claws > DD, but you can't sweep as cleanly since you can be revenge killed very easily. Just my opinion though...

Focus miss has less accuracy than iron tail

 

[Patrick1088]

Focus miss has less accuracy than iron tail

O i though it was 80 for some reason, brain fart. But still, the accuracy is an issue...

 

[Shiny Minun]

I'd like to address that even though mechanics change in Grass types can absorb Sleep Powder, Venomoth is still very broken - why would you switch a Grass type in a Venomoth when its typing just screams fuck Grass types? Uninvested Bug Buzz at +1 still does a ton, and even if you manage to stop Venomoth from passing, your Grass type has just been severely weakened and perhaps can't check opposing bulky waters anymore. The only Grass in UU that takes Bug Buzzes neutrally and not get outright demolished by Sludge Bomb is Chesnaght, who still doesn't enjoy eating Bug Buzzes with its mediocre SpDef and has its STABs 4x resisted by Venomoth.

Why is your chestnaught running overgrow? Bulletproof makes him immune to sludge bomb. Venomoth can't learn wave.

That being said, I don't know what chestnaught could do to stop moth from setting up. Stone Miss doesn't even ensure KO. All it does it ensure that venomoth can't get something to sleep for free. You're better off running safety goggles on something that can OHKO it and is faster at +0 than venomoth.

Saftey goggles victini anyone? lol

 

[TM13IceBeam]

Have fun with 75% accuracy. If you thought Focus Miss and Stone Miss were bad, then you can have fun with Iron Tail. Mence can't afford to miss even once since Moonblast is almost guaranteed OHKO after SR. I suppose you could run Hone Claws > DD, but you can't sweep as cleanly since you can be revenge killed very easily. Just my opinion though...

Iron Tail allows it to beat its best counter 3 games out of 4. A worthy tradeoff imo seeing as Salamence isnt just breaking Florges otherwise.

Shiny Minun: im pretty sure the not get demolished by sludge bomb comment was in reference to Bulletproof.

 

[Mahmudkipz]

Why is your chestnaught running overgrow? Bulletproof makes him immune to sludge bomb. Venomoth can't learn wave.

That being said, I don't know what chestnaught could do to stop moth from setting up. Stone Miss doesn't even ensure KO. All it does it ensure that venomoth can't get something to sleep for free. You're better off running safety goggles on something that can OHKO it and is faster at +0 than venomoth.

Saftey goggles victini anyone? lol

What? I said he doesn't outright get demolished by Sludge Bomb, indirectly referring to Bulletproof. And yeah as I said Chesnaught can't do shit back to Venomoth. Safety Goggles is an interesting option on non-grass types, but are you seriously gonna run this item on anything? Lefties is still the surperior option if you want to cancel out weather damage and Lum Berry is better for setup sweepers to deter status (i.e. from powder moves).

Escavalier is, to-date, the best counter to Venomoth down here due to Overcoat preventing sleep powder and its typing resisting Moth's STABs.
Meanwhile you can just spam Knock Off to cripple either of the Venomoth or Baton Passed receiver or just predict the switch and go for the appriopiate coverage move.

 

[KM]

the accuracy of iron tail is sort of irrelevant because everyone's running it. this means it's not smart to randomly switch in florges on a salamence, especially if it's not scarfed. The point is that florges can't counter salamence the way it's being played in the meta right now, which is a big black mark against it staying in UU, as it forces you to have multiple dragon checks. at the same time, it's not like flash cannon specs hydreigon and flash cannon lo/specs kyurem are unheard of.

at any rate florges can not be considered a counter

Another set I think deserves discussion is the band set, as it still finds itself in a very good speed tier and has enough natural bulk/typing to take a hit if needed from anything that outspeeds it (bar scarf dragons). Band Moxie is a great wallbreaker that also has quite a lot of sweeping potential (for instance +1 Outrage OHKOS mega-stoise from full, which is ridiculous), and Band Intimidate is a great wallbreaker that can come in on physical threats and heavily chunk teams.

 

[Shiny Minun]

What? I said he doesn't outright get demolished by Sludge Bomb, indirectly referring to Bulletproof.

Oops my bad, read you wrong.

 

[DiscoDucky]

I don't understad why people are saying Veno isn't broken. Nevo is basically low risk high reward. Wonder Skin + Sleep Powder aalready gives it so much anti-setup protection. Furthermore, a majority of UU's S and A+ rank mons are amazing QD recipients (nido, nido, Dre, Mew, Hound, Blas, Megaman, etc.) Hell, you can run Veno + two special sweepers that resist each others counters and checks and faceroll to victory.

 

[WebBowser]

I would like to take a moment to clarify my argument on venomoth. My initial argument was meant to counter initial posts that justified venomoth's ban by saying that the combination of quiver pass and sweeping ability made it broken. As has been stated, venomoth has very little if any sweeping ability on it's own but has other things going for it like strong defensive typing and a great ability. These things were not mentioned when I made my initial arguments. After I made my posts, better justifications were made for venomoth's ban, and these justifications have refuted my initial arguments that tried to link venomoth to boomburst smeargle, a mon who is obviously not broken. I am currently reading over these new arguments and seeing if I can find any holes in them (haven't found any yet, they're pretty solid at first glance).

On a related note, how does specially defensive Amoonguss fair against venomoth? I know wonder skin makes spore less reliable, but it also heavily discourages venomoth from trying to swap.

+1 252 SpA Venomoth Bug Buzz vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Amoonguss: 144-169 (33.3 - 39.1%) -- 9.1% chance to 3HKO after Black Sludge recovery

Even at +1 with offensive investment, veno struggles to deal any significant damage to amoonguss(regenerator is a wonderful ability), at which point amoonguss can either clear smog for guaranteed stat removal or attempt to spore on the chance venomoth attempts to swap / coin flip happens to be in your favor.

That being said, even if Amoonguss happens to be a good counter, the existence of a single counter is not a terribly good anti-ban argument, but it's a start. Amoonguss is especially relevant due to being a staple of stall teams, which IIRC is one of the archtypes that has the most difficult matchup against veno (correct me if I happen to be wrong on that). Escaliver has also been mentioned as a pretty good venomoth counter, though it cannot really stop moth from swapping (it does hit hard on the physical side though, which helps a lot). Chesnaught can wall venomoth, but cannot do much back, so is a shaky counter at best.

 

[Kawaii Kyouko]

LOL Venomoth got banned from 3 tiers at the same time is that a new record?

Also Mence is coming back time to change all HP Grasses to HP Ice

Gothitelle last gen experienced the same thing.

 

[Shiny Minun]

Mence really did change those HP's I'm seeing a LOT more things run ice beam and HP ice because of mence, weather that is a bad thing or not is up for discussion. I still think the tier is not really ready for him. Moxie snowballs too easily in conjunction with dragon dance, all you need is a free revenge kill and you're already arguably too powerful for common answers like slowbro to come in clean and have a guaranteed kill.

On the other hand you have intimidate assault vest set which is basically impossible to OHKO. Or just standard DD intimidate still turning Donphan's ice shard into a 3HKO

 

[thecrowing2k8]

I would like to take a moment to clarify my argument on venomoth. My initial argument was meant to counter initial posts that justified venomoth's ban by saying that the combination of quiver pass and sweeping ability made it broken. As has been stated, venomoth has very little if any sweeping ability on it's own but has other things going for it like strong defensive typing and a great ability. These things were not mentioned when I made my initial arguments. After I made my posts, better justifications were made for venomoth's ban, and these justifications have refuted my initial arguments that tried to link venomoth to boomburst smeargle, a mon who is obviously not broken. I am currently reading over these new arguments and seeing if I can find any holes in them (haven't found any yet, they're pretty solid at first glance).

On a related note, how does specially defensive Amoonguss fair against venomoth? I know wonder skin makes spore less reliable, but it also heavily discourages venomoth from trying to swap.

+1 252 SpA Venomoth Bug Buzz vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Amoonguss: 144-169 (33.3 - 39.1%) -- 9.1% chance to 3HKO after Black Sludge recovery

Even at +1 with offensive investment, veno struggles to deal any significant damage to amoonguss(regenerator is a wonderful ability), at which point amoonguss can either clear smog for guaranteed stat removal or attempt to spore on the chance venomoth attempts to swap / coin flip happens to be in your favor.

That being said, even if Amoonguss happens to be a good counter, the existence of a single counter is not a terribly good anti-ban argument, but it's a start. Amoonguss is especially relevant due to being a staple of stall teams, which IIRC is one of the archtypes that has the most difficult matchup against veno (correct me if I happen to be wrong on that). Escaliver has also been mentioned as a pretty good venomoth counter, though it cannot really stop moth from swapping (it does hit hard on the physical side though, which helps a lot). Chesnaught can wall venomoth, but cannot do much back, so is a shaky counter at best.

Some moths can run sub to avoid spore so it's a check at best. Even so, recipients can opt to run sleep talk, and still benefit from +1 stat boosts

 

[RowDog]

HP Ice and Ice Beam have its uses on a lot of Pokemon outside of Salamence, Salamence is just the Poke which pushes it across the border to make it more worthwhile than other moves. Flygon is still around, Hydreigon, the Nidos and a few Grass-types. At the moment now Dragon-types are just more relevant than Water/Ground types so HP Ice is gonna generally have more uses than HP Grass now. It's not necessarily that bad a thing at all, its just changing your coverage to hit more things relevant to the metagame.