Metagame NP: NU Stage 0 (Beta) - Bring The Noize (Cofagrigus is Banned)

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shiloh

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hey i figured i would make my post now!

so first things first ive been a bit busy due to the release of beta lining up with my finals almost exactly which kind of stinks. from what i have played i really have liked this metagame so far and love all the variety you can have in a metagame like this. ive been messing around a lot with offense in the past few days especially focused around taking advantage of the offensive threats we have atm so ill just discuss the mon ive been using the most and one i think will remain to be good in the transition from oras -> sm.


Vivillon-Monsoon @ Flyinium Z
Ability: Compound Eyes
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Quiver Dance
- Sleep Powder
- Substitute
- Hurricane

viv is still one of my favorite mons in this metagame because sleep quiver mons remain good in this metagame. ive been using this set on a few different teams and it manages to put in work all the time. super sonic skystrike is able to put huge dents into common flying resists to the point where viv is impossible to takedown. at +2, which isnt hard to get to by using sleep + sub, SSSS is able to do 80-90 percent to common steelix sets meaning all you need is a little bit of chip from something like rocky helmet xatu / u-turn from cincinno or some hazards up and steelix then struggles to deal with a viv that hasnt yet used its z move.

http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen7nubeta-588761288 - game i had against eternally that really shows off how potent viv can be against teams that really on lix as the flying check as its easy to take advantage of with sleep powder followed by subs in order to set up quivers safely.
with that being said lets talk about something more important, the first slate of council voting is now underway and these are the mons that have been nommed for the first round:

and Drought
Porygon2 / Noivern / Moltres / Tyrantrum / Meloetta / Virizion / Necrozma / Ribombee / Kingdra / Exploud / Drought
feel free to leave your thoughts on the current slate down below, and results from the suspect will be made public in the next 24 hours or so once all the votes have been submitted. expect results soon n_n
 

erisia

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I've been playing around with a few cool sets recently but none of them are super competitive so for now I'm just gonna talk about the state of the metagame in my opinion. Overall I'm enjoying playing this meta a lot but I agree with a lot of people in that it's very threat dominant at the moment, with teams mostly relying on threats of their own to brute force their way through the opponents teams rather than having specific counterplay in mind for the opposing threats. This is partly due to the current Beta state where we have some really powerful mons like Noivern, Ribombee, and Tyrantrum that can invalidate a lot of other offensive Pokemon due to their sheer speed and strength, and partly due to the existence of Z-moves that make wallbreaking a lot easier in general (utilised particularly well by key threats such as Moltres, Virizion, and Necrozma). This makes it quite hard to build balance due to it either being too weak to make a lasting impression on stall teams (which immensly benefit from the likes of Porygon2, Pyukumuku, Vaporeon, and so on) or too frail to stand up to key offensive threats (such as Normalium-Z Lilligant, Ribombee, Exploud, Kingdra, and so on). Most of the teams I've had success with have either been stall (which works well on low ladder but quickly becomes overwhelmed due to random Z-moves and some excellent stallbreakers like Ghostium-Z Mismagius and that Taunt + Super Fang Noivern set) or some form of gimmick offense (basically anything that interferes with generic strong mons, such as Whimsicott, Kadabra, Ditto, weather, Trick Room), with balance teams generally being very matchup based. This is obviously something that will improve as the metagame develops and specific sets start to appear that can help to combat the key threats that remain.

With respect to the suspect slate, I agree with all of the nominees that have been selected. These mons can all be overwhelming to deal with in some ways; Porygon2 with its ludicrous bulk and ability to circumvent most of its weaknesses through its teammates with little opportunity cost, Noivern, Ribombee, and Tyrantrum both outspeeding large portions of the metagame while simultaneously being excellent wallbreakers in their own right (the latter with a Dragon Dance boost or Choice Scarf, obviously), Moltres and Necrozma with their extreme versatility and mutual exclusivity of checks to different sets, Meloetta and Exploud for their immense wallbreaking power, Kingdra, Necrozma and Virizion for the multitude of effective Z-moves they can run and their extreme difficulty to predict at team preview (unless the Necrozma team lacks another Rocks user, I suppose), and Drought for destroying any team that doesn't run specific counterplay to it. Wow that was a long sentence. Of course, all of these mons do have various checks and counters, so I can't say for certain which ones I would or wouldn't ban for now. Personally I think the Kokoloko process will do a good job at evaluating which Pokemon are suitable for the NU tier without the presence of a "broken checks broken" mentality or atmosphere, and will ultimately help to reduce the matchup dependency of this current metagame.

Jk I've got a lord set for you to use.


Drapion @ Normalium Z
Ability: Sniper
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Acupressure
- Cross Poison
- Night Slash / Knock Off
- Earthquake

20% of the time it works 100% of the time. Swords Dance + Groundium Z is a more consistent set by far, but Z-Acupressure gives you +2 crit stages on top of a random +2 stat boost. Combined with Sniper and access to high-crit STAB moves, Cross Poison and Night Slash will reach similar levels of power to the Groundium-Z set, while Earthquake will be much less powerful. However, there is no risk of wasting your Z-move if the opponent predicts you accordingly. Furthermore, Acupressure can potentially win the game in a number of different ways; +2 Attack will make Drapion practically unwallable, while +2 Speed will let it clean up the late game with ease. +2 Evasion lets you fish for more boosts or just cheese a lot of impossible KOs through move misses, while +2 Defense or Special Defense can occasionally help you in giving you more setup opportunities, letting you survive to pull off the move in situations where you normally wouldn't, or just tank an extra priority attack. However, the odds of you getting the specific boost you want are very low, so treat it as an awesome secondary chance rather than the main reason to use the move. Knock Off is optional for extra utility in the early game, but makes you rely on Cross Poison a lot more if you don't manage to get an Attack boost. And Drapion is also an environmentally friendly meme since it absorbs T-Spikes and gives you a Psychic-type immunity so Necrozma doesn't 6-0 you from preview.

But you guys already know about this because it's the meme of the week on ladder and you won't forget that one time where it beat you.
 
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Okay so i've done my fair share of laddering and wanna add my 2 cents to what should go and what should stay. My team archetypes have very much been bulkier, so there is a slight bias, however I have used more offensive teams and I have reason for my madness.

First things first, Drought needs to go. It's too consistent, and there are such a huge number of sun sweepers with access to sleep powder / growth / powerful solarbeams and incredible speed that it negates any offensive team and really there are not enough reliable answers to this. Hence I suggest a quick ban, NU doesn't have the tools to deal with it.

The next best thing that should go is honestly p2 / tyrantrum / Noivern. I think whilst the other pokemon on the list are threatening, these 3 stand out to me as being the most threatening / centralizing with the least true answers in the tier.

P2: this mon is the staple for most cores, if you're weak to a certain pokemon? just slap a p2 there, it can be defensive or spdef, run bolt beam / tri attack / toxic with access to reliable recovery. It's hard to judge whether something with defensive capabilities like this is broken or not, but i would argue that it is extremely centralizing and needs to be removed purely because of how consistent it is at walling more than half of the tier if it chooses to run a set for that type of pokemon, heck it could even run mixed defenses and still wall the majority of the tier.

Tyrantrum: this mon is super good and hard to prepare for. it has virtually no defensive answers on teams, great defense to make it extremely hard to revenge kill whilst have options of DD / choiced items to make the prediction for the set extremely hard. There have been times whereby they could click eq on the steelix switch in - see neutral damage so you assume scarf - late game you then see +1 dragon dance and it cleans teams. Rock head + head smash is an amazing stab move combo which makes it crazily powerful that it can 2hitko most of the defensive mons in the tier, and with the high need for defog in this tier and with the high number of fighting types, there will always been mons like golbat / garbodor / togetic / flying types for it to switch in on and get a free hit off, which can break teams with relative ease. I suggest this mon also needs to go.

Noivern: this mon is a disgustingly powerful / reliable pokemon at the moment, that's extremely hard to prep for and has an amazing match up vs offense. It can run 2 extremely high power stabs (although inaccurate) with flamethrower coverage, or if you want a stall breaker it can even run taunt + roost and choose to lose one of these stabs. It's just really good at what it does and has a great match up vs offense. Although i'd be more on the fence about noivern becuase the tier has such an amazing amount of threats at the moment, i'd argue that removing noivern too would be a good move.

Talking about the tier itself right now - i've seen such a huge variety of playstyles / pokemon / setup combinations with z-moves that it's a breath of fresh air from ORAS NU that it actually means I am really enjoying the tier despite getting mad on ladder occasionally. I can see NU shaping into a really fun tier and I like how quickly the council have dealt with the broken mons that have been available.

And lastly, i can add my own pokemon that i love right now:

Clefairy @ Eviolite
Ability: Magic Guard
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Atk / 252 SpD
Careful Nature
- Soft-Boiled
- Seismic Toss
- Knock Off
- Toxic

This pokemon is ridiculously good right now and walls literally so much of the tier. There's an extreme lack of heal bell in the tier right now, hence toxic is being used over t-wave. By using toxic, you're able to switch in on bulky pokemon like p2 / necrozma / slowbro / slowking and then win 1v1 with toxic stall or even just getting a toxic on a slowking could mean you win a CM war later on with your own slowking / bro. And its ability magic guard is MVP in this tier right now, since it's able to absorb status / scald comfortably from bulkier pokemon, then the final amazing part of using clefairy is its amazing bulk and ability to stall out attacks from strong wall breakers such as moltres / noivern / exploud (after a knock off) and ribombee.

252 SpA Life Orb Moltres Fire Blast vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Eviolite Clefairy: 142-169 (41.2 - 49.1%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
252 SpA Choice Specs Noivern Hurricane vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Eviolite Clefairy: 138-163 (40.1 - 47.3%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
252 SpA Choice Specs Ribombee Moonblast vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Eviolite Clefairy: 118-139 (34.3 - 40.4%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
252+ SpA Exploud Boomburst vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Eviolite Clefairy: 124-147 (36 - 42.7%) -- guaranteed 3HKO (Knock off applied)

And if i'm going to be completely biased, ban exploud because it has no switch ins at all on defensive teams whilst still having a respectable amount of bulk that prevents revenge killing and 2 amazing abilities. Heck, it'd be 4th on the list for me :X
 
I've only played between 50-100 games since we've gotten out of beta and I haven't had the chance to use all those mons (Moltres, Necro, Kingdra, Noivern) but I've played against all of them at some point and I don't agree all of them are busted. The only two I disagree on 100% are Melo/Viriz. I straight up don't think Melo is broken and I'm 50/50 on Virizion. Its hard to tell effectively how strong Virizion is right now with how busted everything is.

If there was one mon on the list that I would defer to wait on a week or two on for further testing it'd be that. Once a bunch of other broken shit goes away some more things could pop up that can compete with it. But if any of these mons are gonna be brought back later for testing banning it now is probably fine.

Exploud/Necrozma don't seem broken completely to me either but I don't care enough either way to try and argue against them since the majority think they're completely OP
 
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: Porygon 2 is basically a glue on every team that needs a counter to almost everything that isn't a fighting type, it can be both def or spdef, the ability to run BoltBeam / tri attack / toxic / Twave with access to reliable recovery. This mon is extremely centralizing in this meta and makes certain mons run Knock off or Toxic just to cripple it, myself even used toxic kadabra just for porygon 2. Overall this mon just walls 80% of the tier and has to go. BAN

: Noivern has incredible speed, great power and coverage, has great a match up to most offensive teams and has decent defenses. Noivern is also able to run a great stallbreaker set to beat alot of very bulky mons (unless they run a Ice move). If Porygon 2 gets banned this mon would become even better since P2 was one of it's best counters. Overall this mon is amazing offensively that is also able to deal with bulky mons, would be healthier if this mon goes. BAN

: Moltres is a mon with a decent speed tier and great power, with the new Z-moves Moltres is able to use Bloom Doom which helps this mon so such being able to break through the bulky waters it normally issues has with. Like noivern Moltres has a stallbreaker set what basicly beats every bulky mon that isn't able to do more then 70% to it in one hit, with Pressure combined with Pressure it's able to stall out so many mons and with Toxic it's able to cripple them down. There is no real counter to both sets which makes teambuilding for this mon really hard (unless you want to count that Clef set from Teddeh). BAN

: This thing is legit a monster, great offensive typing, incredible Attack, insane movepool and a great ability. The ability to run Z-move to get past Steelix, Set up moves to became a threatening sweeper, Scarf to be a massive threat to offense and Band to be a massive threat to balance and stall. The biggest issue is with tyrantrum is trying to figure out which set it actually is. If you predict wrong vs it you probably lose a mon. I remember I talked about this mon before SM NU was even out and said then already it was a massive threat, and from what I have seen I wasn't wrong. BAN

: Meloetta is a great mon with good typing, good spA, good movepool and has multiple sets it is able to use like Scarf, Specs SubCM and Twinkle Tackle. Only issue I have with Meloetta is that every set is either scoutable or decently to check, with mons like AV Slowking being really popular which makes 4 attacks Twinkle Tackle checkable, Spiritomb and Sableye are able to check Scarf and Specs is you predict well enough and SubCM is either not to deal with Spiritomb or with Steelix (since either Focus Blast or Dazzling Gleam). All these mons are pretty common it's pretty hard for Meloetta to be broken and I haven't mentioned that huge amount of dark types in this tier like Sneasel and Drapion. I think Meloetta will probably will be banned eventually but now isn't the time. NO BAN

: I'm actually one of the players that think this mon is pretty busted with Z-moves. With Shattered Psyche it's able to beat bulky poisons what is normally couldn't, with Continual Crush it's able to deal with the bulky flyings that it normally couldn't. The ability to be both CM and SD makes it also really unpredictable, good speed tier as well. with Noivern and Rimbobee (talk later about it) also on this list which are 2 of it's biggest offensive checks, if those 2 are going make Virizion even more busted. BAN

: With this mon i'm actually one of the players this thing isn't busted enough to be banned, yes it has great defensive stats, great ability, recovery, good spA, multiple sets it's able to use and gives the Stealth Rock. Although all of that I think this mon misses the movepool and the coverage to deal with both dark types and steel types, gets easily crippled by status etc. This mon is probably going later down the line of SM NU but not now. NO BAN

: This mon is legit busted, it reminds me of Pheromosa in OU, with the Z-moves its able to deal with the counters it otherwise has (like golbat). Give this one QD and you basicly screwed, it limits teambuilding so much that's not even fun anymore. Being immune to Dragon makes it even more broken since when you know Noivern for example goes for Specs Draco it's a free set up. This really needs to go. BAN

: Another dragon type that has so many sets that it can run that isn't even fun anymore, just some straight out of my head: Sub DD Dragium Z, Focus Energy Agility, 3 attack Rain Dance, Specs and 3 attacks DD. All these sets are able to break through every kind of team although Kingdra has some issues with offense it's bulk makes it able to take some hits and just set up. Same thing with Tyrantrum predict the wrong set and you probably lost a mon. Would be more healthier is this mon goes. BAN

: Finally the last one Exploud, Exploud has almost no switch ins but has one big thing against it. It's slow and not able to come in on most offensive mons. It may get 1 kill and die straight after that (at least from what i have seen), it's threatening but not busted as some others. NO BAN

Oh forgot Drought, yeah it's just stupidly broken ADVANTAGE is showing with Vuplix Sun that it's broken so yeah not much to say about other then BAN!

First of all MASSIVE shoutout to Eternally for grammar checking this big post I love you bro. I also hope this helped.
 
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Pokedots

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Probopass @ Leftovers
Ability: Sturdy
EVs: 252 HP / 172 SpD / 84 Spe
Calm Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Stealth Rock
- Power Gem
- Toxic
- Volt Switch


Probopass is one of my favorite Pokemon in the tier and I wanted to post about it before the quick bans make it a more mediocre pick. Last generation, it suffered because of its inability to check the main Normal- and Flying-types in the tier like Archeops, Tauros, and Kangaskhan, unlike its superior counterparts Steelix and Rhydon. This metagame is in my opinion far kinder to it, as it is honestly a fantastic answer to the most dominant Pokemon. It beats Rirombee, Noivern, Meloetta, Sigilyph, Tyrantrum, Vivillon, Exploud, even Fire-types such as Moltres and Charizard thanks to its amazing special bulk, and much more thanks to its great defenses. Just Leftovers recovery gives it surprising durability, Power Gem is a great STAB to pressure Xatu, and Volt Switch is amazing for momentum, though unfortunately a lot of Ground-types (mainly Steelix) can freely switch into it. This has made it probably my favorite rocks setter to use, and options like Magnet Pull with Earth Power and Magnet Rise/Air Balloon is probably cool to trap Steelix for teammates like Rirombee. Probopass is just a really fun, likable Pokemon right now

Here are a couple of decent replays with it
http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen7nubeta-589119978 checks Vivillon, Typhlosion, and Xatu
http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen7nubeta-588564070 checks Meloetta and Rotom-Mow
 
Porygon2 / Noivern / Moltres / Tyrantrum / Meloetta / Virizion / Necrozma / Ribombee / Kingdra / Exploud / Drought

After laddering with both frail fast teams and some form of bulky offense/balance teams, I thought I'd give my thoughts on this slate.

Porygon2 - disgusting. There is little opportunity cost in running it on any remotely bulkier team. As has been said already, it's very hard to break and the only thing you need to run alongside it are Knock Off absorber, Fighting resist and maybe a cleric. Not only that, the spread doesn't have to be set in stone; after playing a couple of games and noticing you're weak to certain threats, usually you can simply adjust the p2's spread without losing out on much else. All of that would be fine if it invited theats in to set up on it, like defensive MegaDino did in ORAS. However, it's no sitting duck - frail offensive mons take a decent amount from its STAB/coverage, and bulkier ones despise getting Toxiced. All of these traits make it very easy to fit on a team and quite difficult to play versus it.

Noivern - in a matchup vs offense, whenever it comes in, if it's Specs/Life Orb, it will get a kill or turn the momentum game in its user's favor. One of the examples is U-turning on AV Slowking into a pursuit trapper or U-turning on Aromatisse to get SD Toxicroak/Garbodor/Steelix in. On top of that, it has very good options against bulkier pokemon being Super Fang and Taunt or Switcheroo if it's choiced. It's pretty hard to even imagine how to play vs it when running offense outside of running Ice Shard or faster pokemon that can beat it (limited to Scarfers and Ribombee) and, overall, really can limit teambuilding, unless you want your counter play to be skillfully dodging.

Moltres - LO/Specs/Bloom Doom sets are relatively hard to check with bulkier teams, but they're manageable without using broken pokemon nevertheless. AV Slowking, Spdef Jellicent, Clefairy as Teddeh showed, all do a decent job, although you might want to scout for Bloom Doom with the first two. Offense can deal with it rather easily, especially hazard stack, since it usually runs a spinblocker or way to punish Defog and Moltres' speed tier does not help it either. The set that is the most potent, I feel, is SubRoost. Its typing lets it check Fairies and Fighters, it can potentially stall out Stone Edges and Toxic its usual switchins. It's still crippled by Stealth Rock, however, and that's the thing i think that makes it not broken, just very good.

Tyrantrum - oh god. What do you even run to check this, outside of Bronzor? Steelix gets chipped so easily its ridiculous, most priority doesn't do enough damage to stop the sweep and almost every team has something it can set up on. Not only that, when playing against it, you rarely can predict that its Scarf, because if it's not you risk it setting up and there are not many things that beat it at +1. Should you decide to stay in, chances are you will lose your pokemon, even though it prevents potential setup. Even this meta with a lotof broken mons still doesnt have near enough counterplay for it.

Meloetta - a good pokemon, but that's all it is. SubCM/Scarf/Specs/Relic Song/Twinkle Tackle are all very good options, but every set has its flaws and is beaten by commonly used pokemon. Spiritomb, Sneasel, Drapion, Steelix, Slowking, Sableye... all of these pokemon deal with at least one Meloetta set. The set I found most fun was Relic Song Life Orb. Although it may have a tough time getting the other form, once it's Pirouette, it makes most teams crumble. Definitely a mon to watch out for, but not in any means broken.

Virizion - the only thing that could tip it over the edge are z-moves. However, even with Continental Crush/Shattered Psyche, its not that hard to deal with since its either not fast enough or not strong enough. It makes a fine pick for absorbing Knock Off and provide a solid wincon, but nothing too serious.

I don't have near enough time to complete this block of text in the same way I started it, but I'd still want to make it somewhat complete.

Necrozma should go, it requires one very specific answer or just multiple answers on one team to be taken care of and it can usually choose its check/counters (even spiritomb can lose to it thanks to Prism Armor). Ribombee should also go - if you dont know what to do, click moonblast and usually its the right play. Not to mention it doesn't have reliable answers that can't be taken care of by coverage (or you know, you can 3hko Lix with Moonblast). Kingdra is a mon I thought would be more centralizing and difficult to deal with, but that's not to say it isn't too difficult already. Rain especially becomes broken with Kingdra on it and the fact not much priority can stand up to it really puts it over the top. Exploud definitely needs to go too - it has decent bulk on top of a very powerful Boomburst which lets it kill multiple mons in one game, especially with VoltTurn behind it or Trick Room. The fact it 2hkoes Steelix with a resisted hit is all you need to know about it.

Drought is absolutely busted as has been said already. Growth/Sleep/high powered attacks/speed make it unmanageable by bulkier or offensive teams without resorting to strategies specifically made to beat it, like Scarf Hail Setters, and even then, it's a very hard matchup.
 

viriz and melo are the two mons on the slate i expect to be less cut and dry than the others because they are less obviously broken. They don't hit as hard as tyrantrum or moltres and they're not as insanely fast as noivern but their diversity in sets really puts them over the top. It's not just that SD rockium/psychium viriz or specs melo cant be walled but on top of that they have multiple viable sets that will generally punish you for trying to play around the others. Your physical wall probably wont enjoy eating a specs focus blast and your special wall wont be doing much once meloetta hits sub. The fact that they have multiple sets and all of them are pretty much at a level above the strength of every other mon in nu makes them stupidly dangerous and it'll only become more blatant the longer they are in the tier as more of the oppressive offensive nukes get banned.

ps. ban shuckle
 
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Tbh so many of these mons are so obviously busted it just makes more sense for me to only voice my opinion on what shouldn't be banned.
To be clear everything I'm talking about is NO BAN for me.

Meloetta
Okay lets be real Meloetta is super duper flexible with insane SpAtk and solid bulk and speed, as well as pretty legit coverage and dual STAB which allows for a ton of different sets and making it p unpredictable, but its altogether not unmanageable. Unless it runs scarf it is pretty easy to revenge just do to the overload of high speed mons in the tier rn and like most other psychics is super susceptible to the influx of pursuiters and strong sucker punches in the tier, making its usage a lot of 50/50s. Yeah subCM and specs are p busted and kinda invalidate stall but lets be real stall is invalidated by this meta anyways so Meloetta really isn't introducing any negative restraints towards teambuilding alone imo.

Kingdra
I honestly don't think Kingdra is nearly as broke as people make it out to be, it's hella strong and can pretty much guarantee a kill due to its unpredictable setup moves allowing it to go Rain, DD, Choice, or Crit but at the end of the day none of its sets necessarily get past a certain bracket of checks better than another by THAT much. Like maybe with the exception of DD cause it beats its defensive checks, offensively Kingdra is still susceptible to having a not-easy time setting up, overwhelmed by priority revenging (like ludi but at least ludi has giga), and without being setup before hand isn't particularly fast or bulky.

Exploud
Yeah exploud really is not bad its strong and can 1shot everything yeah but its so choice dependent and slow and oftentimes depends on pretty hard predicts to get around its checks and I think is a pretty healthy addition to the meta tbh.




Yeah everything else legit needs to go like ik people thing viriz isnt bad but that shit can literally body any team it wants esp with access to z moves and is bulky af like just no.
 

viriz and melo are the two mons on the slate i expect to be less cut and dry than the others because they are less obviously broken. They don't hit as hard as tyrantrum or moltres and they're not as insanely fast as noivern but their diversity in sets really puts them over the top. It's not just that SD rockium/psychium viriz or specs melo cant be walled but on top of that they have multiple viable sets that will generally punish you for trying to play around the others. Your physical wall probably wont enjoy eating a specs focus blast and your special wall wont be doing much once meloetta hits sub. The fact that they have multiple sets and all of them are pretty much at a level above the strength of every other mon in nu makes them stupidly dangerous and it'll only become more blatant the longer they are in the tier as more of the oppressive offensive nukes get banned.
IMO diversity and or versatility shouldn't be a reason to ban just by itself... if that would be true, then things like Lando-T would have been banned a long ago fron OU. Also, while different sets might feel like a lot to cover, most of them are simply inferior to one or two principal ones, and that kind of sets are usually covered by blanket checks. Sure, a misplay can be sometimes costly but that's not indicative of how broken a poke might be...

On a second note, sure, things like Continental Crush and Shattered Psyche can be dealing with some Virizion counters, but isn't that what a lure it's suppossed to do? That kind of lure also have some opportunity cost by using your Z-Crystal and they will work if the Virizion user got the right one when needed (what if your opponent got Toxicroak and u just have Continental Crush? What if your opponent got Xatu and u just picked Shattered Psyche?). I feel this issue is nothing new if u have played a few other metas by now...

U wanna see something REALLY BROKEN? Check Tyrantrum dealing with practically everything in the tier (even physical walls) after one kinda easy turn of setup, or Ribombee just spamming Specs Moonblast and watching things falling, or P2 sponging stupid hits from almost the whole tier and recovering afterwards... those pokes require really huge countermeasures to be beaten reliably.

So, I would wait for those and some others to be banned, and then we could re check if their impact is really that huge!

See ya guys!
 
IMO diversity and or versatility shouldn't be a reason to ban just by itself... if that would be true, then things like Lando-T would have been banned a long ago fron OU. Also, while different sets might feel like a lot to cover, most of them are simply inferior to one or two principal ones, and that kind of sets are usually covered by blanket checks. Sure, a misplay can be sometimes costly but that's not indicative of how broken a poke might be...

On a second note, sure, things like Continental Crush and Shattered Psyche can be dealing with some Virizion counters, but isn't that what a lure it's suppossed to do? That kind of lure also have some opportunity cost by using your Z-Crystal and they will work if the Virizion user got the right one when needed (what if your opponent got Toxicroak and u just have Continental Crush? What if your opponent got Xatu and u just picked Shattered Psyche?). I feel this issue is nothing new if u have played a few other metas by now...

U wanna see something REALLY BROKEN? Check Tyrantrum dealing with practically everything in the tier (even physical walls) after one kinda easy turn of setup, or Ribombee just spamming Specs Moonblast and watching things falling, or P2 sponging stupid hits from almost the whole tier and recovering afterwards... those pokes require really huge countermeasures to be beaten reliably.

So, I would wait for those and some others to be banned, and then we could re check if their impact is really that huge!

See ya guys!
Okay the thing is while it isn't the sole argument for something being broken (think Mesprit for XYNU or Samurott for BWNU), versatility can be a huge aspect of a mon's busted-ness. Yes, lures are meant to allow pokemon to break through their traditional checks and make sweeps happen (Think Iron Tail as a mixup option on XYNU Tauros to bait MegaAudino), but oftentimes when those lures are placed ON TOP OF multiple extremely viable and very powerful sets, the sheer versatility of a pokemon can become overwhelming and extremely constraining towards teambuilding. Yes, tyrantrum and P2 are inarguably broke, but those are on the basis of the sheer power of 1-2 sets, simply meaning that you HAVE to bring a very specific check to get past them. The scary thing about more extreme versatile mons is while yes each set has its own check, it is almost worse due to the fact that you simply can't pack a check for every set.

Take the example of why Greninja was banned from OU back in XY. Any single set could easily be taken care in of, but Protean allowed everything to have its get arounds. SDef wall? I run mixed w Gunk. Mega Venu? I run extrasensory. The problem isn't of any single fixed static set, but rather the options available to it that makes building a viable team that can handle greninja one that can ONLY handle it.

Going back to our meta, Virizion I feel is the epitome of that. High speed, high offenses on either side, very solid bulk allowing for easy setup with SD or with CM. The problem is that to cover every set (at least defensively) you'd theoretically need a bulky poison AND a bulky flying to cover its Stone Edge / Hidden Power + Z-Move variants AND pray that they aren't the slightest worn down. Offensively, its bulk and typing makes it not only outspeed the majority of the non-broken mons in the tier, but resists / hard deters a lot of common revenging priority moves like Sucker and Accelrock. One especially objective thing you have to look at is predicting the meta. When you look at the list of known broke mons (Ribombee, FIREBURD, Noivern) these are the very offensive mons leading us to believe Virizion is easily checked. Knowing that Virizion is already difficult to deter and seeings its checks being very likely bans should be an instant reminder that the mon itself will be even more uncheckable in a future meta.

Yeah Versatility ≠ Brokenness when every set has its flaws, but when each set on its own is already near flawless the argument is a lot more blanket-checky than it is valid lol.
 
Hi, just wanted to discuss a couple sets I've had fun toying around with on the ladder.

Silvally @ Normalium Z
Ability: RKS System
Happiness: 0
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Swords Dance
- Frustration
- Flame Charge/Crunch
- Explosion

Normalvally, while not the best silvally form, let alone a good pokemon in the metagame, is something I've been intending to test on the ladder, and I have to say, this set works surprisingly well. Despite the fact that it mightily struggles with steelix and needs to have opposing steel, ghost and rock types before sweeping, that isn't hard to do in this meta with things like tyrantrum, rotom-m, and dodrio luring in those pokemon and considerably weakening them in the process. Z-explosion hits the metagame's bulkiest pokemon quite hard after a boost, if not outright OHKOing them, so the holes punched by silvally and other teammates is very useful in allowing the proper teammates to clean up afterwards just like that, and makes up for its otherwise average attack stat. heck, even some rock and steel types take considerable damage after a boost(though setting up while they're still healthy isn't recommended):
+2 252 Atk Silvally Breakneck Blitz (200 BP) vs. 0 HP / 4 Def Tyrantrum: 225-266 (73.7 - 87.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock
+2 252 Atk Silvally Breakneck Blitz (200 BP) vs. 80 HP / 0 Def Klinklang: 233-275 (82.9 - 97.8%) -- 31.3% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
+2 252 Atk Silvally Breakneck Blitz (200 BP) vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Omastar: 216-255 (76.8 - 90.7%) -- 25% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock
+2 252 Atk Silvally Breakneck Blitz (200 BP) vs. 252 HP / 120 Def Eviolite Porygon2: 337-397 (90.1 - 106.1%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock
+2 252 Atk Silvally Breakneck Blitz (200 BP) vs. 204 HP / 248+ Def Vaporeon: 519-612 (114.8 - 135.3%) -- guaranteed OHKO
+1 252 Atk Silvally Breakneck Blitz (200 BP) vs. 248 HP / 252+ Def Granbull: 340-402 (88.7 - 104.9%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock
+2 252 Atk Silvally Breakneck Blitz (200 BP) vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Slowbro: 355-418 (90.1 - 106%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock

I find that this set works very well on sticky web teams, so silvally isn't forced to use flame charge to outpace threats such as tauros or ribombee, despite the fact that it doesn't have the hardest time setting up in the first place, it's nice to relieve some pressure off those threats.

Scrafty @ Steelium Z
Ability: Moxie/Shed Skin
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Dragon Dance
- Knock Off
- High Jump Kick
- Iron Tail

Since, pangoro moved up to RU a few days ago, I've been playing with fighting types a lot, particularly scrafty. With the introduction of z-moves, scrafty no longer has to run iron head or poison jab, and also gets a considerably stronger steel move. Z-iron tail, of course, lures in the likes of granbull and aromatisse, which could otherwise easily stomach a poison jab or iron head in the past and ko scrafty back.

Iron head vs. z-iron tail:
252 Atk Scrafty Iron Head vs. 248 HP / 252+ Def Granbull: 118-140 (30.8 - 36.5%) -- 65.8% chance to 3HKO after Stealth Rock and Leftovers recovery
252 Atk Scrafty Corkscrew Crash (180 BP) vs. 248 HP / 252+ Def Granbull: 264-312 (68.9 - 81.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Stealth Rock and Leftovers recovery
Not the greatest calc, but it shows that granbull doesn't require much prior damage in order to be knocked out.
+1 252 Atk Scrafty Iron Head vs. 252 HP / 244+ Def Aromatisse: 180-214 (44.3 - 52.7%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
+1 252 Atk Scrafty Corkscrew Crash (180 BP) vs. 252 HP / 244+ Def Aromatisse: 408-480 (100.4 - 118.2%) -- guaranteed OHKO

Don't need to include a whimsicott calc because that dropped to poison jab before anyway.

I think scrafty is going to be very threatening once the meta settles due to the fact that z-moves and the prankster nerf greatly benefited it. It no longer has to fear encore from the likes of whimsicott or liepard, so in the instance which it has set up to +2, and the opponent sends in those pokemon, it no longer has to fear being locked into dragon dance(or paralyzed). In addition, moxie makes it very hard to stomach scrafty's attacks outside of unaware users, while shed skin eases setup against status users, so scrafty doesn't have the hardest time setting up, although its typing sometimes leaves much to be desired. Unfortunately, the main flaw with using scrafty is its underwhelming speed, which means that it has to set up twice in order to outpace scarfers such as hitmonlee and moltres, and this is where its typing sometimes proves to be a hindrance to setting up.

That's all for now, thanks for reading!
 
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shiloh

is a Member of Senior Staffis a Top Tiering Contributoris a Contributor to Smogonis a Top Tutor Alumnusis a Social Media Contributor Alumnusis a Community Contributor Alumnusis a Smogon Media Contributor Alumnusis a Battle Simulator Staff Alumnusis an Administrator Alumnusis a Dedicated Tournament Host Alumnusis a Past WCoP Champion
Tiering Lead
Voting is complete! You can see how everyone voted inside the hide tag, and keep in mind it takes a 60% majority for something to be banned. Also something to keep in mind when looking at these is that anything that was not banned can be brought up again by a council member in order to be voted on again so any result you disagree with isnt necessarily permanent. Our major goal with this is to get a tier as balanced as possible as fast as possible with retests of banned mons happening after. With that said, heres the voting:
In conclusion, through this round of voting: Porygon2, Noivern, Moltres, Drought, Ribombee, and Kingdra are banned from NU Beta effective immediately.


Porygon2: Thanks to its amazing bulk, Porygon2 is able to switch into the majority of the metagame and is very difficult to take down throughout the course of a game. Porygon2's biggest weaknesses are Fighting-types, Knock Off, and Toxic. While NU definitely has no shortage of these 3 things, all of them are easily handled by Porygon2's teammates and severely limit the options opponents have to deal with it. Porygon2 also has the ability to function as a great support Pokemon for Trick Room teams and can reliably set Trick Room more than once in a match. Porygon2's combination of bulk, support options, and ease of being supported lead to it being an unhealthy presence in the NU metagame.​


Noivern: Noivern's great base speed, offensive typing and movepool have made it too strong for NU in the eyes of the council. Its mediocre special attack is mitigated through its high base powered STABs alongside its near unresisted coverage, and its great 123 base speed make it almost impossible to check for offensive teams. Noivern also has the ability to run a potent Taunt + Roost set that allows it to shut down most of the defensive walls that would normally wall it. Because of all of these factors, Noivern will be banned from SM NU.​


Moltres: Due to a combination of spectacular power, virtually unresisted coverage, and great defensive attributes, the NU Council has deemed Moltres too much for the tier. Moltres' fantastic base 125 Special Attack, coupled with respectable speed and potent dual STABs (Hurricane and Fire Blast / Flamethrower) allow it to run a variety of sets to get through would-be counters, including but not limited to Grassium-Z Solarbeam, SubToxic, Scarf, and Life Orb + Roost. Although Moltres is heavily pressured by Stealth Rock, the most common setters (Necrozma / Seismitoad / Rhydon / Steelix) are extremely threatened by it, moreover Moltres shares good synergy with common hazard removers such as Hitmontop and Hitmonlee. Overall, all of these factors have resulted in Moltres being banned from the NeverUsed tier.​


Drought: One thing the council had agreed upon prior to banning Drought was that auto-sun in some way was problematic in the tier. The ability to not have to use a move and automatically gain 8 turns of weather thats easily abused with top tier sweepers like Victreebell, Exeggutor, and Shiftry among others as well as powering up fire type attacks from Pokemon like Charizard. When we came to this conclusion, we had the dilemma of either banning the most common Drought user in the tier, Ninetales, or banning the ability itself. In the end a few council members did in fact ladder with Vulpix in place of Ninetales and we came to the same conclusion that it was in fact the ability Drought that was unhealthy and not the users themselves which led us to voting and banning Drought from the tier.​


Ribombee: Ribombee's combination of blazing Speed, above-average power, and potent offensive typing have made it too much for the NU tier. Base 124 Speed places Ribombee above nearly every relevant threat in NU, while Choice Specs-boosted Moonblast is extremely dangerous in a tier with few sturdy Fairy resists, making it easy for it to punch massive dents into opposing teams and threaten sweeps with minimal support. Ribombee can also opt to run Quiver Dance with Psychium Z, allowing it to break through several of the only good checks to the Choice Specs set. As a result of these factors, Ribombee will be banned from NU.​


Kingdra: Because of its great stats, typing, and move pool, Kingdra has been deemed banworthy from the NU tier. Kingdra is the most unpredictable pokemon in the tier as it can run both physical and special sets with equal viability, and it is also incredibly strong through the use of its high powered STAB moves. Kingdra also has a fantastic defensive and offensive typing as well as very good bulk for an offensive pokemon which allows it to set up on a large portion of the NU tier. As a result of all these factors, the council has banned Kingdra from SM NU.
Also if you guys noticed, shaneghoul did not vote this round of nominations. This is due to him realizing he doesn't have enough time needed for the high activity during the first few months of NU. Normally we would replace him at this stage, but for the rest of Beta we have decided to just use a council of 9 for all votes while continuing to use a 60% ban threshold.

Now have fun discovering what is going to be good with this round of bans and feel free to leave your thoughts on this past slate as well as what you think will be the new face of the metagame n_n
 
ARE YOU AS OUTRAGED AS I AM THAT EXPLOUD WASN'T QUICKBANNED? DO YOU WANT THE NU TIER TO KEEP IMPROVING? DON'T YOU THINK WE SHOULD MOVE BIKINI BOTTOM, AND PUSH IT SOMEWHERE ELSE?

If you answered yes to those 3 questions, then i have your attention. In order for everyone to have an adequate shot at testing Exploud, I will drop a team I built that showcases how good it can be.


Whimsicott @ Leftovers
Ability: Prankster
EVs: 248 HP / 8 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Moonblast
- U-turn
- Tailwind
- Encore

Exploud @ Choice Specs
Ability: Scrappy
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Boomburst
- Surf
- Fire Blast
- Sleep Talk

Vivillon-Sun @ Flyinium Z
Ability: Compound Eyes
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Quiver Dance
- Sleep Powder
- Hurricane
- Energy Ball

Rhydon @ Eviolite
Ability: Lightning Rod
EVs: 240 HP / 16 Atk / 244 SpD / 8 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Earthquake
- Rock Blast
- Toxic

Xatu @ Colbur Berry
Ability: Magic Bounce
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpA
Bold Nature
- U-turn
- Roost
- Heat Wave
- Psychic

Kabutops @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Swift Swim
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Waterfall
- Stone Edge
- Rapid Spin
- Superpower


This team was purely built to showcase how broken Exploud can be with proper team support. I didn't want to use trick room as our best setter (p2) just got the boot, so i decided on tailwind. Vivillon is just a broken pokemon I wanted to abuse but it pairs nicely since Exploud can beat any normal resist one on one which clears the way for Vivillon. Additionally Vivi can wear down and weaken normal resists for Exploud. Next up is my obligatory fire resist in Rhydon. I opted for a max sp.def spread to help tank stuff like specs eruption from typh. Xatu helps with hazard control and I personally find myself at a disadvantage if im not running Xatu so it often finds a way onto one of my teams. Last but not least is scarf Kabutops. This might seem a little out of place but i desperately wanted secondary hazard control as Xatu isnt always reliable, and Kabu served as a very important ice check (bar freeze dry). Please spam this team in roomtours and ladder to show both yourself and others how broken Exploud can be. Thank you for helping me make the NU tier a better place

edit: feel free to put megahorn over toxic on rhydon, i had it there for p2 initially bop
 
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Shadestep

volition immanent
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one mon I feel has gotten a lot better after these bans is Delphox, especially the following set:


Delphox @ Firium Z / Life Orb
Ability: Blaze
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Calm Mind
- Fire Blast
- Psyshock
- Grass Knot

I tried this set out in Beta before the bans happened because I thought Delphox would be a sleeper threat, but I was wrong. It was walled to hell and back by Porygon2. SubToxic Moltres, Noivern, and couldn't comfortably set up because of faster pokes that could KO it or very easily chip it or revenge at lower HP (think Noivern, Ribombee, Shiftry under Sun, etc)

All in all I think this mon is worth giving a shot now looking at its coverage, (boosted) power, and strong STABs. If you look at the team tennis posted above for example, nothing switches into Delphox safely and half of the team gets OHKO'd. I'm on phone now so I can't drop the squad I used with it but I'll update my post tonight with proper grammar and the full team.
 
hey guys, its excellent to see that the council are really trying to balance out this meta as quickly as possible, it obviously matters a great deal to players like myself who really want to enjoy their experience in the tier. But building on Shadestep 's post above this one, I wanna give a few pokemon that i think really got better with the most recent bans. With p2 leaving the tier, as well as ribombee and noivern, it really opens the door for a new really fast but not neccesarily powerful special attacker to abuse that hole left by those two.


Sceptile @ Life Orb
Ability: Overgrow
EVs: 72 Atk / 184 SpA / 252 Spe
Hasty Nature
- Giga Drain
- Leaf Storm
- Earthquake
- Hidden Power [Flying] / Rock Slide


Sceptile will surely have a massive resurgence in usage in this new meta. It has the highest combined speed and base power now that Ribombee and Noivern has left, and will take up that mantra as the fastest non-scarf pokemon in the tier, which is a hugely useful advantage to any team, considering its coverage isn't that bad either. Shadowtags aka the goat player suggested for me to use HP Flying in order to lure Virizion's, and after i busted his balls a little bit, its actually one of the most useful coverage moves you can run with sceptile at the moment, as well as earthquake, which with the ev spread allows sceptile to 2hko garbodor 90% of the time after rocks. I fully expect Sceptile to spike in usage, so I would suggest for anyone building a team, for their grass resist not to be just garbodor, which you probably could have got away with in the previous meta.


Accelgor @ Choice Specs
Ability: Unburden
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
- Bug Buzz
- Focus Blast
- Energy Ball
- Spikes / U-Turn


Alongside Sceptile, Accelgor should also get a nice spike in usage (sorry if that hurt). Choice Specs Modest Accelgor is excellent for picking apart offense teams since they tend to lack proper bug resists, but thanks to that 4th move, spikes or uturn, you can immediately get an impetus versus balance teams. This set in particular was inspired by the specs ash greninja set you see in the OU metagame, so although specs spikes looks really low ladder, it can be super useful when u know accelgor is just being walled by anything really, its not completely useless, which other fast wallbreakers w/o recovery tend to be. Modest Specs actually still has a gruesomely high speed tier, enough to easily outspeed sceptile and pretty much the rest of the non scarf metagame also. If you are literally insane, you can run timid specs accelgor to deliberately be able to check scarf tyrantrum (which is quite disgusting if you think about it), and it also provides a check to those pesky Malamars which everyone panics at when they see it on team preview, which can be quite a comforting asset. Overall, I believe that this mon will become a staple in the NU metagame once the tier settles down some more.

Special mentions go out to Electrode. Its not a fundamentally good pokemon in this meta as it lets in steelix for free everytime it comes in, and does like max 31% with specs hp grass / ice but thanks to soundproof it actually can provide a check to exploud. And if you decide to run hidden power fire / ground, you tend to be super nice in the Steelix matchups also (at the disadvantage of not being able to hit other ground types like Seismitoad or Rhydon. Its speed tier is even more disgusting that accelgor, to the point where i think it ties with scarf ttrum with a modest nature x.x.
 
This may or may not end up being a rhetorical question, but what switches in on Exploud? Currently trying to build a team with at least one and, now that P2 is gone (good riddance, imo), I'm having trouble finding one that's not bad or a niche pick. Soundproof Exploud doesn't seem like the right answer.

Even AV Slowking risks the 2HKO before rocks and isn't guaranteed a 2HKO if it does survive. Not that anybody uses it, but it evens has a small chance to 2HKO 252 SpD AV Guzzlord before rocks.

252+ SpA Choice Specs Exploud Boomburst vs. 248 HP / 0 SpD Assault Vest Slowking: 181-214 (46 - 54.4%) -- 56.3% chance to 2HKO

252+ SpA Choice Specs Exploud Focus Blast vs. 0 HP / 252 SpD Assault Vest Guzzlord: 260-308 (44.2 - 52.4%) -- 18.4% chance to 2HKO

I can't help but think Exploud gets a KO and forces in your Fighting-type to revenge it or force it to switch just so it can come back in later.

All-in-all, Exploud seems like a real terror for BO teams seeing as how it's not the slowest thing ever and is just bulky enough that priority isn't going to do the job. It pretty much forces you to run something faster than it that is also capable of OHKOing it and even then it probably already took one of your mons out since its switch-ins are practically non-existent.

Please ban it. Please. Like, immediately.
 
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With Ribombee's departure, offensive Fairies are scarce as of now. However, while this set has been brought up in the past, I believe that while this mon's set has a chance to shine in the metagame.


Whimsicott @ Choice Specs
Ability: Infiltrator
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Moonblast
- Energy Ball
- Switcheroo/Psychic
- U-turn

This was definitely a viable set in UU last generation, and it's also viable here. Whimsi's speed tier allows it to outspeed a vast majority of the tier, with the added benefit of creeping base 115s such as Persian-A and even Ambipom (top kek finally NU). With a lack of Fairy resists in the tier (as shown by Ribombee's reign of terror), Whimsicott has free reign to spam Moonblast in conjunction with its other attacking moves to become a threat on the field. What Moonblast doesn't hit Psychic and Energy Ball slap, with Psychic hitting Poison types such as Toxicroak and Golbat that destroy this thing otherwise, and Energy Ball for extra coverage while also notably hitting the best steel type in the meta for solid neutral damage (Steelix). Whimsicott doesn't just hit hard, either: utility with Switcheroo is a great thing to have, as it cripples walls that could easily shut it down and U-Turn allows it to give its team momentum and aid with predictions. While not vital to Whimsicott's viability, Infiltrator also helps it bop Substitute users who think "OHPASSIVEWHIMSILEMMESETUPHUEHUEHUEP2ISASS".

NU is gonna be REALLY fun after all these mons have been banned. Looking to be a great tier so far ;)
 
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Does your Xatu keep getting bodied by darks? Heres the solution.

upload_2017-6-12_21-38-16.png

Xatu @ Colbur Berry
Ability: Magic Bounce
EVs: 248 HP / 164 Def / 96 Spe
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Night Shade
- Thunder Wave / Dazzling Gleam / Heat Wave
- Feather Dance
- Roost

This is one of my fav Xatu sets from back when Skuntank was first introduced into XYNU and darkspam was a reality which gives it a significantly better matchup against Darks, allowing it to be a much more reliable hazard checker. Especially with the sheer-commonness of Dark type pursuiters in the tier, Xatu I feel has almost become a liability aside from having to constantly spam U-Turn with no real way to deal with them until they're either taken out or it is successfully pursuited. By using Feather Dance, no incoming Dark Type can even come close to OHKOing it (with most being unable to even 2HKO), allowing you to punish T-Wave, and continue to Feather Dance / Night Shading, either crippling it hard with T-Wave or outright killing it in the 1 on 1. As long as you click feather dance on their switch in, you win the 1 on 1 against all of them (you win the 1 on 1 against slower ones like Tomb, Skunk, and Absol (EVs let you outspeed adamant absol / most common pursuit skunk spreads). You also happen to outspeed garb in case they're running poisinium shit and so you can feather first lol.. (you should always be feathering first anyways regardless of weather it is or is not offensive as long as a dark is in the back but its a nice perk). Some calcs listed below with method of dealing, beyond this handful its obvious that other unlisted darks (liepard, shiftry, etc. can't kill it under similar scenarios). Overall just a lot safer mon to protect from hazards with / hard bait a lot of darks.

-2 252 Atk Choice Band Sneasel Icicle Crash vs. 248 HP / 164+ Def Xatu: 168-198 (50.4 - 59.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
T-Wave first turn, roost / 2nd feather dance to win.
252+ Atk Choice Band Spiritomb Shadow Sneak vs. 248 HP / 164+ Def Xatu: 168-200 (50.4 - 60%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
Feather dance, roost / 2nd feather, proceed to win (Avoid the trick though)
-2 252+ Atk Life Orb Absol Knock Off (97.5 BP) vs. 248 HP / 164+ Def Colbur Berry Xatu: 113-134 (33.9 - 40.2%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
Nah
-2 252+ Atk Drapion Knock Off (97.5 BP) vs. 248 HP / 164+ Def Colbur Berry Xatu: 67-81 (20.1 - 24.3%) -- guaranteed 5HKO
lol

-2 252+ Atk Garbodor Acid Downpour (190 BP) vs. 248 HP / 164+ Def Xatu: 135-160 (40.5 - 48%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
 

Shadestep

volition immanent
is a Community Contributor Alumnusis a Tiering Contributor Alumnus

Sceptile @ Sitrus Berry
Ability: Unburden
EVs: 80 HP / 252 Atk / 176 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Swords Dance
- Leaf Blade
- Acrobatics
- Earthquake / Rock Slide

this pokemon is soooooo good! i love it. I've been playing around with this set the last couple of days and I'd recommend everybody to try it out. It's just as good as it is in ORAS i'd say, purely because of its unpredictability and the fact that it can easily set up an SD on a lot of decently strong attackers is absolutely fantastic. It can also easily scare out Pokemon it doesnt instantly beat without +2 by bluffing the special set, forcing said pokemon out, and getting a free SD. the first 3 moves are pretty much mandatory but the last move is up to you. I'd say Earthquake in most cases since it's really good for dealing with garbodor, qwilfish, and plenty other grounded poisons that you'd prefer not to get in literal contact with. However, for Golbat / Braviary / Togetic or whatever other bulky flying type you run across, Rock Slide is really helpful. I'd say its a bit team dependant. the team i used it on had a sick flying-type lure in HP Rock Accelgor which is able to chunk bulky flyers pretty hard as long as you manage to keep rocks up and pressure their flyers by making aggressive doubles etc. here is the team i used SD sceptile on so you all can give it a shot too, and i'll include some replays of SD Sceptile cleaning up without any real needed team support besides the obvious hazards in both stealth rock and spikes (+ xatu, to potentially bounce back sticky web and / or toxic spikes).


Accelgor @ Choice Specs
Ability: Unburden
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Bug Buzz
- Focus Blast
- Energy Ball
- Spikes

Rhydon @ Eviolite
Ability: Lightning Rod
EVs: 240 HP / 16 Atk / 244 SpD / 8 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Earthquake
- Rock Blast
- Toxic

Sceptile @ Sitrus Berry
Ability: Unburden
EVs: 80 HP / 252 Atk / 176 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Swords Dance
- Leaf Blade
- Acrobatics
- Earthquake

Jellicent @ Leftovers
Ability: Water Absorb
EVs: 248 HP / 184 Def / 32 SpD / 44 Spe
Calm Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Scald
- Taunt
- Will-O-Wisp
- Recover

Sneasel @ Choice Band
Ability: Inner Focus
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Knock Off
- Icicle Crash
- Ice Shard
- Pursuit

Xatu @ Colbur Berry
Ability: Magic Bounce
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpA
Bold Nature
- U-turn
- Roost
- Heat Wave
- Psychic

http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen7nubeta-589984096 ladder vs Dementora
http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen7nubeta-589978354 ladder vs a really odd stall team with no counterplay to sceptile
http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen7nubeta-589973462 friendly match vs Evann
http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen7nubeta-589964575 sceptile cleans up more than half of the team

anyways, besides SD Sceptile, I think this other physically boosting pokemon is really reaaally underrated. it's the following:


Scrafty @ Steelium Z
Ability: Shed Skin
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Dragon Dance
- Drain Punch
- Knock Off
- Iron Tail
i think this pokemon has really flown under the radar after bans happened. it's super strong, has an easy time setting up DDs against anything that can't hit it super effectively and isnt called specs sceptile / accelgor. the idea of this set is to (wow, shocker) lure in fairy types that can easily switch in on the combination of drain punch and knock off, even after multiple Dragon Dance boosts. targets of this are Whimsicott, Aromatisse, and Togetic. bonus points for facing togetic, since 9 times out of 10 it will be pure set up fodder for scrafty. it almost never runs Dazzling Gleam, and its seismic tosses will only be a 3HKO, meaning you'll almost always be able to get a free boost from it. Another added bonus is that 1. Garbodor is even more set up fodder for you since it often doesnt run RH anymore AND you can avoid contact move if necessary by going for z-iron tail.
 

PSYCHO CLOWN (Magmortar) @ Firium Z
Ability: Vital Spirit
EVs: 68 Atk / 252 SpA / 188 Spe
Mild Nature
- Sunny Day
- Fire Blast
- Solar Beam
- Earthquake

Now that Porygon2 and Moltres are banned Magmortar has a chance to shine. Z Sunny Day not only boosts the power of Fire Blast, but it also gives Magmortar the speed boost that allows it to outspeed and then OHKO its offensive checks. Solar Beam hits Rock and Water type Pokemon for super effective damage and it no longer has to wait two turns. Earthquake allows Magmortar to KO opposing fire types such as Houndoom and Delphox. This set works best when used late game and it requires a layer of spikes/stealth rock to 2HKO Slowking. 188 speed allows +1 Magmortar to outspeed everything in NU(except Electrode and Ninjask, but they would outspeed anyways) and gives it room for some more attack investment.

252+ SpA Magmortar Fire Blast vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Necrozma in Sun: 316-373 (79.3 - 93.7%) -- 43.8% chance to OHKO after 1 layer of Spikes
252+ SpA Magmortar Solar Beam vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Assault Vest Slowking: 172-204 (43.6 - 51.7%) -- 99.6% chance to 2HKO after 1 layer of Spikes
68 Atk Magmortar Earthquake vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Delphox: 194-230 (66.6 - 79%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock and 1 layer of Spikes
 

PSYCHO CLOWN (Magmortar) @ Firium Z
Ability: Vital Spirit
EVs: 68 Atk / 252 SpA / 188 Spe
Mild Nature
- Sunny Day
- Fire Blast
- Solar Beam
- Earthquake
Can't Charizard do the same thing but with a better speed tier (100 vs 83) and Solar Power? It even gets EQ as well if you really want that. I assume its the unappealing typing that turns you away from Zard, but that can easily be taken of with hazard removal, which you sort of need when running Fire-types anyway. Like, Vital Spirit is the only real advantage, but the likes of Lilligant, Vileplume, and Jynx are all rarely seen now.

The damage output is actually STRONGER from Zard as well (I know Mew is OU but its 100 across the board and is neutral to Fire so yeah):
252 SpA Solar Power Charizard Fire Blast vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Mew in Sun: 357-420 (104.6 - 123.1%) -- guaranteed OHKO
252+ SpA Magmortar Fire Blast vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Mew in Sun: 288-339 (84.4 - 99.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

You get worn down easily, but these type of Pokemon aren't meant to be sustainable to begin with.
 
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Drapion @ Groundium Z / Dread Plate
Ability: Battle Armor
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Knock Off
- Poison Jab
- Earthquake / Pursuit
- Swords Dance / Toxic Spikes

Rhydon @ Eviolite
Ability: Rock Head
EVs: 252 HP / 16 Atk / 240 SpD
Adamant Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Earthquake
- Stone Edge
- Megahorn / Roar

Slowbro @ Colbur Berry
Ability: Regenerator
EVs: 244 HP / 228 Def / 36 SpD
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Scald
- Psyshock
- Thunder Wave / Calm Mind
- Slack Off
Jarii and I were building and found this core to be pretty effective for bo and balanced teams. Sets are rly customizable depending on the full team, but either Slowbro or Drapion can act as a win condition. These 3 handle a lot of the meta pretty well but strong Grass-types like Offensive Whimsi, Virizion, and Rotom-C are p threatening so definitely account for those when ur building w this core.
+

Hitmonchan @ Life Orb
Ability: Iron Fist
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature / Adamant
- Drain Punch
- Thunder Punch
- Mach Punch
- Rapid Spin

Toxicroak @ Poisonium Z / Fightinium Z
Ability: Dry Skin
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Nasty Plot
- Sludge Wave
- Focus Blast
- Vacuum Wave
Rly simple but T Punch Chan lures the fuck out of Jellicent and easily 2hko's, helping Toxicroak sweep. On the other side +2 Acid Downpour rinses bulky Psychic- and Poison-types like Necrozma, Garb, Weezing etc. that bother Chan. You can run Ada over Jolly for more pwr on Chan but I think the speed is usually more helpful. Thunder Punch also 2hkos Golbat after Rocks which is neat but so does other shit like Ice punch and Stone Edge soo. Sneasel also works well in tandem w these two.
252 Atk Life Orb Iron Fist Hitmonchan Thunder Punch vs. 248 HP / 216+ Def Jellicent: 205-244 (50.8 - 60.5%) -- 89.1% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
+2 252 SpA Toxicroak Acid Downpour (175 BP) vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Necrozma: 475-561 (119.3 - 140.9%) -- guaranteed OHKO
+2 252 SpA Toxicroak Acid Downpour (175 BP) vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Garbodor: 255-300 (70 - 82.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
+2 252 SpA Toxicroak Acid Downpour (175 BP) vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Weezing: 288-340 (86.2 - 101.7%) -- 12.5% chance to OHKO


Mr. Mime @ Psychium Z
Ability: Soundproof
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Hypnosis
- Psychic
- Dazzling Gleam
- Focus Blast

I personally think Exploud is rly unhealthy for the tier atm, so when trying to find a switch in that works on offense and can directly threaten stuff I found this. Lots of teams rely on Pokemon like Spritomb, Sableye, Sneasel, Steelix etc. to check Psychic-types and Mime can blow through all of them fairly easily. Pretty lame relying on 60% Hypnosis but the +1 Speed boost lets it overcome a lot of its "would be checks" and allows it to clean up weakened teams with its sick coverage. This set is a little gimmicky, but Mr. Mime is pretty versatile as both Specs and Scarf have done well for me, and access to Healing Wish is also cool. Not the best pkmn ever but its cute and has niche.

n_n
 
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Kangaskhan @ Silk Scarf
Ability: Scrappy
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Fake Out
- Double-Edge
- Sucker Punch
- Earthquake


Nothing new here, but with some many offensive threaths around, the meta has tend to more offensive oriented builds. Kangha has shown to be still relevant, with it's dual priority and the fact that things like Steelix and Rhydon have already too many things to check at once, we can still see this dude putting in work.


Emboar @ Expert Belt
Ability: Blaze
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpA / 252 Spe
Hasty Nature
- Flare Blitz
- Wild Charge
- Grass Knot
- Superpower

I like this set to lure stuff that think you're scarf, no much explanation needed here, I guess.


Scrafty @ Chople Berry
Ability: Moxie
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Dragon Dance
- Knock Off
- Iron Head
- High Jump Kick/ Drain Punch


This mon is scary, used to play with it in RU and it was great. Put it along spikes support and you'll have a cool late game sweeper. Chople helps against those mach punchs.


Granbull @ Choice Band
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Play Rough
- Earthquake
- Close Combat
- Rock Slide


Just thought about this mon, I remember running it in RU. 120 + band does a ton, Close Combat+EQ for Steel and Poison, Rock Slide is coverage for Golbat. ADVANTAGE can confirm it's good.
 


Kangaskhan @ Silk Scarf
Ability: Scrappy
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Fake Out
- Double-Edge
- Sucker Punch
- Earthquake


Nothing new here, but with some many offensive threaths around, the meta has tend to more offensive oriented builds. Kangha has shown to be still relevant, with it's dual priority and the fact that things like Steelix and Rhydon have already too many things to check at once, we can still see this dude putting in work.


Emboar @ Expert Belt
Ability: Blaze
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpA / 252 Spe
Hasty Nature
- Flare Blitz
- Wild Charge
- Grass Knot
- Superpower

I like this set to lure stuff that think you're scarf, no much explanation needed here, I guess.


Scrafty @ Chople Berry
Ability: Moxie
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Dragon Dance
- Knock Off
- Iron Head
- High Jump Kick/ Drain Punch


This mon is scary, used to play with it in RU and it was great. Put it along spikes support and you'll have a cool late game sweeper. Chople helps against those mach punchs.


Granbull @ Choice Band
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Play Rough
- Earthquake
- Close Combat
- Rock Slide


Just thought about this mon, I remember running it in RU. 120 + band does a ton, Close Combat+EQ for Steel and Poison, Rock Slide is coverage for Golbat. ADVANTAGE can confirm it's good.
I can confirm Chople Scrafty is really good, been using it a lot, it allows a ton of setup opportunities against the plethora of fighting types in the tier that attempt to prevent you from setting up aids with sweeps against teams with shit like scarf hitmon and stuff.
 
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