Hello everyone – following the results of both our recent player survey and the conclusion of the Ogerpon-Wellspring suspect test, the council has decided to revisit Zamazenta as the twelfth suspect of this generation! Zamazenta has been a metagame staple since the tier’s early inception, and remains one of the tier’s most prominent threats today. For those unfamiliar with the history of National Dex tiering, Zamazenta was previously suspected back in March 2023, receiving only a 45% share of votes in favor of a ban. However, based upon the metagame shifts that have taken place since its last test and the sufficiency of the tools available to properly contain Zamazenta in the current metagame, the council believes this is the appropriate time to reevaluate Zamazenta’s place in the National Dex OU tier.
Specifically, since the previous suspect test, the tier has notably parted ways with Dragapult and Gholdengo. With their departure came a void of splashable Ghosts which otherwise helped to contain most of Zamazenta’s common sets, and which further restricted Zamazenta’s freedom to choose alternative coverage moves and Tera types in the teambuilder. Offensively, the lack of the aforementioned Dragapult means that Zamazenta can now claim the highest unboosted speed tier in National Dex’s VR, outpacing the tier’s other options for organic speed control such as Mega Lopunny and Tapu Koko. Zamazenta’s titanic physical bulk, in addition to its speed, further frustrates efforts to revenge kill or offensively force Zamazenta out of play as few pokemon can claim to reliably achieve this task. While some options to revenge kill or offensively pressure Zamazenta do exist, such as Choice Scarf Tapu Lele, Booster Energy Iron Valiant, and Tapu Koko, these options are not guaranteed to be successful given Zamazenta’s overall bulk and the rise in defensive Tera types such as Steel, Fire and Electric to limit offensive counterplay even further.
In light of the lack of offensive options noted above along with the recent surge in popularity of Zamazenta’s arguably most threatening Iron Defense + Body Press sets, many teams have elected to mitigate this set's progress through defensive counterplay. At first glance, the tier possesses ample defensive checks through common pokemon such as Toxapex, Slowking-Galar, Earth Power Landorus-T, Zapdos, Moltres and Skeledirge. Stall teams also have the benefit of pokemon such as Dondozo and Iron Defense Corvknight to choose from, while common balance cores such as Landorus-T + Slowking or Gliscor + Alomomola can attempt to hold Zamazenta back from forcing too much progress while pivoting in potential revenge killers safely. Additionally, although Zamazenta is no longer required to run Crunch to enforce progress into the aforementioned Ghosts, Zamazenta continues to suffer from mild 4MSS, particularly on its Choice Band and HDB attacker sets. However, given Zamazenta’s speed, bulk and defensive Tera opportunities, even pokemon such as Toxapex can struggle to win the PP war if they are not properly preserved for this role, and more passive options such as Slowking-Galar or Alomomola can struggle to muscle through bulky substitutes without the use of specific coverage moves and/or additional team support. While pokemon such as Zapdos and Moltres can stave off Zamazenta before it accrues too many boosts, both can fall victim to a well-timed Stone Edge, and both can be circumvented through the appropriate defensive Tera type by the Zamazenta user. Additionally, pokemon such as Landorus-T can become setup fodder after a single Iron Defense boost, while Rocky Helmet sets lack the longevity to compete with Zamazenta behind substitute over the course of a game. In terms of teambuilding, while many other pokemon such as Garganacl, Ferrothorn or Ting-Lu have since seen an uptick in Tera Ghost usage to defensively answer Zamazenta, many believe that this imposes an unhealthy strain on teambuilding as these pokemon already rely on defensive Terastallization to check other common offensive threats such as Tapu Lele and Ogerpon-Wellspring.
This warping effect on teambuilding, combined with the lack of splashable offensive counterplay and Zamazenta’s increased freedom to circumvent its traditional checks has necessitated a revisiting of Zamazenta’s place in the current metagame.
- Reading this is mandatory for participating in the suspect test. The voting requirements are a minimum GXE of 80 with at least 50 games played. In addition, you may play 1 less game for every 0.2 GXE you have above 80 GXE, down to a minimum of 30 games at a GXE of 84. Also, needing more than 50 games to reach 80 GXE will suffice.
- The table for this can be found below:
GXE minimum games 80 50 80.2 49 80.4 48 80.6 47 80.8 46 81 45 81.2 44 81.4 43 81.6 42 81.8 41 82 40 82.2 39 82.4 38 82.6 37 82.8 36 83 35 83.2 34 83.4 33 83.6 32 83.8 31 84 30
- You must signup with a newly registered account on Pokemon Showdown! that begins with the appropriate prefix for the suspect test. For this suspect test, the prefix will be ND9DWG. For example, I could sign up as ND9DWG sealoo.
- Laddering with an account that impersonates, mocks, or insults another Smogon user or breaks Pokemon Showdown! rules may be disqualified from voting and infracted. Moderator discretion will be applied here. If there is any doubt or hesitance when making the alt, just pick another name. There are infinite possibilities and we have had trouble for this repeatedly. If you wish to participate in the suspect, you should be able to exhibit decent enough judgement here. We will not be lenient.
- Any form of voting manipulation will result in swift and severe punishment. You are more than welcome to state your argument to as many people as you so please, but do not use any kind of underhanded tactics to get a result you desire. Bribery, blackmail, or any other type of tactic used to sway votes will be handled and sanctioned.
- Do not attempt to cheat the ladder. We will know if you did not actually achieve voting requisites, so don't do it. Harsh sanctions will be applied.
- The suspect test will run for approximately two weeks, lasting until May 28th at 11:59 pm (GMT-4), and then we will put up the voting thread in the Blind Voting subforum.
- No unhelpful one liners nor uninformed posts;
- No discussion on other potential suspects;
- You are required to make respectful posts;
- Failure to follow these simple guidelines will result in your post being deleted and infracted without any prior warning.
- Please also take a moment to read over some suggestions from the National Dex Council and the National Dex Moderation team for posting in this thread; adhering these will help out our time moderating the thread and present your arguments better and more educated.
- Do not argue because it's your favorite Pokémon. This should be common sense, but please don't do this, because we will delete posts like this.
- You do not need a boatload of experience to have an informed opinion, but please try to minimize the hypotheticals and use your experiences watching and playing. Playing some on the ladder before posting is plenty if you're concerned about this.
- Do not flame, belittle, or be disrespectful to users in this thread. While not everyone will read this post in its entirety nor will everyone have informed opinion, please be sure not to be disrespectful. If there's an issue, bring it up to a moderator.
- Do not use the argument of broken checking broken. Should your argument rest on your opinion that banning the Pokémon or mechanic being tested in this suspect test will make a Pokémon or mechanic broken, overpowered, and/or uncompetitive; don't. If something needs to be banned because of the result of this suspect, then so be it.
- This is not the place to complain about the suspect process. Please PM Kyo or Sulo if you have any questions regarding this, and any broader questions about this test.
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